Ballou on Baseball: August 23, 2023

Today’s Red Sox may or may not have been nicknamed the “Speed Boys” back in the days of Teddy Roosevelt, but the name did not stick, nor did the style of play.

For most of the organization’s history its attitude towards the stolen base was summed up by manager Joe Morgan in 1990. When asked during spring training why Boston teams didn’t run more, he responded, “Why don’t we run? Because we can’t, sir.”

Those days are gone and probably forever. The Worcester Red Sox can run and they do, sir, especially this season. The WooSox finished their recent homestand with 171 steals. That is already 23 more than the prior Boston Triple-A record of 148 set by the 1983 Pawtucket Red Sox. The WooSox have stolen at least 100 bases every year they have been in the city.

David Hamilton could break the Boston Triple-A record for stolen bases in a season on the current road trip. He had 48 heading to Rochester. Lee Graham holds the mark with 51 in 1983. The only other Sox Triple-A player with at least 50 is Dave Mann. He had 50 for the Minneapolis Millers playing the outfield along side Carl Yastrzemski.

Worcester manager Chad Tracy spoke about how speed has become a more important part of — not just his team’s game — but the sport as a whole.

“The game is changing for sure,” he said. “With the rules in place now, you have the ability to be more aggressive on the bases which I think is what Major League Baseball wanted to see. The personnel we have on our roster has allowed us to be more aggressive but the rules changes have really pushed the envelope.”

Outs are precious, so running into them on the bases can be rally killers. The science says a team’s success rate has to be pretty overwhelming to make it worthwhile to steal. The 2023 WooSox are 171-for-215, close to 80 percent successful.

“It has to be around 72, 73 percent,” Tracy said. “Otherwise you’re mathematically costing your team runs.”

Even that math is imperfect, though. With Hamilton often the bait at first base, Tracy will green-light him with a teammate at third.

“There have been times this year,” the manager said, “where we’ve had runers and first and third and I’ve sent a runner, and we’ve been running into an out on purpose. There are two outs, two strikes and we feel like we can steal a run at the plate. It might cost us a caught stealing, but it stole us a run.”

What makes these running WooSox unique is their combination of speed and power. Adding up homers and steals brings them to 361. Since Boston began having Triple-A affiliates in the late 1930s, the only other team with 300 combined is the 1998 PawSox with 187 homers and and 132 steals. That was a good team at 77-64.

All things remaining equal, which actually rarely happens in Triple-A, Hamilton and the 2023 WooSox will set speed records that will shatter anything previous. And it may be just the beginning, not the end, of the new Speed Boys era.

TRIPLE-A TRIVIA

1. Who is the only active major league manager who also managed a Red Sox Triple-A affiliate?

2. Which American college has produced the most Worcester Red Sox players?

Answers below.

CATCHING UP WITH….

Pitcher Darin Gillies, a right-handed reliever who pitched in six games for the WooSox last year, is a clinical specialist at Abbott Neuromodulation in Scottsdale, Ariz.

Roberto Ramos is the regular first baseman for the Mexico City Red Devils in his native country. He is batting .291 with 12 homers and 45 RBIs for the first-place Red Devils. Ramos played in 39 games for Worcester last season and is one of four WooSox batters with a game-ending home run to his credit.

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You never know who’ll you see at Polar Park. Last week featured a visit from former Boston and Pawtucket Red Sox infielder Tim Naehring, Vice-President of Baseball Operations for the Yankees. He had a pre-game chat Friday with Mike Tamburro of the Pawtucket-then-WooSox ownership group, a reunion that put together two of the best people ever to be part of the Red Sox organization. … Since replay is part of baseball, for better or worse, shouldn’t ejections be subject to review also? That might have let Chad Tracy stay in Thursday night’s game after the WooSox tried to let the umpires know that SWB pitcher Mitch Spence was throwing the ball from six inches in front of the rubber in the first inning. Tracy was run by plate umpire Trevor Dannegger who, coincidentally, was working his first WooSox game ever behind the plate. … Still doing research on the Kyle Barraclough thing, but at 8-0 it appears he has tied Allen Ripley for the best beginning to a Boston Triple-A season. Ripley was 8-0 to the start the year for the 1977 Pawtucket Red Sox, then lost a decision. The best perfect pitching seasons in at least PawSox-WooSox history belong to Australian reliever Ryan Rowland-Smith, who was 7-0 in 2013 for Pawtucket and Tomo Ohka. Ohka was 7-0 for the PawSox in 1999, all decisions as a starting pitcher.

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Worcester batters are up to 27 triples for the season, the most for one of Boston’s Triple-A affiliates since the 2012 PawSox also had 27. The last time a PawSox team broke the 30 mark was 2008 when they had 32. … A good sign for the future — the WooSox have eight hitters with at least 10 home runs and four are Triple-A rookies. That list includescurrent Boston Red Sox Wilyer Abreu, David Hamilton, Ceddanne Rafaela and Stephen Scott. All told Worcester has 52 homers from Triple-A rookies. … Abreu’s 12-game hitting streak included six multi-hit games and 12 of his 20 hits have been for extra bases. He was 20 for 41 (.488) to lift his average from .240 to .274, had 23 RBIs and had walked eight times before getting promoted to Boston on Tuesday (and getting his first two big league hits later that night in Houston. … Strange but true and possibly irrelevant — no WooSox catcher has been charged with a passed ball over the last 30 games. That is after they had 25 passed balls in the season’s first 89 games.

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The SWB series was a wild one except for the middle games which ended 2-1 and 3-1. Otherwise, Worcester pitching allowed 12 runs on Friday but won the game. That marked the first time the WooSox had won when the opposition scored in double figures. They are 1-41 in such games.

Worcester batters struck out 18 times on Tuesday. That’s the third time that has happened but the first time since May, 2021 in the franchise’s opening games versus Buffalo in Trenton.

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THE WEEK AHEAD…..

The WooSox are scheduled for six games at Innovative Field in Rochester where they went 2-4 during a series in May. On Tuesday night in Rochester, Worcester broke the 1,000,000 mark in all-time road attendance.

Before this season the ballpark was named Frontier Field and the name change has not worked well for Worcester. The WooSox were 14-6 at Frontier Field.

The Red Wings had lost four in a row and were 2-8 in their last 10 games before rallying to beat the WooSox on Tuesday, 8-7. Former WooSox infielder Jeter Downs had spent August with the parent Washington Nationals but was optioned to Rochester this week.

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TRIVIA ANSWERS

1. Diamondbacks skipper Torey Luvullo managed the 2010 Pawtucket Red Sox for just that one season. The PawSox finished the year with a 66-78 record.

2. Four different WooSox players came out of the University of Arizona, more than any other school. They are Bobby Dalbec, Jett Bandy, Rob Refsnyder and Cam Cannon.