Outfielder Keury De La Cruz (Darrell Snow / Greenville Drive)

Keury De La Cruz has never been prominently mentioned as a Red Sox prospect. He signed for just $120,000 out of the Dominican as a 17-year-old in early 2009, having been passed over as a 16-year-old the previous summer. But his performance to date in the Sox system — particularly in a 2012 season that has represented a breakout seasonto date — has served as a reminder of the unpredictable nature of the market for Latin American amateurs, for whom multi-million dollar bonuses have been anything but a guarantee of success, while far more modest bonuses have netted quality big leaguers.

The Sox scouted De La Cruz a number of times before signing him in Feb. 2009. Despite a 5-foot-11 frame and a lack of strength at the time, the Sox were impressed by a swing that suggested projectable power once he filled out.

“He wasn’t strong then, but he had natural loft and showed the ability to drive the ball. He just didn’t have muscle behind it to make it go anywhere,” said Sox international scouting director Eddie Romero. “[Former Sox international scouting director Craig Shipley] said, ‘You can project power on this guy. He was right.”

That is certainly proving the case this year. On Friday, De La Cruz continued his phenomenal season in Single-A Greenville, going 3-for-5 with a double and triple to improve his line for the season to .329/.374/.579/.953. The left-handed hitter continued to do damage against southpaws (all three Power pitchers were left-handers), improving to .347/.439/.612/1.051 against them. His .579 slugging percentage is the third best among the organization’s minor leaguers, behind only Will Middlebrooks and Mauro Gomez (counting only the minor league stats for both). He has seven homers, nine doubles and four triples, averaging better than one extra-base hit for every two games.

His strong performance this year is impressive enough in its own right, but it is even more significant in that it demonstrates a prospect who endured struggles, learned from them and went on a mission to get better as a results of those lessons. De La Cruz, a strong performer in both the Dominican Summer League in 2009 and the Rookie Level Gulf Coast League in 2010, struggled in 2011 against more advanced pitching in a New York-Penn League that is loaded with college arms making their professional debuts. His numbers weren’t disastrous, but his line of .263/.292/.390/.682 was hardly head-turning.

But he used that experience as the basis for improvement.

“He didn’t look at it as a bad season. Usually, players look at the numbers and say, ‘I stunk.’ But he said, I didn’t hit what I wanted to and didn’t hit as many homers as I wanted to, but I learned a lot,” said Romero. “He went in with his old approach and realized it wasn’t working and that he needed to work on it in the offseason.”

That work has yielded a greater commitment to driving the ball to all fields and hitting the ball where it’s pitched. With positive results in that regard has come greater confidence and a more consistent approach in the box.

“When he was younger, he liked to tinker,” said Romero. “Now, he’s kind of focused on one, and he’s seeing the results.”

The results have been eye-opening for a player described as a hard-nosed gamer who plays the game with a positive intensity. De La Cruz did not enter the year with a prominent place on anyone’s prospect radar — he fell outside Baseball America’s top 30 prospects in the organization, for instance — but he is quickly making a case to move up quickly, at a time when his performance at a relatively young age (20) suggests that he could emerge one day as an everyday big-league corner outfielder.

TRIPLE-A PAWTUCKET RED SOX: 6-5 LOSS AT DURHAM

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– In his first game at third base on his rehab assignment, Kevin Youkilis went 1-for-3 with a single and two strikeouts. Defensively, he had three assists (starting one double play turn) and caught a pop-up. Read the rest of this entry »

Center fielder Jackie Bradley was selected by the Red Sox with the No. 40 pick of the 2011 draft. (John Corneau / Lowell Spinners)

It had been a while since the Red Sox had taken a top college position player from a major program when they selected Jackie Bradley Jr. out of the University of South Carolina in the supplemental first round last summer. While Kolbrin Vitek had been selected out of Ball State with the team’s first-round pick in 2010, the level of competition he faced in college wasn’t necessarily the type to allow him to hit the ground sprinting, and so he spent all of last year in Salem.

The last time the team had taken a college position player with something approximating the competitive pedigree and resume of Bradley — the 2010 College World Series MVP and two-time College World Series champion at Omaha — was when the Sox selected Jacoby Ellsbury in the first round of the 2005 draft. Ellsbury made his pro debut in Lowell and then, assigned to High-A Wilmington (then the Sox’ Carolina League affiliate), Ellsbury got off to a strong start, hitting .304 with a .368 OBP, .449 slugging mark and .818 OPS through late-April, before an injury sidelined him for about four weeks. He came back and played roughly a month and a half in Wilmington before a mid-July promotion to Double-A Portland, at a time when he was hitting .299/.379/.418/.797 with four homers and 25 steals in 61 games.

Ellsbury took little time to show that he was ready to move. But he never dominated in the same sustained fashion as Bradley.

Bradley added another page to what has become an incredibly impressive chapter in his pro debut at Salem. On Saturday, he went 5-for-5 with a double, and 31 games into his season, he is hitting .389 with a .507 OBP, .575 slugging mark and 1.082 OPS along with 11 steals. Though he’s made four errors in center, his defense has been described by farm director Ben Crockett as “incredible.”

From a performance standpoint, he’s done just about everything imaginable at this level. So what does the team want to see from him before sending Bradley to Portland?

“Jackie’s performed very well. It’s still a small sample,” said Crockett. “We’re very happy with what we’ve seen so far, though, and want to continue to see consistency in the way he plays, get him used to the rigors of playing everyday and playing more often than he has in the past.”

Bradley has played 31 games in Salem, about half the number that Ellsbury had before his promotion. But he hasn’t missed time due to injury while playing everyday, and at some point, if Bradley keeps dominating his competition, he’ll force his way up to the next level. The last Red Sox college position player to start his first full pro season with this kind of performance was Dustin Pedroia, whom the Sox pushed all the way up to Double-A at the start of 2005, with the second baseman responding by hitting .347/.434/.521/.954 in his first 31 games en route to a promotion to Triple-A by late-June.

TRIPLE-A PAWTUCKET RED SOX: 7-6 WIN VS. COLUMBUS (INDIANS)

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– There was progress for Daisuke Matsuzaka, who managed to pitch into the sixth inning for the first time in his rehab assignment and who showed more power on his fastball (topping out at 93 mph on his fastball on the McCoy Stadium gun, according to reports), showed improved command with the pitch and who knocked down his walks total to one. Still, after allowing five runs on seven hits, including a pair of homers, Matsuzaka seemed skeptical of the idea that he’s major league ready. Read the rest of this entry »

Lars Anderson had a big day against left-handed pitchers. (AP)

The members of the Triple-A Pawtucket lineup had an interesting barometer of sorts in the form of a 240-game winner.

Left-hander Andy Pettitte was on the hill for Scranton Wilkes-Barre on Sunday, and while it would be a mistake to read too much into one outing as the 39-year-old continues to work his way back into big league shape, it was notable to see what the PawSox did against him. Pettitte allowed five runs (three earned) on eight hits in five innings. While Pettitte told reporters that his command wasn’t as sharp as it needs to be and that he’s having a difficult time maintaining the necessary start-to-start focus in the minor league setting, from the vantage point of members of the PawSox lineup, there is also something to be said for enjoying success against one of the best pitchers of the last baseball generation.

Lars Anderson, Jose Iglesias and Ryan Lavarnway all had notable performances for the PawSox, while further down, left-handers Drake Britton and Henry Owens both had, in their own ways, dominant performances, and in Greenville, outfielder Keury De La Cruz continued one of the most interesting performances by a relatively unheralded Sox prospect at the start of this season.

TRIPLE-A PAWTUCKET RED SOX: 7-5 WIN AT SCRANTON WILKES-BARRE (YANKEES)

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– Jose Iglesias very well may be amidst the best offensive stretch of his career. He doesn’t need to hit for power to be a very good major league shortstop. He simply needs to spray line drives around the field, deliver the occasional double, take the occasional walk and get on base at a respectable rate. Right now, he’s doing that.

On Sunday, Iglesias had his fifth straight multi-hit game, getting a single (a comebacker) and a walk before flying out to right in three plate appearances against Andy Pettitte, and later adding a single on a line drive to right. In his last five games, Iglesias is now 10-for-18 (.556) with a double, a triple and three walks. He is reaching base at a .619 clip in that span. In the process, he’s elevated his average (.253) and OBP (.330) to roughly league average numbers in the Triple-A International League, where the average batting average is .250 and OBP is .330. His power (.293) remains deficient (league average is .379), but the Red Sox would gladly take a shortstop with average on-base skills, below-average power and outrageous, game-changing defensive skills.

