Triston Casas' thinks his 'swing plays well' at Fenway Park; wants to control the inner part of plate

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Red Sox first baseman Triston Casas was subject to trade rumors during the offseason after being limited to just 63 games last season.

Casas dealt with torn cartilage in his left rib cage, an injury he suffered early on in the year when the Red Sox were on the road playing the Pirates.

Now healthy, Casas is in camp this spring, focused on staying healthy and turning himself into one of the premier hitters in the game. Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow has been open all offseason that Casas has the ability to hit 40 homers and drive in 120 RBI.

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“I think that is the expectation for the first baseman of the Boston Red Sox. I think if I’m not able to do that, then I don’t deserve a job here,” Casas said, per The Boston Globe’s Alex Speier. “I don’t feel that’s out of my reach. I feel like that’s something that’s very possible for me to accomplish.

“I appreciate (Craig Breslow’s) vote of confidence in myself, but that is the caliber of hitter that I need to be to stay in this position that I am. I’ve put in plenty of work to be able to go out there and accomplish it, but it’s just a matter of staying healthy and being out there on the field for, say, 150-plus games. I think that it’s very reasonable.”

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Only nine players in Red Sox history have gone 40/120 in a season, including the likes of J.D. Martinez, David Ortiz, Mo Vaughn, and Manny Ramirez.

Is it possible that Casas could raise the bar at the plate and go 40/120 in a season? Speier points out in his article that over the final 54 games of Casas’ rookie season in 2023, the slugger hit .317/.417/.617 with 15 homers and 38 RBIs—numbers that would project to 45 homers and 134 RBIs over 162 games.

Red Sox skipper Alex Cora has mentioned this spring that Casas has been trying to drive the ball to left-center field. Once the Red Sox get back to Fenway Park in a few weeks, Casas is prepared to tattoo the Green Monster.

“My swing plays well in our home field,” said Casas. “If I’m able to control the inner part of the plate and drive it to left-center, I think that’s the Mount Rushmore of a great hitter, being able to take an inside pitch and drive it to the opposite field. I think that’s the next step in my game.

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“I know my strength is up the middle to right-center. That’s what I get this opportunity to do this job for, is to drive the ball in the air, hit homers, hit doubles, and a lot of the time it’s going to happen to the pull side. But I feel that if I have that mind-set of driving middle, middle-in pitches towards left-center—and that doesn’t mean left field, that doesn’t mean down the left-field line, I want to hit it hard towards the shortstop—I feel like it’s going to help me stay on other pitches towards right-center.”