The Boston Red Sox were busy at the Major League Baseball trade deadline, pulling off four different deals.
Now since a month has passed since making those deadline acquisitions, it’s a little easier to assess the returns the Red Sox got back.
That’s what Bradford Doolittle of ESPN did and he believes one of the trades the Red Sox made stands out above the rest. Doolittle praised Boston’s acquisition of catcher Reese McGuire from the Chicago White Sox in exchange for lefty reliever Jake Diekman.
McGuire’s been one of the team’s best hitters since joining the Red Sox. He’s batting .370 with five RBIs in 18 games, which is a marked improvement from the .225 he was hitting with the White Sox prior to the trade.
“The Red Sox have slipped out of the playoff race but if that wasn’t the case, the acquisition of McGuire would be getting more attention,” Doolittle wrote. “McGuire has hit .370/.386/.463 since arriving from the White Sox. It’s not the kind of performance that can be sustained, especially for McGuire, but it’s this kind of lightning-in-the-bottle outburst contending general managers are looking for at deadline time.”
McGuire is a career .253 hitter, so it is safe to assume that his offensive production will come back to earth at some point. But he’s definitely made an impact since coming over to Boston.
While McGuire has swung a hot bat, it will be interesting to see how often manager Alex Cora puts him in the starting lineup with the Red Sox platooning McGuire with veteran Kevin Plawecki along with newly recalled backstop Connor Wong, who had been on an absolute hitting tear with Triple-A Worcester.
McGuire didn’t get the starting nod Friday night — it went to Wong — but it would be hard to be disappointed with McGuire’s contribution in a Red Sox uniform.
The Red Sox also just recently completed the deal with the White Sox that brought McGuire to Boston.
