The Red Sox have proclaimed by proclamation that Xander Bogaerts will have every opportunity in the spring training of 2014 to win a starting job. Well, they haven’t really said that. Yet. They will. It’s the same spiel every team says about every prospect. “You-Know-Whosie has shown plenty in the minor leagues and now You-Know-Whosie will get every opportunity to show me, the Ruler of What Our Team Does, what You-Know-Whosie can do.” That’s what they say. It’s a basic Mad Libs of team-speak. I don’t think Xander gets that opportunity out of Spring Training. I mean, I think they say he will, but unless he’s the team leader in batting, they’ll probably send him down until June. It’s not clear as of right now due to the opening the Sawx will have at shortstop with Drew becoming a free agent. So, I’ll go over what Xander can do if called up in June (which I think will happen) and what he can do if he’s the starting shortstop out of spring training. Anyway, what can Xander Bogaerts do for 2014 fantasy baseball?
In Low-A in 2011, he tore up the league from the floor up, to paraphrase a guest from The Ricki Lake Show. 16 homers in only 72 games and then continued his torrid hitting the next year (2012) in High-A. That level of production tailed a tad (almost stutterer!) as he moved up to harder competition. Looking at 9 homers in 60 games in Triple-A and 6 homers in 56 games in Double-A last year. That’s not screaming out at me that this guy is the next Hanley that the Sawx just need to sell to the Marlins to make the comparison official. Though, to be fair, Hanley wasn’t a huge power hitter in the minors, and Xander’s around the same age as Hanley when he first came up. In fact, Xander has shown more power than Hanley in the minors. Xander’s still young yadda3. His power can still grow yadda cubed. Though, Hanley’s speed was undeniable as a minor leaguer (36 steals one year). Xander’s had a high of 8 steals. Sad trombone. Adam Dunn used to steal 8 bags and that was because he was hypnotized to think the bases were vanilla cupcakes. I honestly don’t see anything right now that has me crazy excited about drafting Bogaerts next year, but a flyer at MI isn’t the worst thing you can do. If he’s called up in June, I could see a line of 34/8/31/.262/4. It’s an MI streamer, in that scenario. If he makes the club in April, then I’ll give him the line of 69/14/73/.250/6. Definitely worth a flyer in all leagues, but I’d keep expectations in oekávání. No, that’s in Czech, Siri! C’mon!
