Duran has left the yard six times so far this spring. His two most recent homers came against Matthew Boyd in Team Mexico's pool play battle with Team USA, emphasizing the 29-year-old's sizzling start to competitive action this season.
Baseball doesn't actually need defending. It's one of the world's great global games and is enjoyed in various forms by hundreds of millions of people every year. It's going to outlive all of us, I promise. But because of baseball's historical and cultural position in America, it is constantly subjected to a weird kind of forensic analysis that isn't usually applied to other sports: is it dying? Is it too slow?
It's looking increasingly likely that the deal that sent Christian Vazquez to the Houston Astros for Wilyer Abreu will be remembered not only as Chaim Bloom's best trade during his tenure at the helm of the Red Sox, but as one of the best trade's in recent baseball memory. Abreu has already won two Gold Gloves and isn't that far off from making the all-star team.
