Red Sox Hitting Coach Responds to Claims Surrounding Young Player and Coaching Staff

Lawson was responding to McAdams story, which detailed that within the Red Sox organization, there is frustration surrounding Rafaela. The excerpt from McAdams is as follows:

"There's some growing frustration within the Red Sox organization about outfielder Ceddanne Rafaela. More than once, Rafaela has been advised in the dugout to take the first pitch in his next at-bat, only to swing freely minutes later. Rafaela showed in spring training that he can be selective at the plate, but that discipline has mostly disappeared in the regular season."

Rafaela, in 16 games in spring training, had 6 walks to 4 strikeouts. Now in the regular season, Rafaela has just 8 walks to 24 strikeouts across 37 games. The strikeout rate has jumped, while the walk rate has fallen.

But despite that, Rafaela has gotten off to a solid start for Boston. He has a .242 batting average with a .667 OPS. While not the best on the Red Sox, his game is predicated on his fielding and base-running, both of which are in the 99th and 97th percentile respectively according to Baseball Savant.

While Rafaela isn't having a breakout offensive season, he's still been a solid contributor for the Red Sox offensively. He had 30 hits, 22 runs, 6 doubles, 2 triples, 2 home runs, 15 RBI, and 7 stolen bases across 124 at-bats. It's good enough for what the Red Sox need out of him.

But despite his solid start, this report from McAdams calls out Rafaela for his inability to listen to the Red Sox coaching staff, and continue to be aggressive at the plate. 

Lawson, a hitting coach for the Red Sox who would have that type of conversation with Rafaela, responded to that claim by expressing that it's "news to me." Lawson is effectively denying the claim from McAdam surrounding Rafaela not listening to the coaching staff.

McAdam's report is just another layer on top of the ongoing Red Sox drama. While there are metrics which point towards Rafaela's discipline not being as good as it was in spring training, the report from McAdams isn't true according to one of the Red Sox assistant hitting coaches.