Chris Sale’s 2019 season came to an end in August when he hit the shelf with left elbow inflammation. Fortunately, he was able to treat the injury with a PRP injection and rest. The Red Sox ace began a throwing program in December, and he told reporters today (including Pete Abraham of the Boston Globe) his elbow is now fine. Tommy John surgery was never on the table, Sale said (via Chris Cotillo of MassLive).
More recently, though, the 30-year-old (31 in March) came down with a mild case of pneumonia, reports Christopher Smith of MassLive. Boston won’t ramp him up too hard during spring training, manager Ron Roenicke told Smith, preferring to cautiously monitor as he rebuilds strength. Roenicke acknowledged that conservative build-up leaves open the possibility Sale could miss Opening Day. Nevertheless, the left-hander expressed hope (via Cotillo) he will indeed be ready for the start of the season.
A return to form for Sale is critical if the Red Sox are to compete for a playoff spot. He posted only a 4.40 ERA in 2019, nearly a full run higher than his previous career-worst mark. Of course, Sale’s peripherals tell a different story. His 35.6% strikeout rate trailed only Gerrit Cole’s 39.9% mark (minimum 100 innings). Sale’s 6.1% walk rate, too, was much better than average. Even with an uptick in home runs to a career-worst 1.47/9, Sale’s 3.39 FIP was among the top 20 in the league.
He, Eduardo Rodríguez, and Nathan Eovaldi will lead a rotation with a fair bit of upside but ample uncertainty. A healthy, productive season from Sale is all the more important in the wake of the recent Mookie Betts/David Price trade.
Time for Vaughn Eschelman to step up.
He actually died
He actually died
Yes, I am aware. I help keep his spirit alive by mentioning him whenever possible.
Then cross him off then.
Mitchell Friedman??
a comment so nice ya posted it twice :^)
It’s a mobile app glitch.
Mobile app does not get rave reviews
“Well, cross him off the list then” Name the movie?
easy,,major league. most of these guys are way past their prime, Most of these guys never had a prime.
Trading the farm or signing these guys to enormous deals is and always will be a huge gamble because it is the biggest risk in the sport. Too bad because it’s not their fault whatsoever..
You you still couldn’t spell Vaughn’s last name correctly.
Wasn’t Vaughn’s girlfriend’s name also Vaughn in the 2nd movie? The really hot one?
Might have to package Sale with Devers to move that contract.
Devers has a lot of team control, so likely won’t need to cover half of Sale’s remaining money.
lol
That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever read.
Just look at the name and it tells you everything you need to know
Forgive me but this is the most laughable comment I have ever seen on this site. The thought of the sox trading sale right now is highly unrealistic. And the idea that they would trade devers may be the most insane thing I have ever heard. Teams don’t trade 23 year old MVP candidates that are cost controlled!
That’s like saying it’s laughable the sox would trade the second best player in baseball and 2018 MVP in a salary dump.
94, except you’re wrong. Betts is a FA to be that said he was going to test the FA Waters. Fevers is cheap and has a ton of team control left.
That isnt true at all 94yankee. Devers isnt even arb eligible yer and is 23. Betts is making 27 million this year and wasn’t going to be back next year.
123, your comment isn’t entirely true either. For sure Betts said he was testing free agency, but he never said he wouldn’t re-sign with the Red Sox. Heck, he could come back after a year in LA. Anything is possible. No matter what happens, whomever signs him has to pay what he’s asking.
My comment is completely true. The sox aren’t going to pay him. By moving him they made that clear.
94 Yankmees!
When Sale says he is going to test free agency and demand a 400 million dollar contract I guess he would be tradable like Betts
Exactly. But sale was willing to sign an extension
They had the option of having Betts on their team this year for $27m. In eight months time having Betts on their team will cost them $300m-$400m. $27m vs $400m is my idea of cost control.
If Betts does return to the Red Sox so much the better but he never hinted that he wanted to. The team had no choice but to move him before he lost all value. A 2021 squad that had neither Betts, Verdugo or Downs, who just showed up at #15 in ZIPS prospect rankings, would not be a very pretty sight.
it’s a joke there pal
they might not get a huge return if they don’t eat money but I think a handful of teams would take the whole sale contract if he was available
Why would they trade Sale though? The injury I get, but let’s not act like he isn’t one of the most dominant pitchers in baseball when healthy.
Exactly! And he isn’t over the hill and a clubhouse issue like price
123
Price is generally well-regarded in the clubhouse.
