Red Sox @ Rays Game Thread/ 11th-14th July 2022

Injuries & Moves: Eovaldi could return in NY
July 10th, 2022

Keep track of the Red Sox’s recent transactions and injury updates throughout the season.
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July 10: RHP Nathan Eovaldi could return at Yankee Stadium
Red Sox ace Eovaldi took a big step toward his return from a lower back injury when he fired three innings in a Minor League rehab outing for Triple-A Worcester. The righty reached 97 mph and allowed five hits and two runs while walking none and striking out four. Eovaldi threw 54 pitches, 40 of them for strikes. There's a chance that will be Eovaldi's only rehab start and he will be activated for a start next weekend when the Red Sox are at Yankee Stadium for their final series before the All-Star break. -- Ian Browne

July 10: CF Kiké Hernández has setback
There is concern for Hernández, who was shut down due to soreness in his ailing right hip after just one rehab game for Triple-A Worcester on Friday, in which he was the DH.

"The progress was good for a little bit," said Red Sox manager Alex Cora. "He was able to play. But now it’s a setback. I do believe going through testing tomorrow and doing the other stuff is going to give us clarity -- for him, too, in a sense. We can attack differently it if we have to and hopefully he can be with us sooner rather than later." -- Ian Browne

July 10: 3B Rafael Devers will likely sit out opener at Trop
Boston's All-Star slugger didn't start the final two games of this weekend's four-game series against the Yankees due to a recurrence of back issues from earlier in the week. Manager Alex Cora said Devers will likely miss the opener of a four-game series at Tropicana Field against the Rays that starts on Monday. Cora is leery of starting Devers for four straight games on turf. It was on turf in Toronto a couple of weeks ago that Devers first started experiencing back stiffness. -- Ian Browne

RHP Garrett Whitlock (right hip inflammation)
Expected return: At some point before All-Star break
Whitlock will make a second Minor League rehab appearance on July 12 for Double-A Portland. Whitlock hopes to have better results than he had for Triple-A Worcester on July 8, when he allowed six hits and two runs over two innings. If all goes well, Whitlock could be activated for the final few games before the All-Star break. -- Ian Browne (Last updated: July 10)

RHP Matt Barnes (right shoulder inflammation)
Expected return: August
Barnes opened a Minor League rehab assignment in the Florida Complex League on July 9, giving up three hits and three runs in one inning. Given the struggles Barnes has had this season, the Red Sox are likely to give him as long as possible in his rehab assignment. -- Ian Browne (Last updated: July 10)

LHP Rich Hill (sprained left knee)
Expected return: After All-Star break
Hill is making stronger than expected progress from a left knee injury he sustained on July 1 at Wrigley Field. In fact, manager Alex Cora called Hill's progress "eye opening". Hill has been pitching off flat ground in recent days and could get on a mound soon.

"Today was a good day," Hill said on July 10. "I felt great, really. I didn't feel as much on my MCL. Curveball came out good, cutter was good, fastball really good. It's a little bit of a regen day today, but throwing was normal. Hopefully I'm progressing to getting on the mound here shortly. -- Ian Browne (Last updated: July 10)

LHP Josh Taylor (lower back strain)
Expected return: Mid-July
Taylor had a second straight strong outing for Worcester on July 10, throwing a 1-2-3 inning that included a strikeout. The Red Sox have yet to plot out when he might be activated. -- Ian Browne (Last updated: July 10)

RED SOX NOTEBOOK
Kiké Hernández still a ways off from returning to Red Sox
By Alex Speier Globe Staff,Updated July 10, 2022, 11:43 p.m.

More than a month since he was placed on the injured list with a hip flexor strain, center fielder Kiké Hernández does not appear close to a return to the Red Sox lineup.

Hernández started a rehab assignment Friday, going 0 for 4 with two strikeouts while serving as the designated hitter for Triple A Worcester. But he came out of the game feeling continued discomfort in his hip, and he’ll be sent for further tests (likely including an MRI) on Monday.

“It’s been a while now. It’s been a month,” said manager Alex Cora before the Red Sox’ 11-6 comeback win over the Yankees on Sunday night. “The progress was good for a little bit. He was able to play. But now it’s a setback. I do believe going through testing [Monday] and doing the other stuff is going to give us clarity.”

Hernández was off to a slow start before landing on the injured list June 8, hitting .209/.273/.340 but playing excellent defense in center. In his absence, the Sox will continue to split leadoff duties between Rob Refsnyder and Jarren Duran.


