Red Sox ace Chris Sale has a stress fracture in his right rib cage and will not be ready for Opening Day, chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom announced to reporters today (Twitter links via Alex Speier of the Boston Globe). It will be “weeks, not days” before Sale is even cleared to pick up a ball and begin any form of throwing, Bloom adds. Sale didn’t suggest a timeline other than stating that bones typically take six to eight weeks to heal. Sale suffered the injury during the lockout during a live batting practice he was streaming on Instagram, but was prohibited from communicating it to the Red Sox until the new collective bargaining agreement was reached March 10.
Sale joined the Red Sox in a December 2016 trade and is in the third year of a five-year, $145MM extension. He underwent Tommy John surgery in March 2020, ultimately leading to a gap of almost exactly two years between MLB mound appearances. In his nine starts in late 2021, Sale averaged 82 pitches per outing. Sale’s work fell short of his Cy Young-caliber peak, which is to be expected at age 32 and after a long layoff, but he still managed a healthy 28.4 K% and 6.6 BB% in his 42 1/3 innings. Two of Sale’s three postseason starts were particularly brief, but he was able to make a strong 87-pitch effort in Game 5 of the NLCS against the Astros.
The prospect of Sale missing potentially a couple months of the 2022 season is a blow to the Red Sox. Still, the club did sign free agents Michael Wacha and Rich Hill before the lockout, and has already been stretching out Tanner Houck and Garrett Whitlock this spring. Nathan Eovaldi and Nick Pivetta are also set for the team’s rotation.
GOD F***ING DAMNIT, FIRST TATIS NOW SALE. God dangit my fantasy is in trouble.
As always, we await developments.
So no Suzuki, no Schwarber, no Sale.
The day couldn’t be going much worse.
Anyone taking bets on Bloom signing Freeman?
The Sale trade looking even better for ChiSox now!
I’ll take the ring 10 out of 10 times.
Me too. Sale gave the team hope the moment he came. That said the contract extension is what has been horrible. Where is the fx?
What?
They have a World Series Champsonship, 4 in the last 22 years, the White Sox have one, it was 17 years ago.
A couple of those Red Sox championships are tainted by cheaters. In fact Boston is a cheater town (deflategate et al from unPatriots). Loser whiny Boston Nation. The AL version of Cubbiedumb. Sale is a team cancer. Good riddance.
All the Dead Sox world series victories were steroid enhanced. Big Papi was a s juiced as ARod and Clemens.
Um er, who knows what Manny was up to back then given his subsequent suspension (2009). Yes, BigPoopy implicated (tested positive in 2003). They’re all pukes.
The trade was outstanding for the Red Sox. The extension was an enormous mistake.
Definition of a win-win deal. Red Sox get the ring, White Sox get controllable prospects with high upside.
i’ll take Eovaldi’s ring over Kopech and Moncada tbh Sale a postseason daddio
Who else is on your F team? I want to know so I can trade them ASAP
Well last season I had a rotation of Kershaw, Glasnow, and Bauer. Then all 3 went down with injury, or suspension
Dude that sucks so much
But the good news is the evil Dead Sox lose out on a great pitcher!
…or months?
Wonderful news. Not only are the Sox not making additions, they now have to grapple with a hole in the rotation. Sure they have guys capable of giving them multiple innings, but it’s not a great start for Sale who is being relied on to have a bounce back season
so Michael Wacha, James Paxton, Rich Hill, Matt Strahm and Jake Diekman were additions to the grounds crew and not the pitching staff? Harry and I would be happy to get paid to roll around on the tarp.
someone having a stress fracture is “wonderful news”? I think no
Sarcasm
You sound like an unhappy person, calling an injury great news.
Guys it was sarcasm. I’m a Sox fan. It’s devastating news. I’m saying we have a bunch of arms, but we need Sale.
i see now, anyway our front office is doing nothing
How is it that these people don’t recognize that as sarcasm?
The fact that you have to explain that you were being sarcastic. shows how fragile people are. Smh
Last year there was a (supposedly) female poster who wished a player would get injured, so sadly there are some who cross that line. I have known Yankee fans who celebrate Red Sox injuries, and vice versa.
I also think some things are lost in translation when written as compared to spoken.
A “supposedly” female poster? As if that means anything?
It means they are easier to remember because there are so few here who claim to be.
Closing Sale…
No bueno, but realistically looking at the fact he hasn’t topped 200 innings since 2017, this may be a good way to keep his innings at a manageable level – but it’s certainly not ideal for a Sox team that certainly envisioned Sale being healthy. Us fleshy type, humans are indeed fragile, especially the older we get.
Red Sox don’t seem very active. Not sure what they are thinking. Jays and Rays are tough and the Yankees are still pretty good. Boston?
Red Sox signed Michael Wacha, Rich Hill and James Paxton before the lockout. They’re all good pitchers (well, Wacha’s had a bad couple of years). So it’s not like they haven’t done anything.
warren – Are you the Franks & Beans guy?
