Red Sox Rookie Development Program – Jose Iglesias Looking Sharp
The Red Sox are in the middle of their Rookie Development Program this winter and shortstop Jose Iglesias is looking good. Iglesias is also using the time to get used to living in a new country with new culture and way of life. So far so good for the Cuban defector whom the Red Sox signed in September 2009 to be their “shortstop of the future”.
Iglesias also got to walk on Fenway Park grass for the 1st time in his life. It was a great moment for the young superstar: “It was quite an experience. I found myself in that stadium and it was a really pretty thing. I just felt like I had this chemistry with the ballpark and I could see myself at one point playing in this ballpark, and it was just a tremendous experience for me personally.” Did someone write this stuff for him? Red Sox Nation is going to eat this up!
Iglesias is only 20 years old and he is taking his time learning the language. Iglesias played in the Arizona Fall League and excelled against older, more polished minor league players who have been around the block a few times. Iglesias got his 1st taste of American baseball justice when he show-boated a little too much after a home run during a game. The next time up, the pitcher plunked him. It was a good learning experience for Iglesias: “You could call it a rookie mistake. It’s very different from where I come from in Cuba, where exuberance after a homer is something normal. I did take it and I learned from the bruise. Hopefully it won’t happen again.”
The Red Sox organization is confident that Iglesias is already capable of fielding the shortstop position at the major league level. The question is how quickly he will be able to adjust to the pitching. Another Red Sox top prospect – pitcher Casey Kelly – was on Iglesias’ team in the Arizona Fall League and he came away impressed with Iglesias’ abilities: “He does some stuff that you just kind of sit there and go, ‘Wow’. You don’t know what to say. He’s only 20 years old. He’s going to get better and better as he goes along. There were a couple of plays he made in Arizona where everyone in the dugout looked at each other with just a stunned face, like, ‘Did he just do that?’”
Sounds like Iglesias is on the right track. Let’s just hope someone is there to mentor him through the process so that he has the right attitude to achieve success at the major league level at Fenway Park in the near future…