The Red Sox announced to reporters, including Jen McCaffrey of The Athletic, that right-hander Garrett Whitlock has been placed on the 15-day injured list due to a left oblique strain. Left-hander Joe Jacques has been recalled to take his spot on the roster for now.
Whitlock, 28 in June, exited last night’s game with some tightness in the oblique. Per manager Álex Cora, as relayed by McCaffrey in the tweet above, Whitlock fought the club to stay on the active roster but the Sox made the decision for him, not wanting him to make the injury worse.
That perhaps suggests that the issue is minor and that Whitlock will be back in a couple of weeks, but it’s a tough blow for the Red Sox nonetheless. He was off to a strong start to the season, having posted an earned run average of 1.96 through his first four starts, though he wasn’t going to maintain a .265 batting average on balls in play nor an 87.4% strand rate.
Still, the Sox are facing a number of challenges in the rotation. Lucas Giolito and Chris Murphy are out for the year due to elbow surgeries while Nick Pivetta is currently on the shelf with a flexor strain. With Whitlock now out of action as well, the rotation is down to Brayan Bello, Kutter Crawford, Tanner Houck and Cooper Criswell. They will need to find someone else to replace Whitlock but Cora didn’t tip his hand to McCaffrey about who that would be.
Veteran Chase Anderson is with the big league club and could be an option since his first two appearances were three innings each, though his last outing was just one inning and the previous appearance was just two. Naoyuki Uwasawa is on the 40-man roster but has a 6.30 ERA through his first two Triple-A starts. Wikelman Gonzalez is on the 40-man but he’s in Double-A and didn’t make it out of the first innings in his most recent start at that level.
Jacques tossed 26 2/3 innings for the Sox last year with a 5.06 ERA. He’ll give the Sox another lefty in their bullpen for the time being but perhaps find himself optioned back out in the coming days when the club decides on the move to replace Whitlock in the rotation.
Jacques? Yuck. In the words of Chevy Chase, “you’re not, uhh, you’re not good.”
Seriously, what do they see in that bum that a guy like Booser or Benitez doesn’t have.
he’s on the 40 man those 2 are not
Story is out, free spot.
Why is crud like him on the 40 man?
Mi – Hey hey hey ….don’t call him crud.
He was waived by the Pirates. He is crap, not crud.
RED ALERT
filihok has been spotted in the Fangraphs comment section! The menace has broken MLBTR containment!!!
Dude just needs to start a blog which no one will read.
This got me curious if they were going to call up a prospect, but they are bringing up Jacques bon bon fromage baguette
The only dude that caught my eye was Richard fitts, why not call him up now and get him some experience for a few spot starts?
Jacques won’t be starting — they’ll make another move next time Whitlock’s spot comes around. Not sure which way they will go with that, no great options.
TFF – Look for Winck to start Sunday.
You hear that somewhere or an educated guess? I thought that he might step into the start that Criswell took, so certainly plausible.
TFF – No official announcement yet, lots expect it to happen. Technically Pivetta could pitch Sunday, but they would likely give him another few days.
Fever, you’re probably right about Winck. That said I can’t bare to imagine the atrocity it’ll be.
Fitts needs to develop a third pitch to go with his fastball and slider if he is going to be an effective starter. It is probably best for him to stay in the minors and work on it.
Will MLB have enough pitchers to get them through the 2024 season?
I offer to pitch for free. Experience? Three little league batters and was perfect. Walked all three and was never handed the ball again. LOL.
@deweybelongsinthehall
I pitched to 3 batters in little league and got three weak groundballs to me. I decided if I went to the Majors, I would embarrass most of the league so I didn’t pursuit that path.
Put me in coach…I’m ready to play today.
I’ll bring my 40 mph heater. Of course, I may not reach the plate.
I’ll do it, but i might make Doc Wingate from “Major League: Back to the Minors” look like Nolan Ryan…
We don’t need to spend on no steenkin free agent pitchers!!
