The Boston Red Sox come home to Fenway Park after a 3-4 road trip to start the 2025 season.
Alex Cora’s club lost three straight games after an Opening Day win to drop their first series in Texas against the Rangers. The Red Sox responded and won the final two games of their set in Baltimore to earn a series victory over the Orioles.
Boston starts the home slate with a losing record overall but showed plenty of encouraging signs, maybe none more than the first hits of the season for Rafael Devers.
The Red Sox take on the St. Louis Cardinals on Friday and give the Fenway Faithful the first look at the new-look Boston squad with increased star power and postseason expectations.
Here are three reasons for optimism as the Red Sox take the field at Fenway Park for their home opener.
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Better Bullpen
The Red Sox had serious questions to answer about the bullpen coming out of camp.
Liam Hendriks remains on the injured list with elbow inflammation. Aroldis Chapman, Justin Slaten and Garrett Whitlock are all worthy of leverage innings, but how would the group hold together?
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There’s so much baseball left this season, 155 games to be exact, but the early return is an overperforming bullpen that got the job done against two talented American League lineups in the Rangers and the Orioles.
Boston’s bullpen ERA sat around 2.00 over the first seven games of the season and Whitlock’s return as a reliever already proves to be the wisest pitching decision of all for the Red Sox.
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Bats Are Revived
Cold bats, runners left on base and failure to get the big hit plagued the Red Sox in their four losses so far this season.
It took time as Devers, Alex Bregman, Triston Casas and Trevor Story failed to offer production as the depended-upon heart of the order. That all started to change in the last two games in Baltimore.
Devers finally recorded his first hit with a well-timed RBI double Wednesday night and added a single to break free from his slew of strikeouts. Bregman, Casas and Story all homered as well to get real production from the bats that will carry the Red Sox this season.
The Future Is Secured
The Red Sox have two new faces in town who drove Boston to early success.
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The club went 2-0 in Garrett Crochet’s first two starts and he looks like every bit of the ace Boston traded for him to be. Kristian Campbell made his MLB debut after a meteoric rise as an elite prospect last year. He’s done nothing but hit so far with a pair of home runs and hard contact all over the ballpark.
The Red Sox ensured both players would be in Boston for the foreseeable future with a pair of key contract extensions.
Boston inked Crochet to a six-year deal reportedly worth $170 million while Campbell signed on for eight years and a reported $60 million with a pair of team options at the back end of that deal.
Crochet and Campbell very well could be All-Stars this season in the first of now lengthy Red Sox careers ahead of them.
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Featured image via Mitch Stringer/Imagn Images
