Red Sox’s Sale not looking too far ahead after elbow surgery
Chris Sale has tried not to think about the future as he began working his way back from Tommy John surgery in April.
As virtually the only person at the Red Sox’s training facility in Florida this offseason, it helped keep the 31-year-old left-hander sane as he began the first steps of a recovery program expected to take a minimum of 14 months.
He has had a few hurdles that have slowed the process, including neck injury and a mild bout with COVID-19 last month that required him to quarantine for two weeks. But as Boston’s pitchers and catchers arrived in Fort Myers to join him for their first spring training workout on Thursday, Sale said he’s a full-go and is concentrating on checking off each benchmark of his throwing program as he inches closer to a return.
“I was here by myself the whole
summer, it’s nice to get back and have people around and be like a ballplayer again,” Sale said Thursday. “I’ve never been more excited for spring training . ... Just, you know, feeling normal again.”
That journey has been a slow one for the seven-time All-Star who is 109-73 in 10 major league seasons and is entering the third season of a $160 million, six-year contract.
But after helping the Red Sox win the 2018 World Series, he went just 6-11 in 2019 with a 4.40 ERA in 25 starts last year, marking his fewest wins and starts, highest ERA, and the first time he failed to finish among the top six in Cy Young Award voting in any full season as a starter.
He then missed the start of spring training in 2020 with an illness that the team described as a flu that it said turned into pneumonia. The Red Sox later revealed he had a flexor strain near his pitching elbow, and after consultation with doctors Sale decided ligament replacement surgery was the best option.
He eventually underwent the procedure on
March 30.
While Sale said he believes there’s no doubt he will be a better pitcher after having the surgery, he isn’t allowing himself to ponder what it will look like yet.