FULL THROTTLE BAY-BEE!!
‘Ol Joe Jock gets the call
Whitlock seems to be a bit injury prone looking at his MLB and MiLB history.
Yes. His best role might be the one he filled his rookie year — a dominant if carefully used reliever.
TFF17: carefully used !!! Not with Cora as the manager. He will use out of the pen until his arm falls off.
Cora doesn’t exactly have a choice, at least not when the SP have been collected off the scrap heap and struggle to finish five, This year has been better, so far, but injuries could take them down. A “bullpen game” anyone?
Lord – That is the ONLY reason Cashman left him unprotected in the Rule 5.
Yet multiple generations of Boston management insist on making him a starter….
Why call up Jacques. He has pitched poorly in AAA. Why not call up Zach Kelly who is on the 40 man
The only reason that makes any sense is Kelly pitched 2 innings last night and likely isn’t available for a few days.
Bruin – It saddens me that pitchers aren’t available for a few days after pitching just 2 innings. MLB is intentionally making pitchers fragile by reducing their stamina.
The flip side of that is the increased velocity. They are throwing max effort on every pitch, which of course kills stamina.
TFF – Right you are!
And another thing people don’t realize with relievers …. using a reliever by pitching him three times in 5 days for one inning each takes a greater toll on the pitcher than using him once in 5 days for 3 innings.
Why? Because with the three appearances he’s warming up two more times, and warmups affect stamina too.
Yup. In the past, I’ve modeled a reliever’s workload using G + IP. It isn’t a perfect metric, of course, but it at least roughly captures the dynamic you describe.
Would Whitlock be able to stay healthy if he were pitching three innings every 5-6 days? That would add up to 90-100 innings over the course of a season, which is more than he has shouldered to date. Hand him the ball with a 4-2 lead at the top of the seventh and put the win in the books?
You ever join the BOSOX listserv?
The wheels are falling off the wagon sooner rather than later. We had die hards telling us we were negative but name a season Whitlock and Houck pitched over 150 innings?
They had no depth in the middle infield and no depth in the rotation. Now Whitlock and Pivetta are out. Obliques are tricky. He could be out for two weeks or two months.
Healthy this team can beat up on the Angels and A’s. With the injuries they are accumulating they are going to go 1 or 0 for 3 in a LOT of series.
I can’t wait until Sam Kennedy says they would have won 90+ games if it weren’t for the injuries. Then he gets promoted and another big bag of money for kissing the owner’s rear end and covering for this dumpster fire.
Goose – Those who were calling us negative are not diehards.
Real diehards have a right to be angry about what has transpired the past several years, and especially this past offseason.
Our only hope is revenue drops enough that the FSG board does something about Henry.
Don’t forget Markus Lynn Betts. Every other decision was arguably defensible (if misguided in many cases). Letting Betts go was historically bad.
100% – it’s the only feedback these Pvt Equity cult clowns will respond to..
Another day another player on an already thin roster down…
I didn’t think the Red Sox would win more than 75 games before the season even started, but now you guys are pacing 95 losses…
Acoss – Too much talent for less than 70 wins. Even if Devers and Whitlock miss significant time, Casas & Duran & healthy Houck/Crawford should keep them above 70.
Never underestimate The Dombrowski Four.
Fever,
I hope so, already got the White Sox and Athletics staking a claim for worst teams in the AL!
Lots of oblique injuries. I assume the idiots in the MLBPA will blame the pitch clock
The MLBPA statement getting universally crushed by mlb, players, media commentators and medical experts, might have them thinking twice.
The injuries are unfortunate, but the way this team has been run the last few years unfortunately leads to these types of situations. The FO has gone for the less expensive option in the FA market and that is usually a guy who is either oft injured or just not that good. Hence the many last place finishes recently and of course the unavoidable cellar result coming up for 2024.
