MLB: Red Sox second baseman, 2008 AL MVP Pedroia retires
BOSTON—Dustin Pedroia, the undersized and over-achieving second baseman who spurred the Boston Red Sox to a pair of World Series victories with his grit and a third, after a knee injury effectively ended his career, with his mouth, has retired.
Pedroia, 37, was the AL rookie of the Year in 2007 and the MVP in his second season but has played in only nine games in three seasons since a spikes-high slide by then-Orioles shortstop Manny Machado took out his knee in 2017.
He was the longest-tenured player on the Red Sox roster and the only holdover from the 2007 championship team.
“I never took one play off, from Little League on,” Pedroia said on a video conference with reporters on Monday after acknowledging he would not be able to return despite six surgeries that included a pandemic-delayed partial knee replacement in December. “At some point, you can’t play anymore. And this is the time.”
A four-time all-star and fourtime Gold Glove winner, Pedroia batted .299 with 140 homers and 725 RBIs in a 17-year career, all with the Red Sox. He is the only player ever to earn rookie of the year, Gold Glove and MVP awards along with a World Series championship in his first two full seasons; only nine other players have accomplished those feats in their entire career.
“He was the ultimate team player,” said Terry Francona, the current Cleveland manager and Pedroia’s manager and cribbage opponent for six seasons. “He always seemed to save his very best plays for the most important time of the game. He seemed to will himself at times to lead us to victory. It is impossible to spend any amount of time with him and not become close to him. He just has that type of personality.”
At five-foot-nine — to be generous — and 170 pounds, Pedroia burst into the majors, hitting .317 with 39 doubles in his first season. Despite hitting a home run that year in his first World Series at-bat, he went unrecognized when the Series shifted to Denver and he told the Coors Field security guard: “I’m the guy who took Jeff Francis onto the Mass Pike. How’s that?”
Longtime Red Sox designated hitter David Ortiz said Pedroia was the player he would buy a ticket to see.
“He played with a little chip on his shoulder,” Ortiz said. “The one thing I learned for sure was that this was not about size. This was about heart. He was the whole package.”