Red Sox Prediction: Jorge Alfaro

The additions of Kenley Jansen and Masataka Yoshida, along with the Rafael Devers extensions, are certainly the deals that will grab the most attention from this offseason, but sometimes it is the under-the-radar additions that turn out to be the best. We saw this firsthand last season with John Schreiber and Rob Refsnyder, two players who were viewed as depth pieces who turned out to be key contributors to the big-league club.

If there’s a leading candidate for this season’s Schreiber of Refsnyder, it has to be Jorge Alfaro. I, like many others, expected Alfaro to land a major league contract, and was pleasantly surprised when the Red Sox got him on a minor league deal. The tools are absolutely off the charts. He’s got powers for days, evident by a max exit velocity that ranked in the 97th percentile. He’s fast enough to rank in the 85th percentile in sprint speed, athletic enough to handle a corner outfield position, and has a strong enough arm to rank in the 96th percentile in pop time. Of all the free agent catchers, perhaps only Wilson Contreras could match Alfaro’s ceiling.

While Alfaro has always been immensely talented, putting his tools to good use has been the challenge. His plate discipline is just atrocious, as he has 566 career strikeouts against just 70 walks. Alfaro can drive the ball with the best of them, but that ability gets diluted when you strikeout a whopping 35.8% of the time, as he did in 2022. Alfaro got off to a smoking hot start last year, but a 5-46 stretch to finish the regular season cost him playing time in October and millions of dollars in free agency. On defense, his framing grades out as below-average, and he threw out only 5 of 30 attempted stolen bases despite his pop time.

Even with all that being said, when you compare Alfaro to his catcher competitor Connor Wong, it’s hard not to say that Alfaro has the clear advantage. Wong cannot match any of Alfaro raw tools and looked even more overmatched than Alfaro during his cup of coffee last September. Alfaro has experience, versatility and talent on his side, and with a .269/.310/.463 career slash line versus left-handers, is a much better fit to platoon with Resse Mcguire. So even though Wong will likely get the first shot, I expect Alfaro to take over the catching duties vs lefties at some point this season and add some much-needed thump to the Red Sox lineup.

Projected Stats: .231/.284/.391 11 HR 36 RBI 0.4 WAR