I’m nearly 60 and have been following this club for nearly 55 years(both dad and granddad were fans), however the direction current ownership has taken has me watching less, following less closely and just not that interested for most of the season. Of course as an older guy who now has time and is financially comfortable, I would seem to be the sort of fan they’d want to try to keep, however they don’t seem to be making an effort; so neither will I much in the future.
Whitlock was great and healthy as a late inning stopper.
As a SP he’s constantly injured and can’t handle the workload.
Boston needs to wake up and get him back to doing what he did best and kept him contributing the most.
Trevor f-ing Bauer….go!
I assume you are being facetious? No one is bringing back Bauer. Other then the massive distraction it would be for any team, Bauer seems pretty unlikable and controversy(mostly deserved) attaches itself to this guy like colon cancer.
Then again, maybe he’d be cheap, so right in Henry’s wheelhouse of decision making.
Good grief – just what this organization needs is the addition of a certified wanker / circus act .
Full Throttle right Kennedy? Right into last place. I thought they would be out of it by May. I did not think Mid April would be it. Pivetta hurt, Whitlock hurt again. Great job Breslow ! No defense, no pitching and no free agent signings. I love the Full Throttle 2024.
Breslow has been “operating under constraints”. Put the blame where it belongs, on the Chief Weasel and his masters.
I like what little Breslow was able to do without a budget. O’Neill for starters, and the pitching improvement that Bailey has supported. Cooper Criswell was a decent depth signing, Fitts is an actual prospect, and he snagged a couple decent relievers. Limits to how far you can remake a team while cutting payroll, though.
TFF – I still like Breslow, not just because of his intelligence but also because he seems to be a standup guy. I trust him, whereas we can’t trust a thing Henry or Werner says.
But unfortunately Breslow is doing on the job training, and unlike Theo he doesn’t have any great fulltime mentors around. So it will take time before he gains enough knowledge and experience to have a bigger impact on operations. Right now it’s the old guard that’s influencing many of the decisions being made.
Agreed that Breslow is working on building experience, but I believe the more serious issue is that he lacks influence. He can go to ownership and tell them that they need X, Y, and Z to be competitive, but are they going to listen to him? Or tell him that a good GM doesn’t require money to succeed?
Absolutely agree that Breslow is a stand-up guy. Plenty of evidence that Kennedy is *not* honest with people. Love or hate LL, he absolutely knew what he was doing every second. Kennedy is a marketing guy who lied his way to the top and now is lying his ass off trying to stay there.
TFF – When they first hired Breslow, most of us here predicted he will stick around and be subservient until he gains enough knowledge and experience.
Once he does, he will likely do what Theo and most others in his position would do ….. demand more authority or leave. I don’t think it will come to that until after the 2028 season.
Frankly, it doesn’t matter what Breslow needs. John Henry will dictate what kind of budget Craig will have to work with, and Henry won’t give a damn if it means winning or losing. All that matters to him is revenue and the bottom line.
Boston isn’t like some other cities where baseball is the focal point. As long as John Henry continues to put an inferior team on the field because of his cheapness, people will have plenty of other entertainment options … and I don’t mean just the Celtics and Bruins.
Henry invested in the team for the first 15 years, and earned a certain amount of good will – but that is rapidly eroding. Already hints that some long-time sponsors are jumping ship, and they have an awful lot of fans dressing up as empty seats. Boston can easily be a top-three team by revenue (behind NYY and LAD), but there are hints that they are conceding that position to others. Sad to see this progression.
It gives me some hope that they brought Theo on board. He is smart enough to realize the connection between winning and revenues, and close enough to Henry to possibly get his attention.
TFF17: The Red Sox CBT player payroll is currently at $218.3M. I think they should be able to field a very competitive team if it is spent well.
Yes and no… The CBT payroll is quite a bit higher than the actual payroll of $179M. Assume you are looking at Roster Resource? Scan to the bottom and you see over $30M for Sale, Justin Turner, and more.