The three pitchers you mentioned:
One of them has a 5.11 ERA over the past 3 seasons
Another one of them is 42 years old
And the third won’t even be pitching until at least August
THEY HAVEN’T DONE ANYTHING
Rich Hill has been good for his age….
James Paxton is Mariner legend
Wacha Wacha is Cardilols goat
Hill’s age is 42, he hasn’t pitched as a 42-year-old yet.
Any players over the age of 40 are high risk signings, they can lose it very quickly.
I like the Paxton signing, but that won’t pay off until August … more likely next year.
FTR – I’m not judging Bloom until the regular season begins.
Looking more like Whitlock will be in the rotation
Or Houck
Him and Joe Karen Kelly are built like twigs.
3 days into Spring Training and…..HE GONE.
Wow! Bloom was up before noon today!
I guess it depends on when he had the injury and how long has it been and when he starts throwing-program.
The number of injuries we will see early, will be intense.
You’d think that players were conditioning themselves on their own.
Injuries will hurt a bunch of teams early on this season.
Come on man…..
Man, these ST post-practice showers must get rough……
The Red Sox need a corner outfielder. Schwarber just signed with the Phillies and Suzuki signed with the Cubs. Trading Renfroe to the Brewers was supposed to open up a spot for Schwarber or Suzuki, so hopefully their is someone else like Bryant who can play outfield now and 3B next year when Devers moves to DH.
They were never going to re-sign Schwarber and are almost definitely not signing Bryant, unless his market completely tanks.
Soler?
This wouldn’t be a result of those informal late February workouts at his alma mater, would it
When did Boston join and Houston go back to the NL?
Irish – answer….when Dave Dombrowski over spent his budget by signing Price for $217,000,000, Sale for $145,000,000, and Eovaldi for $68,000,000.
Signed Freddie Freeman, trade Xander Bogaerts to free up the money, wait one year for Marcelo Meyer. Easy peasy.
Bogaerts, who will NOT be signing an extension with the Red Sox, will bring a starting pitcher perhaps to plug in the rotation, even though Xander is a rental.
Done.
Mayer is not going to be ready in a year. Extend Xander for 5 seasons. Push him to 2nd or 3rd when Mayer is ready. Why do you think he won’t resign? He’s made it very clear that he wants to stay. Just because he doesn’t want to shift to 2nd now or because he plans to opt out doesn’t mean he wants to leave. He deserves to get paid after seeing what Lindor, seager, and Tatis received.
I just think with the guys in the pipeline money should be spent Elsewhere for a power-hitting middle of the lineup guy, whoever that may be.
And all the classless Yankee fans rejoice.
There’s plenty of classless Red Sox fans who have rejoiced when Yankees have injuries
Can’t wait to see Sale pitch key games in the Bronx! Oh wait….
Injured cutting up clothes in the clubhouse?
Suzuki to the Cubs, Schwarber to the Phillies, Chapman to the Jays, Sale to the IL, and Renfroe traded for JBJ. I wanna go home.
This guy is like a twig , skinny and no water added for make it strong , every turn he breaks down. Hopefully by mid season ( yet again) he can earn his bloody money that he’s getting paid. Only wish players get paid for what they do in a season, not what they done in the past. Performance base on wins , innings or in case of a everyday player hits , ribs , errors and so on.
This is bad but we did have the best record last year before Sale even threw a pitch. We can win without him, as shown last season. Still doesn’t make it easier though as he’s our ace.
Part of that was because Barnes was lights out. The second half he became Matt Barnes again.
True but one pitcher doesn’t just win games.
Hmm… So he got hurt during the lockout… in batting practice? Was he hitting?
Can this guy stay healthy? Always injured.
There are a lot of Price and Sale haters on this site since they got paid big bucks but big bucks come from previous performances and both players have had great careers.
There is one common thread besides the big bucks. A very, very bad manager.
Lets start with Sale.
2012 he becomes a starter in Chicago. He starts 30 games because he’s not the most durable guy but when he’s on the mound, he’s top 5 material. His ERA is 3.05 and WHIP 1.113. Not bad for his 23 year old season.
2013 is similar with 30 starts (not 36) due to durability with an ERA of 3.07 and improved control lowering his WHIP to 1.073. He proves he’s a workhorse by throwing 4 complete games but as always misses a few starts here and there.
2014 He jumps to elite with a 2.17 ERA and 0.966 WHIP.. He has a few issues and only throws 26 starts. So is missing a few starts his NORM? It is by 2014 when he is 25!!
2015 After three top 6 finishes in the CY race he tries to stretch out and start more games and jumps up to 31 starts. His ERA comes back to excellent from elite (3.41) and his WHIP is still excellent at 1.088. In 2016, at age 27 (start of his prime years) he has another excellent year this time increasing starts to 32 (not 36 but the most of his career). His ERA is still a very respectable 3.34 and his WHIP is 1.037. This year marks the 5th consecutive finish in the top 6 in the CY voting.
