Rafael Devers Has Come Out on Top of the Red Sox Drama

Since breaking into the league back in 2017, Rafael Devers has become one of baseball’s best offensive third basemen. In that timeframe, he’s top-five at the position in home runs, RBI, runs scored, and slugging percentage.

He’s also sixth in fWAR (27.7) while simultaneously being one of the worst defenders in the game. Sure, he had a random burst of defensive competence back in 2019 when he posted 18 Outs Above Average at the hot corner, but he’s got -62 Defensive Runs Saved since 2017 (second-lowest in the game) and -27 OAA (eighth-lowest).

Even still, Devers earned a long-term extension with the Boston Red Sox that’ll keep him in town through 2033 thanks to his offensive prowess. Prior to this season, he racked up three All-Star Game appearances and two Silver Slugger Awards while also winning a World Series ring and earning MVP votes five times.

Defensive metrics be damned, Devers is so important to Boston baseball. Yes, he’s been rough at third base, but if the defense was that much of a concern, the Red Sox shouldn’t have locked him up for a decade.

That in mind, it’s easy to see why such a successful player, who’s already been given an extension that’ll keep him financially set for the rest of his life, expected to remain at his primary position when the 2025 season came around.

Of course, we all know that that’s not exactly how things shook out. A few months into the 2025 season and it took some awkwardness and hard feelings to get to a point where everyone can thrive in the situations they were handed.

Let’s break down what exactly went wrong with the Red Sox and Devers in recent months, and look at how the 28-year-old has come out on top of it all.

Rafael Devers, Alex Bregman, and the Third Base Gig

Shortly after acquiring new staff ace Garrett Crochet from the Chicago White Sox, the Red Sox nabbed Alex Bregman, one of the game’s most respected veteran infielders, on a three-year contract in free agency. This promptly opened up the conversation on Devers and where he was going to play defense in 2025.

Devers turned down a position change.

This led to Bregman saying he’d be open to playing second base for the Red Sox so Devers can remain at his primary position. You don’t need me to tell you that this would’ve significantly hindered the Red Sox defensively, as Bregman was just a few months removed from his first career Gold Glove at third base.

In late March, Red Sox manager Alex Cora announced that his club would open the regular season with Bregman at third base and Devers at designated hitter. Devers was publicly not fully in favor of the move, but as Cora put it, “we are all in the winning business. [Devers] understands that.”

Triston Casas’ Injury Kickstarts New Conversations

A short while into the regular season, Red Sox first baseman Triston Casas went down with a nasty knee injury. The expectation is that he will miss the rest of the season. Naturally, the “Devers to first base?!” talk didn’t take very long to start up.

Once again, he turned down a position change.

Instead, the Red Sox have been forced to turn to Abraham Toro, a 28-year-old journeyman infielder, and Romy Gonzalez, a light-hitting utility man. To date, this has actually worked out nicely, as both players are hitting above .300. Still, Devers did more than enough to rub a lot of people the wrong way after determining he wasn’t going to switch positions multiple times in a relatively short span.

Devers May Not Fully Be in the Wrong

Through all of this, I am personally of the belief that Devers has done very little (if anything) wrong here. Many people seem to think that just because he’s locked up for the long run, he’s supposed to do anything and everything that is asked of him.

Even though the defensive metrics haven’t been kind, Devers was said to have been putting in work at third base over this past offseason. The Red Sox responded by essentially replacing him at the position and then asking/demanding him to make a switch to DH.

By the time Devers got his head wrapped around a permanent move off of third base, Casas got injured and the Red Sox now asked him to abandon his DH-only mindset and pick up a first baseman’s glove for the first time in his professional career.

Doing so mid-season is a bold and unnecessary move to make on the organization’s part. He is very clearly the face of this franchise, so for the Red Sox to ask/demand him to make significant changes to his regimen more than once is certainly a slap in the face to the player.

Holding down a position on a full-time basis is definitely a pride thing for a player like Devers, but it only becomes easier to sympathize with him the more Boston tries to change his role at a moment’s notice.

Continuing to Shine Through It All

Now that we’ve got the long and complicated backstory out of the way, it’s time to get to my main point in all of this: Devers has continued to dominate the opposition through all of the drama.

Through an MLB-leading 69 games, the nine-year veteran has yet to play a single inning in the field. No first base, no third base, nothing. Yet, he’s one of baseball’s best offensive contributors, which falls right in line with his career norms.

Not only does Devers lead the league in games played, but he also tops the AL leaderboards in walks (54), but he finds himself comfortably amongst the best in the league in many other offensive categories.

FanGraphs’ WAR carries a ton of value in a player’s defensive contributions, so to see Devers rank 10th in the AL in fWAR despite the fact that he hasn’t taken the field once this year says a lot.

He opened the season in an 0-for-21 slump with 15 strikeouts, which sure made it look like he wasn’t taking to his new assignment very well. But he’s been on absolute fire ever since. Devers began to turn his fortunes around on April 3 and is fourth in the AL with a 167 wRC+ since that date.

Devers Has Been Better Than Ever

In many ways, Devers is performing at a higher rate than he ever has before. Call it a fire lit underneath him amongst all the drama, but he’s been improving upon many of his previous career-highs to open the year.

One significant way Devers is turning his game up to a new level is in his patience/sense of pitch recognition at the plate. After raising his walk-percentage from 9.5 in 2023 to 11.1 in 2024, he is now up to 17%, which leads the AL and is right behind Juan Soto and Marcell Ozuna for the major-league lead.

Devers finished last year in the 85th percentile in BB%, but he currently resides in the 99th percentile. Also tying in to his pitch recognition, Devers is chasing bad pitches much less in the current campaign. He was in the 35th percentile in Chase% last year but is in the 72nd percentile this season through just over two month’s worth of games.

Entering Wednesday’s action, Devers is on pace to hit 33 home runs with 134 runs driven in (which would be a new career-high), and 108 runs scored. He’s also on pace to walk 127 times, which is close to how many Aaron Judge (133) and Soto (129) had last season.

Closing Thoughts

Regardless of whether you approve of how Rafael Devers has handled all of the drama he’s been mired in since the calendar year began, it’s impossible to deny that he’s been keeping his talents on full display in the new season.

Landing as the Red Sox designated hitter on a full-time basis, it seems that Devers has been able to successfully transition from fielder and hitter to just a straight-up masher. So far, the results have been promising, and the Red Sox decision-makers should be thanking the powers that be that this didn’t get even uglier along the way.