Rafael Devers perhaps is a wild card of sorts in the Boston Red Sox’s lineup.
The 22-year-old has shown flashes of great potential through his first 179 games, but in his first full year in Major League Baseball, Devers left some wanting more from the third baseman at the plate.
Devers played in 121 games, had 450 at-bats and had a line of .240/.298/.433 with 21 homers and 66 RBIs.
Entering spring training this year, Red Sox manager Alex Cora issued a challenged to Devers to be more like New York Yankees third baseman Miguel Andujar, according to MLB.com’s Ian Browne.
Andujar, 23, finished second in American League Rookie of the Year voting after slashing .297/.328/.527 with 27 homers and 92 RBIs over 149 games and 573 at-bats.
“If this kid clicks the way Andujar did with the Yankees, we’re that much better offensively,” Cora said, via Browne. “The kid Andujar, he was amazing last year. He was great for New York and hopefully our 22-year-old kid can do the things he did in September and October, because that was a good player. I was very happy with the way he played in September. After that, after he went to the rehab assignment, he was another player.”
Devers seems to have taken on the challenge well, and thinks he can be a lot better in 2019.
“Yeah, I can do that,” Devers said of being Boston’s version of Andujar. “I think I can do that. Last year, I had a bad year, but it wasn’t really a bad year. I know I can do a lot better this year coming up.”
Of course, the Red Sox already have one of the best lineups in the American League. If Devers were to make a massive jump in his second full season with the big-league team and put up numbers similar to Andujar’s rookie campaign, then Boston would have one more bat that is universally feared around the league along with Mookie Betts, J.D. Martinez and Xander Bogaerts.