Price is well regarded by teammates. But hes stirred up issues with the media that have helped form some division in sox nation.
Trading him is out of the question. He is still one of the best pitchers in baseball and will likely show his true self this year.
yep,,great 1st half and then the yearly slide in the 2nd half.
Might have to pay down some of the deal if they want to move him… But no way they’re packaging Devers with him.
They’re two very different scenarios. Sale has upside and can still be worth his contract and Devers is under control and affordable like you’ve mentioned. Trading them both together really makes zero business sense. If you must, Red Sox would get a better return trading them separately.
Lol
Frazier, Happ, Andujar for Sale and Devers.
The original comment was dumb, but this is somehow even worse.
Frazier could still become something but the Yankees are barely willing to keep him on the roster over their other options, Happ has negative value, and Andujar is nearly unplayable in the field and has no on base skills.
The only good thing about this is that you didn’t mention Estevan Florial, who also has no value.
This guy loves to troll don’t worry about it
How is it trolling? The guy offers an idiotic trade idea and I double down on it.
Sale and Devers are not getting traded. Even for the greatest Yankee trade options.
Oh, I forgot to add Greg Bird to that…
Ahh, I missed the trolling so that’s on me. (While you’re at it, maybe they could throw in Refsnyder too.)
Greg Bird isn’t a Yankee
I know, that makes it funnier.
yep, but sale is one bad pitch away from tommy john so there’s that to factor into your equation.
sox wouldnt do that trade for cole, dominguez, and torres?
Melchez, throw in Judge and you have a deal!
Yankee fans answer to any trade. Two DHs, one a head case, and an overpaid pitcher for every team’s star.
I have been on this page for years. I belong to many Facebook sports groups. This is the single stupidest comment I’ve ever seen. Not just about sports. I know “anti vax” people that make more sense than your comment.
That’s not a serious comment, right?
Dumb and dumber; dumb handle, dumber trade idea.
That has to be one of the dumbest post I’ve read in a long time the Sox have no interest in trading sale let alone adding devers
Eovaldi … no.
As a fan of both Sox, I actually think the Red Sox would be smart to bring him along slow to start the season. His entire career he’s worn down towards the end of the year. 3.78 career ERA in September/October compared to a 2.56 career ERA in June. Maybe limiting him early on will allow him to be more effective in the most important months of the season which is the 2nd half of the year.
If he doesn’t pitch well early in the season they will be too far out late in the year for him to make a difference. The Sox punted on the season as soon as they traded Betts. This year is all about getting Sale/Eovaldi productive enough so that they can rebuild some trade value.
They didn’t “punt the season”. That’s just ridiculous. The Sox lineup is loaded. Having betts was a luxury, not a necessity. And replacing him with verdugo is probably not replacing him with another superstar, verdugo is NO slouch! Getting price off the books and out of the clubhouse is complete addition by subtraction!
No, they punted the season. They didn’t fix any of their problem areas and traded Betts and Price to get under the luxury tax. And they knowingly got damaged good in Verdugo…not a blueprint for trying to compete.
Compete for a playoff spot? Lol. The jays have a better chance than the sox do, and theirs is virtually 0.
AL East results:
TB – 104 wins
NYY – 101 wins
TOR – 83 wins
BOS – 75 wins
BAL – 49 wins
wrong fool
Nice rebuttal, fool. Feel free to post your own numbers and then come back in october… we’ll see who’s right then.
Who knows what will happen & that is why you play the games. Rays & Yankees will be there in the thick of it & the Blue Jays will need their SPs to be very effective to be there as well. Rays did not have to shell out $300+mil to get a Ace & pray that he stays healthy for most of those 9 years.
The yankees will be lucky to win 75 games. Everyone knows they cheat and when the Red Sox are exonerated next week the hammer will come down hard on them. cash man and boon doggle will be punted, at least half the team will pull a hammy. With no fake ball and robot strike zones taking away their pitchers 21 inch wide home plate, their goose will be cooked. Rays and Jays will duke it out for the division at 95 wins apiece, Sox third at 90.
Now.
Wait.
For.
It.
This is the worst case of Yankee-Hater Derangement Syndrome I’ve ever seen
Don’t you think if they cheated they would have won?
I hate the Yankees, and this is dumb af. It’s TB and NY in some combination of 1st and 2nd place in the AL East with 95+ wins each.
Be happy if the sux finish 4th!
