Andrew Bailey’s Philosophies Open New Doors For Red Sox Pitching

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. -- Andrew Bailey returns to the Boston Red Sox after parts of two seasons with the ball club as a player in 2012 and 2013.

Now returning as the team's pitching coach, Bailey joins chief baseball officer Craig Breslow, advisor Kyle Boddy and director of pitching Justin Willard in a new brain trust to reshape the future of pitching within the Red Sox organization.

"For us, outs are made in zone," Bailey told reporters on Saturday during Red Sox Winter Weekend at the MassMutual Center. "We want to help educate our pitchers on what makes them unique, relative to other pitchers around the league."

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In modern baseball, Bailey listed several factors that make up his pitching philosophy, including but not limited to: pitch shaping, repertoire selection, delivery mechanics, release points, pitch usage and location.

"There's addition by subtraction, as well," Bailey said. "One of your pitches may play better than another. Spin in-zone generally produces better outcomes. Understanding, in the history of baseball, that fastballs get hit the hardest and generate the most slugging over a long period of time. … Blending together to create an understanding of who the athlete is and (their) identity is really big."

Bailey continued: "If you look over a long period of time at the best pitchers at the major league level, you know what they're going to do to both right-handed hitters and left-handed hitters. They have a general attack plan and they don't get off that. Cleaning up the gray area there and doubling up on strengths is going to be huge."

For the Red Sox as a whole, the pitching staff has significant expectations to improve from a disappointing 2023 season, doing so with mostly the same group. Arms such as Brayan Bello, Garrett Whitlock, Kutter Crawford, Tanner Houck, Josh Winckowski and Nick Pivetta will be relied upon to increase their production, a task that Bailey is ready to handle with the Red Sox.

"We have a lot of talent," Bailey said. "For me, if certain guys aren't at higher levels going into next season, we just didn't do our jobs. Expecting players to take steps forward and helping them on that path and be the best versions of themselves every time out. … If we hold true to our processes and accountability over 162 games, our run-prevention unit will be setting up our team for success."

Returning to the Red Sox as a new voice, Bailey hopes to provide the hungry Boston pitching staff with an "organic change of scenery." Major improvements will provide value, both to the players and the Red Sox, to highlight Boston as a premier place to perform.

"As humans in general, we should always be striving to grow and develop," Bailey shared. "I think that holds true for baseball players. They're generally inquisitive. They want to be better versions of themselves. If we as human beings were complacent, we wouldn't be taking steps forward. We should always be striving to be better at our jobs, no matter what that is."