The Red Sox are likely to add to their 60-man Summer Camp player pool this week, manager Ron Roenicke said Monday following Boston’s intrasqaud game at Fenway Park.
Per Roenicke, he is going to meet with Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom and a few other people to discuss who should be added to Boston’s Summer Camp pool.
As things currently stand, the Sox have 50 players in their pool after adding left-hander Mike Kickham to the roster over the weekend. In other words, they have 10 open slots to work with between now and Friday if they want to be at full capacity.
Players added to the pool this week, as well as the players who are optioned or reassigned to minor-league camp, will report to the club’s alternate training site in Pawtucket on Friday, as noted by MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo.
With 10 open spots in the roster pool available, who could Bloom, Roenicke, and Co. choose? Well, that’s a somewhat difficult question to answer.
There seems to be two realistic possibilities here, with the first being add top prospects from within the organization, and the second being to add players from outside the organization.
“We’ve talked about both ways in doing it,” Roenicke said on June 29 when asked which direction the Sox will take in filling out the rest of the player pool.
With there being no minor-league baseball at all in 2020, top Red Sox prospects like Jeter Downs, Triston Casas, Bryan Mata, Tanner Houck, Jay Groome, Thad Ward, and Jarren Duran could benefit from being under the watchful eye of their parent organization as they continue to develop.
None of these aforementioned propsects are quite ready for the majors yet, but they could certainly use the playing time if they are in the Sox’ long-term plans.
On the other hand, Boston could pursue veteran free agents who already have plenty of major-league experience under their belts and would be ready to contribute right away. The club has recently been linked to outfielder Yasiel Puig and right-hander Aaron Sanchez.
Of course, who the Red Sox add is likely dependent on COVID-19 testing results. That is mainly why the team has waited this long to fill out the rest of the 60-man player pool.
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