Cot’s Contracts has the Opening Day payroll at $176M (close to the Roster Resource number) which ranks #11 in the majors. That would still be enough to be competitive (the Rays and Orioles make do with much less), but demands a heck of a lot more talent from the minors. If you are waiting for the team to be competitive on a $100M payroll, it could be a very long wait — Boston will never qualify for the competitive balance draft picks that they do, and you have to be REALLY bad to have a decent shot at one of the first few picks in the draft.
Can’t say that the money has been spent well, either. I don’t fault Breslow for Giolito getting injured, but Story and Yoshida have been albatrosses.
TFF17: That was from Spotrac. I like RR too. I think they need to turn the roster over and spend better and I think they are going in that direction. I see talent evaluation and player development as more important than the final amount spent.
Houck tossed a nice one tonight. But let’s just bash the Sox and ignore any success. Ok?
9 IP, 3 hits, 0 BB, 9 Ks, 94 pitches
Whyhayzee – I loved the way Houck looked. I still think he’s the most talented of the starters. I think Crawford is second most talented. Any good game thrown by Houck, Crawford, Bello or Whitlock is an excellent find for the future.
We simply need the issues addressed. Better managing and better defense. It sure seems the pitching coaches are off to a good start. The clubhouse needs to be fixed. Fewer DHs.
We have a free year to learn much about the young kids. Is Ceddanne a CF or a SS or a RF? Can someone protect O’Neill from the bull in the china shop? It’s not like Devers catches anything so why put him on the field? Put an infielder who can field at 3B until they can trade Yoshi for a 3B. Yoshi doesn’t add $18MM of value but I like the guy.
The season is going to have plenty of bumps but at some point someone needs to make a decision to improve the performance by fixing the defense. Until then, it’s just all about getting the youngster some at bats and some work on defense to improve.
Only the results are going to be negative. The individual players for the most part will be positive as they improve on defense and hitting. We have O’Neill and Casas as potential future all-stars Same for Duran, Houck and others. I say thumbs up overall without winning in 2024.
TF – You and I have been Houck’s biggest supporters over the years. We were both around back in the good old days of 2021 when Houck first made his name. Lots of people crapped on him and Duran for the Vax issue, but we stuck by both of them while others chose to support only the Bloom rejects. Now we are being rewarded for our loyalty.
Hayzee – There have been certain people who wanted to get rid of Houck because their analytics gods told them Houck cannot succeed going through a lineup more than twice. I’m glad those people are either gone or muted.
I wanted him in the bullpen, for that reason, and knew he woukd dominate there. Turns out the real answer was to find him a pitching coach to harness his full potential.
To be fair, he was going 6 innings last September as well. And we know he put work in over the offseason to build up a little.
TFF – Agreed, new pitching coach (plus Breslow) and good health are the biggest factors. He simply wasn’t healthy the past two seasons.
I’m a huge fan of statistics, but not of all the new BS ones that attempt to be predictive. I prefer statistics surrounding what actually happened, and last night there were plenty of interesting ones!
Shortest MLB 9-inning game timewise since 2010 ….just one hour 49 minutes!
First MLB pitcher to toss a 9+ strikeout complete game shutout in less than 1 hour 50 minutes since Greg Maddux in 1995!
Shortest Red Sox 9-inning game since 1999!
First 9-inning shutout in less than 100 pitches by a Red Sox pitcher since Clay Buchholz in 2014!
And my personal favorite ….
Fewest pitches in a shutout by a Red Sox pitcher since Aaron Cook in 2012!!
How many people here remembered Cook? I sure didn’t! Of course that was the Bobby Valentine year, hopefully it’s not a bad omen. LOL!!
