The news Tuesday that Chris Sale would be lost for the season didn't register much, other than to offer up Sale as, once again, a sad punchline.
Sale's broken wrist -- his third injury this calendar year alone -- means he won't be returning in September, as the Red Sox had hoped. Then again, even if Sale hadn't been thrown from his bicycle Saturday, it's doubtful that he was going to impact the team much in the final few weeks. Post-accident, manager Alex Cora admitted that Sale would have only contributed out of the bullpen in the final weeks of the season, since the broken pinkie he suffered in mid-July wouldn't have healed enough to allow Sale to throw his changeup, making him a two-pitch pitcher.
And anyway, the way things are going for the Red Sox -- four games below the .500 mark, six games out of the wild card spot -- how important are those games going to be anyway? Answer: not very, in all likelihood.
But Sale's extended run of misfortune does, however, have consequences for the 2023 Red Sox.
First, a look at the experienced major league starters under control in 2023:
Nick Pivetta
James Paxton
Chris Sale
That's it. Pivetta is the only one who competed healthy in 2022. Paxton, whom the Sox have under control with a team option, has missed the entire season as he recovers from Tommy John, and with just over seven weeks remaining in the regular season, is not guaranteed to make a start for the '22 Sox. Though he's healthy and throwing bullpens in Fort Myers, he hasn't yet begun a progression of rehab starts in the minors he would need to build up arm strength and there's only about three weeks remaining in the minor league seasons.
As for Sale, the inability to compete any further this season means that he will have pitched a grand total of 48.1 innings over the last three seasons combined.
Paxton, meanwhile, will have pitched 21.2 innings over the last three years.
So, heading into next April, two of the three starters in the Red Sox rotation will have combined for exactly 70 innings from 2020-2022.
Why does that matter? First, it's not as if the Red Sox can assume good health for either of the two veteran lefties, especially Sale. But secondly, the team may have to carefully monitor, and indeed, limit the workloads for one or both. It would be hard for the Sox to expect Paxton to go from an average of seven innings per season in the last three years to, say 175 innings. The same, obviously, applies to Sale -- again, likely to a greater degree, given his track record on setbacks.
Apart from those three, the Sox have a number of potential starters: Kutter Crawford, Josh Winckowski, Connor Seabold and Brayan Bello.
That group includes some talented arms, to be sure. Bello has high upside, though his handful of appearances this year have been mostly rocky, not uncommon for the best of pitching prospects. And Crawford, save for his last outing in Kansas City this past Sunday, has shown promise with above-average stuff that plays well within the strike zone.
But those two -- and the rest -- remain unproven.
There's also Garrett Whitlock, whom the Red Sox still envision as a starter long-term. But while there's a lot to like about Whitlock, there's little track record of him as a successful major league starter. He's made all of nine big league starts in his career. And even in a best-case scenario in which Whitlock makes the permanent and successful transition from bullpen to rotation, his shift will leave a corresponding black hole in the bullpen.
The Sox could, potentially, bring back free agent Michael Wacha at a reasonable number. And they could either re-sign free agent Nathan Eovaldi, or give him a qualifying offer that would have him under the Sox' control for 2023 at somewhere between $18-$19 million. It's far more likely, however, that Eovaldi seeks the kind of long-term deal that the Sox have been highly reluctant to issue to starters in their 30s. Since arriving in 2018, Eovaldi has spent time on the IL in every season but once (2021).
So where does that leave the Sox? Reinforcements will be needed.
The free agent market will, as always, represent a crapshoot, and an expensive one at that. Jacob DeGrom and Justin Verlander will be available, but DeGrom has battled shoulder issues the last two years and represents a gigantic risk while Verlander is 40. It's also highly unlikely, given their respective situations, that the Mets and Astros will allow them to go elsewhere.
Other than someone like Carlos Rodon, the best of the rest are mid-to-back-end starters like Chris Bassitt, Taijuan Walker and Sean Manaea -- all useful options, but far from surefire rotation anchors.
The Red Sox could trade for a starter or two, but that would require digging deep into the prospect inventory, something that's been anathema to chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom.