Other teams are incredibly dumb, and the Red Sox need to take advantage of this.
Doesn't seem like they have a lot of better options floating around, so might as well give him another chance. Hopefully after a better opening.
Indeed! My brain couldn't calculate his ERA being under 5 given the 3 runs he gave up, but then I saw 6 2/3 IP. That's a kid who wants to give Chaim a reason to keep him up.
He had a quality start without actually being the starter. You'd think that would earn him another turn but with the off-day falling where it does next week, they might try to send him down for a fresh bullpen arm and recall him after 10 days when they actually need another starter/bulk guy.
You are correct, he's already been sent down for Chris Murphy, but hopefully will have a good start in 5 days for Worcester and be up in 10 days to start for the parent club.
Yes it will. He already an ace-in-the-making with his extreme ground ball rate plus nearly a K per inning. He looks kind of like pre-2023 Framber….with that 9 K/9 3 BB/9 and extreme ground ball rate when looking under the hood.
Yeah, a pitcher with an ERA over 5.00 has certainly earned his spot.
When a team only has 4 starters, being healthy is all you need to keep your spot no matter what your ERA is. I suppose you could flip him and Pivetta, but I don't think it would make much of a difference overall.
Why not? His numbers after the first time through the order aren’t good. He’s relatively inexperienced. I think some struggles were inevitable. But, he should stay in the rotation and learn to work through it, no? If you want to develop young starters, gotta let them pitch without thinking every bad start will get them demoted.
He’s not particularly young any more and he’s increasingly ineffective in a starting role.
He's not a free agent until '29, so odd shade. But obviously it's better for everyone if he can be a good starter.
It's closer than we realize and 5 more seasons as a starter, even a fourth or fifth (he seems to be project more like a third at best right now), will net him more money than being the closer for a team in the midst of a lean stretch.
The radio broadcast was talking about how he didn’t have his slider in his last start against the Twins and didn’t have his change up tonight. If one pitch isn’t working Whitlock is in trouble because his other two aren’t good enough as a two pitch pitcher. He really needs all three working.
How exactly would being a #4 or #5 starter make him more money than being an elite closer? Especially with the trend of starters pitching less and less.
I do agree that it seems some folks are considering Whitlock and Houck to be solid starters for the next few seasons. Not sure either has earned that confidence yet.
If he needs all three to work to be an effective starter, he’s not an effective starter. He can and has been a dominant reliever already though.
I don't follow your argument, if there is one.
I think working out of the zone HAS to be the next step in his development. His profile is such that being in the zone too much is really not great for him.
Yeah, totally agree. Hopefully the coaching is aware, and I imagine they are. And to be fair to him, he's been great about not walking people... it's just that with a chase rate like that, he can afford to throw his offspeed stuff and even his fastball away from hitters.
