Will Injured Garrett Crochet Pitch Again in 2026?
The Boston Red Sox have been without the 2025 Cy Young Award Runner-Up since April thanks to a shoulder injury.
Video Transcript
What's up everyone?
Zach Coe here for Roundtable.
Wanted to take a minute to talk about Red Sox ace Garrett Crochet, and whether or not we'll see him back on a big league mound in 2026.
Obviously, Tuesday night's game against the Baltimore Orioles got canceled thanks to inclement weather sweeping across the entire East Coast, but that didn't stop Crochet from meeting with the media where he answered that question about whether or not he'll be back on the big league mound.
He told NBC Sports Boston that it's too tough to tell right now, and he went on to describe the injury being much, much different than when he initially landed on the injured list.
Of course, he started to ramp back up and then experienced a setback, with a lat strain thereafter he threw his first live BP of the season and obviously to this point he hasn't been able to throw a baseball again since.
And it's getting really close to the point where he simply might not have enough time to build back up to become a starter.
And obviously it becomes a lot easier for Crochet to not be back as a starter with how well the Red Sox rotation has been pitching.
You have Jake Bennett, Peyton Tully, and Connelly Early, three rookie lefties who are rapidly approaching their career highs in innings and if you have the security of having Garrett Crochet back, you could start to ramp those guys down a little bit to protect their long-term health too.
And that's not to say that Crochet might not be back at some point this year, but it may be in a relief role and he could be among the most dangerous and valuable relievers down the stretch for the Red Sox, but that's obviously not what you want him to do.
And now we're getting dangerously close to the point where he's gonna hit that one hundred and twenty-day on the injured list mark that gets the Red Sox the extra year on his contract, which at the time of his injury seemed absolutely unfathomable.
He said it to NBC Sports Boston this afternoon that it just at the time he thought he was gonna maybe miss one start in the way that it just continued to evolve.
And overall, this is a pretty big indictment on the Red Sox medical staff because we've seen this time and time again now, whether it be with Roman Anthony or Chris Sale in the past or any number of examples, these injuries always end up being much, much worse than their original diagnosis.
And I think at a certain point you have to start asking questions about this Red Sox medical staff.
