Every Team's Most Interesting Player: Boston Red Sox, Andrew Benintendi
This is the fourth in a series of articles about the most interesting player for fantasy owners on each team heading into the 2020 season. We are going alphabetically, so today we’re going to talk about Andrew Benintendi of the Boston Red Sox.
Benintendi was a massive letdown in 2019, entering the year as a 24-year-old coming off a .290, 16-home run, 21-stolen base campaign that was on the heels of a 20/20 2017 showing. The .290 average showed improvement upon his .271 average in ’17, and gave hope that he was becoming an all-around stud. Then, his average dropped to .266 in 2019, and he hit just 13 home runs and stole only 10 bases while missing 24 games. While we were dreaming of Jose Altuve as a ceiling for Benintendi, we ended up with Great Value Nick Markakis. Considering his 2019 ADP (No. 29 overall), that is dreadful return on investment.
A lack of evident bad luck makes 2019 more discouraging. His .333 BABIP was fairly high, and consistent with what he normally produces. His strikeout rate jumped about six points, and the .266 batting average combined with his .271 mark in 2017 makes 2018 look more like an outlier, and less like a trend. For Benintendi to be a star, he needs to make .290 a floor rather than a ceiling, because his power is not cutting it.
Home runs exploded in 2019, and while that may be because of “juiced baseballs,” Benintendi only hit 13 homers. He did not ever post big home run numbers at the minor league level, and he’s topped out at 20 dongs in three full MLB seasons.
His totals have gone down every year in the bigs. His ability to steal bases is a major factor, but so far he has never stolen enough to shoot him toward the top of his position. The 10 steals in 2019 sucked, but that’s probably an anomaly. As a 20-steal player, he’s useful, but he’s not coming near the likes of Trea Turner or Starling Marte unless he gets a lot more aggressive.
This all sounds negative, and you might be asking, what’s so interesting about him then? First, he’s still only 25! By no means am I saying that the potential for him to be an elite fantasy option is gone. Anyone who puts up a 20/20 season as a 23-year-old needs to be given repeated chances at the big league level even when they have awful years, and Benintendi’s only been bad once. Second, I’ve gone on about how he hasn’t shown he’s elite at any skill. But he might emerge as an elite source of an unexpected stat: RBI. Fangraphs’ Rosterresource projects him to be the No. 5 hitter in a stacked Red Sox lineup. Batting in an RBI spot behind Mookie Betts, Rafael Devers, Xander Bogaerts and J.D. Martinez will give him tons of chances to drive in runs. That lineup spot could lessen his aggressiveness on the base paths, but hitting fifth regularly gives him 100+ RBI potential. He also saw a 10% drop in medium contact rate from 2018 to 2019, and that all became hard contact. In a hitter haven like Fenway Park, making hard contact can turn into home runs pretty easily. Despite the highest hard contact percentage of his career, Benintendi posted the lowest home run to fly ball ratio in his three MLB seasons. That’s weird, and should go back to normal if he keeps hitting the ball so hard.
The path is there for him. Raise his average, drive in 100+ RBI, and maybe, get into the 25-30 stolen base range. At 25, a leap is certainly possible, and that’s why he is Boston’s most intriguing player.