‘All my fingers are attached’: Chris Sale cherishes chance to face hitters
"Last time I faced a hitter, it wasn’t fun. So this was a lot of fun. Today was a big day for me."
Chris Sale faced hitters for the first time since July on Saturday.
The Red Sox left-hander, with his family present, threw 23 pitches off a mound to teammates in Fort Myers.
He called it “a big deal” in the process as he makes his return after Aaron Hicks of the Yankees tattooed a ball that destroyed Sale’s left pinkie.
“Last time I faced a hitter, it wasn’t fun,” Sale told reporters. “So this was a lot of fun. Today was a big day for me, just because it’s one more step in the right direction.”
Sale, who has started just 11 games since 2019, faced Alex Verdugo, Triston Casas, Jarren Duran, Daniel Palka, Nick Yorke, and Chase Meidroth.
He said there was nothing different about what he has to do or how he has to do it following the pinkie fracture. His focus now is on “sharpening the axe” and working on his repetitions and consistency.
A nugget from Alex Speier of The Boston Globe:
On that front, a Hall of Famer offered a hand on Saturday. As Sale threw long toss to prepare for his session, Pedro Martinez noticed the lefthander’s lead arm flying open early instead of staying closed on his slider, resulting in a rotational delivery and mislocation.
Martinez identified the flaw, then observed Globe photographer Jim Davis taking pictures of Sale’s preparation. Martinez summoned Sale to look at a picture on Davis’s screen. Sale nodded in recognition and addressed the issue.
“It was literally instantaneous,” Sale said of the fix. “I’ve been doing this for a while but I’ve been away for a while. Consistency is something I’m really working on. That’s part of being consistent, cleaning up my mechanics.”
As for this step in the process, he was aware that he was standing just 55 feet away from a hitter, but he considers the pinkie injury a fluke.
He was grateful this time went differently than that at-bat in July.
“All my fingers are attached,” Sale said.
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