The Red Sox made a series of roster moves Thursday morning, most notably reinstating right-handed reliever Justin Slaten from the 60-day IL. That move brings Boston’s 40-man roster to capacity. They’d previously had a vacancy after outrighting infielder Abraham Toro. The Red Sox also activated outfielder Rob Refsnyder from the 10-day injured list. To open active roster spots for Slaten and Refsnyder, they optioned southpaw Jovani Moran to Triple-A Worcester and placed first baseman Nathaniel Lowe on the paternity list (where he can spend up to three days).
Slaten, 27, is in his second season with the Red Sox after coming to Boston via the Rule 5 Draft in 2023. He was outstanding as a rookie in 2024, tossing 55 1/3 innings with a 2.93 ERA, a 25.9% strikeout rate, a tiny 4% walk rate and a strong 50% ground-ball rate. He’s had good results in 2025 as well, logging a 3.47 ERA in 23 1/3 frames, albeit with lesser rate stats. He’s been on the injured list since late May due to shoulder inflammation.
Slaten’s strikeout rate dipped to 17.8%, perhaps in part due to a significant drop in his slider usage. He threw nearly 25% sliders in ’24 but is down to 8% in ’25, instead favoring his curveball far more heavily (8.4% in ’24, 21.6% in ’25). Slaten’s walk rate has nearly doubled, up to 7.8%, but that’s still comfortably better than average. Sustaining a 4% walk rate was always going to be tough — it would be for any pitcher — particularly considering Slaten’s 8.5% walk rate in his final minor league season.
Even with some modest steps back this year, Slaten is a big arm who’ll provide a notable boost to Alex Cora’s bullpen. He’s been effective since day one in the majors, quickly pitching his way into a high-leverage role last year, and actually saw a bump in velocity prior to his IL placement, with his average four-seamer rising from 96.4 mph last year to 97 mph in 2025. He’ll join Garrett Whitlock, Justin Wilson and Greg Weissert as one of the primary setup options to closer Aroldis Chapman, who is enjoying perhaps the most dominant season of his 16-year major league career.
It’s Slaten time! Huge boost to the back end of the bullpen if he’s the same Slaten we saw last year. Weissert, Matz, Slaten, Whitlock, Chapman is potentially a very strong BP core (and Justin Wilson has been pretty solid lately too)
This roller coaster of a season continues!!! Win a bunch … lose 3 in a row at home to Weak teams… take 3/4 in NY and 6/7 lastly… just hope I hear click,click ,click etc at end of year!! Go Carmines!!!!!
olm – Okay I give up, what’s the clicks represent? LOL
Click click click is the sound of the roller coaster slowly cresting the tracks at the top?
Gary – Doesn’t that mean it’s getting ready for a steep decline?
My initial thought was the clicking represented shooting down all the opponents. LOL
Fpg…duck boats make a clicking sound…I thought you were from Boston
No fever.., cruising downhill the rest of the way all the way to the championship !! It’s all down from here.
Russian roulette click click boom
Good. We needed one more decent RP. We’ve had a couple of games this year where our lesser RPs forced us to wind up using Chapman to close out a game where we once held a big lead.
Whatever it takes to keep Hicks off the field. This is a rock solid BP.
Curious to see how they shore up the 4-5 spots in the rotation. It would be great to have at least one player from the Devers trade to actually contribute. Harrison and/or Tolle could be the answer at the back end of the rotation. I think they’re planning on pitching one of them vs PIT next week.
Jordan Hicks starting pitcher attempt #2???
For real though it’s rough that Criswell got hurt just now because he seems the obvious choice to fill the last rotation spot. Here’s hoping Harrison and May (and possibly eventually Tolle) can fill in well enough down the stretch. Only *really* need 3 starters in the playoffs, but I’d rather have a decent 4th for bulk innings at least than relying on full bullpen games every 4th go.
NO.
Now is not the time for experiments. Jordan Hicks is strictly mop up duty when the team is behind 4 runs or more.
The Hicks thing was a joke xD
Gary – Whomever does start, wouldn’t you consider it to be an experiment?
Whether it’s Harrison or Tolle? All come with risks, but honestly I don’t think it matters much in the grand scheme of things. There won’t be a September collapse to the point where they miss the playoffs.
He got the ‘W’ today. Maybe it will turn him around.
Buehler will be back in the rotation sooner or later if nothing else out of necessity. I’d like to see Harrison get a start or two. The Sox gave away Priester way too early with only 1 start on the last day of the season last year and look at the season he has had in Milwaukee. I’d hate for them to do that a second time with Harrison
I think you’re gonna like the guys we got for Priester. Holobetz has a 3.28 ERA in AA. 18 games started averaging a strikeout an inning and a WHIP of 1.1. Similar profile to Quinn.
Draft pick Phillips is electric with huge upside. Yophery young lottery ticket OF.
Harrison Friday?
This is looking like the plan. They’ve announced May to pitch on Sat so Harrison will likely get the ball tomorrow. What a huge boost to have someone step and be the #4.
swan – Yeah whenever they’ve got a chance to give an extra day’s rest to the rotation, they will take advantage of it. And this is a chance to do just that.
Tolle doesn’t have to be added to the 40-man roster until 2027 for rule 5 protection. They will likely bring him up before then anyway but they aren’t going to add him to the 40-man and start his clock to run out of options now if they don’t have to. You can’t look only at immediate need. Future impact also factors into things.
If they bring Tolle up in September and don’t send him back down to the minors before the end of the season he won’t burn an option year.
I serious doubt we’ll see Tolle his year unless a bigger emergency happens, cross your fingers it doesn’t.
I more wonder if they want to rest the rotation they’ll go with a bullpen day, see if Matz can be stretched out to 3 innings along with recalling Criswell to do 3 or 4.
Payton Tolle has already thrown 91.2 innings, which exceeds his last two seasons of 80-85. The scouts I read said the Red Sox do not want Tolle throwing more than another 25ish innings. That would rule out a 4th starter unless the Red Sox use him as a 2 or 3 inning opener. The service time is also a huge issue. Why loose a year of team control for 20 innings when Harrison can probably do a serviceable job.
Hail Slaten!
I think Tolle should be an announcer.
a Tolle booth?
No free passes.
Okay!!!! Raise your hand if you had Hicks getting win and Matz the save today!!!! Keep it going this weekend!!!!
Hicks had to pitch today so Matz could close out with Chapman not available. I have no fingernails left, but it worked out. Can’t believe they pulled it out yesterday too.
For whom the bells Tolles… After September 1, call him up and give him a start against the A’s!
Gary – Sox pitching again was great, but the O’s did play like a last place team. Very sloppy defense and comical baserunning.
In many ways, the Sox got lucky the last two days. Better lucky than good lol