26-year old righty swinging Dustin Pedroia followed up his MVP season in 2008 with a solid 2009. Pedroia played in 154 games for the Red Sox last season and he was 185 for 626 (.296 avg, .818 OPS) with 115 runs scored, 15 homers, 72 RBIs and 20 stolen bases. Pedroia will continue seeing a lot of fastballs batting between Jacoby Ellsbury and Kevin Youkilis so look for him to continue to pound the ball in 2010. Pedroia only made six errors in 154 games at 2B last season for the Red Sox but he has poor range which is often overlooked by the media up north. Still, he makes plays on the balls he gets to. His defense is the reason that the Red Sox would have made a big mistake by moving him to shortstop which they briefly considered before signing Marco Scutaro to start there.

30-year old righty swinging Bill Hall will back-up Pedroia at 2B as he can play almost anywhere on the field. Hall played in 3 games at 2B last season and he didn’t make any errors while also showing poor range there.

PROJECTED GRADE FOR THE 2B IN 2010: A