Last night,
J.D. Drew hit his 19th home run of the season, tying his total from last year. His next home run will rank as only the fourth time in 11 full seasons that he’s reached that plateau.
Outside of a .217/.316/.361 line in June, Drew has been turning in a great year. It is easy to get on Drew when his batting average seems to be hovering in the .230s and he’s always dinged up. But let’s take a second here, step back, and see how valuable Drew has been to the Sox.
Throwing out 2007 and his grand slam to ice the ALCS in Game Six, Drew has a .272/.395/.505 line, not including last night’s game. To have a line like that out of your right fielder is immensely valuable.
To compare, I ran a comparison of batters with at least 800 plate appearances over the last two years from the beginning of 2008 to August 31, 2009.
The first right fielder to show up on the list is Ryan Ludwick of the St. Louis Cardinals. Drew checks in at eighth, behind Andre Ethier, Justin Upton, Jermaine Dye, Brad Hawpe, Jayson Werth and Shin-Soo Choo. (Vladimir Guerrero was disqualified as he is no longer a “true” right fielder.)
So over the past two years, it’s easy to say that Drew has been a Top-10 right fielder, offensively.
Now, how about defensively? Glad you asked. Drew ranks No. 1 among all right fielders in 2009 with a 13.6 UZR/150 (Ultimate Zone Rating divided by 150, to equalize among players with dissimilar playing time). Drew is ahead of Nelson Cruz and Justin Upton by a point or more, and eons ahead of the rest.
In 2008, Drew did not qualify for the rankings because he only played in 109 games total. He played 886 total innings in right (with an additional 5.2 in center), so when setting the cutoff at 850, you get Drew ranking third behind Randy Winn and Kosuke Fukudome.
So now we know Drew’s been a top fielder — top three at worst. With all this told, wouldn’t you consider J.D. Drew a top five right fielder? I would.
33, Drew has two years left on his deal. The Sox can opt out of either 2010 or 2011 provided Drew spends 35 days on the disabled list in one of the two years with an injury related to the pre-existing right shoulder woes that plagued Drew or if he finishes 2009 or 2010 on the disabled list and cannot play outfield the following year.
It’s safe to say that at the very least, Drew will be our right fielder in 2010 and probably 2011. And is that such a bad thing?
Josh Reddick took the Red Sox by storm earlier this year. His final line was unimpressive, but if you watched him on a daily basis it was hard not to get excited about him. It’s unfortunate that it looks as if he can’t take over in right for two more years.
Or is it unfortunate?
Drew needed a learning curve to learn the American League in 2007. One might intimate that he needed that same curve in 2008, because his obscenely hot streak in June of last year coincided with interleague play. But so far this year, he’s been contributing offensively. As your No. 8 hitter in the lineup, that’s very impressive.
Unlike in most stops Drew has been at, Sox fans haven’t grown frustrated by his “cool” demeanor — I think Sox fans have seen enough people come through the clubhouse to understand that everyone handles things differently.
What Sox fans grew annoyed with — myself included — was his constant yo-yoing of inconsistency. He’d be hot, average or cold at any given point. Even in June, I was throwing my hands up and saying “here we go again” but to his credit, he turned it around.
So let’s take a step back and give props to J.D. Drew for being a great right fielder for the Boston Red Sox.