Top prospect Chavis suspended
RED SOX NOTEBOOK
Third baseman Michael Chavis is the top player prospect in the Red Sox minor league system, but Major League Baseball announced yesterday that he will miss half the season after testing positive for a performance-enhancing substance.
Chavis, the Red Sox’ top pick in the 2014 amateur draft, accepted the suspension but in a statement expressed puzzlement over how dehydrochlormethyltestosterone was found in his system during an offseason drug test.
“Over the past several months, I have been searching for an answer as to how a prohibited substance I have never heard of, DHMCT, was detected in my urine during the offseason. It is a question that unfortunately has not been answered and I have run out of time for now to find an answer,” he said. “As hopeless as this is for me, I am faced with the reality that maybe I never will. The only thing I do know is that I would never, and have never, purposely taken any prohibited substance in my entire life.”
Chavis alluded to the disappointment he knows this news has caused, especially to his family, which he said has been “personally affected” by drugs and alcohol.
Chavis said he has never tried any drugs or alcohol “in my entire life.”
The Red Sox also released a statement: “The Boston Red Sox fully support Major League Baseball and the Minor League Drug Prevention and Treatment Program. While we are disappointed by the news of this violation, we will look to provide the appropriate support to Michael. Going forward, the club will not comment further on the matter.”
Chavis had a slow start to his Red Sox career but last year broke out, slugging .910 and hitting 31 homers combined between SingleA Salem and Double-A Portland. He was invited to the team’s major spring training camp, but sustained an oblique strain and was set to begin the season on the disabled list.
Porcello’s new plan
Today, Rick Porcello will take the next turn at extending the remarkable run of season-opening success by Red Sox starters.
Porcello already did his part in the third game of the season, when he held Tampa Bay to a run on six hits in 51⁄3 innings with no walks and four strikeouts.
Porcello’s first outing was a far cry from most of his 2017 season, which he finished with a 4.65 ERA, an 11-17 record and, to his credit, 2031⁄3 innings pitched.
He went into last season after a Cy Young Awardwinning 2016. He pitched last year’s season opener and got the win, but soon fell into bad habits, both mechanically and mentally, and suffered issues with his command and pitch selection. More often than not, he got hit, and hard.
It was a long season and he entered camp this spring determined to adjust his attack plan as well as his mental approach.
He succeeded in his first attempt, and gets another go at essentially the same lineup today.
Earlier this spring, pitching coach Dana Levangie outlined a few tenets to how Porcello can bounce back in 2018. Levangie believes the right-hander will do so with a frame of mind that will bring him consistency.
“Rick is accountable,” said Levangie. “He signed a big contract to come over to Boston. Outside noise can sometimes put you in a situation where it doesn’t allow you to pitch with more ‘exhale’ in this whole thing.
“Sometimes it’s ‘I want to live up to the contract, I’m coming to Boston, I’ve got to win every pitch, I’ve got to be a champion.’ The next year he goes out and dominates. Whatever it might have been — ‘Now, I can be Rick Porcello rather than I have to be the Hall of Fame pitcher and Cy Young every time I throw a ball.’ Now he’s got to live up to the Cy Young, it’s ‘I can’t fail or else I’m not living up to that.’ All those things add up and while I’m not saying they carry a load, but you’ve got to look at those things at times and they can influence how you go about your business.”
Levangie is a believer in Porcello’s renewed determination to hone the mental game. The pitcher plans to block the outside noise, even to the point where he now wants to rely more on his catchers calling the game to give him less to think about there.
“I think we all have to have peace of mind in what we do — What can calm you down in tough circumstances, in big situations?” said Levangie. “Rick’s a really smart guy, talented guy, we’re lucky to have him on our pitching staff. When you know Rick Porcello is taking the ball every fifth day, it’s a calming influence, you don’t have to go down to Triple A or wherever and find a spot starter that day, Rick Porcello is on the mound.”
Through their first seven games, Red Sox starters are 4-0 with a 0.86 ERA, just four runs allowed over 42 innings, with no starter yet allowing more than one run in any start. That’s the longest such stretch ever to start a season in major league history.
Lowe down on Price
David Price has yet to allow a run in his first two starts. Last to do that was Derek Lowe in 2002. Price’s 14-inning scoreless streak is the longest season-beginning stretch of his career . . . .
The Red Sox have not yet committed an error. Since 1913, that equals the franchise’s longest errorless start to a season set by the 2013 Red Sox . . . .
With a triple in his first game at Fenway Park, J.D. Martinez became the first to do that since Jeff Manto tripled in his first Fenway appearance for the Red Sox on May 22, 1996. The last time a player hit a triple in his first at-bat as a Red Sox at Fenway was Pumpsie Green on Aug. 4, 1959 . . . .
The Sports Museum is holding a raffle for a chance to attend next Thursday’s Yankees-Red Sox game with a special guest, Bill “Spaceman” Lee in a luxury suite. Proceeds will benefit The Sports Museum.
For more information go to nhlalumniassociation.org.