Poll: Will The Red Sox Extend Garrett Crochet This Spring?
The Red Sox had their biggest offseason in years this winter, and after a failed pursuit of Juan Soto kicked things off in earnest by pulling off a massive trade with the White Sox where they sent multiple top prospects to Chicago in exchange for the club’s top left-handed pitcher. That Garrett Crochet deal naturally brought to mind the Chris Sale swap from nearly a decade ago, but one major difference between the two deals is the amount of team control remaining: Sale was locked up for three seasons when the Red Sox acquired him, while Crochet only has two years of team control remaining.
That shorter team control window could pose a problem for the Red Sox, given that their deep cache of impact, upper-level prospect talent is only just beginning to reach the major leagues. If Crochet doesn’t stay in Boston beyond the 2026 season, he may only overlap with top hitters like Roman Anthony, Kristian Campbell, and Marcelo Mayer for a year or so before the club will once again have a vacancy at the top of their rotation. Fortunately for fans in Boston, there seems to be mutual interest in an extension. Crochet spoke about the state of extension talks with the club last month and emphasized how appealing the idea of remaining in Boston long-term was to him just days after the club reportedly approached his camp about the possibility of an extension.
Of course, mutual interest in an extension won’t always lead to a deal and it’s also possible that Crochet’s feelings have shifted. He was asked about the extension possibility again last week, per Chris Cotillo of MassLive, and seemed a bit more open to taking his time: “I think that the long-term security is definitely something attractive. As players, we like to look out for our family first. But with last year being my first taste of starting, part of me also wants to see what I could do with the full season of innings workload. [I] was on a short leash. Part of me wants to see what I could do in a full season before, I suppose, locking myself into a certain bracket of player.”
Crochet and the club will still need to line up on what appropriate value for a deal would be, and that could be quite difficult given Crochet’s extremely unusual career path to this point. Drafted 11th overall by the White Sox in the 2020 draft despite the fact that he had spent most of his time in the SEC pitching out of the bullpen, Crochet was brought straight to the major leagues as a reliever and pitched to a phenomenal 2.54 ERA in 60 1/3 innings of work for Chicago from 2020 to 2021. At the time, the club appeared to be eyeing a rotation role for Crochet in 2022, but he underwent Tommy John surgery that April and did not pitch again in the majors until late in the 2023 season.
By that point, the White Sox had already begun rebuilding. That gave them little reason not to explore using Crochet out of the rotation, and so he stretched out over the winter and was tapped as the club’s Opening Day starter for his first career MLB start last year. The lefty was nothing short of brilliant in 32 starts last year, but nearly tripled his career-high workload with 146 innings of work. The White Sox carefully managed his innings throughout the season in an effort to keep him healthy, and he threw just 44 2/3 innings total over his final 14 starts, less than 3 1/3 innings per start. That lack of volume could raise some questions about Crochet’s ability to stay healthy while handling a traditional starter’s workload, particularly given that his ERA in the first half of the season was just 3.00 while that figured ballooned to 4.84 in the second half.
Those potential workload concerns could tamp down Boston’s willingness to offer Crochet a premium guarantee, even as his underlying numbers suggest a ceiling commensurate with the game’s very best starting pitchers. Crochet’s 2.69 FIP would’ve trailed only Cy Young award winners Chris Sale and Tarik Skubal if he had enough innings to qualify, and his eye-popping 35.1% strikeout rate led all starters who pitched even 20 innings last year. It’s also worth noting that Crochet won’t celebrate his 26th birthday until nearly halfway through the 2025 season, and that youth could help to ease some of Boston’s concerns about his longer-term outlook in terms of health and durability.
With so many competing factors to consider, it’s fair to argue that Crochet is one of the most difficult players to pin down in terms of value. Prior to last summer’s trade deadline, reporting indicated that Crochet may view Tyler Glasnow‘s $136.5MM guarantee with the Dodgers as a target for extension talks although, as MLBTR’s Anthony Franco discussed in a post for Front Office subscribers back in August, Glasnow had six years of service time at the time of his deal with L.A. which could make it difficult for Crochet to reach those same heights. If that’s still Crochet’s asking price, it’s possible the Red Sox might prefer to play his first season under club control out and revisit negotiations later this year or next offseason. With that being said, a big season from Crochet would surely push his asking price up substantially. That figures to be especially true if he manages to stay healthy and qualify for the ERA title this year.
How do MLBTR readers think things will play out between Crochet and the Red Sox? Will they come together on an extension before Opening Day? Or will the Red Sox wait to see how Crochet performs with the club during his first season in Boston before making a decision? Have your say in the poll below:
Will Garrett Crochet sign an extension before Opening Day?
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No, he'll go into the season without an extension. 65% (2,582)
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Yes, he'll sign with the Red Sox this Spring. 35% (1,394)
Total votes: 3,976
Garrett Crochet Discusses Extension Talks With Red Sox
Newly-acquired Red Sox lefty Garrett Crochet was in attendance for today’s Fenway Fest event in Boston, and he spoke to reporters (include Chris Cotillo of MassLive) about the state of extension talks between Red Sox brass and Crochet’s own camp. The comments come on the heels of reporting earlier this week that suggested the sides had begun preliminary discussions about a longer-term deal.