Prior to this stretch, Iglesias had never before had multiple hits in more than three straight games (a stretch that came in May 2011 in Pawtucket). Right now, his results suggest someone who is developing an approach at the plate that has him closer than ever to being ready to break through into the major leagues. There is more development in front of him, of course, and there is benefit to having the shortstop further solidify the offensive gains that he’s making. And the likelihood is that even with the progress he’s shown, there will be a transitional period of struggle whenever Iglesias does reach the big leagues.

That said, for perhaps the first time in his Triple-A career, Iglesias has been performing at a level that suggests that he is not overmatched by the advanced pitching that he is facing and, on the contrary, that he is capable of being on the other side of the development curve, even against a pitcher of considerable profile such as Pettitte.

– Lars Anderson also had a strong day against Pettitte and fellow left-hander Juan Cedeno. He collected two hits in as many plate appearances against Pettitte (a single to right, a double to center) and later added a double to left against Cedeno. That performance made Anderson’s season against southpaws look dramatically different. He is now hitting .292/.379/.375/.754 against lefties, and the doubles were his first two extra-base hits in 29 plate appearances against lefties.

Anderson has had two doubles in each of the last two games, going 5-for-10 and improving his season-long totals to .274/.353/.438/.791. Though he has just one homer so far this year, he does have 10 extra-base hits in 19 games. Read the rest of this entry »

Left-hander Henry Owens is one of the younger pitchers in the South Atlantic League. (Gregg Forwerck / Courtesy Team USA Baseball)

Kevin Youkilis was a late scratch for the second straight day due to a back issue that has relegated him to day-to-day status. Will Middlebrooks was out of the PawSox lineup on Monday. Immediately, many observers were happy to connect the dots.

But, Red Sox sources said, Middlebrooks was simply taking a scheduled day off. Still, that is the position that the Sox currently occupy. At a time when Middlebrooks is hitting .348 with a .396 OBP, .708 slugging mark, 1.104 OPS, nine homers and 27 RBI in 23 games, any time that Youkilis hits a speed bump (whether from a health standpoint or a slump), attention will turn immediately to whether or not Middlebrooks is being called up to the majors or not.

The Sox are unlikely to call him up if there is not a clear everyday role for him, but if Youkilis landed on the DL, then the Sox would likely summon Middlebrooks to the majors. While initial indications are that Youkilis’ back stiffness is more of a day-to-day concern than the basis for a DL consideration right now, Middlebrooks told WEEI’s Dennis & Callahan Show on Tuesday morning that he’s ready if called upon.

“Personally, I’d love to say yeah, I am [ready],” Middlebrooks said. “I came in here with a sense of urgency. I wanted to come in and show everybody that I’m a good player, and that it wasn’t just a freak year last year.”

To listen to the Middlebrooks interview on D&C, click here.

TRIPLE-A PAWTUCKET RED SOX: 6-4 WIN AT COLUMBUS (INDIANS)

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– Pedro Ciriaco, now a week into his return from a minor oblique strain, went 3-for-5 with a double for his second extra-base hit of the year. He is now hitting .317/.364/.415/.778, and he certainly has an opportunity to play his way back into consideration as a depth option for the Red Sox.

– Jose Iglesias went 2-for-4, with both of his hits coming on bunt singles to the pitcher.

– First baseman Mauro Gomez went 1-for-4 while smashing his eighth homer of the year, improving his slugging percentage to a robust .703.

DOUBLE-A PORTLAND SEA DOGS: 6-3 LOSS VS. TRENTON (YANKEES)

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– Third baseman Kolbrin Vitek went 2-for-4 while hitting his first homer in Double-A. The blast came in his 104th plate appearance with Portland. A year ago, however, the 2010 first-rounder did not homer at all in the first half of the season. Still, on the year, Vitek is now posting modest across-the-board numbers for the Sea Dogs, with a .268 average, .317 OBP, .351 slugging mark and .668 OPS.

Those marks seem unimpressive. But they’re virtually useless as a basis for judging the 23-year-old’s progress.

