Red Sox fans might experience troubling flashbacks over Henry Owens’ statistical comps

Henry Owens of the Red Sox pitches against the Twins in the second inning of a spring training game at JetBlue Park. Getty Images

By Chad Finn

March 24, 2017

3 minutes to read

COMMENTARY

As my series earlier this week on the top historical statistical comparisons for various Red Sox players was undergoing surgery in the editing phase, one of the wise guys from the copy desk yelled across the room with a question that would probably cause Red Sox fans to grimace:

“Hey, Finn,’’ he hollered, “What about Henry Owens? Who’s his comp?”

That question was as loaded as the bases after three straight walks. Owens, the 24-year-old lefty who was once the 19th-best prospect in the game per MLB.com, has been a disappointment in two partial seasons with the Red Sox and was assigned to minor league camp last week.

The comps Red Sox fans would come up with for him would not be kind at this point in time. So I gave my standard reply whenever the topic of a subpar Red Sox pitcher – the kind who lights up hitters’ eyes rather than radar guns – comes up: “He’s a lefty John Wasdin,” I said. “I’d trade him for Jose Canseco now.”

Now, I wouldn’t really trade Owens for Canseco. Canseco is 52, might struggle with MLB’s various testing policies, and I believe is down to nine functioning fingers, which presumably might affect his power. Owens is at least young and lefthanded and has 10 functioning fingers, thumbs included.

But the semi-serious-at-best question activated the Baseball Dork Seed in my brain, and it made me start thinking about pitchers I remember as similar to Owens. Aesthetically, there aren’t many – he’s a tall, changeup-dependent lefty with command and control issues. But it made me think of Kevin Morton, Vaughn Eshelman, and other southpaw ghosts of Red Sox rotations past who turned out to be more suspect than prospect.

There wasn’t enough data available for Owens for age-specific comparisons to be listed. But there several lousy rotations’ worth of pitchers throughout history who have had similar stats in sum to Owens’s numbers so far.

So I called up baseball-reference.com’s invaluable Play Index and punched in some parameters based on Owens’s key career statistics so far. He’s pitched 85 innings, so I set that standard at less than 95. He has a 5.19 ERA, so I set ERA at 5.00 or higher. He has a 1.518 WHIP, so I set that bar at 1.40 or higher. And he’s walked 4.7 batters per nine innings – the issue that has most damaged his chances for success – so I went with 4.0 BB/9 as the guidepost there.

Those parameters provided a rather long list – turns out it’s pretty tough to succeed as a pitcher in major league baseball – but there were plenty of interesting names, including no less than 191 who had pitched for the Red Sox at one time or another. Here are five:

BILLY ROHR

1967: 42.1 innings, 5.10 ERA, 1.54 WHIP, 4.68 BB/9

His Red Sox career was brief, but his legacy is lasting. His near no-hitter of the Yankees in his first career start is one of the most cherished moments from the Impossible Dream season.

ALLEN WEBSTER

2013-14: 89.1 innings, 6.25 ERA, 1.58 WHIP, 4.63 BB/9

Remember when we thought the Red Sox got genuine pitching prospects back in the Adrian Gonzalez/Josh Beckett/Carl Crawford salary dump on the Dodgers in 2012? Didn’t quite work out that way, though Rubby de la Rosa had a moment or two. Let’s just say the jittery Webster did not have ice water in his veins.

ERIC HETZEL

1989-90: 85.1 innings, 6.12 ERA, 1.74 WHIP, 5.17 BB/9

One of those quasi-prospects in the late ‘80s who always seemed to pick up a start or two along the way and do nothing with the opportunity. Steve Curry, Mike Rochford, Rob Woodward, and Steve Ellsworth are others in that group. Call ‘em the Jeff Sellers All-Stars. Actually, among them, Jeff Sellers was an All-Star.

LENNY DINARDO

2004-06: 81.1 innings, 5.53 ERA, 1.78 WHIP, 4.02 BB/9

Hey, he got a ring out of it. I remember him being more helpful than his numbers suggest, actually, probably because it was in the heart of the PED era.

CRAIG HANSEN

2005-08: 71.2 innings, 6.15 ERA, 1.67 WHIP, 4.90 BB/9

The much-hyped first-rounder was a reliever, so it’s not a perfect comp to Owens, but … ouch. Not a lot of hope for Owens’s future here.

After looking at this list, I can come to only one conclusion: Maybe I’ve been too hard on John Wasdin all these years.

Follow Chad Finn on Twitter at @GlobeChadFinn.