Sale sets Opening Day goal
Sox ace says ‘I think I’m going to be ready’
FORT MYERS — Chris Sale is as slender as ever after recovering from a bout of pneumonia, but the Red Sox’ lanky lefty said he doesn’t expect to miss any time.
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“I think I’m going to be ready for (Opening Day),” he said. “But those aren’t my calls to make. I go out there, do my job, tell them how I feel on a daily basis. Obviously as the workload picks up, we have to see how things work out. I’ve just got to be open and honest with them and then we map out a plan and see how it works out.”
Sale caught the flu as pitchers and catchers were to report in early February, but was fighting through his illness to continue his pitching progress. The flu later turned to pneumonia, and Sale kept on throwing.
He said he’s recovered now.
“You have to build that back up,” he said. “Every step of the way has been good. I’ve been off the mound twice and will throw again (on Sunday). More pitches, more throwing. After that I think we’ll meet on Monday to go over the schedule, figure out where to go.”
Sale notoriously went through a reduced build-up plan last spring training. He didn’t debut until March 16, made just two starts spanning nine innings and then flew to Seattle for his opening day start against the Mariners. He was rocked for seven runs, including three homers, while pitching with
reduced velocity.
This year, interim manager Ron Roenicke said the Red Sox will go back to a full spring workload for their starters and is hoping to get Sale (and the other starters) five or six starts.
“I don’t know if there’s any one specific thing that was the deciding factor (last year),” Sale said. “There were a lot of things that went into it. We threw a lot in the regular season (in 2018), threw a lot in the postseason, had a short offseason and all that stuff. I can give you all the excuses in the book but we just didn’t get it done.
“We have no excuse this year other than to go out there and get it done. I didn’t have a short offseason. I had the longest offseason of my life. Hopefully I’m sitting here a year from now telling you guys a different story.”
Narron is bench coach
Roenicke is bringing back his old bench coach.
The Red Sox announced Saturday that Jerry Narron will take over as bench coach, the job vacated by Roenicke, who was named interim manager this spring after the departure of former manager Alex Cora.
Narron, 64, was Roenicke’s bench coach during his entire tenure as manager of the Milwaukee Brewers from 2011 until Roenicke was fired in ‘15. He’ll begin his new job today.
“Just being around Ron in Milwaukee for almost five years being his bench coach there, I have a real good idea of how he wants to run things and the way he does the game,” Narron said. “And it’s nice. He’s an outstanding manager, a great communicator and looking forward to it here.”
Said Roenicke, “I wouldn’t do it just because he’s familiar with me. I’d do it because he’s really good.”
Narron was also the bench coach of the 2003 Red Sox under Grady Little.
“It’s like coming home after 17 years,” he said.
Narron was a member of the Arizona Diamondbacks coaching staff the last three seasons. Originally their Triple-A manager, he was promoted to bench coach in April, 2017, when Ron Gardenhire went on leave to battle cancer. Narron was named the full-time bench coach in 2018 and 2019 before he departed Torey Lovullo’s staff this past offseason.
As a manager, Narron never had a winning season. He went 134-162 with the Texas Rangers from 2001 to ‘02 and 157-179 with the Cincinnati Reds from ‘05 to ‘07.
Second chance
The last time Andrew Benintendi hit leadoff for the Red Sox, it was a disaster.
Cora wanted Mookie Betts to hit second to maximize his RBI potential. But two months into the season, it was clear he made a mistake.
In 48 games hitting leadoff, Benintendi batted .119 with a .229 on-base percentage while batting to start a game. He had just one extrabase hit. He struck out in 16 of his 48 plate appearances.
With Betts gone, Benintendi will get the first crack at being the leadoff man again. And in the Sox’ first Grapefruit League game on Saturday, when they beat the Rays, 3-2, Benintendi hit leadoff. He singled and stole second in his first at-bat.
“The other day when I talked to him about it, I said, ‘you know, we’ll try this at the beginning,’” Roenicke said. “And then we’ll talk through camp, make sure he’s doing things. I guess the biggest thing with that is, where is his comfort zone with it going into this season? Sometimes we feel that a player changes who he is. That’s not the reason we move you in the lineup. The reason we move you is because of what you do.
“But you move a guy to leadoff and all of a sudden, he thinks he needs to take more pitches or he thinks he needs to change what he does because he needs to get on base more for everybody else. That’s not why we move guys in the lineup. We move them because the fit, what they do best, fits into whether it’s leadoff or second, it becomes a good fit.”
JBJ starts in center
The Red Sox’ first Grapefruit League lineup included Jackie Bradley Jr. in center fieldand Kevin Pillar in right. With Alex Verdugo expected to miss the start of the season recovering from a back injury, Roenicke said he’d experiment with Bradley and Pillar in center and right to let them build chemistry. …
The Sox won’t send any regulars to Sarasota for a game against the Orioles today. They’ll use many of their regulars again on Monday for a split-squad game across town against the Twins. Nathan Eovaldi will start.