DD picks up Price in 2016 to add a top of the rotation guy and then follows it up with a trade in 2017 to get Sale the ultimate top of the staff guy.
During his 5 years as Chicago’s SP1 Sale averaged roughly 30 starts and played for Robin Ventura a fine manager and former star player. Robin let Sale pitch with his hair on fire and accepted he might miss a start or two because he always pitched full out like Scherzer. In 2017 Sale goes to Boston to play for a manager who was a former pitcher and pitching coach John Farrell. He was like Ventura in that he was strict and precise in what he wanted. Sale in 2017 under Farrell started 32 games tying the most of his career and finished second (highest of his career) in the CY vote. His ERA was 2.90 and his WHIP was 0.97. He won 17 games the year after Papi retired and JD had not arrived yet. He was an even better Sale than in Chicago.
Farrell gets fired and is replaced by an unqualified manager after the owners publicly discuss their new efforts to be more diverse. The main qualification of the new manager is he speaks two languages which will benefit Devers the organizations next hope for superstardom despite having Mookie Betts and Xander Bogaerts. Boston also picks up a stud hitter named JD Martinez to fill Papi’s spot and Boston goes on to win the World Series despite the daily mistakes by their unqualified manager.
Two key mistakes in 2018 that Cora needs to take responsibility for is putting Pearce in the 4 hole on July 31 ruining JD’s run for the MVP and allowing a .270 journeyman player named Pearce to artificially show stats far above his norm. The other huge mistake was the way Sale was handled by Cora. At the end of July with Sale having a 2.06 ERA (was the starting pitcher in the all-star game) he decided to rest Sale so he would be fresh for the post season. He rested him from July 27 to Aug 12 and Sale came out and was having a huge game with 12 Ks through 5 innings and the only hit was actually an error by Devers that the score keeper mishandled as usual. A ball that hits the right foot of a player is called an error 99.9% of the time unless it’s Devers and the front office wants to pretend his fielding isn’t as bad as it really is. He ends up throwing more pitches in the inning thanks to Devers and then the MANAGER WITHOUT A CLUE pulls him after 68 pitches since he doesn’t have a no hitter thanks to Devers. When Sale has his next bullpen session he says his arm was a bit tight so they stopped the session and immediately put him on the IL so he didn’t face the AL East rivals in upcoming series and he could rest for the post season since Boston was so far ahead.
Sale sat an entire month!!! For no good reason!!! When he tried to get back in the flow of things with his 1.97 ERA he pitched on Sept 11th against TOR. Gurriel started the game with a double, then Sale struck out two and the last batter popped out. Then Cora pulled him yet again!!! A non pitcher or pitching coach does not understand the impact this type of behavior will have on a pitcher who is elite and dying to pitch. Cora should have been fired that day!! On Sept 16 he got another start. This time 9 batters and 3 innings and 42 pitches. He gave up one hit to the Mets and GOT PULLED AGAIN!!! At that point he had not given up a run in 28 innings but CORA refused to let Sale be Sale.
In the end, Sale threw two more partial outings to end Sept and didn’t look good. Being out of practice his pitches were getting too much of the plate. A bench jockey like Cora can’t comprehend the damage he did to Sale but anyone who has ever pitched at an advanced level knows exactly what I’m talking about.
So 2018 ended with Sale having a 2.11 ERA and 0.861 WHIP yet most fans could only talk about whats wrong with Sale because of Cora’s mistakes. Some people said he was damaged goods but those in the know saw Cora as the problem. If Farrell had still been there, the Sale we expected when DD signed him would still be the elite pitcher he was when he arrived and in 2017.
Price – So is it a simple coincidence that Price’s last good year was 2017 under Farrell just like Sale? I think not. The three years before signing in Boston Price had ERAs of 2.45, 2.53 and 2.30. It doesn’t get more elite than that. Under Farrell, Price had a 17 win first season like Sale did and then in year two he got hurt but still put up excellent numbers. Then Cora showed up and his ERA jumped 0.20 the first year and another 0.70 the second year which mean the CY winner had an ERA of 4.28 for Cora in 2019. Part of that is because of the Spring Training screw-up by Cora which goes overlooked far too often..
If either pitcher was an isolated situation then Cora wouldn’t be blamed but since Cora was only with these guys 2 years and the both dropped off dramatically it’s no longer a coincidence it’s negligence!! Or ineptitude or just bad managing of the pitching staff since it was multiple players. Cora is like Nuke LaLoosh when it comes to the pitching staff. When he thinks, he hurts the team.
So if Sale isn’t what you expected when he was contracted before the 2019 season don’t blame the GM because he procured an elite pitcher, put the blame where it belongs and that squarely on CORA’S HEAD!! Ditto for Price. It’s not a coincidence that two elite pitchers failed with Cora as the manager. There needs to be accountability for Cora and the commissioner and now the Red Sox refuse to hold the bench jockey accountable!!
That is a cogent, lucid and erudite reply, but hats off to the Red Sox for celebrating diversity in the choice of their manager!
Diversity is what made the United States great and more diversity will make us betta!