Tomase: 21 fearless predictions for the 2021 Red Sox
In honor of the new year and all of the great promise it holds by virtue of not being 2020, here are 21 predictions for the upcoming Red Sox season. Be sure to write these down.
The young outfielder earned one fifth-place vote in the 2020 MVP race, which was dubious, to be sure, but primarily because the Red Sox were so terrible. Had Verdugo hit .308 with an .844 OPS while playing above-average defense for a contender, he absolutely would've earned down-ballot MVP consideration. In 2021, his reward will be his first All-Star berth.
No one has been more bullish on Benintendi than me, but at some point the various factors that have contributed to his precipitous decline -- a lack of sprint speed, broken pitch recognition abilities, an approach ill-suited for today's launch-angle-obsessed game -- make you wonder if he simply is what he is, which is an average (at best) outfielder.
The Red Sox are counting on Sale's return sometime this summer, probably in July, but they shouldn't be counting on real production. That comes next year. He won't even hit the one-year anniversary of Tommy John surgery until March 30 (his 32nd birthday), and as the Red Sox ramp up their rebuild, it's hard to justify racing Sale back atop the rotation when baby steps are in order.
Martinez's issues in 2020 were partly mental and partly mechanical. He failed to adapt to a lack of in-game video, which became a crutch. He also allowed himself to be tied up on fastballs, hitting just .186 against them after teeing off at a .361 rate in 2018. I'm betting that Martinez's struggles don't reflect diminished bat speed, but bad mechanics, which can be fixed.
I will make this prediction every year until it comes true. Devers has that kind of ability as a left-handed version of Vladimir Guerrero. He can hammer any pitch to any part of the park, and we shouldn't put a limit on his potential production, especially if he learns to avoid a third straight slow start. A .320-40-130 season is on the table.
The Japanese right-hander must choose a team by this Thursday or head back to the NPB. Reports suggest he'll make a decision by Tuesday. The Red Sox are in a mix that includes the Mets, Giants, and Blue Jays, but they've already lost out on Korean slugger He-Seong Kim, and even though they have more of a need for starting pitching, they don't yet seem to be in a position to win too many big-money free-agent bids.
The two-time Cy Young Award winner was a 20-game winner as recently as 2018, and even though a shoulder injury ended his 2020 after only one inning with the Rangers, we're otherwise talking about one of the most durable starters in the game, since the line drive that broke his arm in 2019 qualifies as a freak injury and not a chronic one. Kluber will work out for teams in a couple of weeks, and the Red Sox will be in attendance.
Now we're cooking! The Red Sox have money and they have gaping holes in their rotation, especially with questions about Sale and even left-hander Eduardo Rodriguez, who battled COVID-related heart issues in 2020. Odorizzi played for Chaim Bloom in Tampa and is coming off a lost season that also included a batted ball injury, after he got smoked in the chest with a line drive. An All-Star in 2019, he could slot in to the second or third spot in the Red Sox rotation.
There should be a market for JBJ once the top free agent center fielder, Houston's George Springer, finds a new home. Bradley did not receive a qualifying offer from the Red Sox, so he won't cost anyone a draft pick to sign. His defensive prowess provides value, and he's coming off a surprisingly strong offensive campaign. The Red Sox say they want him back, but Bradley has earned the right to find a new home, and I'm guessing he takes it.
Might as well begin integrating some youth into the lineup, rather than signing a stopgap like Kevin Pillar. Duran just turned 24 in September and has reached the age where it's time to give him a shot. He only hit .236 with Caguas in the Puerto Rican winter league, but he's got speed to burn and the strength to start hitting home runs.
As long as we're talking prospects, who will be the next one to provide a spark during the season? My money's on Mata, a hard-throwing right-hander who could eventually provide a boost in the same way that Darwinzon Hernandez and Josh Taylor did in 2019, or even Tanner Houck last year.
With all of the needs the Red Sox have, I'm not sure that closer is a priority, especially when there's already someone on the roster with the stuff to do the job. I suspect that unlike Dave Dombrowski, who made Craig Kimbrel his first major acquisition, Chaim Bloom doesn't mind turning over the closer spot every couple of years. In his last three years in Tampa, for instance, the Rays had three different saves leaders -- Alex Colome in 2017, Sergio Romo in 2018, and Emilio Pagan in 2019.
There's always the chance the Red Sox add a left-handed hitting first baseman to platoon with the right-handed Dalbec, but we're going to bet on the intriguing power prospect, who arrived with a bang last year, launching eight homers in 23 games.
Talk about a match made in heaven. In the old days, the Red Sox scoured the earth for right-handed sluggers who could launch fly balls over the Monster. Renfroe harkens back to that time. He hit a career-high 33 homers with the Padres in 2019, and Fenway perfectly fits his powerful swing.
Now in the final year of his contract, Pedroia long ago knew his playing days were over. The ravages of his recent knee injuries took care of that. All that's left is for the all-time franchise great to call it a career, and even if it takes until the end of the season, expect that announcement sometime in 2021.
Even if he is truly done experiencing the effects of myocarditis, an inflammation of the lining surrounding the heart, it's simply a fact that he missed months of conditioning, not to mention a full year of competitive throwing. He won't necessarily be able to build all of that back in one offseason.
Depending on whom the Red Sox acquire this winter, Pivetta and Houck could be competing for the final spot in the rotation. While Houck opened more eyes in 2020, Pivetta has the better long-term future, thanks to a deeper arsenal. It also doesn't hurt that he's more experienced, with 73 starts in the big leagues to his name.
It's hard to believe, but Vazquez has been in the organization since 2008. With Bloom still in the asset-maximization portion of the rebuild, now is the time to explore a Vazquez trade. He's in the sweet spot of age (30), production (.801 OPS last year), contract (signed through 2021, with an affordable $7 million option for 2022), and positional scarcity, and there should be interest in all of the above.
I know, not much of a prediction. Eovaldi is coming off his best "season," with a career-high in strikeouts per nine (9.7) and a career-low in walks (1.3). But even last year, he was limited to nine starts because of various maladies, and his next 30-start season will be only the second of his 10-year career. There will be something, because there's always something.
Remember the Baby Bombers of 2016? Those Yankees were still a .500 team in early August, but as they began to turn over their roster and integrate prospects, they caught fire, winning 28 of their final 50 and finishing with 84 wins. They've made the playoffs every year since.
The Red Sox lack that kind of minor-league star power -- there's no Gary Sanchez or Aaron Judge atop their system -- but management is smart, perhaps Sale's return will help, and we'll feel a lot better about them at the end of 2021 than we did 2020.
The arrival of vaccines and a national strategy for administering them means that at some point, the Red Sox will be allowed to reopen the gates. Even if fans are masked and capacity is limited, it will be nice to hear the sounds of the ballpark again as life takes one more step back to normalcy.
