Here’s hoping the Buch(holz) stops here
COMMENTARY
You were in one of either two camps on Tuesday when news came down that the Boston Red Sox had exercised their $13 million club option on right-handed pitcher Clay Buchholz.
1. Thirteen million dollars for a pitcher of Buchholz’s caliber? A no-brainer for the Red Sox, especially if new president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski can dangle him on the trade market this winter.
2. What the $#@&?
To label Buchholz the most maddening pitcher in Red Sox history is doing somewhat of a disservice to guys like Daisuke Matsuzaka and Matt Young, but he belongs in that group based not only on his inability to stay healthy, but his wild card ineffectiveness when he is on the 28-man roster.
But what truly drives the Buchholz Exasperation Express is the Red Sox’ nonplussed faith in a guy who consistently lets them down. Buchholz is considered an ace in the waiting, yet has never managed to put it all together, a poor man’s A.J. Burnett with notable “stuff’’ but little resume to serve as a reasonable comparison. Along the way, Buchholz has been coddled and exalted more than any other underperforming player to call Fenway Park his home, an excuse-creating accelerant that the Sox front office has been wont to cut ties with based on the potential ceiling.
No more. Buchholz will be 31 next summer, not exactly possessing the open landscape that he displayed as a rookie in 2007, a season that included a no-hitter in only his second big-league start. He teased Red Sox fans in 2010, going 17-7 with a 2.33 ERA and finishing sixth in the Cy Young Award voting as a 25-year-old. He managed to pitch all of 82 2/3 innings the following season.
Same deal in 2013, when Buchholz was a sparkling 9-0 through 12 starts before going on the disabled list after sleeping the wrong way while holding his newborn daughter. He finished the Red Sox’ World Series season with a 12-1 record.
He’s gone 15-18 since.
If you’re waiting for the day when Buchholz might finally toss as many as 200 innings, you might as well sit tight for a reunion of the original Beatles. It’s never going to happen as long as there are enough mystery ailments and injuries to allow his coaches to deliver yet another reason why their “ace-in-waiting’’ is sidelined. Again.
And so, here we are, at a crossroads at Buchholz’s time in a Red Sox uniform, hopefully, mercifully, coming to a close before pitchers and catchers report in Fort Myers, Fla.
The very fact that $13 million is a “bargain’’ for a guy like Buchholz either tells you all you need to know about the current level of starting pitching these days in Major League Baseball, or gives credence to the popular notion that other teams will see the salary and make a run for the guy, with the extensive delusion that Buchholz will be any different for their team.
Nobody has ever questioned Buchholz’s talent, but his lackadaisical drive and complete absence of a hardened bone in his gentle frame have created an enigma who can be considered one of the best pitchers in baseball when he’s 100 percent and not concerned about the slightest boo-boo that might derail him. That happens, without much exaggeration, once every three years.
The Red Sox, ahem, the last-place Red Sox, of course had one of the worst starting staffs in the major leagues last season, so perhaps there’s the notion that they need to add starters, not get rid of them. That’s a great theory until Buchholz goes on the disabled list in mid-June and the team is swirling back out of contention for the fourth time in five seasons.
No. If you want to put any level of faith in the new front office regime that Dombrowski has taken control of, you have to assume the $13 million option was picked up in order that the Red Sox can ship him off to be someone else’s problem this offseason. If there was anything other than that in mind, then the new regime has not only started off on the wrong foot, but stepped in a pile of dog vomit to boot.
“Everyone is aware of his history, and the potential that he won’t make 80 percent of his starts,’’ an astute American League general manager told the Boston Globe’s Nick Cafardo, “but for the price, a lot of teams will make inquiries to Boston about him.
“Everyone knows the frustration level he brings, but we all know how good he can be also. He’s reaching that age where he’s learned how to pitch. Sometimes a player or pitcher gets a lot of injuries in the first half of their careers because they haven’t figured out what they need to do to stay healthy. There’s always the hope that Buchholz figures that all out.’’
No. Not in Boston there isn’t. Not anymore.
That’s the assumption at least, that better baseball minds have taken over Yawkey Way and figured out the deterioration a guy like Buchholz can have on any team’s stability, and that someone out there, like our unnamed GM, is dumb enough to take a risk on what the former folks in charge believed would one day come to fruition.
It won’t.
Well, most likely it won’t. This could, after all, end one of two ways; Either Buchholz gets dealt to a National League team, wins 20 games and earns the Cy Young Award, or the Red Sox fail to find what they consider proper return for him prior to spring training, and he ends up on the Boston roster for yet another Grapefruit League schedule.
In which case, he’ll suffer some semblance of a setback before St. Patrick’s Day that will sideline him. Then, another in June that will completely wipe out the team’s hope to give him a new address.
Ask most fans, and they’re likely to tell you that they’ve seen enough of Clay Buchholz to be willing to risk the first scenario.
Contact Eric Wilbur at: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter: @GlobeEricWilbur
Fifteen Reasons Boston Loves Mookie Betts
[bdc-gallery id=”655770″]
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com