Red Sox right-hander Austin Maddox announced his retirement during the offseason, as reported by SoxProspects.com (Twitter link) in March. The 28-year-old Maddox is hanging up his glove after 13 Major League appearances (all with the Sox during the 2017 season) and seven total professional seasons.
A University of Florida product, Maddox was a third-round pick for the Red Sox in the 2012 draft and he pitched almost exclusively as a reliever during his time in Boston’s farm system — 136 of his 151 career minor league appearances came out of the bullpen. After some issues with the home run ball early in his career, Maddox began to post better results in 2015, and then made a three-level jump during the 2016 season. Another strong performance at the Double-A and Triple-A levels in 2017 led to his call-up to the Red Sox roster.
Maddox’s brief MLB career will go into the books as an impressive one by the numbers, as he allowed just a single earned run over 17 1/3 regular season innings. Beyond that minuscule 0.52 ERA, Maddox also recorded 14 strikeouts against just two walks. This was enough to earn Maddox a spot on the Red Sox postseason roster, and he allowed a run in two innings pitched during Boston’s ALDS loss to the Astros.
What looked like a promising start ended up as the entirety of Maddox’s big league career. A shoulder strain limited him to only eight total outings in the minors in 2018, and he missed all of 2019 recovering from rotator cuff surgery. The Red Sox re-signed Maddox to a new minor league deal over the offseason, though he didn’t appear in any Spring Training games.
MLBTR wishes Maddox the best in the next step in his post-playing career.