Players often tend to post modest numbers in Portland during the season’s first month, as the weather in Maine in April tends to be inhospitable to power numbers. That being the case, it would be premature to assess the development of Vitek or fellow 2010 first-rounder Bryce Brentz (.318 slugging) or even someone like shortstop Derrik Gibson, the 2008 second-rounder whose .209/.284/.239/.523 line belies the fact that he has been having what Sox officials feel are some of the best at-bats of his professional career. Read the rest of this entry »

Will Middlebrooks (DVM Sports/Courtesy Portland Sea Dogs)

He did it again.

For the sixth time in eight games, Will Middlebrooks went deep, this time taking Yankees prospect Adam Warren deep to right-center in a display of the opposite field power that has been a hallmark of his emergence as a top prospect. The 23-year-old went 2-for-5 with that homer (his ninth of the season), and though he struck out three times (a season-high in strikeouts, and just the second time this year that he’s struck out more than once in a game), his numbers remain extraordinary.

Middlebrooks is hitting .377 with a .429 OBP, .729 slugging mark and 1.221 OPS along with nine homers and 27 RBI. His three strikeouts on Wednesday notwithstanding, he’s controlling the strike zone in impressive fashion, having walked seven times and punched out just 13.

All of this comes at a time when big league third baseman Kevin Youkilis has gotten off to a difficult start. After going 1-for-4 against the Twins on Wednesday, Youkilis is hitting .204/.267/.296/.563. Middlebrooks has almost as many homers (9) as Youkilis has hits (11).

And so, it has become a popular line of thinking to suggest that the Red Sox should call up Middlebrooks and let him displace the incumbent. How much thought have the Sox given to such a scenario?

“There’s been no talk of that,” said a team source this week. “None.”

Why not? A few reasons.

First, there’s the question of sample size and track record. Youkilis has a great one at the big league level, having been an above-average everyday player for six seasons while performing at an offensive level matched by only a handful or so of players over the last four years. If the slow starts of David Ortiz in 2009 and 2010 offered any lesson, it was that you remain patient with players capable of producing at an All-Star level. If Youkilis is able to rebound to perform at his more customary .900-plus OPS levels going forward, then the odds are that few players — whether Middlebrooks or anyone else — can match such an impact in the lineup.

Similarly, the incredible performance of Middlebrooks represents something that has occurred in a small stretch. Just as it would have been a mistake to judge him from his 16-game struggle in Pawtucket at the end of last year, when he hit .161/.200/.268/.468, it would also be premature to get carried away with what he’s done in 19 games this year. He has shown a great deal of progress, both in his command of the strike zone and in the fact that he is now maturing to the point where he’s adding pull power to his prior gap-to-gap power approach, but to promote him now might risk a challenging transition to the majors given the relatively limited number of plate appearances that the 23-year-old has had against the most advanced minor leaguers. Read the rest of this entry »

Will Middlebrooks (DVM Sports/Courtesy Portland Sea Dogs)

Will Middlebrooks entered the year as the top prospect in the Red Sox system. Not only has he lived up to that billing, but he’s actually managed to continue building his prospect status in the early weeks of the 2012 season, a development that continued with a dominant performance on Wednesday. Middlebrooks and Ryan Lavarnway both underscored the fact that the Sox do have impressive prospects who are close to major league ready at a couple of important positions, while both Aaron Cook and Rich Hill continued to offer evidence that they will be able to help the big league pitching staff before long.

TRIPLE-A PAWTUCKET RED SOX: 6-1 WIN (11 INNINGS) AT SYRACUSE (NATIONALS)

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– Middlebrooks had yet another tremendous game, going 3-for-4 with a homer in five plate appearances. Almost as notable was Middlebrooks’ walk, his second of the year, on a full-count pitch. While it would be easy to look at an OBP (.389) that is just 24 points higher than his average and conclude that Middlebrooks is a free-swinger who will struggle against more advanced pitching, that doesn’t appear to be quite accurate.

Middlebrooks has simply shown a consistent ability not to miss the pitches that he feels he can drive. Moreover, he has a well-defined approach when at the plate, looking to get in advantage counts and then to drive pitches that are middle-away from center to right-center. (His homer on Wednesday was to center off of Nats starter John Lannan.)

