What form might a Red Sox pitching rotation upgrade take this winter?
The team is making no secret of its intention to improve its starting pitching, for obvious reasons. The cumulative 5.34 ERA forged by the Sox rotation in the compressed 60-game season ranked 25th in the majors and made contention virtually impossible in 2020. Of the 16 teams that made the playoffs, just one (Atlanta) ranked worse than 18th in the majors in rotation ERA last season.
It seems hard to imagine the team being worse, and it’s not hard to see some level of improvement with the expected returns of Chris Sale and Eduardo Rodríguez. Sale, now almost nine months removed from Tommy John surgery, is long-tossing with plans to start throwing off a mound in January. His impact, even if he returns to the team around June, could represent a considerable upgrade.
“The recovery is going great,” said B.B. Abbott, Sale’s agent. “If anything, they’ll be holding him back. From a work ethic standpoint, he’s not going to fall off at all. He’s going to be in a good place physically. … I think on the other side he’s going to look like the old Chris Sale. I don’t anticipate anything different from him.”
A rotation that consists of Rodríguez, Sale, Nate Eovaldi, and perhaps either Nick Pivetta or Tanner Houck (along with potential midyear reinforcements in Bryan Mata and Connor Seabold) would look markedly different from the one that condemned the Sox to their pronounced struggles in 2020. Yet for different reasons, it’s a group in which every member would come with considerable question marks, helping to explain why the team is likely to target the addition of at least two starters this winter.
So who remains available? Even after five free-agent starters – righties Charlie Morton (Atlanta) and Chris Flexen (Mariners) and lefties Mike Minor (Royals), Drew Smyly (Giants), and Robbie Ray (Blue Jays) – signed guaranteed major league deals (all for one or two years) and potential free agents Marcus Stroman (Mets) and Kevin Gausman (Giants) accepted qualifying offers to return to their 2020 teams, a number of solid candidates remain in play.
To this point, there appears little chance that the Sox will chase the premier free-agent starter on the market, Trevor Bauer. Beyond that, the team is taking a fairly open-minded approach, with a likely hope of adding one pitcher with mid-rotation (or better) ability and another who would come as more of a back-of-the-rotation option.
The Sox, according to major league sources (confirming a report from Boston Sports Journal’s Sean McAdam), are expected to pursue 31-year-old righthander Tomoyuki Sugano, who was posted this week by the Yomiuri Giants. Sugano has been one of the elite pitchers in Japan in his eight-year career, with a career 2.34 ERA with 8.0 strikeouts and 1.8 walks per nine innings.
The two-time winner of the Sawamura Award as Japan’s best pitcher is viewed as a No. 3 or 4 starter. The Sox are expected to compete for the services of a pitcher who is expected to garner a two- or three-year deal after going 14-2 with a 1.97 ERA in 2020. (The posting process would confer a percentage of Sugano’s earnings – starting with 20 percent of the first $25 million he earns in his deal – on the Giants.)
Beyond Sugano, according to major league sources, the Sox have interest in a few starters with track records of excellence who dealt with injuries in 2020: righthanders Corey Kluber and Jake Odorizzi and lefthander Rich Hill.
Kluber was arguably the most dominant starter in the AL from 2014-18, winning two Cy Young Awards with Cleveland. But he missed most of 2019 with Cleveland, and then following a trade to the Rangers last year, pitched just one inning before a season-ending muscle tear in his right shoulder.
Kluber – who lives in the Boston suburbs in the offseason – is splitting his offseason in Florida and Massachusetts while working out with Eric Cressey. According to Abbott (who is also Kluber’s agent), the 34-year-old is scheduled to throw his first light bullpen session next week, with plans to throw a full bullpen session by roughly the end of the month.
While clubs are being invited to those bullpen sessions, it’s also possible that he could hold a workout for clubs in mid-January if he hasn’t signed by then. If he’s throwing well in those sessions, many teams will be interested in Kluber – likely on an incentive-laden, one-year deal.
Hill also lives in the Boston area. The lefty logged 38 2/3 innings in eight starts with the Twins last year, forging a 3.03 ERA, albeit with a downtick in both his strikeout rate (19.9 percent) and an increase in his walks (10.9 percent) rate. That said, the performance was consistent with what Hill’s done over the last five years, in which his innings have been limited (he averaged roughly 110 innings and 20 starts from 2016-19) but he’s been excellent when on the mound (3.01 ERA, 28 percent strikeout rate).
According to major league sources, the Sox have expressed interest in Hill, and that interest has been reciprocated. Like Kluber, the 40-year-old could boost the Sox’ rotation potential considerably – even with few guarantees about the frequency with which he could contribute.
Odorizzi, 30, was limited to four starts and 13 2/3 innings with the Twins in 2020 due to a chest contusion and a blister. But he was an All-Star in 2019 while going 15-7 with a 3.51 ERA and 27.1 percent strikeout rate in 30 starts, and given that his injuries in 2020 didn’t involve his shoulder or elbow, he’s viewed as a decent bet to return to the durability (30 starts and 165 innings per year from 2014-19) and performance he’d exhibited previously.
While exploring such possibilities for a mid-rotation upgrade, the Sox may look additionally to add to the back of their rotation – perhaps with free agents J.A. Happ (a 38-year-old coming off a 3.47 ERA in nine starts but a declining strikeout rate with the Yankees) or former All-Star José Quintana (looking to bounce back from a lat strain that limited him to 10 innings with the Cubs).
One well-known candidate appears not to be a target, however. Multiple sources characterize a pursuit of lefthander Jon Lester as unlikely given his struggles (5.16 ERA) and declining strikeout rate (6.2 per nine innings in 2020.
All the same, it appears the Sox are continuing their broad-based exploration of the market. No deal to add a starter is seen as imminent. But the Sox do appear committed to building the sort of starting pitching volume in 2021 that they so desperately lacked in 2020, in a free agent market that seems to offer a number of mid-rotation and back-of-the-rotation options.
Alex Speier can be reached at alex.speier@globe.com. Follow him on twitter at @alexspeier.
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