I had one question for Vladimir Guerrero Jr. before Wednesday’s series finale between his Blue Jays and the Red Sox.
But I didn’t get to ask it.
“I gotta go hit,” Vlad Jr. politely told me on the field before heading over to take batting practice.
What ensued was a methodical build up. Some use BP — especially at a historic ballpark like Fenway — to hack away and try to hit every pitch over the Green Monster. But not Vladdy, who has been there and done that. Much like Ray Allen when he would warm up for a game at shootaround, Guerrero Jr. slowly worked his way up to game-readiness.
A master craftsman at his workbench. #Vladdy #TOTHECORE pic.twitter.com/fiGfaaaF1D
— Gethin Coolbaugh (@GethinCoolbaugh) June 26, 2024
Vladdy began by bunting, then hitting some singles, doubles… then finally unleashing the beast. When I tell you I’ve never seen a ball leave Fenway Park faster than the one he hit into the first row of the Monster at the end of his BP session…
(Vladdy even drew cheers for the BP moonshot he hit, then motioned and acknowledged the Fenway crowd with a smile…)
Guerrero then hurried off the field in a conversation with teammate Bo Bichette, one which I didn’t want to interrupt. I’d ask him after the game if I got the chance, I thought.
My question? “Could you ever see yourself playing for the Boston Red Sox?”
I’m not the first to think it, nor will I be the last. After all, any fan or observer with half a brain should want the elite of the elite playing for their team, right?
Guerrero’s future has mostly been a back-burner subject in the past few years around baseball, but it got bumped up to the front stove this week… and by Guerrero’s own doing.
After once famously saying he would never play for the AL East rival New York Yankees — more specifically, he said he would “never sign with the Yankees — not even dead” — Guerrero adjusted his stance in an interview with Virus Deportivo on Monday.
"Sometimes one says things. It is not that I am trying to take back what I said about the Yankees," Guerrero said in the interview. "But this is a business. I sat down and spoke with my dad [Vladimir Guerrero Sr.] and my family, and this is a business. And I said I would never again talk about this topic and lots of people have asked me about it.”
Guerrero added, “I'm a player and if a team picks me or if they do something, it's because they need it, obviously, and I'll be happy to help any team. … But right now, I'm just focused on helping my team try to get out of this bad streak.”
He certainly did — and then some. A day after unleashing a 471-foot Green Monster shot — the third-longest ever hit at Fenway in the Statcast era — and driving in three runs, Guerrero followed with a 2 for 5 day with a pair of two-run doubles to propel Toronto to a 9-4 win that snapped a seven-game losing streak.
471 feet from Vladimir Guerrero Jr. over the Green Monster. 😲
— MLB Stats (@MLBStats) June 25, 2024
(MLBStats x @GoogleCloud) pic.twitter.com/msefZFdRz7
It’s safe to say that Fenway is a place Vladdy Jr. enjoys hitting — he was hitting a blistering .348 with 10 home runs and 41 RBIs in 41 career games (those numbers… they are insane) in Boston entering Wednesday’s finale.
His 59 hits at Fenway are the most at any park outside of Toronto, as is his RBI total. He’s hit more home runs at only one visiting park — can you take a guess? Yep, you guessed it, Yankee Stadium… where he’s hit 13 and is batting .272 with 24 RBIs in 39 games.
Now, do any teams come to mind that could benefit from trading for a player who thrives hitting at Fenway Park and is a certified Yankee killer?
Hmm…
Saying “the Red Sox should be in on Vladimir Guerrero Jr.” a.k.a. “the Red Sox should want one of the best hitters in the game, and potentially of all time, to play for them” isn’t a particularly controversial statement. At least it shouldn’t be, as I know some in the sabermetrics crowd might dispute that…
But Guerrero, who is making $19.9 million after being awarded the most money ever in an arbitration hearing this year, is set to enter his final year under team control in 2025 and will be a free agent in 2026.
Now, you could make an argument the Red Sox could just wait until he hits the market and pay him them. But come on, we know this Red Sox front office… and we know John Henry. At around $20 million, Guerrero’s salary is not a huge dealbreaker. And trading for Vladdy Jr. now would give the organization — and Red Sox Nation — the chance to give themselves an edge up on resigning him.
A trade for Guerrero would be costly, no doubt. It may very well cost you one of your top prospects — Marcelo Mayer, Roman Anthony, Kyle Teel, etc. — but it’s a move I would be willing to make if the intent is there to re-sign him beyond his current deal. (And if, somehow, you could get him for a lesser prospect haul, and he still walked at the end of the deal, I’d say that’s absolutely worth it too…).
From an on field perspective, there isn’t much I should need to say to sell you on why it would be a good fit. But how about these nine words… “batting second Rafael Devers, batting third Vladimir Guerrero Jr.”
Enough said, for me.
A Devers-Vladdy heart of the lineup would arguably be the best in baseball from day one, and both are still on the right side of 30 — with Guerrero only being 25 year old. That’s a one-two punch that could do damage for years to come.
From a financial standpoint, yeah, I realize it’s one Henry probably isn’t looking to make right now. Baseball players are expensive, after all. But trading for Guerrero at the deadline, or even next offseason, would be a great way to get the fans and Gethin Coolbaughs off your back about not caring about your baseball team anymore.
Not to mention, it would be a great way to accelerate the resurgence of the Red Sox to true World Series-contending status…
Down goes Bello
What’s wrong with Brayan Bello?
He couldn’t tell you…
“I don’t really know what’s going on right now,” Bello said through a team interpreter after imploding to the tune of a season-high seven runs allowed — all in the third inning — of his team’s eventual 9-4 loss to the Jays on Tuesday.
