FORT MYERS, Fla. - Before Saturday's game against Northeastern University, Boston Red Sox Manager Bobby Valentine described Ryan Sweeney as a hitter who is still trying to find himself, from a mechanical standpoint.

Pehaps the work he has done this spring with hitting coach Dava Magadan will pay off sooner than expected.

While college pitching isn't the best gauge for a hitter's progress, Sweeney did take some fine cuts amid a 4-for-5 performance that included a double, homer and five RBIs.

"I've sat down with the hitting coach and talked about my swing, and I'm just trying to get back to some of the stuff I've been doing in '08 and '09 as far as rhythm at the plate," said Sweeney.

"I didn't really have a lot of rhythm last year at the plate because I wasn't in there every day. I've been working on a few things with my hands, just trying to get in a good rhythm and maybe a little bit of lift on the ball."

(The Red Sox obtained Sweeney, from Cedar Rapids, in a trade with the Oakland A's during the winter.)

While Sweeney has hit for average during his career, the power hasn't come yet. Why is that?

"Bad mechanics," Valentine suspected. "Doesn't know himself as a hitter ... Oh, he's hit some balls really far. He was the one early on who was hitting them into the bullpen over there when we were warming up.

"Branch Rickey said, if you see a guy hit a ball 500 feet, that means he has Major League power. It's up to the coaches to get him to perform at the Major League level."

In Saturday's game, Sweeney walloped a homer over the Boston bullpen in right-center in his final at-bat.

Though Valentine said earlier in the winter he's not a huge fan of platoons, he said that Sweeney could very well get the bulk of starts against righties, while Cody Ross plays against leftties.

"When the game starts, that might be exactly the way it works so that they understand where they are," Valentine said. "As the game progresses, when I say strict platoons, if it's the fifth inning and we're up 5-0 and they bring in a left-hander, I expect Sweeney to hit. If they bring in a right-hander, I would expect Ross to hit. That kind of thing."