Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora on Wednesday somewhat walked back his earlier comments about not discussing a move to first base with Rafael Devers in the wake of Triston Casas’ season-ending knee injury. Cora gave a flat “no” when asked whether he plans to talk to Devers about first base on Tuesday (via MassLive.com).
Here’s what Cora said during an appearance on WEEI on Wednesday. If nothing else, Cora left the door open at least a little bit to discuss first base with Devers.
“Right now with him, he’s very comfortable with his role, right? And we asked him to do something in spring training that as you guys know, he didn’t agree (with) in the beginning. And then little by little, he has embraced it because he knows the quality of the player that we have at third base, where we’re at as a team. I always say that time is our best friend in situations like this. And you know, there’s two reasons. Triston got hurt Saturday, and we got some capable players. Romy is having a good season. Toro, you saw him yesterday, he put some good at bats. So I’m not saying we’ll never have that conversation, but I think for now, where we’re at, I like Raffy as a DH. I like him as I make my DH. You take away the first weekend of the season, he’s been one of the best hitters in the big leagues, and he’s doing an outstanding job.”
The Red Sox have used Romy Gonzalez and Abraham Toro at first base since Casas suffered a ruptured left patellar tendon on an awkward step running through first base last Friday. He had surgery Sunday and it will end his season. Here’s the play:
Devers has never played first base as a professional, not even in the minors. He shifted from third base to DH in deference to Alex Bregman this year, though that was handled a bit awkwardly in spring training. Learning any position on the fly, especially one involved in as many plays as first base, is not easy. There would be growing pains for Devers, undoubtedly.
Our R.J. Anderson explored Boston’s first base options with Casas sidelined. Gonzalez is the best the Red Sox have in-house at the moment. The trade market for impactful big-league players won’t heat up for another few weeks.
Although he’s shown tremendous power in the past, Casas was off to a slow start this season, hitting .182/.277/.303 with three home runs in 29 games. Boston’s first basemen enter play Tuesday among the league’s least productive units with a .635 OPS and minus-1.1 WAR. It won’t take much for Gonzalez & Co. to be an upgrade.
The Red Sox are 18-19 this year and have lost five of their last six games. Following a terrible start, Devers is hitting .252/.373/.439 with five home runs. He leads the league with 27 walks.
following sentence:
“The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.”
Rewritten sentence:
“The lazy dog is jumped over by the quick brown fox.”