Devers delivers again in sweep
Making quite the case for All-Star Game nod
If the first phase of voting was an indicator, Rafael Devers could earn his first career All-Star appearance with a start next month in Denver.
RED SOX NOTEBOOK
This weekend, Devers showed exactly why.
The 24-year-old third baseman is producing the best first half of his career in all facets of his game, consistently torching the baseball at the plate and making significant improvements on defense. That was all on display as he fueled the Red Sox to a weekend sweep of the Yankees.
“This kid, he was into this series,” manager Alex Cora said. “I saw him talking to veterans about situations, about at-bats, and he keeps growing. Like I said, this is his best first half of the season professionally and we all know what he does in the second one, so it should be fun watching him.”
In Saturday’s win, Devers was all over the place. He made possibly his best defensive play of the season when he barehanded a slow grounder for an out to first, and he made a head’s up play by tagging up and scoring from third on a short foul out, as he caught the Yankees by surprise.
Sunday, it was more of the same as he smoked a threerun homer off Yankees ace Gerrit Cole in the first inning to send the Sox on their way. He jumped all over Cole’s 100 mph fastball and sent it 451 feet to right, the third-longest homer of his career.
Devers had struggled keeping up with fastballs earlier this year but he’s doing just fine now. Sunday’s shot against Cole was the second time in his career he’s homered on a 100 mph or faster pitch, the first coming on his famous homer against Aroldis Chapman in 2017.
Devers is proud of how he’s started this season, and wants to keep going.
“I give 100% like I always do,” Devers said. “The best part is staying healthy, being available, and continuing to grow as a player, that’s what’s helped me have the type of year that I’m having right now. It’s really good and I’m just trying to stay consistent.”
Red Sox advance in ASG voting
Devers, Xander Bogaerts, J.D. Martinez and Alex Verdugo were voted into the second phase of All-Star voting, which begins on Monday. Bogaerts and Devers were the American League’s top vote-getters at shortstop and third base, respectively, while Martinez was second at designated hitter behind Angels star Shohei Ohtani and Verdugo was eighth among AL outfielders.
Phase 2 of voting begins at noon today and ends Thursday to determine the starters at each position. The starters for each league will be revealed on Thursday night.
Sale’s next step
Chris Sale is getting closer, and even Cora has to admit he’s starting to get excited.
The Red Sox ace came out of his 15-pitch session to live hitters on Saturday feeling great, the manager said.
Sale will take an even bigger next step on Wednesday, when he’ll pitch two innings to live hitters at Fenway Park as he continues to make positive progressions in his return from Tommy John surgery.
Cora has been careful not to get too ahead of himself with Sale during the lefthander’s long recovery that has featured a few setbacks, but on Sunday, the manager was imagining a future, possibly soon, of Sale’s eventual return.
“Now he’s got to stay patient, don’t get too excited,” Cora said. “But the fact that he’s progressed this way, you start thinking ahead when he’s going to contribute and when he’s going to be part of what we’re trying to accomplish. That’s the fun part.
“Obviously teams are going to make moves in the upcoming weeks, trying to improve, but one thing for sure, nobody can trade for Chris Sale. We can add Chris Sale to our equation and we’re very excited about that.”
With the rate Sale has recovered, it seems reasonable that a return in mid-August is possible. Cora said the plan is to build him up as a starter to rejoin the rotation. But without a rehab assignment scheduled just yet, they’re still taking it day by day.
“We’ll stay the course like we always do and whenever he’s ready, he’s ready,” Cora said.
“We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves and say this day or that and then it’s not the case and put pressure on him and the whole medical staff. So we’ll stay the course and whenever he’s ready, he’ll be with us.”
Whitlock stays hot
Garrett Whitlock continued to not look like a rookie as he succeeded Sunday in the most pressure-packed situation of the game. With two runners on, one out and a four-run lead in the seventh, Cora called on Whitlock. He loaded the bases with a walk to Gary Sanchez, but retired the Yankees’ two best hitters, D.J. LeMahieu and Aaron Judge, to escape.
“I was trusting (Christian Vazquez),” Whitlock said. “During our meetings, we knew exactly how we were going to attack (Judge) and so I trusted Vazqy and we just stuck to the approach and executed some pitches and luckily got out.”
Sunday marked Whitlock’s 14th scoreless appearance of more than one inning this season, which is the most in baseball. He’s posted a 0.57 ERA in his last 11 games.