Injured Red Sox first baseman Steve Pearce and knuckleballer Steven Wright have barely been factors this season, which now looks likely to go down as a lost year for both players. It’s “doubtful” either will take the field again in 2019, according to Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com.
It’s hard to believe 2019 has been so dreadful for Pearce, one of the main heroes of the Red Sox’s championship run a year ago. The midseason trade acquisition was an offensive force with two teams (Boston and Toronto) during the regular season and continued his torrid pace in the playoffs, earning World Series MVP honors for the Red Sox’s five-game triumph against the Dodgers.
As great as Pearce was in 2018, he only appeared in 76 games then. This season, thanks largely to a lower back strain that has shelved him since May 31, Pearce has played in a mere 29 contests. When he has entered the batters box, the once-potent Pearce has slashed a miserable .180/.245/.258 with one home run and a microscopic .079 ISO in 99 plate appearances. That obviously isn’t what the Red Sox had in mind when they re-signed Pearce to a $6.25MM guarantee last November. Considering his meager production since inking that deal, free agency certainly won’t be as kind to the 36-year-old Pearce during the upcoming offseason.
The Red Sox can still control Wright next year, his last season of arbitration eligibility, but he has joined Pearce in enduring a nightmarish campaign. Wright began the year serving an 80-game suspension after a failed PED test, thus keeping him from debuting until late June, and then went on the IL in mid-July with a right foot contusion. The 34-year-old right-hander – a former All-Star – has thrown 6 1/3 innings this season and allowed six earned runs on 11 hits (including three home runs) and four walks.
In better news for Boston, there’s a “good chance” righty reliever Heath Hembree will pitch again this season, manager Alex Cora told Cotillo. Hembree went down with an elbow strain Aug. 2 – the second time the joint forced him to the IL in 2019. The elbow problems have helped lead to middling results for Hembree, he of the 4.06 ERA/4.91 FIP with 10.75 K/9, 4.3 BB/9 and a paltry 21.8 percent groundball rate in 37 2/3 innings.
How the mighty have fallen
Hard to win the division every year and they DID win it from 2016-2018, not to mention the last WS.
It obviously isn’t as hard as you think the Dodgers have won their division since 2013 with this year that will make 7 in a row.
John and joshua were talking about the AL east, and the NL west for example has a different level of competition.
AL east 2 championships in the last 10 years.
NL West 3.
NL West teams have been in 5 of the last 10 WS… AL east just the 2. AL central has been in 4 of the last 10.
Exactly although the bottom of the East has made others look even better. Baltimore the last two season is the worst club I’ve seen since 1968 (the first year I can remember from seeing the games as compared to remembering highlights).
I’m always impressed every time I see all those “NL West Champs” banners at Dodgers Stadium.
LOL but as a Sox fan who went through a lot of suffering I always say to myself I never want to seem arrogant. Nothing other than taxes (unless your Trump) and death are guaranteed.
Competition in the National vs American is vastly different. Lineups in AL vastly superior with the DH.
Until they win a World Series the Dodgers are not on the same level as Yankees or Astros.
When did the Yankees win a world series? I mean, I hear “27” being screamed by the Yankee fans all the time, but really. that’s ancient history. That’s like saying the Edmondton Oilers are the greatest hockey team.
Finishing last in 2012, 2014, 2015…guess you (JohnSilver) forgot about those years!
You can stock up pretty well in the draft with that going on.
Rocky. Remember the Steinbrenner years. Yes he bought a winner (highest average payroll) but what about that drought from the early 80s to the mid 90s. It took a suspension for the Yankees to again become a winner. Had he not been suspended, he probably would have traded the core four.
“In better news for Boston, there’s a “good chance” righty reliever Heath Hembree will pitch again this season”
Pretty bad that’s better news for a team that has hopes for a 4.06 era Hembree
It’s better news because the other news is really bad…reading comprehension matters.
Really? His statement is actually very reasonable. Perhaps you should practice some of that “reading comprehension” you’re preaching?
Yes, and hope springs eternal in Beantown!
Rock, I said it before. The Sox had the great regular season and proved they were the best in 2018. I’ll listen if and when the Yankees win it all in 19. The picture I see is Oakland winning the wild card game, making all Yankees’ fans nervous – Before you say it, yes of course I’d rather have my team in it. You just can’t win every season.
That ERA is because of the elbow. Hembree was pitching lights out and was about to take over the closer role. Then the elbow issues happened and his ERA blew up.
And Pierce was really a .350 hitter, but he was just swinging over or under the ball!
Come on man!
Just DFA Pierce. Hembre and Wright next year? Both are cheap
Why DFA?
Pearce is a FA after this season. He’s gone any way. Wright’s probably gone a PED suspension plus Domestic Violence suspension in 2019 the Red Sox don’t need that type of PR mess.
The Red Sox were already beyond any “PR Issues” with Wright. Nobody cared. He just wasn’t very good.
Actually he was virtually unhittable for awhile. But it went south very fast. The days of Hoyt Wilhelm like careers are bygone. Rookie at age 29 and HOF career. Legend.
Wright was decent until that buffoon Farrell decided he should be a pinch runner in an intraleague game.
To be fair, Wright has a lot of other things going on that are more likely the result of how he’s playing now. But Farrell pinch running him is still up there for dumb moves I’ve seen in the last few years.
I imagine that the list of knuckle ball pitchers in the entire history of baseball who would make good pinch runners has exactly zero names on it. Names like knee crow and huff don’t exactly put forth images of speed.
Charlie, pitchers run every day. It was simply an accident. In the 60s, pitchers not only pinch ran but they also pinch hit. Some are in better shape and while in the end I was not a Farrell fan, I don’t blame him for Wright’s injury.
I’ve run over 65,000 miles and I pitched in an amateur league until I was 41 and I can honestly say I may be the worst base runner in the history of the world. I even blew out my hamstring trying to beat out an infield hit (gasp…I made contact…now what). I tend to agree, it should have been ok.
Charlie is correct. Thanks Farrell ruined Wright.