In what may have been his final start of the 2025 regular season, Garrett Crochet delivered.
The Boston Red Sox ace was on top of his game, firing eight shutout innings against the Toronto Blue Jays at Rogers Centre on Wednesday. He scattered three hits and no walks while striking out six, pitching the Red Sox to a 7-1 victory and moving them one step closer to a playoff berth.
While Crochet could still pitch Sunday on short rest if absolutely needed, that seems unlikely now with Boston’s magic number at one. All the Red Sox need to do is win one more game (or have the Houston Astros lose one) to make the postseason.
If Crochet’s regular season is done, it’s been one for the record books. All he did in his first season with Boston was go 18-5 with a 2.59 ERA while leading the Major Leagues in innings (205 1/3) and strikeouts (255).
The 26-year-old lefty showed exceptional control all season as well, walking just 46 of the 814 batters he faced (5.7%). In fact, he’s just the fifth southpaw in MLB history to have more than 250 strikeouts and fewer than 50 walks in the same season, joining Randy Johnson (2004), David Price (2014), Clayton Kershaw (2015) and Chris Sale (2015 and 2017).
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He’s also only the fourth lefty in American League history with a 30% strikeout rate or better (31.3%) over at least 200 innings in a season, joining Johnson (1995 and 1997), Sale (2015 and 2017) and Johan Santana (2004).
All of those pitchers won at least one Cy Young award, which Crochet has a pretty good chance of doing this year. His main competition is Tarik Skubal, who won the AL award last year and has been even better this year.
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Regardless, the Red Sox are hoping Crochet can keep up his historic level of dominance when the playoffs start next week. He’s been phenomenal down the stretch, winning his last four starts, so hopefully he can carry that over into October as he prepares for his first postseason run with Boston.
Featured image via Dale Zanine/Imagn Images
