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Dateline: Goodyear, Arizona
An eye rolling spring training lineup features TJ Friedl in left field today (022626) against the San Diego Padres.
It is one of those spring training experiments that may or may not be significant when the season starts.
Friedl has been the main character in center field for the last five seasons. The 30-year old leadoff hitter played 362 games in center, 53 in left and 17 in right.
Manager Terry Francona just once to see how it looks in Cactus League under a difficult acid test from the Arizona sky.
"If you don't do something fundamentally right out here, you will pay for it," Francona said. "If you can play outfield here, you can play it anywhere. The high sky, the sun, big outfields, it's interesting."
Francona wants Friedl to get some repetitions in left with the flexibility that the acquisition of Dane Myers brings.
"Myers is such a good center fielder," Francona said. "You try to cover things in spring training so when the season happens, you don't look back as say God dang it, I should have done that in spring training. I talked to TJ about it back a little bit. I betcha he'll play three or for games this spring, not a lot, but just to cover. If we're playing a certain leftie, more times than not, TJ still plays but if Myers is in there it might make sense to put him there."
Myers bats right handed while Friedl's main backup in center is left handed hitting Will Benson.
Noelvi Marte had some problems with the Arizona sky on Sunday against the Seattle Mariners, appearing to lose the ball in the sun.
"He just didn't get back well enough and he knew it right away. To his credit, he came right up to me and goes, I got to get behind it. I said yeah. That ball he caught at the last week of last season, if he drifts on that, he doesn't catch that. And he knew it right away so that's good," Francona said.
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