The Red Sox cutting bait with Ryan Brasier is the best news some Red Sox fans could have ever asked for.
Joely Rodriguez, who the Red Sox activated from the injured list Monday, takes Brasier’s roster spot.
The #RedSox today announced the following roster moves: pic.twitter.com/jVcyZVzId9
— Red Sox (@RedSox) May 15, 2023
With so much quality pitching depth this season, Boston can’t afford to have pitchers like Brasier waste a roster spot — not when they’re getting healthier by the day.
More cuts like this (and a couple of demotions from the rotation) are coming in the next few weeks as more pitchers near their returns from injury.
The Ryan Brasier News Red Sox Fans Have Longed for Finally Breaks
Ryan Brasier signed a minor league deal with the Red Sox in 2018 after spending 2017 in Japan. He posted a 1.60 ERA/2.83 FIP/277 ERA+/2.60 xERA with 29 strikeouts and seven walks over 33.2 regular-season innings in 2018.
Not bad for a pitcher who had gone five seasons between MLB appearances.
Brasier had a 1.04 ERA/3.62 FIP with five walks and seven strikeouts in 8.2 postseason innings during the Red Sox championship run.
The 35-year-old never could replicate his flash-in-the-pan 2018.
2019-20 weren’t great for Brasier (4.57/4.03 FIP over 80.2 innings). He did show a brief glimpse of brilliance again in 2021 (1.50 ERA/4.84 FIP/320 ERA+/3.81 xERA with four walks and nine strikeouts in 12 innings) after returning that September from a series of unfortunate events.
That did not carry over. 2022 was one of Brasier’s worst seasons with the Red Sox, but he managed to stave off baseball’s grim reaper with a complete turnaround in September (12 IP, 3 R, 2 BB, 13 K, 2.53 FIP, .423 OPS) after he tweaked his pitch mix and mechanics.
Those tweaks and the subsequent solid results did not carry over to 2023 (again) as the Sox had hoped.
The Witchita Falls, Texas, native has been as bad over the last couple of seasons as he’s ever been (6.16 ERA/3.81 FIP/70 ERA+ with 22 walks and 82 strikeouts over 83.1 innings).
The results never matched the stuff for Brasier in Boston. He didn’t miss bats and got walloped often. The strikeouts and walks weren’t terrible in 2022 and cratered this season. He rightfully became a mop-up-type guy this season but still struggled.
Why It Took So Long
Fans were becoming furious at Chaim Bloom and the Red Sox front office the longer Ryan Brasier survived this past off-season’s roster turnover.
But the club always liked Brasier’s stuff and underlying metrics, though.
Chaim Bloom explaining Brasier’s existence, said, “With Ryan, it’s not rocket science, he throws a ton of strikes. He has really good stuff, made some adjustments later in the [2022] season, just in terms of how and when he used what he had to sequence it better and help him get outs. […] There’s a lot of reason there and optimism that’s shared by both front office and field staff that that we will get better results going forward. […] When you have people close to the player who do believe in the player, that moves the needle for me. I think it’s really important if you’re making those types of calls, you want to be on the same page as them, even when they are tough decisions.”
They were wrong. Dead wrong.
Cora on Brasier: “He struggled and we stayed with him all the way to the end. It didn’t work out, but the kid is Class-A.” He recalls how in ‘18, “nobody knew about this kid. … He pitched. He posted.” Cora also raves about Brasier’s season-ending performance in ‘21.
— Alex Speier (@alexspeier) May 15, 2023
Brasier talking about leaving the Red Sox, said, “Honestly, a new start might not be bad. Obviously getting to play at Fenway every day is a dream come true. Two parks you want to play at growing up are Yankee Stadium and Fenway. And I got to do both a lot. So grateful. It sucks obviously but new start.”
The news of the Red Sox ditching Ryan Brasier was years in the making. This day probably should have come sooner, but it is what it is.
(Rafael Devers and Chris Sale are now the only players left from 2018. Thirty-three players on the Red Sox 40-man roster, including players on the 60-day IL, are Chaim Bloom’s.)
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