“There have been conversations with my agent and the front office, just kind of getting a feel for one another,” Crochet said, as relayed by Cotillo. “Staying in Boston long-term is something that has a lot of merit in my mind and something I think would be awesome. In the meantime, I’m just focusing on spring and getting ready for the upcoming season, trying to stay focused one day at a time. When something’s presented, then we’ll attack it.”
Crochet, 25, enjoyed a breakout season with the White Sox last year as he moved from a relief role into the rotation. He made the most of the opportunity, pitching to a solid 3.58 ERA in 146 innings of work with a 2.69 FIP and an eye-popping 35.1% strikeout rate. That dominant performance on a team that broke the all-time MLB loss record made a trade nearly inevitable, and Boston pounced on the opportunity during the Winter Meetings last month and shipped a package headlined by catching prospect Kyle Teel and outfield prospect Braden Montgomery to Chicago in exchange for Crochet’s services.
The southpaw immediately adds a clear #1 starter to the front of the Red Sox rotation, but with a young core of talent reaching the major leagues and knocking on the door at Triple-A, locking up Crochet beyond his remaining two years of control would make plenty of sense for Boston. Crochet is clearly open to such an arrangement, and his comments today only served to confirm the lefty’s interest in locking in a longer-term guarantee. It’s hardly a surprise that Crochet would be open to listening on extension talks. He’s suffered through a number of injury-marred seasons already in his career, and that elevated injury risk surely makes a long-term guarantee more attractive.
To that end, he made clear prior to the trade deadline last summer that if he was going to go over his established innings limit to pitch in the 2024 postseason after a midseason trade, he would want to get an extension worked out prior to a deal coming together. Of course, no deal was ultimately made and now Crochet is in Boston. It’s unclear exactly what sort of deal either Crochet or the Red Sox are angling for at this point, though one noteworthy reference point is a report from ESPN’s Jeff Passan over the summer that suggested Crochet was seeking a nine-figure deal at the time.
Crochet wasn’t the only Red Sox player to discuss the state of extension talks today, as top prospects Roman Anthony and Kristian Campbell both spoke to WEEI today and revealed that neither has been approached by the Red Sox about the possibility of a pre-debut extension. That’s not necessarily a major shock, given that pre-debut extensions are generally quite rare. They’ve become more common in recent years, however, as evidenced by both Jackson Chourio of the Brewers and Colt Keith of the Tigers signing deals of that sort last offseason alone.
The Red Sox would surely love to lock up either Anthony or Campbell beyond their current windows of control. Anthony is rated by Baseball America as the #1 prospect in all of baseball, while Campbell isn’t ranked too far behind at #24. Both figure to make their big league debuts in 2025, though the exact timing of those debuts remains up in the air. There’s been some speculation that Campbell, in particular, could be in the conversation for an Opening Day roster spot should he manage to win the second base job away from David Hamilton and Vaughn Grissom in Spring Training this spring, but it shouldn’t surprise anyone if both youngsters are in the majors by the time the first half of the 2025 season comes to a close.
While there’s certainly value from a player’s perspective in locking in a major payday before they so much as take their first big league at-bat, they also typically come with much lower price tags relative to extensions signed as soon as during a player’s pre-arb years as a big leaguer. Chourio’s extension with the Brewers guaranteed him a record-setting $82MM last winter, but that pales in comparison to the nine-figure deals secured by players like Julio Rodriguez and Bobby Witt Jr. once they had already established themselves as star-caliber big leaguers. That said, pre-debut extensions aren’t without risk for the team either; even elite prospects can go on to struggle in the majors, with Jon Singleton of the Astros and Scott Kingery of the Phillies standing out as examples of players who signed pre-debut extensions and then went on to provide their clubs with little value over the life of those deals.
Given that, it’s perhaps not surprising for the sides to have not yet engaged in extension talks. Anthony and Campbell may well both prefer to bet on themselves early in their careers as they eye either a more lucrative extension down the line or free agency once their time under team control comes to a close. On the other hand, the Red Sox may prefer to see how Anthony, Campbell, and other top prospects like Marcelo Mayer develop before making extension offers as they have over the years with players like Brayan Bello, Garrett Whitlock, Rafael Devers, and Xander Bogaerts.
Red Sox, Garrett Crochet Have Had Preliminary Extension Talks
The Red Sox made one of the biggest trade acquisitions of the winter, landing Garrett Crochet from the White Sox for four prospects. Boston apparently has interest in keeping their newly-acquired southpaw for the longer term.
Chris Cotillo of MassLive reports that the Red Sox and Crochet’s camp at CAA have had at least preliminary discussions about a long-term deal. Tomorrow is the deadline for teams and arbitration-eligible players to exchange filing figures on salaries for the 2025 season. That doesn’t preclude the sides from continuing to negotiate, but it stands to reason they’ll attempt to hammer out a deal to avoid an arbitration hearing for this year.
Crochet is coming off his first full season as a starting pitcher. His early-career injuries and usage out of the White Sox’s bullpen limited his arbitration earnings. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects the southpaw for a $2.9MM salary. He’s controllable for one additional year and is on track to reach free agency after his age-27 season.
For the next two seasons, Crochet should offer immense surplus value. He turned in top-of-the-rotation numbers on a rate basis last year. Crochet worked to a 3.58 earned run average with a massive 35.1% strikeout percentage. Chicago limited his workload within starts down the stretch. He finished the season with 146 innings despite taking all 32 turns through the rotation. Boston presumably won’t have any qualms about fully unleashing Crochet in his second season as a starter.
Crochet’s contract status was a key issue heading into last summer’s deadline. The southpaw seemed an obvious candidate to move as the ace of a team that was headed to the worst season in modern history. Chicago held onto him instead, in large part because his camp indicated he wanted an extension to pitch into October. To be clear, there’s no indication that Crochet would take that stance again now that he has a full season under his belt. At the time, ESPN’s Jeff Passan wrote that the asking price would’ve been above nine figures. Passan noted that Crochet’s camp could compare him to Tyler Glasnow, who signed for four years and $110MM in new money on his extension with the Dodgers.
It’s not a perfect comparison. Glasnow was one year from free agency and had banked significantly greater earnings. Crochet is an extra season away. However, Crochet’s second half probably pushes his asking price higher than where it had been at the deadline. He finished the year healthy and is a few months closer to free agency. Even last year’s capped innings tally is above Glasnow’s career high of 134 frames in an MLB season.
Jacob deGrom holds the record for the largest extension for a pitcher with between four and five years of service time. deGrom secured $120.5MM from the Mets covering his age 32-35 seasons. That was an anomaly, as deGrom was a late bloomer but was coming off a Cy Young season. Crochet would certainly look to top more recent precedents like Pablo López’s $73.5MM deal with the Twins and the $71.5575MM in new money which Mitch Keller got from Pittsburgh last spring. A four- or five-year term would seem the most likely midpoint if the sides can reach an agreement. That’d allow the Sox to buy out two or three free agent seasons while Crochet would still have an opportunity to cash in as a free agent at 30 or 31.
Giants Declined To Include Bryce Eldridge In Tucker/Crochet Trade Offers
The Giants were known to have had interest in Kyle Tucker before the Astros traded the outfielder to the Cubs, and The Athletic’s Andrew Baggarly shared some details on that pursuit plus the new information that the Giants were one of the many teams who talked to the White Sox about Garrett Crochet. San Francisco “made legitimate offers” for both Tucker and Crochet, Baggarly writes, “to the point that [the Giants] were said to feel a bit uncomfortable with the players they were willing to sacrifice.” However, neither offer included top prospect Bryce Eldridge, and thus no trades materialized since the Astros and Sox each viewed Eldridge’s inclusion as “a prerequisite.”
Eldridge was the 16th overall pick of the 2023 draft, and he has already hit .292/.379/.514 with 29 home runs over 649 plate appearances in the minors even before he turned 20 years old last October. This hot hitting saw Eldridge moved up the ladder to four different affiliates during the 2024 season, though it is worth noting that his numbers dropped off (in small sample sizes) as he played higher levels of minor league ball. Eldridge had a more modest .785 OPS in 40 PA with Double-A Richmond and then a .601 OPS in 35 PA with Triple-A Sacramento.
Since he has already reached Triple-A, it isn’t out of the question that Eldridge’s MLB debut could come during the 2025 season, especially given how San Francisco was already aggressive with his early promotions. LaMonte Wade Jr. is a free agent next winter and has been the subject of trade speculation even this offseason, so the path should soon be clear for Eldridge as the Bay Area’s first baseman of the future. While the Giants will naturally want to see him post better numbers in the upper minors before calling him to the Show, it is easy to see the potential in the 6’7″, 223-pound first baseman.
Eldridge fits the mold of a classic left-handed slugger, and scouting reports from both MLB Pipeline and Baseball America praise his huge power and his mature approach at the plate. Pipeline and BA each place Eldridge 35th in the most recent editions of their league-wide top-100 prospects rankings. He is the only Giants minor leaguer in Baseball America’s rankings, while Pipeline also has James Tibbs III (the 13th overall pick of the 2024 draft) 88th on their list.
In either case, Eldridge is certainly the top prospect in a San Francisco farm system that is considered to be relatively thin, so it isn’t surprising that the Giants aren’t eager to move him in any trades. Obviously this is a big roadblock in negotiations, since as Baggarly notes, “any team dangling a solid-average everyday player or better is going to start by asking for Eldridge — and not likely to move off that position.”
The White Sox were known to be focusing on young position players in exchange for Crochet, and indeed three of the four prospects Chicago received from the Red Sox in the trade package were position players. As per Pipeline’s rankings of San Francisco’s farm system, the Giants are slightly deeper in position players than pitchers, though not to the level of Boston’s depth. Likewise, the Cubs still have a wealth of position players in their minor league system even after moving Cam Smith as part of the Tucker trade.