I only watched a snippet but it seemed like there weren’t a ton of fastballs thrown. Those seem to lead to excess foul balls, wasted pitches. Get ahead in the count on pitches that batters tend to lay off of, slowly expand the strike zone, be perfectly ok with balls put into play. But you need to have good control of all your pitches to do what he did. I think the Breslow and Bailey team is working well for the rotation. I’m sure they’re also working with the bullpen guys, it just hasn’t shown the same results yet. Pitching wins. Some more offense and clearly the defense can improve a lot. It’s not a bad start for this season so far.
hayzee – I think Breslow/Bailey have had more of an impact on the rotation because younger players tend to embrace change better than older players.
Who has been performing poorly? Kenley, Martin, Joely. All older players.
Sorry but it has indeed been a bad start.
3-6 at home, most of the losses just plain ugly.
7 of their 10 wins against the lowly Angels and Athletics.
Even last night, the offense sucked …. one run scored on a balk, the other on a solo shot.
No Devers or O’Neill in the starting lineup today, good luck with that against Carrasco.
Bernardino is the opener.
I understand the age thing, I just hope when the older guys see the success, they reexamine their approach. But, there is something to be said when you don’t try the same thing with every pitcher. Opponents will figure things out more quickly. I remember Terry Forster closing a Wilbur Wood start against the Red Sox. They had no chance.
Home record will improve I think. Any time you want to be positive or negative you can find support. Hitting needs to improve, but I think it will. Defense? Not so sure.
I have greater hope for the defense than the offense. Many of the defensive problems at this point are kids struggling with the “third deck and bright lights” of the majors. Mental lapses. Rafaela should be very good defensively once he settles in, Abreu has the tools to be a plus defender, and Casas is at least making small improvements. Devers is a big-body player for a tough defensive position like 3B, but he isn’t awful. Mostly need him to get healthy so we don’t see Reyes over there so regularly.
Even Hamilton is *supposed* to be a decent defender, though I shake my head when I read that. They just need to keep their heads in the game.
But offense? They were the #22 team in the majors by team offense last year, and while O’Neill has been a nice addition he doesn’t fully replace Verdugo *and* Turner *and* Duvall. Rafaela and Abreu add more defensively than with the bats. Their ceiling offensively is league average until they get more talent up.
They are plumbing the depths of the ocean floor to retrieve the likes of Jacques. Which ironically what Jacques is good for- deep sea exploration. Oh look: a Ray.
But his cost, oh, is fairly low, so the contract won’t put them under water.
don’t know what bailey is preaching (less fastballs?) but so far the rotation has been insanely good. bullpen and team defense not so much
dasit – I think the biggest aspect Bailey has changed is to start pounding the strike zone.
In their first starts of the season Pivetta had 68 percent strikes, Crawford and Whitlock 63 percent, and Houck an outstanding 76 percent.
Just by drastically reducing free passes and getting ahead in the count, they have swung the advantage to them.
thanks!
He has them focusing on their best pitches (Houck hasn’t thrown a four-seam fastball yet this year) and working the strike zone East-West rather than North-South. A very different look for hitters than what most of the league is practicing, and tough for them to adjust.
good info thank you
For anyone thinking ‘Joe Jacque couldn’t be that bad’ – he current has a 15.75 ERA in AAA. 14 baserunners in 4 innings.
The problem is that the Red Sox are almost out of options. They have 9 players on the short term injured lists and 2 prospects not close to being even AAA ready. That leaves 3 players: Heineman (catching depth), Uwasawa (good chance he gets called up for Jacque in a couple of days) and Zach Kelly.
Kelly is a talented relief pitcher but he missed most of last season with an injury, so they’re handling him with kid gloves. 8 IP, 1H, 8 BB, 9K, 0ER. Expect we will see him soon.
Jacques is on the 40-man roster, so he gets called up. At the point that they are unwilling to pitch him in the majors, he will be released. He is the equivalent of a single-use plastic IMHO.
Uwasawa or Kelly would be interesting adds… Beyond that, they need to look for somebody to take Story’s roster spot (moving him to the 60-day DL).