I hope this was a joke
No bud! The Red Sox who have been the Red Sox for a real long time now are not going to bow down to a team, called once the Devil Rays and to draw more of a crowd they re named them the Rays! Now I guess when they move to Montreal in 2021 they will be called the Expos again!
The same team that went 751 years without a championship? The same team that plays in a tin box overflowing with rotten lawbstah?? The same team that’s spent a billion more dollars than the devil Rays with a 1/4 of the results??? Gotcha! My bad, your highness.
On se voit a montreal!
LOL you’re either a terrible troll or the most delusional baseball fan on this site
I doubt they’d be called the Expos… that was in reference to the World Expo back forever ago. Maybe the Montreal Snowballs?
You must be an Astro fan
Devil Ray’s have a WS title? How do you get to 1/4 of 0??
I knew one of “you” would say this. Why don’t you figure out how much the sux have paid per win in the last 12 seasons and compare it with the Rays? Get back to me if you can figure out the math. If you need help, call Will Hunting.
I agree MW n I’m a RS fan
Who came up with these laughable projections?
I’ll keep that post for one reason only. To shove it in your face half way through the season. Not at the end but half way. Lmao
TB with 104 wins? LOL get real, The Nats have a better pitching staff and they couldn’t even win their own division. The Rays have about 4 players that are above-average run producers, Yankees have only gotten better in the offseason and they still beat the Rays in 2019 even with a record amount of injuries.
Don’t see Boston moving Sale until the Red Sox have a clearer picture of their farm & development of younger players. If he bounces back he keeps you as a playoff contender.
Damn, those are some good peripherals. I bet he won the peripheral Cy Young. I kept looking through the channels in October, to watch him pitch in the peripheral World Series, but it once again wasn’t televised.
You have to get the extra wide TV screen.
You must not have been using your peripheral vision…
Don’t like math ha? I guess you can always bust out the ol’ virgin blood and chicken bones.
Look at what the math is saying. Sale didn’t change teams, so he’s playing with the same defense, minus Betts. Unless the coaches position the players MUCH better, how would his actual run prevention (ERA) improve? FIP is lazy in this case. The culprit in Sale’s case is pitching out of the stretch. Opponents OPS with no one on base: .627
Opponents OPS with runners on: .808
He needs to get together with his pitching coaches and determine what he is doing differently out of the stretch so they can come up with a way of correcting it. If he pitches the same, his ERA will not magically match his FIP.
That might be statistical noise. In 2018, he had a .590/.426 (MOB), which seems almost impossible. But the .426 came with a .250 BABIP. In 2019, he had a .627/.808, which you mentioned, but with BABIPs of .286/.352. If that .52 came closer to even .300, then the MOB component would be close to a .700 OPS.
Having said that, I have long felt that something was wrong with the RS pitching philosophy. Too many pitchers had bad years, and more worrisome, the rotation all followed the same pattern. They started off slow, had a very good 6-week stretch, then all collapsed, except ERod.
The Sox have serious rotation problems with no solutions in sight….
1. Sale – showing signs of age and becoming injury prone (2019 6-11 4.40 ERA)
2. Rodriguez – only steady pitcher in rotation but has had recent knee problems (2019 19-6 3.81 ERA)
3. Eovaldi – has only pitched more than 150 innings twice in his career and that was 4 yrs ago (2019 2-1 5.99 ERA) I doubt he finishes the year in the rotation and ends up on IL or bullpen.
4. Perez – serviceable pitcher but not going to get you to post season (2019 10-7 5.12 ERA)
5. (no one listed on their depth chart)……?
Chris Sale also won the Cy Young in 2018 with more than 300 strikeouts, Eovaldi was a catalyst in our 2018 World Series run where he pitched to a sub 2.00 era, E-Rod had the best season of his career last year, Martin Perez was a top prospect who hasn’t panned out but did show signs of success in the first half of last season. Point being, there’s potential with also a lot of risk like you were showing. A lot of baseball fans are sleeping on this team because of our suspect pitching and shedding Price and Betts but there’s no denying the potential for this team to be right back in the mix. Time will tell!
Is this a joke? Chris Sale didn’t win the cy young award in 2018 and has never won a cy young award in his career.
Haha that’s my bad, his 300 strikeouts were in 2017 also! But my point is don’t sleep on this team rebounding.
at this point right now…..Chris Sale is not even close of getting into the HOF !