Refsnyder has delivered a remarkable performance, hitting .344/.405/.563 with three homers in 21 games — including an incredible .467/.485/.767 line against lefties. Among those with at least 30 plate appearances against southpaws, the 31-year-old ranks first in average and second in OPS (1.252).

Refsnyder attributes the production to a significant swing overhaul after the 2020 season. He’d featured a sizable leg kick early in his career, but had abandoned it in favor of a simpler approach as a big league platoon player. But in 2021, he worked with Twins Triple A hitting coach Matt Borgschulte to reincorporate a leg lift in an effort to improve both his timing and power. He studied a trio of former Rockies — righthanded-hitting sluggers Troy Tulowitzki, Matt Holliday, and Nolan Arenado — while refining his swing.


“It’s certainly been a humbling experience the past year, two years, just really trying to start from scratch. It was really, really hard,” said Refsnyder. “We worked really, really hard to make some adjustments and it’s nice to see some of those paying off.”

Duran, meanwhile, entered Sunday in an 0-for-9 slump that included seven strikeouts, but hitting .291/.344/.465 for the season with five steals. He’s been a top-of-the-order on-base presence with game-changing speed, though his defense in center remains a work in progress.

“There’s going to be hiccups,” Cora said of a player who’d been a lifelong second baseman until the Red Sox drafted him in 2018. “[But] it’s a learning experience and the more he plays, the better he’s going to be. I think where he’s at now compared to last year, it’s better.”
Change for the better

Righthander Kutter Crawford opened eyes in spring training with high-90s velocity, easily the highest readings of his life. But he struggled out of the Red Sox’ bullpen to start the year, posting an 8.44 ERA in eight outings before a demotion to Worcester.

He spent a month with the WooSox and then returned to the big leagues in mid-June, impressing (while shuttling between Worcester and Boston) with a 2.33 ERA in four outings of four or more innings, most recently with five innings of one-run ball against the Yankees Saturday in what turned out to be a 6-5 win in 10 innings.


Crawford suggested that the month in Triple A working with WooSox pitching coach Paul Abbott allowed him to recalibrate his plan of attack, and stop overthrowing. An emphasis on staying over the rubber allows him to keep his delivery under control in a way that has improved his command. Meanwhile, he’s more effectively changed speeds — particularly with a low-80s curveball — to emphasize the disruption of hitters’ timing rather than just throwing hard.

“It’s kind of getting back to my old ways of actually pitching. When I was up here at the beginning of the year, I was more of a thrower. I was trying to throw too hard, got away from who I was as a pitcher, being in the bullpen and trying to handle that,” said Crawford. “Once I got back to starting [in Triple A], I gotta kind of get back in my routine, a little bit of failure, analyze what I needed to do to work to get better. And now I’m starting to feel back to my normal self, like I was last year on the mound.”
Eovaldi gets closer

Nate Eovaldi made a rehab start with Worcester, logging three innings in which he was charged with two runs on five hits while striking out four and walking none. He topped out at 97 mile per hour and recorded two strikeouts on splitters and two on fastballs.

Eovaldi had allowed just four hits and one run (a solo homer) through his scheduled three innings, but returned to the mound for the fourth to build his pitch count. He was removed after allowing a leadoff double that came around to score. Cora said that Eovaldi would be a consideration to start Friday in Yankee Stadium New York against the Yankees.


“I’m ready to go,” said Eovaldi. “I know my mechanics and I’m ready.”
Devers out again

Rafael Devers (back) was out of the lineup Sunday night, missing his second straight game, and Cora said the All-Star third baseman is likely to sit Monday in order to stay off the artificial turf at the Tropicana Dome following a flight expected to land in Tampa Bay around 4 a.m. . . . Michael Wacha (shoulder) and Rich Hill (knee) will accompany the Sox on the road trip. Cora praised the veteran leadership of both in suggesting they had considerable value to their young teammates, even while on the injured list . . . Garrett Whitlock will make another rehab appearance – his second – for Double A Portland on Tuesday . . . Lefthander Josh Taylor threw a scoreless inning for the WooSox on Sunday . . . Top prospect Marcelo Mayer was removed from Sunday’s game for Single-A Salem due to lower back tightness, according to a team source. The issue is considered minor.

(Peter Abraham of the Globe staff contributed to this report.)