Giants president of baseball operations Buster Posey and GM Zack Minasian have yet to complete a trade in their limited time leading the San Francisco front office, though in the view of rival executives, Baggarly hears the Giants have been “hyperactive in attempting to generate trade dialogue.” Since questions remain about how much ownership is willing to commit to the payroll this season, the trade market could therefore be the Giants’ best method of adding talent to the roster, though that creates another layer of complication if other teams are chiefly focused on Eldridge among the minor league prospects. As Baggarly frames the situation, some other front offices have been trying to see if they can get Posey or Minasian to bite on an unfavorable trade out of sheer inexperience, which has “led to a few opening offers…that have amounted to non-starters and time wasters.”
In terms of other trade candidates, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle details some of the players the Giants could still look to pry away from rival teams, and reports that the Giants “had some interest” in Cubs second baseman Nico Hoerner earlier this winter. The past-tense phrasing, however, indicates that San Francisco moved on after signing Willy Adames as the new everyday shortstop, so Tyler Fitzgerald now looks to move from shortstop to second base.
MLBTR Podcast: Winter Meetings Recap
The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.
This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Tim Dierkes, Steve Adams and Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…
- The Mets signing Juan Soto (2:35)
- The Yankees to sign Max Fried (26:05)
- The Red Sox acquiring Garrett Crochet from the White Sox (36:10)
- The Giants signing Willy Adames (46:40)
- The Athletics signing Luis Severino (51:55)
- The Blue Jays acquiring Andrés Giménez from the Guardians who flip Spencer Horwitz to the Pirates for Luis Ortiz (1:01:25)
- The Orioles signing Tyler O’Neill and Gary Sánchez (1:14:00)
- The Tigers signing Alex Cobb (1:21:35)
- The Rangers re-signing Nathan Eovaldi and acquiring Jake Burger from the Marlins (1:25:20)
Check out our past episodes!
- Blake Snell, Dodger Fatigue, And The Simmering Hot Stove – listen here
- Yusei Kikuchi, The Aggressive Angels, And The Brady Singer/Jonathan India Trade – listen here
- The Rays’ Stadium Plans, Diamond Sports, And Some Offseason Rumors – listen here
The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff. Check out their Facebook page here!
Red Sox Acquire Garrett Crochet
The long-awaited Garrett Crochet trade is finally here. The lefty will be swapping his White Sox for Red Sox, according to announcements from both clubs. Four prospects are going the other way: catcher Kyle Teel, outfielder Braden Montgomery, infielder Chase Meidroth and right-hander Wikelman Gonzalez.
Crochet, 25, was the eleventh overall pick in the 2020 draft and made his big league debut that same season with a six-inning cup of coffee. He was a key piece of the White Sox bullpen in 2021 with a 2.82 ERA and 2.80 FIP in 54 1/3 innings of work but missed the entire 2022 season and a portion of the 2023 campaign after undergoing Tommy John surgery. The lefty ultimately made just 13 appearances in the majors last year and struggled in 12 2/3 innings while walking more batters than he struck out during that time.
When the White Sox made the decision to not only move Crochet into the rotation but name him the club’s Opening Day starter back in March, the news came as something of a shock given his lengthy injury history. The move proved to be a fateful one, however, as Crochet went on to turn in a dominant season for Chicago to emerge as the club’s lone bright spot amid a brutal 121-loss season. Crochet pitched 146 innings across 32 starts for the White Sox this year, and in doing so posted a 3.58 ERA (115 ERA+) with a phenomenal 2.69 FIP. Among starters with at least 100 innings of work in 2024, Crochet led the sport in strikeout rate (35.1%) and SIERA (2.53) while also posting an elite 5.5% walk rate and a solid 45.1% groundball rate.
Those unmatched peripheral numbers paint a picture of Crochet as among the game’s very best starters on a rate basis, offering a rare combination of command and top-end velocity from the left side. That’s not to say Crochet comes completely without concerns, of course. He was quite prone to giving up hard contact with the White Sox this year, as evidenced by 14.4% of his fly balls leaving the yard for home runs and a 9.2% barrel rate that was in the bottom 15 among all MLB starters with at least 140 innings this year. While that proclivity towards lackluster batted ball results can be more than made up for with Crochet’s elite strikeout-to-walk ratios, the lefty’s lack of track record due to a substantial injury history is also sure to raise some eyebrows. His 146 innings of work this year represents the first time he’s thrown more than 65 innings in a season dating back to his college days in the SEC, and he threw even 90 pitches in just nine of his 32 starts this year.
Of course, it’s hardly a surprise that Crochet’s workload was closely managed given he more than doubled his previous career high for innings in 2024. Barring injury, it’s easy to imagine the Red Sox being able to stretch him out for larger workloads over the course of his two remaining seasons of team control, and perhaps even for as soon as the 2025 campaign. Ultimately, Crochet profiles as one of the most impactful arms in the entire sport on a per-inning basis, and that was clearly enough for a Red Sox club that has been on the hunt for an ace all winter to pull the triggers regardless of durability concerns.
