Brave New Pawtucket

About 50 days ago, I wrote a piece on upcoming roster changes for the Pawtucket Red Sox that would be necessitated by a surge of players from below (see: The Pawtucket Roster Crunch). Things have turned out slightly differently. Promotion from within has certainly occurred. Aaron Bates had already moved up by then. Mark Wagner has since, and Junichi Tazawa recently joined the ranks in McCoy Stadium. Victor Martinez' acquisition will likely force Kottaras back down also (he should clear waivers) once the dust has settled. I expect the denizens of this site are already plenty familiar with those names, though, so let's focus elsewhere.

Equal pressure has come from outside the organization. By trading Julio Lugo and Mark Kotsay, the Red Sox acquired Chris Duncan and Brian Anderson. These acquisitions have of course required counter moves. Joining the ranks of the departed are outfielders Freddy Guzman, Jonathan Van Every (who left earlier due to a season ending injury, signing with Pittsburgh), and Paul McAnulty, as well as catcher Carlos Maldonado.

Two once highly-touted prospects whose careers had fizzled over the last few years, Duncan and Anderson now provide organizational depth at the AAA level with hopes of maybe reigniting the spark that a few years back had promised long successful MLB careers.

Major League success has always eluded Brian Anderson. Despite once being named a top-30 prospect in all of Baseball, Anderson has never batted well for average, has only once managed an OBP over .300 (this season at .322), and has only once slugged over .400 (last year and .436). His career average line in 782 professional at bats is an ugly .225/.288/.364. So far, in his short AAA stint, Anderson has been average. He's homered twice in 25 at bats, and has 7 hits for a .280 average. He's only walked once, however, leaving his OBP at a lowly .308, and that looks particularly ugly next to the 6 strikeouts. Earlier this year, with AAA Charlotte, he posted similar average and on base numbers, just without any power to back it up. It would be more than a little bit wishful to expect Anderson to turn it around at this point and live up to his 1^st round pick status, or anything close to it.

Chris Duncan, on the other hand, has experienced quite a bit of success in the majors. In his first season in the majors in 2006, Duncan was on fire, hitting 22 home runs in only 280 at bats en route to a line of .293/.363/.589. He followed this up with a solid, if unimpressive in comparison 2007, where he nearly matched his home run numbers, but in an extra 100 at bats. His high strikeout rate caught up with him somewhat, lowering his average to .259, but where he nearly doubled his strikeouts, he also nearly doubled his walks, keeping his OBP fairly consistent at .354. Duncan has been hampered by injuries in the last few years, though, starting with a hernia in late 2007, then a herniated disk in his neck in July of 2008. In recovering this year, Duncan posted a career low OPS of .687 in 260 career at bats. Duncan typically struggles tremendously against lefties, but has hit righties very well over the course of his career.

For the Red Sox right now, Brian Anderson is the one most likely to contribute, and could actually see time with the team reasonably soon. While Josh Reddick is more than making use of his time in the majors, the Sox are certain to want to make sure he gets ample playing time, so if the regular cadre of outfielders ends up healthy anytime soon, he could quickly be recalled to AA—or pro/demoted to AAA—to assure him a standard 4 at bats a game. In such a situation, the Sox would likely want to have a 5^th outfielder on the bench, and Brian Anderson can provide a solid glove at all three positions. Duncan lacks the range the Red Sox would be looking for, and so for now will most likely have to make the best with his opportunity in Pawtucket. If he can get himself healthy, his ceiling could be fairly high though, if unlikely to be reached. If he can also work out his problems with lefties to a point where he's at least respectable against them, Duncan has a slim chance of being a future contributor to the team. If not, he's more likely to be traded elsewhere to act in a platoon role. Still, at the moment he has quite a bit more long-term potential than Brian Anderson.