It’s time for Chris Sale to do some damage to opposing lineups
By Tara Sullivan Globe Staff,Updated July 11, 2022, 57 minutes ago

What a great two days for the Red Sox, who earned a series split with the Yankees after back-to-back thrilling victories. There’s no time to take a breath, though, with the schedule makers sending the Sox straight to Tampa for four games and then to the Bronx for three more over the weekend.

But help is on the way.

If, that is, you believe Chris Sale will ever help the Red Sox again.

The Sox’ mercurial starting pitcher put himself out a couple thousand dollars last week after a dugout tunnel temper tantrum took out a flatscreen television. Despite the fact the set was revealed to have been inoperable even before Sale ripped it off the WooSox tunnel wall and destroyed it in a fit of anger, the 33-year-old pro made amends. He not only paid for a new TV, but reportedly dropped a couple grand on lunch and dinner for the Triple A players and coaches with whom he shared his most recent rehab assignment.


But the real payback Sale owes is to the Red Sox, and it’s about time he starts paying them back for one of the most lucrative yet disappointing contracts in franchise history.


The lack of return on a $145 million investment by way of a 2019 contract extension has been dissected and discussed at length, but it boils down to this: Tuesday night in Tampa, Sale is scheduled to make his first start of the 2022 Major League season. If it actually happens, it would be just his ninth start since August of 2019. At an average of $30 million a season, that’s $3.3 million a start.
Related: A taste of the big leagues in June changed Jeter Downs

But hey, at least he paid for dinner and damages. Unfortunately, he can’t buy his way out of embarrassment or immaturity. It’s tough to know if Sale actually felt either after his petulant outburst, when it seemed he was bothered more by getting caught than by the act itself.


“I’m not going to shy away from it. I acted like an idiot [last Wednesday] and I’ve acted like an idiot before,” Sale told reporters Thursday at Fenway Park, before the Sox dropped the opener of the four-game set with the Yankees.

“I’d do it in the dugout. [But] I’ve been told through the years, hey, take it to the tunnel. So you think you’re in a safe space and you think that you’re in private. That’s a place that you’re not supposed to really have cameras. There’s no public access to that. So I thought I was in kind of a safer spot, but it is what it is, man.”

Here’s also what is: The Sox need him now, more than ever. Their starting rotation has been ravaged by injury, they are desperate for depth in the bullpen, and they are deep in the throes of their toughest stretch of the schedule. It’s time for the lanky lefthander to deliver something, anything on that gift of a contract from former president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski. For all the times Sale talks about being an emotional leader on this team, he needs to produce on the field, not cause drama off it.

“It’s who I am,” is how he explained that Worcester outburst. “It’s what makes me a big leaguer. It’s what makes me good at my job. It might not be the best for the public eye, but what is? Who’s perfect? Name him. I’d love to shake his hand.”


Nobody is asking for perfection. Just production. The Sox have been more than patient with him, often beyond reason or explanation. Since his one most perfect Red Sox moment, when he struck out the side to bring the Dodgers to their knees (literally, in the case of final batter Manny Machado) to clinch the 2018 World Series, repeated injury and ridiculous selfishness has turned Sale more into a sideshow than a star.

He hasn’t made an Opening Day roster for the past three seasons, going back to the Tommy John surgery that cost him the entirety of the 2020 season as well as three-quarters of the 2021 season. Then a stress fracture in his right ribcage sustained during an off-site workout during the pandemic cost him the start of this year. That was followed by an additional delay for what he and the team described as a personal medical issue. There is also the lingering issue of his vaccination status, with his decision to remain unvaccinated keeping him on the wrong side of any road trip to Toronto, where the Sox are scheduled to play their penultimate season series.

Of course Sale said many of the right things after that final rehab assignment in Worcester, the one in which he was so annoyed by walking five minor league hitters that he took it out on the defenseless dugout TV. He declared himself “very ready” to rejoin a rotation he once seemed destined to anchor.


“This was all for me to get back up to the big leagues and start doing my job and pulling my weight and trying to win a championship,’’ Sale told reporters in Worcester. “This is all great, but that’s the big picture and I need to get back there.’’

Two games into the Yankee series, that big picture was pretty cloudy. Fielding errors, poor pitching, and too many New York home runs threatened to push the Red Sox out of the playoff conversation. But two thrilling games later the Sox head south with newfound momentum.

If Sale can somehow get himself into a meaningful role, that momentum has a much better chance of continuing. Never mind the drama of beating up a TV. It’s time for Sale to do some damage of a different sort.