He’s had one bad injury-laden season last year. His career stats and trajectory say otherwise if he regains form. WINS aren’t everything anymore for HOF consideration.
Wow, one bad injury bad season……have you been watching him the last 3 years from August on……you’ve got to have a better argument than “wins aren’t everything” as far as HOF consideration for Sale at this point in his career….and with the team he’s been pitching in front of for the last several seasons, wins,, or lack of, do tall a story of his continually weakening from August on.
It was always about Sale’s and Eovoldi’s health, with or without Mookie. If both are healthy, they’re still in it. If not, they’re not, and wouldn’t have been even with Betts and Price.
Trade Devers? Oh ya; same OPS+ as Mookie, higher WAR than Lindor (just to point out a couple of comparisons). Defense is still poor, but no longer wretched. Yanks will trade Judge waaaaaaaay before the Sox trade Devers. Dodgers? Trade Bellinger.
Uh, Bob calm down a bit……the Yankees, if they ever do trade Judge will do so with the right timing and not before he is grossly overpaid for accomplishments he had years before….trades, even touch ones, make ball clubs better….go ahead…..pledge love for Devers and when he’s making ridiculous mone and not producing or living up to that contract, the Sox will again be looking for the Dodgers to be suckers and take him on in another lopsided trade…..guess you’ve missed these last 2 times when the Dodgers have bailed out the Sox after the Sox made terrible players decisions and WAY overpaid only to look for the back door quickly!
LMAO @ Yanks trading Judge
1. It was a joke
2. The Yankees nor the dodgers have traded a star because they cost too much. Boston shipped out 2 of them in the same deal for the same logic
3. In 3 years, Devers could be Mookie 2.0 and Sale could be Price deal, 2.0. Js…..
The NYY allowed themselves to be outbid by Seattle on Cano. It was the right move, imo, just as the RS made the right move on Betts.
But let’s not pretend that the NYY didn’t make the correct financial move in that case.
devers has had one good season, lol, lets pump the breaks,,DJ Lemahieu is a better player.
Even though the Boston Red Sox won the World Series in 2018 where Sale was not productive for the last two months of that season and the playoffs to the rumors that cheating was going on after bringing Cora in from the Astros, as a White Sox I still appreciate the Red Sox taking Sale and giving us fans Kopech and Moncada. Moncada is going to be a stud for years to come and Kopech‘a potential after having an injury taken care of at a young age along with other core players has the White Sox the team to team to watch out for the next five to seven years.
Boston fans are happy with the parade. Good trade both ways, enjoy those guys hope they do well.
And who are the Sox’ other starting pitchers? Perez? Velazquez?
I’m really confused about the amount of crap Sale and the Sox get for his contract. Doesn’t anyone realize that Sale signed for 180 million FEWER dollars than Gerrit Cole just signed for? Sale’s contract is a more than reasonable deal if he can bounce back to being a version of his normal self.
Because in 3-4 years, people will be talking the same about Cole’s contract: how can the Yankees eat as much as possible in order to move him? It’s how fan discussions about these contracts work. It’s also a dumb conversation.
fortunately the yankees can absorb that hit,,and its more like in 6 or 7 years, maybe more,,look at verlander.
The main issue with Sale’s contract was locking him up before last season when he had a history of slowing down late in the season to doing time on the DL. The Red Sox could’ve waited until this off-season to sign him or even tried trading him during last season’s trade deadline to a contender who needed a pitcher to get some prospects.
I just wonder why Chris is getting sick, like pneumonia?
Looking at Sale remaining contract and Darvish contract….most teams would take on Darvish contract at this point.
If Red Sox trade Sale……they need to eat more than half of his salary.
Pneumonia in a healthy 30 year old makes me wonder about immune suppressive drugs, perhaps cortisone for inflammation. Not a good sign. Even if it was natural pneumonia – a young guy in good health bounces back quickly. Its not like he is doing marathons or heavy cardio work. He is throwing a baseball. Talk of the possibility of not being ready for opening day should not even be on the table at this point if his arm is fine. I hope his arm is ok because he is a joy to watch when healthy, but I am skeptical. Beware of pitchers who sign extensions in their free agent year (Beckett and now Sale)
healthy 30 year olds get pneumonias all the time. It seems tome that the pneumonia plus whatever arm problems he’s having lead to the delay
Will be packaged and traded next offseason
Sale might become the MLB’a highest paid closer in a few years.
7 foot tall and 64 pounds, max effort delivery and breaking down? Color me shocked.