Boston Red Sox: Remembering when Dustin Pedroia was superhuman
Boston Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia has accumulated just 32 at-bats the past two seasons. Let’s go back to a time when he was putting up MVP numbers in 2008.
Dustin Pedroia is a perfect ballplayer to be playing for the Boston Red Sox. The blue-collar second baseman was meant to play in Beantown’s no non-sense workhorse city.
Boston is no “what have you done for me lately” kind of place and the Fenway Faithful support Pedroia specifically for what he did in 2008.
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Fresh off winning the 2007 World Series, their second in four years, the Red Sox were hungry for more. Pedroia was fresh off winning the Rookie of the Year award and was equally primed for great results.
In a lineup, full of superstars such as Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, and Kevin Youkilis, it was Dustin Pedroia who filled all the stat columns for the Sox.
He led the team with a 6.9 WAR in 2008 and it wasn’t because he was hitting home runs or driving runs in. He was doing all the little things which help teams win, hence earning him the 2008 Most Valuable Player Award.
His 213 hits led the league and carried him to a .326 batting average. He was on base all the time, so he was coming around to score all the time.
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He led the league with 118 runs scored and poked a league-high 54 doubles to boot. Pedroia stole 20 bases while being caught just one time and had only two fewer walks than strikeouts.
Dustin Pedroia embodied hustle, grit, determination, will, motivation and dedication. He was well worthy of not only the MVP award but also the other hardware he earned in 2008.
He was an All-Star, Silver Slugger, and won a Gold Glove for his work at second base.
Pedroia may have fallen on hard times with his ailing knees, though he’ll continue to have my support.
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True, he is not the player he once was and when all said and done four years of his six-year, $85M contract may end up being worthless. However, he earned that paycheck back the Boston Red Sox gave him in 2008 and for that, I’ll continue to support him torn up knees and all.