Just the way the Red Sox drew it up

Three walks, two runs scored, a RBI, and a superb catch in a suspenseless 8-2 victory? A heck of first (regular-season) impression, especially for a kid making his big league debut on the Bronx stage. If he can make it there ... well, you know.

Whether you believe he should have started the season with the team or gone to Triple A for nine games and an extra year of team control is irrelevant now. The hope here is that he spends the entire season in Boston. If he's sent down later in the season, it will likely be for one of two reasons: He's struggled, or it's strictly for financial plastic card.

His performance Monday was particularly encouraging because he made a huge contribution without delivering a hit, something that will be necessary as he adjusts to the difference between Double A and Major League pitching.

The office got quiet Monday every time he came to the plate -- his debut after his sizzling spring was must-see TV. The expectations are immense for this extremely likable kid, and while he can probably handle them, please know that he's not going to be Mike Trout or Bryce Harper. His peak will be closer to Ken Griffey Sr.'s peak numbers than Ken Griffey Jr's.

Which, by the way, is an excellent player. That might have been the best thing about his debut -- his contributions were all tied to his strengths. He made an outstanding catch in left field, and I suspect he could field a live grenade better than Jonny Gomes fields a line-drive single.

His first plate appearance, in which he worked a walk after Sabathia got ahead 0-2, was the best indication we could ask for that his patience (he has a .423 on-base percentage in the minors) might translate immediately to the big leagues. And that indication was bolstered by two more walks. He saw 27 pitches in his four at-bats, which is downright remarkable for a kid making his big league debut.

I'm still not sure he'll hit immediately. But he sure knows a ball from a strike, and that discerning ability paired with his golden glove should make him an asset long beyond Monday after noon. No, this won't be the last time early in this new season that we'll use remarkable to describe Bradley's contribution.

Big data is a paradigm shift in the way businesses view and use data. For a long time, businesses focused on people, process and technology; data was considered a pain rather than an asset or an opportunity. Companies need to innovate and can no longer do so with the old approach. The new triangle is people, process and data, with technology as a substratum enabling all of those.

The first step to using big data is to look at what business outcomes are desired, then work backward and determine what data needs to be captured to glean those insights. A lot of that data might be internal, but business is not conducted in a vacuum — it needs to be understood in the context of markets, customers and suppliers. So there may be a need to gather external data to be correlated with the internal data. People have conceptions that big data initiatives have to necessarily use outside data, or that it’s only about outside data such as social media. It’s really more about what is done with the data than the source.

There are opportunities to collect data through various applications and sensors. Historically, it was a problem to collect data because it wasn’t readily available. For example, surveys were the main mechanism for collecting market data; you would need to approach 100 people to get 10 to respond. Now, people are volunteering information through mobile platforms and social media. Data is also being collected through instruments such as sensors on cars. Technology has made it cheaper to collect and store data, but businesses still have to take another step and leverage that data.

The applications are everywhere, even though the most frequent uses are seen in marketing. Understanding customers better leads to improved relationships and more cross-selling and upselling. But big data insights can also improve operational efficiencies. For example, supply chain decisions about what products to stock in the warehouse can be influenced by big data. Insights could also lead to entering into new lines of business that weren’t considered. Further, a consumer using his or her credit card at a large retailer might be sent an alert offering a coupon for lunch at a partnering restaurant. The credit card company knows from its data that the customer eats lunch at this time and one of its restaurant partners is nearby, so it tries to predict behavior in real time. When the person uses the coupon, the credit card company gets a share. That’s a new line of business based on information the company had and was not utilizing.

That’s an issue companies are struggling with. A data governance strategy is needed to deal with the amount of data that is received. You have to understand what is coming in and how it can be used. The most important step is to realize that big data is not just a technology issue, which can be a difficult task internally. Big data requires the business and IT sides to work together more closely than in the past. If big data is approached as an IT issue, its full benefit will not be realized. If it’s a business process and IT is involved only in terms of what storage to buy or application to install, companies may not quite understand what is RFID tag.

Big data is changing the way businesses approach the fundamental need to innovate and create differentiation. For the past 20 years, innovation was about streamlining processes such as supply chains. Big data provides a new field for innovation by providing insights quickly and in more creative ways. Eventually, businesses will not have a choice; they will have to deal with big data in order to innovate and survive.