It’s was quite the about-face from his last start, also against the Blue Jays, when he turned in a quality start of six innings of two-run ball with six strikeouts on June 19 during Boston’s three-game sweep in Toronto.
Unfortunately, that start resembled the exception, not the rule, of late as Bello has struggled mightily in this month, pitching to an 8.25 ERA while allowing four or more earned runs in four of his five June starts.
To put that in context, Bello — who has given up 22 earned runs this month — didn’t allow his seventh earned run of the season until his third start of the season against Baltimore on April 9th.
Brayan Bello
— Boston Sports Info (@bostonsportsinf) June 26, 2024
There are 86 pitchers with at least 14 games started this year
Bello ranks 84th of the 86 in ERA
84. Brayan Bello - 5.55 ERA
Going to need him to get on track
pic.twitter.com/7lAkzemtxZ
The results have been so bad of late that the Sox are actually taking Bello out of the rotation (briefly), with Alex Cora telling WEEI’s Jones & Mego with Arcand program on Wednesday that he won’t pitch against San Diego over the weekend.
"It's been a challenge,” Cora said. “The stuff is a lot better than in the past, but we're not throwing strikes. We have to be more aggressive in the zone. We're making an adjustment.”
Cora said Bello’s won’t pitch again until next Wednesday in Miami.
So, again, what’s really wrong with Bello? Cora thinks it’s strike-throwing, and Bello has walked at least three batters in all but one of his starts this month. Bello recently said because all of his pitches have “a lot of movement, so for me to try to control them that’s a challenge. When I try to control those pitches, sometimes I leave them in the middle and that’s where the battle starts.”
Me? Primarily, I’d say it’s… confidence. We saw Bello let his emotions loose during Tuesday’s poor showing, something he says he’s struggled with since the minors, and that’s an indication of a player who isn’t commanding the mound like it’s HIS…
Cora and Andrew Bailey will certainly address elements of that in this skipped start, I’m sure, but I can’t help but wonder if a demotion to Triple-A Worcester might not be the best thing for him at this point.
Sure, you can let him work out the kinks at this level, and Bello has certainly shown that he’s got the ability to be an effective pitcher today. But how many times have we seen a potential star arm’s shattered confidence been their undoing?
The Sox have a lot invested in Bello, and they owe it to him to put him in the best position for success. With the way he’s pitching right now, leaving him to sink or swim as he tries to figure it out — and is hurting the team in the process — doesn’t really seem like what’s best for him, or for the Red Sox.
The truth of the matter is this: Bello was never going to be the ace of the Red Sox in 2024 — and that’s totally fine.
The expectations placed on his shoulders when he made his first Opening Day start at Seattle back in April were completely unfair for a 25-year-old entering his second full big league season, with or without an early contract extension.
This is where Cora really earns his money, and it’s good to see that he’s identified that Bello needs a bit of a break. I just can’t help but wonder if more of a break might be the better option…
(Almost) Halfway there
Eighty one down, eighty one to go…
At least, that was supposed to be the case before Wednesday's game got rained out (and way too late given the torrential rain that caused the delay, for my liking...).
The torrential (worst I’ve ever seen) rain at Fenway began at 7:30.
— Gethin Coolbaugh (@GethinCoolbaugh) June 27, 2024
They didn’t call the game until 9:18.
Negligence. @RedSox @BlueJays @MLB @John_W_Henry @skennedysox
The series finale against Toronto would have marked the Red Sox’s official midway point of their 2024 regular season schedule. For now, Boston will remain 43-37 through 81 games before resuming play Friday against the Padres.
Boston entered the day with a top 10 record in the majors’, as well as with a half-game hold on the final American League playoff spot.
But with half of the story yet to be written, Cora isn’t just thinking about merely hanging on to the ledge of the mountain — he’s thinking about climbing it.
“There’s a lot of teams around there — let’s shoot for more,” Cora told Jones & Mego with Arcand about the wild-card race. “You know, there’s a few teams ahead of us that they’re struggling. I know we’ve been talking about the wild card, but there’s a lot of season left.”
It’s noble thinking by Cora, and it will be easier said than done. But impossible? Certainly not. Cora’s team entered Wednesday just 8 1/2 games back of the division-leading Yankees — with three more games in New York coming right around the corner. They were only 4 1/2 back of second-place Baltimore, which held a 6 1/2 game lead in the wild-card standings.
That being said, as we’ve established, the time for these Red Sox to make their move is now. They have a good opportunity in front of them to establish themselves as more than .500 chasers with a favorable schedule before the All-Star break.
After it, life gets a bit tougher. Boston opens the second half with three games in Los Angeles against the Dodgers. Then there’s a brief respite with a three-game set in Colorado, only to be followed by three more against the Yankees. When the trade deadline hits on July 30th, the Sox will be in the middle of a three-game series versus Seattle.
It goes without saying, but how the Red Sox perform over the next month will shape their ability to earnestly contend for a playoff spot — and possibly more.
Craig Breslow and the front office will have their thoughts, which until we see pen put to paper remains a wild card in its own right, but you can count Cora as someone who believes that this Sox team is worth investing in — and not only in 2025, 2026 or 2027, but right away in the here and now.
“I believe that this brand of baseball is sustainable,” Cora said. “We can do this because we gonna pitch and athleticism is gonna take over. Let’s play well the next two weeks, put us in a better spot, and then I bet the conversations are more serious.”
Gethin Coolbaugh is a columnist for Boston Sports Journal. Follow him @GethinCoolbaugh on X/Twitter.