The Red Sox owe Youkilis $12MM this season and hold a $13MM club option for his services next year ($1MM buyout). Baseball America ranked Middlebrooks as the 51st best prospect in the game before the season, and the 23-year-old is doing his best to show the team he deserves to play the hot corner on the full-time basis. Top prospect Will Middlebrooks has burst onto the scene with three homers and four doubles in his six games with Boston, continuing the hot streak that saw him hit nine homers in 24 games in Triple-A games before being recalled. To make matters worse for Youkilis, the Red Sox have a ready-made third base replacement already in-house. A player with injury concerns and declining performance as he approaches his mid-30s usually isn't someone a team tries to keep around. 308/.404/.560 from 2008-2010 – appears to be very much a thing of the past right now. Dating back to last year's All-Star break, he's produced a. 219/.292/.344 batting line in 72 plate appearances. Prior to being placed on the DL, Youkilis had a.
Since the start of the 2010 season, Youkilis has played in just 240 of 352 possible games (68.2%). It's his fifth trip to the DL in the last four years, part of a laundry list of injuries that includes an oblique strain (2009), thumb surgery (2010), back tightness (2011), and a sports hernia (2011). Youkilis, 33, is currently on the disabled list with a lower back strain. Boston also lost Kevin Youkilis, an important right-handed bat in their lefty heavy lineup. Closer Andrew Bailey, outfielders Carl Crawford and Jacoby Ellsbury, and starters John Lackey and Daisuke Matsuzaka are among the players the team has lost for a significant length of time already in 2012. The Red Sox are among baseball's most disappointing teams so far this season, due in part to injury.
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