“He’s never been a high-walks guy, but right now he’s getting a lot of pitches to hit. He’s not striking out a lot and he’s not chasing a lot of bad pitches,” said Sox farm director Ben Crockett. “No matter what, to some extent, that’s the kind of hitter he’s going to be with some power, but his approach, more than anything, in terms of being able to use the entire field, it makes it hard for pitchers to pitch to him because of that. It’s really his strength. His ability to drive the ball to right field makes him dangerous.”

The 23-year-old ranks fourth in the International League with a .365 average, fourth with a .654 slugging mark, fifth with a 1.043 OPS, is tied for third with four homer runs and second with 12 RBI. He is currently scorching, with four multi-hit games in his last five contests, a stretch in which he’s 9-for-21 with three homers and nine RBI. Anytime that a top prospect goes on such a run — particularly at the start of the year, when there are no slumps on a player’s record to drag numbers down from the stratosphere, it is natural to suggest he’s ready for the big leagues.

Crockett, while noting that all players in Triple-A are by definition close to the majors, still has just over 100 plate appearances in Triple-A to his credit.

“It’s still really early in the season. Obviously we’re happy and pleased with the way things have started, but we’re [14] games into the season so I think speculation beyond that is premature. [But] If the numbers finish like this,” Crockett mused, “we’ll be pretty happy.”

– Aaron Cook has perhaps two starts left before he can opt out of the minor league deal he signed with the Red Sox, but it seems safe to say that there’s virtually no chance that he’ll be in the minors (whether for the Sox or another team) by the time that May rolls around. Cook’s third start of the year was not his best; he walked four, struck out none and threw just 50 of 92 pitches for strikes. Yet he tossed eight innings, allowing one run on two hits, and he induced 13 more groundball outs. Read the rest of this entry »

Right-hander Matt Barnes has thrown 10 scoreless innings to start his pro career. (John Corneau / Lowell Spinners)

Aaron Cook and Rich Hill both looked like pitchers who will be able to offer meaningful depth to the Red Sox in the near future (indeed, Cook could probably do so right now), while power-hitting prospects Will Middlebrooks and Bryce Brentz showed, well, power.

Further down, it was a mixed bag for pitching prospects in the lower minors, with left-hander Drake Britton getting hammered, but 2011 first-rounder Matt Barnes dominating. The details:

TRIPLE-A PAWTUCKET RED SOX: 4-3 WIN AT ROCHESTER (TWINS)

– Aaron Cook‘s sinker once again performed its distinctive sort of magic. He recorded 15 outs, 10 of which were on grounders with three more coming via strikeout. He was, however, slightly efficient than in his previous outing (a seven-inning complete game), as Cook tossed 81 pitches (54 strikes) over his five innings.

– Jose Iglesias was 0-for-3 but had two walks. For a player whose plate discipline has been questioned, that represented a milestone of sorts. It was the first time that Iglesias has walked multiple times in Triple-A; he had two two-walk games in Double-A in 2010.

– Will Middlebrooks continued the excellent start to his season. His two-out, three-run homer in the bottom of the sixth (this one to center field) was part of a 2-for-4 night that left the 23-year-old hitting .343/.343/.571/.914 with two homers in nine games.

– Outfielder Alex Hassan, who got off to an 0-for-17 start in Triple-A, went 3-for-4 with a double to get the roundest of numbers (.000) off of his stat line. While Hassan’s .143 average is nothing to text home about, it is worth noting that he has walked seven times and struck out just four this year, suggesting a player who is controlling the strike zone and for whom improved results were likely just a matter of time. It is interesting to note that Hassan has a higher OBP (.347) than Middlebrooks (.343), the latter of whom has yet to walk this year.

– Right-hander Junichi Tazawa tossed two shutout innings, striking out four, walking one and not allowing a hit. In three appearances this year (each a two-inning outing), he has struck out nine.

DOUBLE-A PORTLAND SEA DOGS: 4-3 VS. BINGHAMTON (METS)

– The ability to regulate effort level has been a significant consideration for Bryce Brentz in the almost two years since the Red Sox drafted him as a supplemental first rounder in the 2010 draft. By his own admission, he was trying to hit five-run homers while struggling in his poor debut in Lowell in 2010, but then erupted for 30 homers last year as he came to realize that he didn’t always need to hit the ball beyond the horizon. Read the rest of this entry »