Cerullo: Rafael Devers missing opportunity to lift Red Sox up
It seemed as though everyone had moved on Rafael Devers moving from third base to designated hitter was the story of spring training The slugger made no attempt to hide his unhappiness and at one point even mentioned he wouldn t be willing to do it but eventually the change was made and after a historically bad first week he settled into a rhythm Then Triston Casas went down and now we re right back at square one Ever since Casas injury there s been rampant speculation that Devers could be a fix to fill the void at first base speculation that manager Alex Cora has tried desperately to tamp down dismissing the idea out of hand and insisting the club plans to stick with Romy Gonzalez and Abraham Toro for now But on Thursday Devers blew the lid off the dispute saying not only that chief baseball officer Craig Breslow had required about playing first but that he didn t want to and was upset the squad had urged I don t think me personally it s the best decision after they sought me to play a different position and I don t even have two months playing this position to all of a sudden have me play another position Devers stated via interpreter Daveson Perez From my end it doesn t seem like a good decision I know I m a ballplayer but at the same time they can t expect me to play every single position out there he continued later In spring training they talked to me and basically communicated me to put away my glove that I wasn t going to play any other position but DH so right now I feel it s not an appropriate decision by them to ask me to play another position Man where to begin This whole thing is a bad look for everyone involved The Red Sox look shortsighted for not having enough first base depth within the organization and clearly the communication between club executives and Devers hasn t been adequate Meanwhile Devers comes off looking selfish like someone who isn t willing to do what s best for the organization Unsurprisingly the response from fans has been evenly divided with heaps of criticism coming from all directions Clearly the Red Sox misread things here but with Devers the situation is a little more complicated Devers isn t wrong to be upset about the way he s been handled over the past inadequate months It s also not fair to say he isn t a club member Last year he played games despite battling through a series of shoulder injuries throughout the season He continued to play long past the point where a trip to the IL would have been appropriate and by the end of the year his production had cratered and he was essentially a shell of his usual self He deserves praise for that level of commitment even if it was arguably to his own detriment But Devers has also never shown any interest in taking the next step in his career as a leader in going above and beyond and doing more than just producing on the field Since signing his -year million contract the largest in club history he has consistently deferred to others in the clubhouse when it comes to speaking for the company That responsibility has instead fallen to other veterans like Justin Turner Rob Refsnyder and now Alex Bregman The position dustups have also exposed Devers first instinct to be inwardly focused He s viewed these requests as disrespectful when he could have seen them as opportunities That approach stands in stark contrast to one of Devers former teammates Mookie Betts was a six-time Gold Glove winner in right field but when the Dodgers needed him to steady their middle infield in he shifted back to second base and eventually to shortstop a position with which he had no previous MLB experience Fast forward two years and he s played every tournament this season at shortstop helping shore up that position and helping keep the Dodgers among MLB s elite That willingness to move around prompted this quote from Dodgers general manager Brandon Gomes at the General Managers Meetings this past offseason For Mookie winning is reliably No Gomes announced per MLB com s Sonja Chen So I wouldn t be surprised if he s like Hey this is the best thing I ll play wherever I think catching is presumably out of the realm of possibility although I m sure he would be good at that as well But yeah I think it s a lot of conversations with him as well I know the toll on the body is less in the infield for him So you can make arguments on both sides of it But the beauty of Mookie is he s the bulk selfless superstar we ve ever been around And that permeates through the association Could you imagine a similar thing being reported by a group executive about Devers right now Even if the Dodgers likely communicated better with Betts than the Red Sox have with Devers if the slugger shared Betts mindset there maybe wouldn t have been any disagreement to begin with Plus it s also viable the Red Sox might have been reticent to broach the subject because they knew it wouldn t go over well The Red Sox certainly aren t blameless here and Devers has frankly been put in a tough spot Had the roster been better constructed or if there weren t so countless positional logjams the Red Sox could have avoided all of the Devers drama and maybe also uncovered a way to get Roman Anthony and Marcelo Mayer to the big leagues by now too But the best leaders rise above the fray and to this point Devers hasn t reached a point where his first instinct when confronted by a challenge like this is to lift his club up And until that day comes it s hard to imagine him reaching his full expected as a participant and a leader