The upside to Crochet’s limitations in previous seasons is that it has tamped down his earning power to this point in his career. He has accrued over four years of major league service time but since so much of that was spent either on the injured list or in the bullpen, he hasn’t been able to push his salary up terribly high. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects him for just $2.9MM next year. He will be due another raise in 2026 before his slated trip to free agency but probably won’t even be able to get to eight-figure territory due to his modest starting point. Given the massive prices being paid for free agent starters this winter, Crochet’s situation gave him a huge amount of trade value.
In return for two years of Crochet’s services, Boston is giving up a massive prospect haul. Teel is the clear headliner, ranked by Baseball America as the #25 prospect in the sport and Boston’s third-best prospect behind only Roman Anthony and Kristian Campbell, both of whom reports have suggested the club regards as untouchable. A left-handed hitting catcher, Teel was the 14th overall pick in the 2023 draft and hit an excellent .299/.390/.462 in 84 games at the Double-A level this year before earning a promotion to Triple-A. The youngster rates as a solid defender behind the plate who is expected to have no issues sticking behind the plate, and with his 23rd birthday coming up in February it’s not hard to imagine him taking over as the everyday catcher for the White Sox in Chicago sometime in 2025.
In addition to Teel, the Red Sox are also dealing 2024 first rounder Braden Montgomery. The 12th overall pick in this year’s draft, Montgomery is a switch-hitting outfielder who has yet to make his pro debut but slashed .322/.454/.733 in 295 trips to the plate for Texas A&M this year. BA ranks Montgomery as the #59 prospect in baseball while MLB Pipeline ranks him as the #54 prospect in the sport, noting that he offers plus power and double-plus arm strength that should make him a good fit for right field. Meidroth and Gonzalez, meanwhile, are not considered top-100 prospects in the sport but are nonetheless well-regarded within Boston’s system. Per Pipeline, they ranked as Boston’s #11 and #14 prospects prior to the trade.
Meidroth was the club’s fourth-rounder in the 2022 draft and looked good in 122 games at Triple-A this year with a .293/.437/.401 slash line. The 23-year-old offers little power and profiles best as a second baseman in the majors but also has experience at third base and shortstop. Like Teel, he could impact the White Sox as soon as this year. Gonzalez, meanwhile, signed with the Red Sox out of Venezuela and made his pro debut back in 2019. He split his time between the rotation and bullpen at the Double-A level in 2024, posting a 4.73 ERA in 83 2/3 innings of work. His solid 25.6% strikeout rate at the level was overshadowed by a 12.8% walk rate. It’s possible Gonzalez could make an impact at the big league level out of the bullpen in the near-term, but given Chicago’s lengthy timeline for a return to contention it would hardly be a surprise to see the club opt to develop the 22-year-old carefully with an eye towards a future in the big league rotation.
With Crochet now in the fold, the Red Sox have checked the biggest box off of their offseason to-do list by adding a premium talent to the front of their rotation. What’s unclear, however, is the club’s next steps. Rumors percolated earlier this winter that the club may pursue multiple top-level pitching additions, and given the fact that the club reportedly prepared a formal offer for top free agent starter Corbin Burnes last night such an addition can’t necessarily be ruled out. A lower-level addition to supplement the rotation appears more likely at this point, however, given recent reporting expressing skepticism regarding Boston’s odds of landing Burnes. A reunion with Nick Pivetta or a pursuit of Walker Buehler have been floated as possible alternative free agent targets for the Red Sox and could allow the club to further build out depth for a rotation that currently projects to see Crochet joined by Tanner Houck, Brayan Bello, Kutter Crawford, and Lucas Giolito next year.
Aside from bolstering the rotation, the Red Sox still figure to explore the market for a right-handed addition to their lineup. Teoscar Hernandez and Alex Bregman have both received buzz as potential targets for Boston, with Hernandez theoretically joining a crowded outfield mix as a replacement for Tyler O’Neill while Bregman would slot into the club’s lineup as the everyday second baseman barring a decision to move Rafael Devers off third base. Now that Teel is headed for Chicago, bolstering the club’s depth behind the plate seems likely and finding a back-up such as James McCann to pair with Connor Wong could be a priority for the club.
Julian McWilliams of the Boston Globe (X link) first reported that the Red Sox were about to acquire Crochet with Teel going the other way. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (X link) first reported the other names in the deal.
Yankees, Mets Among Top Suitors For Garrett Crochet
One day after the Mets and Yankees finished battling for the top free agent, they’re in the competition for arguably the winter’s #1 trade candidate. Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon of the Athletic report that the New York teams are currently the most aggressive suitors for White Sox’s lefty Garrett Crochet.
The Athletic writes that the Red Sox and Phillies have also expressed interest, but they appear to be behind the New York teams for the moment. Jon Morosi of the MLB Network put the Brewers on Crochet this morning, though The Athletic report does not mention Milwaukee. Rosenthal and Sammon indicate that no team is close to pulling off a deal yet.
