Reporters, analysts and fans were high on the 2025 Boston Red Sox after the team’s first big offseason in nearly half a decade.
Boston traded for Garrett Crochet and signed Alex Bregman to take its squad to the next level with elite talent on all sides of the baseball. Crochet may be one of the only Red Sox living up to his end of the bargain, though.
The Red Sox have gone through a particularly rough stretch since their commanding sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals from April 4-6. They piled on for 36 runs in three games but have looked like a completely different team since.
Boston has lost six of its last eight games and even its best players look utterly confused on the field. Bregman is chief among them — the gritty veteran the Red Sox brought in to help take their team back to the playoffs leads the team with four errors in 18 games and is batting .160/.241/.200 with seven strikeouts in his last seven games.
Alex Bregman’s defense as a member of the Red Sox has been brutal to watch
The Red Sox went above and beyond to justify moving Rafael Devers off third to play Bregman there, but it’d be hard to argue Bregman has been the better player to this point. In fairness, no one has looked good defensively besides Ceddanne Rafela and Wilyer Abreu. Bregman and Trevor Story both booted multiple balls in Boston’s 16-1 loss to the Rays. The Red Sox had no business finishing that game with just one error on the board.
The rest of the infield has also been rocky. David Hamilton and Triston Casas also have errors and miscues on their record. Alex Cora is also insistent on moving Kristian Campbell between second base and center field often, just months after chief baseball officer Craig Breslow determined that similar moves between center field and shortstop hindered Rafaela’s development. Campbell is just 22, but already has two errors and a few more miscues at second base on his stat sheet, and the Red Sox do not seem to be prioritizing his development there.
Despite the many issues with Boston’s lineup so far, Bregman’s performance has been the most disappointing. He doesn’t look like a third baseman just one year removed from a Gold Glove, and his bat hasn’t made up for it since he earned American League Player of the Week honors on April 9.
The Red Sox signed Bregman for his consistent righty bat, tight defense and commitment to a winning culture. It’s still early, but the Red Sox haven’t seen much of that in recent games. Cora should take some blame, too — how many seasons can strikeouts and horrible defense be the story of your team before something changes in the clubhouse? Bregman and the rest of the team need to break out of this early-season funk soon, before they fall into habits they can’t kick.
