If only every Boston Red Sox prospect could turn out like Xander Bogaerts.
MLB.com’s Jim Callis, Jonathan Mayo and Mike Rosenbaum named the Boston Red Sox shortstop the team’s “most decorated prospect” of the last decade. After the Red Sox signed Bogaerts in August 2009 as an amateur free agent, he rose through Boston’s farm system to claim a place in the big-league club’s lineup by the end of the 2013 season. He since has become a two-time World Series winner, a two-time All-Star, a three-time Silver Slugger award winner, and his recognition as a 2019 All-MLB First Team member cements his status as on of the premier shortstops in the game.
“The Red Sox’s best international prospect since Hanley Ramirez, Bogaerts first cracked the Top 100 after hitting 16 homers and posting an .834 OPS in Class A at age 18 in 2011,” Callis, Mayo and Rosenbaum wrote Thursday. “He swiftly rose to Boston, finishing 2013 in the big leagues while learning third base on the fly and playing a key role in a World Series championship that October.”
Although fellow Red Sox All-Decade Team members Mookie Betts, Andrew Benintendi and Jackie Bradley Jr. also have enjoyed fine careers during the last decade, it’s almost impossible to argue against Bogaerts as Boston’s “most decorated prospect” of the last 10 years.
Bogaerts, 27, is entering the first of a six-year contract extension, so he’s poised to build on his already impressive Red Sox legacy in the new decade, too.