Crochet stayed healthy in his first full season as a starter. The Sox pulled back his workload after failing to line up a deadline trade. Chicago never shut him down or skipped his turns through the rotation, but they abbreviated his starts at the end of the year. Crochet finished the season with 146 innings across 32 appearances. He turned in dominant rate stats, striking out 35.1% of batters faced against an excellent 5.5% walk rate. His 3.58 earned run average didn’t quite align with those fantastic peripherals. That’s at least in part because he was pitching in front of one of the game’s worst defensive teams, contributing to an elevated .318 average on balls in play against him.
Going into 2025, Crochet projects as a top-of-the-rotation arm. He shouldn’t have as many concerns about his workload down the stretch. His deadline trade candidacy was also complicated by the late revelation that he was seeking a contract extension if he’d be asked to pitch into the postseason during his first season as a starter. That’s no longer an obstacle.
Chicago GM Chris Getz spoke in generalities about a potential Crochet trade. He repeated the organization’s preference to add young hitting talent but suggested they weren’t opposed to building around pitching if they felt it was the best offer (X link via Scott Merkin of MLB.com). Getz reiterated that he didn’t feel compelled to make a trade this offseason, though it’d be a major surprise if Crochet were still in a White Sox uniform by the end of March.
Of the New York teams, the Mets have more talent at the top of the farm system. Their system is headlined by shortstop Jett Williams. Baseball America ranks 19-year-old infielder Jesus Baez as the #3 prospect in the organization. Ronny Mauricio is a former top prospect who might’ve opened the season as New York’s third baseman had he not torn his ACL in winter ball last year. Third baseman Brett Baty has seen his stock dip as he’s underperformed against MLB pitching, but he’s drawing attention as a change of scenery candidate. While Baty no longer has the pull to headline a Crochet package, he could be of interest as a secondary piece. (The Sox built their deadline return for Erick Fedde and Michael Kopech around Miguel Vargas, another post-hype infielder.)
The Yankees’ system is headlined by Jasson Domínguez. There’s a sharp drop thereafter, however. It’d be a surprise if the Yanks were willing to put Domínguez in a Crochet package. The switch-hitter may well be New York’s starting center fielder next year, with Aaron Judge potentially kicking to right field after Juan Soto walked. Outfielder Spencer Jones and infielders George Lombard Jr. and Roderick Arias were once viewed as Top 100 type talents, but they’re all coming off somewhat alarming minor league seasons. Jones and Arias struck out at huge rates, while Lombard didn’t hit for much power in A-ball.
Crochet is controllable for two seasons. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects him for a bargain $2.9MM salary. Even for the New York franchises, the affordability is appealing. The Yankees could prefer to attack the lineup in free agency rather than make a top-of-the-market splash for starting pitching. The Mets still need a top-of-the-rotation starter. They’ve thus far shied away from making that kind of move in free agency, instead building the rotation with upside plays for Clay Holmes and Frankie Montas.
Brewers Reportedly “Engaged” In Garrett Crochet Market
Reporting yesterday indicated that the market for White Sox southpaw Garrett Crochet has started to heat up, with an increasing chance that a deal could come together at some point during the Winter Meetings this week. The Yankees, Red Sox, Padres, Cubs, and Reds are among the suitors who have previously been mentioned, but Jon Morosi of MLBNetwork added an additional suitor this morning when he reported that the Brewers are among the teams who remain engaged with Chicago regarding Crochet.
Milwaukee is an intriguing suitor for Crochet’s services. While the club typically focuses on internal development and savvy free agent deals in the middle and lower tiers of free agency in order to sustain their status as perennial contenders, the Brewers have swung trades for notable players such as Willy Adames and Christian Yelich in the past. Adames, of course, just signed with the Giants after declining a Qualifying Offer from the club, but Yelich went on to become a franchise stalwart who is under contract in Milwaukee through the end of the 2028 season. While Crochet comes with just two years of team control as opposed to the three-and-a-half and five years of control Adames and Yelich respectively had remaining at the time of their deals, the Brewers are firmly in the midst of their competitive window and have plenty of reason to be aggressive.
The club has weathered the losses of stars like Adames, Corbin Burnes, and Josh Hader in recent years that have left them facing increased long-term uncertainty, and with groups of exciting young talent in Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and Chicago reaching the majors it’s not hard to imagine a scenario where Milwaukee’s recent dominance over the NL Central comes to an end within the next few years. Adding a player with Crochet’s upside to a rotation that already figures to feature Brandon Woodruff and Freddy Peralta this winter could be a way for the Brewers to guarantee their competitive window remains firmly open in 2025, and do so at a relatively affordable financial cost. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects Crochet to make just $2.9MM in his penultimate trip through arbitration this winter. That’s a salary any club could afford, including the budget-conscious Brew Crew.
