We note this only because it took Ramirez until Aug. 9 to hit his second home run last year. We are only 10 games into the season, and there's still plenty of time for Ramirez to fall back into his seemingly annual April slump, but right now the veteran shortstop is easily off to the best start of his career.
Ramirez, a lifetime .279 hitter, on average hits 33 points below that in April. It is far and away his worst month. Here are the April numbers for his career:
2008: .121/.147/.182, 0 HRs, 2 RBIs
2009: .214/.273/.286, 1 HR, 9 RBIs
2010: .221/.231/.312, 1 HR, 8 RBIs
2011: .265/.318/.382, 3 HRs, 10 RBIs
2012: .207/.233/.264, 1 HR, 6 RBIs
2013: .281/.316/.382, 1 HR, 4 RBIs
2014: .421/.463/.684, 2 HR, 9 RBIs
Career: .246/.284/.347, 9 HR, 48 RBIs
Obviously, there is no chance Ramirez will continue to hit over .400 for the remainder of April. But with three weeks worth of games to go in the month, he only needs one more home run and one more RBI to equal the most productive April of his career. I like his odds of bettering that this year.
A good start from Ramirez has been one of the pleasant surprises so far for the Sox.
Ramirez hit a two-run homer in the ninth inning Sunday to give the Sox a 4-3 win over the Indians. He now has three home runs and 12 RBIs and has hit in all 13 games thus far. Even if he does nothing the rest of the month, this is officially the most productive April of his career.
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