PITCHING PROMISE COMES IN THREES
Sox trio chasing the best
For all the offseason talk about J.D. Martinez, an equally important development occurred without getting enough attention. The top of the Red Sox rotation became healthy.
Chris Sale, David Price and Rick Porcello are thriving, and their combined output means even more than Martinez’ bat.
The Red Sox’ Big Three is not the best in all of baseball — more on that later — but for this team this season, it’s the essential missing ingredient.
Astute fans will recall entering spring training 2017, the hype was all about run prevention. Sale was meant to make up for the loss of
David Ortiz, with the Red Sox envisioning a three-headed monster — including Porcello, coming off a Cy Young campaign — devouring all enemies in their path through October.
Well, before February ended, the dream crashed to a halt when Price strained a forearm that plagued him for most of the season.
This season, Price is back, Sale is rested, Porcello has hit reset on his mental outlook, and the threeheaded monster is up and operational.
For Alex Cora, the timing could not be any better.
“One thing, when I got the job, what I saw in October was impressive — we’re talking about a very good (Astros) lineup, a complete lineup, playing with swag. It seemed like whoever was on the mound, they didn’t care,” said Cora, referencing opposing the trio as Houston’s bench coach. “And David got their attention. He did. Not only in the playoffs, he pitched against them early in the season and he dominated. You’re talking about a team that, platoon advantage top to bottom against lefties, a team that put the ball in play with two strikes and did damage with two strikes, and he was great.
“So that’s what I remember. I was like, ‘You know what, for everything we’re talking about here, if this guy’s right, we have something special.’ . . . What I’ve seen throughout the spring and what I saw in October, I was very confident we’d have a great pitching staff. We’re not 100 percent and we still feel comfortable.”
The Red Sox’ Big Three is special, no doubt about it. If it can stay healthy, the ramifications are enormous, from giving the slow-to-start offense time to find itself to allowing the bullpen to get the rest it needs.
Good as they are, though, it’s worthwhile to survey the league and get a reality check on just how they compare to other top trios.
The truth is they’re very good, but given how their best efforts have not come so recently, there’s a bit more reputation than reality in play. If all three retain (Sale) or regain (Price, Porcello) their form, then sure, they’ll be as good as anyone else.
Until then, they’re just not the best outside of the wishful world.
How do they rank? Consider durability and recent production, peak seasons, age, statistical accomplishments, the divisions and leagues the pitchers pitch in . . . one could go on and on. Here’s my ranking of how Sale-Price-Porcello stacks up:
1. Nationals
About as unequivocal a topthree ranking as there can be.
Max Scherzer is the best pitcher in baseball the last three seasons — and yes, I’ve heard of Clayton
Kershaw. The Dodgers’ southpaw, however, is three years younger than Scherzer and has been getting hurt more, with Scherzer throwing
100 more innings than Kershaw since 2015 and collecting two Cy Youngs while Kershaw hasn’t padded his three wins since 2014.
I will not allow this treatise to become a Scherzer vs. Kershaw debate, which would be a good one, but when it comes to a supporting cast, Scherzer’s got better arms around him. All three of the Nationals’ best starters each had their best WAR seasons last year. Not only that, but when you ad up the three pitchers’ WAR the last three seasons, only the Indians (38) approach Washington’s 41.5.
Stephen Strasburg definitely and Gio Gonzalez could be No. 1 anywhere else. Strasburg is less of a fireballer than he was when he first came up, but 10.8 strikeouts per nine innings the last three seasons places him among the top strikeout artists in the game. He has learned how to de-emphasize his fastball and flood the strike zone with his offspeed pitches as well. Gonzalez is simply a solid, consistent and productive starter. If Porcello could stop having such strikingly varied peaks and valleys, he could settle into being the type of pitcher Gonzalez is year in and year out.
2. Astros
It’s awfully hard to distinguish between the Astros’ and Indians’ top three pitchers, but this exercise demands decisiveness, so I’ll go with the Astros by a grey whisker.
