The Boston Red Sox had quite the exciting offseason. They began the offseason in the middle of the Juan Soto sweepstakes, which was quite an exciting time for the baseball world. Soto didn't end up picking the Red Sox, but the fact that they were involved should excite fans.
Boston proceeded to swing a huge trade for Garrett Crochet. In his time with Boston during spring training and the early portion of this season, Crochet has looked like an ace with Cy Young potential. Boston also added Walker Buehler to the rotation before bringing in Alex Bregman to play third base.
Bregman was the huge addition that brought everybody excitement except for starting third baseman Rafael Devers. The addition of Bregman meant the poor defensive Devers would need to slot in as the team's new designated hitter.
After showing a bit of reluctance to the move, Devers finally accepted the position, but this season could not have gotten off to a worse start for him in his new role.
For more news and rumors, check out MLB Insider Robert Murray’s work on The Baseball Insiders podcast, subscribe to The Moonshot, our weekly MLB newsletter, and join the discord to get the inside scoop between now and the MLB offseason.
Rafael Devers is on pace to shatter the single season strikeout record
On his career, Devers is slashing .279/.346/.511 with a strikeout percentage of 23 percent as a third baseman. As a DH, he's slashing .237/.286/.423 with a strikeout percentage near 40 percent. That includes this season in which he's 0 for 16 with 12 strikeouts, all coming as a DH. Giancarlo Stanton and others have spoken in the past that hitting as a DH is a bit tougher because you're not as engaged to the game. It seems as though Devers is feeling that first hand.
With 12 strikeouts in four games, that puts him on pace for nearly 500 strikeouts this season. Considering he only had 525 at-bats last year, this number is obviously a bit off base because of the small sample size.
But that doesn't mean he couldn't contend to break the single season strikeout record in 2025.
The single season strikeout record is held by Mark Reynolds who struck out a staggering 223 times in 2009. Only 21 different seasons have seen a player strikeout at least 200 times. This includes Elly De La Cruz who struck out 218 times in 2024.
It's unlikely Devers breaks this record though. He's far too good of a hitter to continue to struggle like this. Plus, Seiya Suzuki has already struck out 12 times this year, too. Multiple other hitters have over eight strikeouts.