Henrique: Red Sox starter Tanner Houck doesn’t have to shoulder the load in 2025

The Red Sox had two options for their Opening Day starter.

New left-handed pitcher Garrett Crochet and Tanner Houck both received consideration for the start. Alex Cora decided to go with his new southpaw, but Houck made a strong case based on his breakout 2024 campaign.

Houck will start the second game of the season with Walker Buehler to follow in Game 3. Now that a decision on who will get the ball for Game 1 is out of the way, the right-hander can focus on his role and doesn’t really care when he pitches; he just wants the ball every fifth day to help his team win.

"I think my entire career I’ve always been that way," Houck told reporters on Monday at JetBlue Park. “Just give me the ball. That’s all I want to do. This is what I love to do. I’ve never worked a day in my life because I get to get to go out there and throw a ball for a living. I’m not going to be picky by any means. Give me a ball every five days, and I won’t complain; otherwise.”

Houck would have embraced the opportunity to start Opening Day but ultimately wants to do what's best for the Red Sox.

“The competitor in me definitely wants to start on Opening Day,” Houck said. “That’s a goal for down the line. But it doesn’t affect me. Just give me the ball every five games. Nobody is going to care who started the first game in the season in July. You win or lose the first game, and you wake up, and there are 161 games left.”

In Houck’s last start against the Orioles on Monday, he allowed two earned runs off six hits with no walks while striking out three in 4 1/3 innings. He threw 72 pitches, 46 for strikes, and before the spring comes to a close, he wants to be in the 85-90 pitch count range.

“I think for me it’s getting in the zone,” Houck said. “Strike one. I felt like I fell behind a little bit too much today but was able to battle back. But with that being said, I think it’s more just checking the boxes of getting to that 70-, 80-, 90-pitch range, five to six innings each time. And then when the lights turn out, go all out.”

BREAKOUT SEASON

The righty emerged as the team’s No. 1 starter and was a first-time All-Star last season. He set career highs with 30 starts, hurling 178 2/3 innings, and struck out 154 batters. That’s 72 2/3 more innings than Houck has ever thrown in a big league season. The former first-rounder recorded a 3.9 EAR, which almost matched his career total, combined.

Houck officially burst onto the scene as a starter when he hurled a 2-0 complete-game shutout on April 17, 2024, at Fenway Park, tossing less than 100 pitches in the process, defeating the Guardians 2-0, and becoming the first Sox pitcher since Clay Buchholz to throw a “Maddux” since Aug. 31, 2014.

A “Maddux” is when a starter throws a complete-game shutout and does it with less than 100 pitches.

The Mizzou alum has been an enigma on the mound, possessing elite stuff, often compared to former teammate Chris Sale due to their unorthodox delivery, tall skinny, and both featuring a devastating slider within their pitching arsenal.

His slider was his bread-and-butter pitch, changing his grip to get side-to-side action. The pitch can technically be categorized as a sweeper. He threw the sweeper 41.4% of the time and opponents batted .230 with a .219 expected batting average against it.

If you were to poll just about every Red Sox pitcher in the organization, they would tell you that the new pitching gurus have asked them to add the pitch to their bag of tricks.

Houck’s sinker was his second most utilized pitch, thrown 32.3% of the time with seven inches of vertical break. He tossed the splitter 24.8% of time. His newfound success last season was largely due in part to abandoning his four-seam heater and cutter (1.5% of the time). According to Baseball Savant, he threw just one four-seamer and 40 cutters last year.

The Red Sox let Houck work deeper into games, and they were rewarded, until the workload became troublesome. Of his 30 starts, in 21 of them he worked six innings or more, and in five starts he went seven innings or more.

A key to Houck’s breakout campaign was his ability to get through lineups a second and third time through the order, something that plagued him since his debut back in 2020. His ERA over his first five innings last season: 3.00 ERA (1st inning), 1.80 ERA (2nd inning), 2.40 ERA (3rd inning), 3.68 ERA (4th inning). Those ERAs are all based off his 30 starts.

In the first 16 starts of the season, Houck showcased what his ceiling looks like as a starter. He posted a 2.18 ERA with 101 strikeouts to 18 walks over 103 1/3 innings. Houck allowed just two homers while holding opposing hitters to a .211 batting average.

The grind of a full big league season finally caught up to Houck over his final 14 starts of the season. He recorded a 4.42 ERA with 53 strikeouts to 30 walks while surrendering nine homers over 75 1/3 frames.

“I just didn’t pitch as well as I did in the first half. I need to be better in the second half," added Houck. "Now that I have been there I can see the road that is in front of me versus not knowing, I think I’ll handle it better. I look at last year as a big step forward.”

Houck gave up 11 homers, which wasn’t an alarming stat compared to his teammate Kutter Crawford, who gave up a league-high 34.

Shoulder fatigue hampered Houck, which led to a velocity dip down the stretch. Houck made just three starts that totaled just 14 innings, giving up five earned runs off 10 hits with 11 strikeouts to two walks.

“I think velocity went down a little bit throughout the year,” Cora said. “If you don't create that separation on pitches, people can make adjustments. And you can kind of like, sit soft, and it happened throughout the season, but he had a great season. He did an outstanding job.”

Houck was eligible for arbitration this season for the first time in his career. He received a one-year, $3.95 million deal in the winter, avoiding arbitration with the club. That number came in lower than his MLBTradeRumors projection of $4.5 million. The Red Sox still own three more years of control with Houck.

CAN HOUCK DUPLICATE HIS 2024 SUCCESS?

Houck’s 6-foot-5, 226-pound frame is built to withstand the innings workload needed to push him through the season. With one full season as a starter under his belt, the Red Sox and Houck will know how to manage him over the course of the dog days of summer to ensure he doesn’t run out of gas come September. 

The Red Sox are expected to be true postseason contenders; they will need Houck to repeat his 2024 season. Cora expects a few tweaks with Houck this season will get him back to the dominant first-half pitcher that helped send him to the All-Star Game.

“Keeping him healthy throughout is important,” Cora said. “He had that little hiccup towards the end, and we took care of him, but overall, I think just keep the delivery [intact]. Be consistent with it. And I know they're working on a few pitches.

“The four-seamer might come into play at one point in camp, which is important to create space for the other stuff. He looks great. He's in a good frame of mind.”

He doesn’t strike out a ton of batters with a 7.76 K/9, but he’s been a ground ball machine with a 55.9% ground ball percentage, which ranked in the 93 percentile, per Baseball Savant. He also barely walks opposing hitters with a 2.42 BB/9, and avoided barrels at a clip of 5.7%.

If he’s able to continue to dominate hitters with that sweeping slider and induce ground balls at a 55.9% clip and add in the fastball here and there to play off his off-speed pitches, he could be in line for a repeat of the 2024 season. Health will always be a factor with a pitcher, and outside the lumbar injury a few seasons ago and the line drive that hit him in the face, he’s remained upright.

The one positive for Houck is he doesn’t have to shoulder the load and lead the rotation. The additions of Crochet, Buehler, and a returning Lucas Giolito will help alleviate the pressure off Houck.

Houck's emergence last season had a lot to do with Andrew Bailey and the entire pitching infrastructure. Back-to-back strong seasons will help to continue to sell to the fans that their development program is working.

If Cora manages Houck correctly, Houck should do his part and be a big reason for any success this season for the Red Sox.