Dallas Keuchel is just two seasons removed from his pretty much out-of-nowhere 2015 AL Cy Young season, and he’s only 30 and in his walk year. That last nugget is no guarantee of anything, but in Keuchel’s case, I’ll go with the hunch that it won’t hurt him.
Everybody wrote Justin Verlander’s obituary after he fell to Earth (by his standards) in 2014-15. Based on everything, he’s been just about as productive as Sale the past three seasons, and in the postseason he certainly made everybody sit up and notice what Kate Upton already had gathered. The Astros still were short in the rotation, however, until the trade for Gerrit Cole. What a coup. He’s only 27, and in 2015 had a 2.60 ERA and 202-strikeout season that screamed upside. With an offense like Houston’s, he fills out the top three quite nicely.
3. Indians
The Indians have the best pitcher in the American League the last three seasons in Corey Kluber. Last year’s Cy Young winner maintained a sub-1.000 WHIP and sub3.00 ERA since 2015, a remarkable accomplishment for the AL. Carlos Carrasco is not breathing down Kluber’s neck, but an ace he is, and a late-blooming one at that. Trevor Bauer is quite the wild card as a No. 3, still inconsistent from start to start, but beginning to show signs of maturity. (The 2016 drone incident notwithstanding.) His last two seasons, he’s begun to record more strikeouts, fewer walks and trust his fastball. He’s only 27. As breakout picks go, he’s a good one, which would obviously vault this top three heavenward.
4. Red Sox
Again, the caveat: If all three pitch to their past peaks, there’s no stopping the Red Sox, but let’s apply some realistic and necessary drag on that dreamscape. Is it plausible that everything clicks with all three in this one season to the extent that they all post top-10 Cy Young-caliber seasons?
As much as I would like to cover that happening, I’m declaring it to be a stretch. Price looks great in his first two scoreless starts, but can he regain 2015 form in a Red Sox uniform? Will Porcello stop the yo-yo seasons and settle into his considerable potential? And can Sale produce yet another top-five Cy performance? Could the answer to all three of these be yes? I say it isn’t, but don’t ask me to pick which one’s wrong. Right now, it’s lollipops and unicorns loving that dirty water.
5. Dodgers
The sky — or Scherzer — is the limit should Kershaw spend the entire season healthy. Everybody knows that. The unknowns in Los Angeles rest with Nos. 2 and 3, Alex Wood and Milton’s Rich Hill. They’ve pitched just 6771⁄3 innings combined the last three years, yet they’re pretty good when they can step on the mound.
Hill’s 38, but as long as his blisters don’t pop up, he’s pretty much an ace. Wood’s 27, but had his best season when he was 23. He and Bauer are a little comparable, yet it’s Bauer who found consistency the last two seasons while Wood, an All-Star last year before fading rapidly, hasn’t.
6. Cubs
The mix of two veterans and a younger starter resembles what the Indians and Astros have, except for some Cy Young hardware. That’s what makes Jon Lester-Kyle Hendricks-Yu Darvish so hard to project.
Hendricks is 28 and had a fantastic 2016, but regressed. Lester was like his bad 2012 version last year, posting a 4.33 ERA, surrendering 26 home runs in 1802⁄3 innings and seeing his walks go up. He’s 34 this season, with lots to prove. Darvish is a great pick-up, and could easily supplant him as their No. 1.
Many questions, not many answers here.
7. Mets
Nobody can forget 2015, when the Mets rode Jacob deGrom, Noah Syndergaard and Matt Harvey all the way to the World Series before they fell to the invincible Royals. Syndergaard is only 25, Harvey is 29 and deGrom doesn’t turn 30 until June. A bit like the Red Sox, if all three perform up to their capabilities, they would be unstoppable again.
Harvey hasn’t cracked 100 innings since 2015 and has not resembled the superstar-in-waiting that everybody forecast, but if deGrom and Syndergaard each shine, that’s a top duo that could rival Scherzer-Strasburg, Sale-Price or Keuchel-Verlander.
The expectations feel low, for a reason, but the idea that all three would approach peak powers is a thrilling scenario to consider.