Of course, a trade for Crochet would come with plenty of risks. The southpaw managed just 146 innings in 2024 after two lost seasons due to injury and has never shown himself to be capable of handling a full starter’s workload at the MLB level; while he started 32 games in 2024, 17 of those starts lasted less than five innings. Even setting aside those volume- and health-related concerns, trading significant prospect capital for a player who wouldn’t be under long-term team control may be a difficult pill to swallow. While prospects like Jeferson Quero and Jacob Misiorowski could be used to create an enticing package for Chicago, the Brewers lack the high-end talent other suitors like the Padres (Ethan Salas), Red Sox (Marcelo Mayer), and Cubs (Matt Shaw) may be able to offer.
Of course, the prospect capital lost in a hypothetical Crochet trade could be made up for in other ways. The Brewers could pull from the playbook San Diego ultimately wound up using with Juan Soto and slot Crochet into their rotation for a year before flipping him next winter. It’s even possible that could land the club a return somewhat comparable to what they gave up if Crochet is able to stay healthy and establish himself as capable of pitching a wire-to-wire big league season on a starter’s workload this year. Alternatively, it’s at least plausible that Milwaukee could explore extension talks with Crochet that would keep him in town for longer than his two years of team control, though it’s unclear whether or not the club would have room on their books for the sort of salary Crochet could command given that any extension would overlap with the final years of Yelich’s deal.
Garrett Crochet Rumors: Cubs, Padres, Yankees, Red Sox, Reds
7:28pm: MLBNetwork’s Jon Morosi reported this evening that a Crochet deal coming together during the Winter Meetings this week is “increasingly possible.” What’s more, Morosi suggests that the Red Sox are “more willing” to listen on top shortstop prospect Marcelo Mayer than previously believed and could become a more significant factor in Crochet’s trade market if they make him available in trade talks with the White Sox.
4:23pm: Garrett Crochet‘s status as the offseason’s top trade candidate means that there is plenty of buzz surrounding the White Sox southpaw as the Winter Meetings get underway. A crosstown trade could be a possibility, as Maddie Lee of the Chicago Sun-Times reports that the Cubs “have had at least preliminary talks” with the Sox about Crochet’s availability.
The Cubs’ list of top prospects is heavy on position players, which could fit with White Sox GM Chris Getz‘s stated aim of obtaining premium position-player talent in exchange for Crochet’s services. It is easy to imagine Getz asking for at least one of Matt Shaw or Owen Caissie as a headliner in a trade package, or perhaps even Pete Crow-Armstrong if the Sox wanted a player with some actual big league experience. Given the Cubs’ depth at both the MLB and minor league levels, Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer might feel comfortable in parting with a younger blue-chipper in order to land a controllable pitcher.
Crochet is projected to earn only $2.9MM in arbitration this season, and he is under one further year of team control in 2026. Even if Crochet’s production takes a dip from his 2024 numbers, he’d still be a bargain in comparison to the cost of the average starting pitcher. This might be the type of special circumstance that would make the Cubs want to keep adding to their rotation, even though the Wrigleyville starting five already seems set with Justin Steele, Shota Imanaga, Jameson Taillon, Javier Assad, and new signing Matthew Boyd.
The White Sox are known to have a very high asking price on Crochet, and apparently had interest in at least one of Ethan Salas or Leodalis De Vries in trade talks with the Padres, as per USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. San Diego has been linked to Crochet on the rumor mill since prior to the trade deadline, yet the Friars have seemingly drawn a line when it comes to moving either of the top two prospects in their farm system.
The Padres and Cubs are just two of the many clubs known to have had some level of interest in Crochet in the last six months, and given his low price, it’s probably safe to say just about every team in baseball has probably at least checked in with Getz about what it would take to land the left-hander. The Yankees refused to deal Spencer Jones to the White Sox for Crochet prior to the deadline, but MassLive.com’s Chris Cotillo (X link) writes that New York is still “believed to be in” on the Crochet sweepstakes.
Boston may be a different story, as Cotillo hears that the Red Sox are “just on the periphery of Garrett Crochet talks and are not aggressors at all.” This tracks with reporting from Cotillo’s MassLive colleague Sean McAdam a couple of weeks ago, as McAdam wrote that negotiations between the two Sox teams had seemingly quieted. On paper, the Red Sox would seemingly be an ideal fit for Crochet given Boston’s need for frontline pitching and their collection of elite position-player prospects (Roman Anthony, Kristian Campbell, Marcelo Mayer, Kyle Teel), but obviously a match depends on what exactly Chicago would want back in return. For instance, there have been reports that Anthony and Campbell are the true untouchables within the “big four” Red Sox prospects, so talks might have cooled with the White Sox are insisting on one of those two.
There appear to be mixed signals on whether or not the Reds could be involved. Cotillo writes that “Cincinnati [is] seen as a real threat to land Crochet,” but Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer throws cold water on the possibility, saying that “the talks went nowhere” between the Reds and White Sox, “and there’s no reason to think they’ll re-engage at this point.” Wittenmyer notes that the two sides discussed Crochet before Cincinnati acquired Brady Singer from the Royals, so that deal could mark the end of any higher-level pitching moves the Reds could make.
Latest On Red Sox’ Rotation Plans
The Red Sox are looking to improve their rotation this winter but it remains to be seen how exactly that will play out. They have previously been connected to top free agents such as Corbin Burnes, Max Fried and Blake Snell, as well as trade candidate Garrett Crochet.
This week, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports that the Sox actually want to of those top free agents. Sean McAdam of MassLive reports that the Sox are continuing to keep tabs on the pitching market while engaging with Juan Soto. They did have some interest in lefty Yusei Kikuchi, though it’s unclear how strong that interest was and he now has an agreement with the Angels. As for Crochet, McAdam reports that the Sox have pulled off the gas a bit there, with some unknown club getting “very aggressive” recently.
Very early in the offseason, chief baseball officer Craig Breslow said the club would be looking to the “raise the ceiling” in the rotation and these pursuits all align with that goal. Burnes, Fried and Snell all have long track records of major league success, with Burnes having a Cy Young award and Snell having two of them. Fried doesn’t have the hardware but does have a 3.07 earned run average in just under 900 career innings. Crochet only just transitioned to the rotation in 2024 but did so with aplomb, posting a 3.58 ERA, 35.1% strikeout rate, 5.5% walk rate and 45.1% ground ball rate in 146 innings.
Any one of those pitchers would be a nice upgrade for Boston or any other club, though that will also make them very popular. In addition to the Sox, those pitchers have been connected to clubs like the Blue Jays, Orioles, Yankees, Dodgers and Padres. There are plenty of other clubs that also make sense, even if they haven’t been explicitly tied to those pitchers in rumors.
For the Sox to come away with two of those pitchers would make for quite an aggressive offseason, but that’s exactly what the club has been signaling. Both Breslow and CEO Sam Kennedy have made comments suggesting the club is planning to act boldly this winter, with Kennedy recently saying that paying the competitive balance tax is on the table. Many fans of the club will bring up last year’s “full throttle” comments from chairman Tom Werner and how those didn’t precede much action last winter, but the club is being more specific this year. Kennedy has repeatedly said the goal is to field a club capable of winning 90 to 95 games and taking the division.
Spending money on free agents is one way they could go about accomplishing that. RosterResource projects the 2025 club for a payroll of $138MM, well below their $184MM spending from 2024, which was itself a drop from what they spent in the previous decade. RR pegs the club’s CBT number at $171MM, which is $70MM below the lowest threshold.
There’s plenty of room in there for two notable contracts, though successfully signing Soto would obviously completely change the calculus, given the expectation that he’ll sign a record-setting contract. Leaving that aside for now, big contracts for two of the big free agent starters is a feasible outcome. As part of MLBTR’s Top 50 Free Agents post, each of Burnes, Fried and Snell were projected for contracts with average annual values between $26MM and $32MM. Putting two of those onto Boston’s payroll still wouldn’t even get them to the CBT line. They will presumably also make additions to the bullpen and maybe the position player group as well, but with a willingness to cross the line, all sorts of possibilities could be on the table for them.
Crochet would be far cheaper from a financial perspective, with the biggest cost coming in the form of prospect capital. Since he has spent so much of his career either working in relief or injured, he is down to two years of club control but hasn’t been able to raise his salary very high through the arbitration process. He made just $800K in 2024 and MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects him for a raise to just $2.9MM in 2025. He would be due another raise in 2026 before he’s slated to become a free agent.
Two years of an ace-caliber pitcher for that kind of money is tremendous value, which is why Crochet figures to be very popular in trade talks. The Red Sox have a strong farm system and could certainly get a deal done if they wanted to, though it seems some mystery club has pulled ahead of them, per McAdam’s reporting.
For now, the Boston rotation projects to be fronted by Tanner Houck, Brayan Bello and Kutter Crawford. Houck had a breakout season in 2024 but may have run out of gas, as he had a 2.54 ERA in the first half and a 4.23 mark in the second. Bello and Crawford are each coming off decent but not outstanding seasons, each finishing with an ERA in the 4.35-4.50 range. Lucas Giolito and Garrett Whitlock could be in the mix in 2025 but they are fairly unknown quantities right now as each underwent internal brace surgery in 2024.
Adding to that group would improve Boston’s chances in 2025 while bumping guys like Cooper Criswell, Richard Fitts and Quinn Priester to depth roles, either in the minors or in the big league bullpen.
The interest in Kikuchi suggests that the Sox are also open to some of mid-market options. With Kikuchi now gone, some of the other names that could be in line for somewhat similar deals include Jack Flaherty, Sean Manaea, Nathan Eovaldi, Luis Severino and old friend Nick Pivetta.
The qualifying offer will likely be a factor, depending on who the Sox ultimately sign. Snell, Eovaldi and Flaherty were ineligible to receive a QO, Snell and Eovaldi because they had already received one and Flaherty because he was traded midseason. Burnes, Fried, Manaea and Severino rejected QOs, meaning the Sox would have to forfeit their second-best pick in next year’s draft and $500K of international bonus pool space to sign them. Pivetta rejected a QO from the Red Sox, meaning they stand to receive a compensation pick just ahead of the third round if he signs elsewhere, though they would not receive that pick if they ultimately re-sign him.