Boston Red Sox: Why Chris Sale Is Still an Elite Starting Pitcher

This season many have speculated if something is wrong with Boston Red Sox ace Chris Sale. In short, no! Sale is just fine and here are some reasons why.

This season, Boston Red Sox ace Chris Sale has the worst W-L% of his career. This comes as the result of a 3-9 record through 19 starts. Those NINE losses are the 4th most Sale has accumulated through a full-season in 10-years of play. They’re also the third most losses of any pitcher in baseball this season.

From the outside looking in, one might say that something must be wrong with one of baseball’s elite starting pitchers. Look closer, however, and you’ll see that Sale is just fine.

In fact, this season, among all MLB starting pitchers that qualify, Sale ranks 2nd in K/9 (12.90). He trails only the league leader, Houston Astros ace Gerrit Cole, who has a 13.43 K/9. Sticking with this same point, his 12.90 K/9 is the third-best K/9 of his career, trailing his 2017 K/9 rate by a measly 0.03 points.

Not only that, Sale is a top 20 pitcher in MLB in some of pitchings best categories, like:

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• Ranks 5th in Strikeouts (160)
• Ranks 5th in xFIP (3.10)
• Ranks 7th in K/BB (5.93)
• Ranks 16th in WHIP (1.10)
• Ranks 16th in FIP (3.37)

All of this despite a decrease of 2 MPH in his fastball velocity from last year.

What Chris Sale is experiencing this season is a bit of bad luck and poor fielding on behalf of Red Sox defenders. In fact, the difference between his ERA (4.27) and FIP (3.37) is the 2nd highest in MLB. This indicates that Sale struggles most in situations he simply cannot control as a pitcher.

Also, his BABIP against of .315 ranks 15th in MLB. This indicates that when batters are putting balls in play, they’re dropping for hits.

To this point, in 19 starts this season, the Boston Red Sox has only managed to score 45 runs this seasons. This comes out to an RS/9 of 3.63, 6th worst in the game of baseball.

Conversely, his teammate Eduardo Rodriguez (4.43 ERA, 4.03 FIP, 1.32 WHIP), clearly a lesser pitcher, has the highest RS/9 (8.45) in baseball. His record this season? 10-4.