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    Home»Massachusetts»Simplification key to Red Sox’ Ceddanne Rafaela becoming ‘premier player’
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    Simplification key to Red Sox’ Ceddanne Rafaela becoming ‘premier player’

    BostonSportsNewsBy BostonSportsNewsJuly 12, 2025No Comments6 Mins Read
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    Simplification key to Red Sox’ Ceddanne Rafaela becoming ‘premier player’
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    Looking at the Red Sox, who on any given night have at least three rookies in their starting lineup (including Roman Anthony, who only celebrated his 21st birthday in May) it’s easy to forget that Ceddanne Rafaela hasn’t been here very long, either.

    Called up for his debut on Aug. 28, 2023, he’s only 269 games into his big-league career. He’s also the third-youngest player on the active roster, his 25th birthday still over two months away (Sept. 18).

    So it’s no surprise that Rafaela is an unfinished product.

    The defense is never in doubt. Manager Alex Cora regularly refers to him as the “best defensive center fielder” in the game. Cora also announced Friday that Rafaela, who made history last year as the only player since at least 1901 to play at least 60 games apiece at center and shortstop in the same season, will be “in the mix” for second base moving forward.

    Over the last several weeks, however, Rafaela has looked more and more like the hitter the Red Sox believe he will be for many years to come. He entered Friday with MLB’s longest active streaks in games with a run scored (7) and games with an RBI (6). In franchise history, he’s only the sixth player younger than 25 to both score a run and record an RBI in six consecutive games. Ever heard of Ted Williams? Bobby Doerr? How about Babe Ruth? Not bad company to be in.

    “Finally, I started to feel how I wanted to feel, and how I wanted to help the team,” Rafaela told the Herald. “I think that gives a player a lot of confidence, when you’re doing good.”

    It’s much more than a six- or seven-game streak at this point, though. Since June 20, Rafaela is batting .343 with a 1.1342 OPS that ranks fourth in the American League. He’s hit six home runs and driven in 17 RBI in that span, during which he also leads the majors in doubles (10), extra-base hits (16), slugging percentage (.761) and total bases (51, tied).

    “I feel like I’m seeing the ball pretty good,” he self-assessed. “Numbers-wise, I’m swinging the same percent of the time, but just, I’m squaring the ball more frequently. I’m swinging at better pitches in the zone.”

    “He’s finishing at-bats,” hitting coach Pete Fatse told the Herald. “The contact rates in zone have gone up exponentially. He’s hitting the ball hard, obviously, tapping into some of the pull-side power now, which is nice, but he’s a very intuitive guy, he’s a very smart player… It’s been cool to see him, getting him as a kid in ’23, the youngest guy on the roster at that point, through now and seeing his progression. I’m just excited for him and what the future holds for him.”

    For a player who last year struck out at a 26.4% clip and walked just 2.6% of the time, the advancements are somewhat staggering. This year, Rafaela is striking out just 19.4% and walking at a rate of 4.8%. His average exit velocity is up 4.4%, and his hard-hit rate has skyrocketed from 36.9% last year, to 48%. His Isolated Power (ISO) is .199, a 56-point jump from last season, and 40 points better than league average. After finishing last year with 2.8 Wins Above Replacement, he’s been worth 3.8 WAR this year.

    “I feel like we’re watching him blossom into one of the premier players in our game,” said Rob Refsnyder. “I think he should have been an All-Star, but I just think I’m watching Rafaela really turn into one of the best players in our game. It’s really cool to see.”

    At 34 years old, Refsnyder is the team’s oldest position player, and one of the veteran leaders in the clubhouse. He’s been with the Red Sox since 2022, and has seen how far Rafaela has come since his debut the following summer. He and Fatse both pointed to simplification as one of the biggest changes to Rafaela’s game.

    “If you watch the first year he was in the big leagues with the Red Sox until now, his mechanical adjustments have been incredible,” said Refsnyder. “I don’t know if we’ve highlighted enough how much simpler he’s gotten, and you can see him gaining confidence with his new setup and his new approach. I haven’t really asked him too much about it, but his hands are just a little bit simpler, his movements are quieter.”

    “A lot of it is, he’s made a conscious effort to simplify his move,” Fatse said. “It started in the offseason, it’s progressed into the season now where I feel like he’s in a place where his moves, the actual mechanics of his swing are very simple.

    “I think any time you can simply your swing and you feel like you can cover more pitches in the zone, you can use your aggressiveness to your benefit because you’re able to finish at-bats with balls in play. When there’s a lot going on, there’s big movements, I think at times the precision gets lost.”

    Like many of his teammates, Rafaela gives a lot of credit to a newcomer: Alex Bregman. The veteran third baseman has helped countless teammates simplify their processes and hone their craft.

    “Bregman helped me a lot this year,” Rafaela said, “He’s been a huge part of what I’m doing right now. He’s probably 90%.”

    “I think guys are a little bit better in their routines, kind of knowing what to focus on,” echoed Refsnyder. “Bregman’s done a really good job of just trying to simplify so many different things.”

    Rafaela also modestly credits something else: the weather.

    “When the season started I was having good (at-bats), hitting the ball well,” he explained. “I think it’s this time of the year, the ball is just flying more. It’s helping me. When the year starts, the ball doesn’t really travel as much, but I think this time of the year, you cannot hope to be in a better place than here.”

    All things Rafaela is getting used to, though he has plenty of time to adjust. At the start of last season, the Red Sox signed him to an eight-year, $50 million extension through 2031, with a club option for ‘32. Now that he’s over a year in, he can look back and say that it took some time to adjust to the contract.

    “I didn’t really put pressure on myself,” he said, “probably just wanted to do too much, to show others, and that’s probably something I didn’t do good. And I forgot the type of player I can be, the type of player I am.”

     

    Originally Published: July 11, 2025 at 7:14 PM EDT



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