The Red Sox announced this morning that the club has recalled right-hander Naoyuki Uwasawa, whose first appearance with Boston will be his big league debut. Left-hander Joely Rodriguez was designated for assignment to make room for Uwasawa on the club’s active roster.
Uwasawa, 30, signed a minor league split contract with the Rays back in January but was traded to the Red Sox after he activated an assignment clause in his deal that obligated Tampa to deal him to any club willing to offer him a 40-man roster spot. Boston indeed added Uwasawa to their 40-man, though he began the season at Triple-A after not making the club’s Opening Day roster. Since then, the right-hander has made three starts with Worcester with a 4.80 ERA in 15 innings. While those early results have left something to be desired, Uwasawa’s 26.1% strikeout rate in the minors so far is reassuring after the righty punched out a meager 17.8% of batters faced in Japan last year.
While Uwasawa did not strike out many batters during his time in Nippon Professional Baseball, it’s impossible to deny that the right-hander was effective. Across nine seasons with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters, Uwasawa posted a strong 3.19 ERA in 1,118 1/3 innings of work. While he struck out less than 20% of batters faced during his time in Japan, Uwasawa posted an ERA below 3.50 in each of the past six seasons. That includes excellent results in 2023, when he posted a 2.96 ERA in 170 innings despite the aforementioned low strikeout rate.
It’s not yet clear what role Uwasawa will occupy with the Red Sox now that he’s been promoted to the big league club. Injuries to Brayan Bello, Garrett Whitlock, and Nick Pivetta have left depth options Josh Winckowski, Cooper Criswell, and Chase Anderson to step into the club’s rotation alongside Tanner Houck and Kutter Crawford. It’s feasible to imagine Uwasawa taking a rotation job and pushing either Anderson or Winckowski back to the bullpen, though its also possible that Uwasawa himself has been called up to be a multi-inning relief option for the club. [UPDATE: Uwasawa will indeed be used as a long reliever, manager Alex Cora told The Athletic’s Jen McCaffrey and other reporters.]
Making room for Uwasawa on the club’s roster is Rodriguez, who has struggled to a 6.55 ERA in 11 innings of work this season with a 5.25 FIP. It’s a very similar line to the one the lefty posted with Boston last year, when he posted an identical 6.55 ERA in 11 frames with a 4.71 FIP. He was limited to just those 11 innings last year by oblique, shoulder, and hip injuries that cost him the majority of the 2023 season, though his repeat performance after re-signing with the club on a minor league deal this past winter seems to have been enough for the Red Sox to decide to move on from the 32-year-old southpaw.
Boston will have seven days to trade Rodriguez or pass attempt to pass him through waivers. Should he make it through waivers unclaimed, the Red Sox will have the opportunity to outright Rodriguez to the minor leagues, at which point Rodriguez would be able to choose between remaining with the organization as non-roster depth or returning to the free agent market in search of greener pastures elsewhere. Even without Rodriguez, the Red Sox bullpen figures to be well-stocked with lefty relief options. Brennan Bernardino and Cam Booser are the two southpaws currently in the club’s bullpen, with non-roster veteran Lucas Luetge and youngster Jorge Benitez among the club’s depth options from the left side.
Thank Gawd!!!!
DBH – Now THAT is progress!!
I too had enough of Rodriguez. That said, the team will need many more relievers if their starters don’t consistently go late on a game (like most clubs). I also don’t consider Six innings, three earned runs a quality start. 4.50 era quality? Biggest thing the club could do is better their team defense. How many extra pitches are thrown because of stupid errors, balls dropping in that most teams would catch, double-play balls that don’t get two outs because the infielder can’t cleanly transfer the ball from the glove or the dropping of the throw that was right on the money? This team’s defense is Cora and Management’s biggest failure.
That’s just it IM. Rodriquez has 5y+ of service time, so he can refuse any outright to minors. Out of options anyway, owed remaining portion of 2m toward the deal he signed late this winter, which nobody is going to want to pay in full.
he’s going to ride it out, wait his time, see nobody will give him a mlb job and hopefully not.. Return back to his buddy Cora in boston and continue to haunt the sox, where no lead is safe whenever he comes into a game and he’s throwing meatballs up to the plate.
They dearly need to cut the cord with this dude once and for all. find another ryan weber type who has nothing, this is just another.
John – Only $1M contract but still too much! LOL!
It seemed to me Alex Cora had a personal liking to Joely, every time I blinked during a pitching change he was being brought in. They seemed joined at the hip, so kinda surprised he went down.
Ignorant – Ultimately it’s Breslow that makes addition/subtraction decisions.
Cora doesn’t decide who he is managing, he just decides how to manage the players he has.
Well, it is the Red Sux were talking about
Why do you have a thing for Clarence Thomas?
You gave something against black people?
I gave nothing. I am married to a beautiful Afro-Caribbean lady.
You have something against questions about your username?
Why do you have a thing for Clarence Thomas?
It is a mistake to silence free speech. You are free to mute them.
It’s a mistake to not know what the term free speech means.
I have no love for Clarence Thomas or his election denying wife “Ginni” but if I were to telegraph ill-tidings and Unhappy Birthdays to any Supreme Court Justice using my screenname on MLBTR it would be to that deadbeat fanatic Sam Alito.
Thank God for Ruth..
You want a medal? Libs get sensitive about black people…
Ruth who? And you’re the only one on here making race an issue.
What’s up with that, Clarence?
A righty who barely breaks 90. Should be interesting.
Just realized Rodriguez has the exact same number of games, innings, and ERA as last year.
Dude, that’s a heck of a catch. Pretty unusual. Kudos.
IM – Exact same wife as last year too.
I’m glad he stayed married.
Hayzee – Yes she will soon be supporting him, unless Bloom gets another POBO job with the Cards.
Bernardino was very effective and did whatever was asked of him last year, and then he came back and had a great spring. The options game / controlling additional depth is a part of the sport, but this was a case where Bernie never should have lost his job in the first place.
I think we wanted to hoard lefty RPs, waiting for the inevitable injury. Unfortunately, it was our rotation that went down.
Swanzey – If Joely was any type of depth, he was a depth of despair. There was no excuse for the Sox not acquiring a real LHP. Starting the season with just one on the entire staff was unconscionable… even for a team with no aspirations to compete.
100%. Just an amazing and very easily avoided failure of the front office. Several starters and relievers available over the winter. The main guy I wanted them to sign was Imanaga, and Friday he continued to show why he was the best value of any free agent starter. Can you imagine if Sox had signed him for the $55MM or so 4 year deal he got from CHI instead of paying Giolito $39MM for perhaps 20 starts?
Bob – Did you read the recent report from Alex Speier? Sox offer to Shota was both laughable and insulting.
Fever .. from what I read, the contract negotiations were even worse than that. Shota wanted to be in Boston, and his side was willing to sign if Boston would just match the offer from the Cubs. Breslow wouldn’t do it because he had internal metrics that said Shota was an injury risk and so would not budge beyond a two-year contract. That is disappointing to hear now!!!
Ignorant – I just wrote about this under the more recent Shota article ….. the Red Sox claiming to be knowledgeable about potential injury candidates is beyond comical.
Fever,
have to give them some credit. cambell is very effective vs lefties and what had seen in his 2 woosox games, plus the 2ip for Boston so far? that cutter Zach kelly is throwing now will be filthy vs them.
never been 1 of thos have to stack a team with multiple LH relievers just to have them because everyone says u must. That is what leads to disasters, such as Rodriquez and Ryan Weber types being on rosters to begin with. You go with the best arms available period, keeping 1 tops if that is how it breaks down.
That said? look at ST results. booser dominated, bernandino dominated and Rodriquez looked then iked the disaster he was all during the month of April. bernandino and Booser finally get called up and have both looked decent. i asky why give a guy a slot they have not earned for ANY reason? it just costs games. he’s not a young kid trying to protect for the future, but a 30+YO yourneyman at best.
Poor decision all the way around that didn’t take some baseball genius to see coming.
John – I agree with most everything you wrote. I know Campbell was hyped as being effective vs LHB …. are you talking minors? Because his MLB career numbers aren’t that great and actually worse than vs RHB. Perhaps part of my skepticism is the Mariners giving up on him, they are usually really good when it comes to identifying talented pitchers.
I know it’s SSS but one guy who has been absolutely phenomenal is Slaten.
,
Never understood why the Red Sox kept Joely. They aren’t going to miss him. Benitez in AAA is very tough to hit he is a better option than Joely. He has trouble throwing strikes but his stuff is filthy he’s hard to get hits off of. The Red Sox also have Luis Guerrero in AAA who imo is ready he’s stuff is big league stuff. The Red Sox actually have a lot of legit minor league relief depth. Kwiatkowski was just promoted to AAA to take Uwasawa place. Would not be surprised at all if Benitez is called up soon.
He will probably have a short leash in Boston. It’s not like he was lighting it up in Worcester.
Sometimes it takes a few starts before the league gets a book on new players. That might be all we need.
Uwasawa’s last start against Durham was pretty good. His line was 5 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K. This was only 5 days after his previous start which was also against Durham.
Not expecting much out of Uwasawa – if the Rays couldn’t figure him out I don’t think the Sox can. But why not give it a go and see what you’ve got?
Dirtydog – Are you kidding? The Red Sox team ERA is 2.63, which is by far the lowest in the MLB (Yankees a distant 2nd at 3.09).
Breslow, Bailey, and the Drive Line consultants the Red Sox hired have the Red Sox pitching staff off to a historically good start (even with 4 starters currently on the DL)!
I’m not kidding. I’m loving watching this start as much as everyone else right now, and I think Bailey is great. But I don’t think that we’re the next pitcher-fixer-upper destination either. They have a super solid staff but let’s be real, we’re not going to be top of the tables come EOY. And no, I don’t think a 30-year-old rookie who can’t strike guys out is suddenly going to be amazing.
But hey, I hope I’m wrong about all of the above, go Sox.
dirty – Agreed! Plenty of wall left for something to stick to it.
Guys I can make excuses for the best of them( don’t become Brais fan club president by not) but other than his first name is fun to say… I got nothing… in Barkley voice… turibulle
Olm – When did Sir Charles become French?
Sorry, “turibulle” joke I know …. I couldn’t resist ;O)
Your beauty is beyond compare
With flaming locks of auburn hair
With ivory skin and eyes of emerald green
Your smile is like a breath of spring
Your voice is soft like summer rain
And I cannot compete with you
Jolene
Islands in the stream…( last line to continue)
Bet he gets claimed quick
This confirms it. Sox have built a superteam. I wondered where this “full throttle” was…now I see it. Full throttle off the waiver wire.