Garrett Crochet amped about revamped Red Sox starting rotation: ‘There’s a lot to like there’

FORT MYERS, Fla. — Garrett Crochet’s first off-season as a member of the Boston Red Sox was unlike any he has experienced. After logging a career-high 205⅓ innings, striking out a major-league-best 255 hitters, and finishing second to Detroit’s Tarik Skubal in American League Cy Young balloting, the left-hander took the full six weeks he allows himself each winter to reset. The extra time was not about baseball; it was about family. Crochet and his wife, Rachel, welcomed their first child, a daughter, in November.

“I can’t really put into words how it’s made me feel,” Crochet said, smiling at the thought even as he acknowledged the nightly challenge of new-parent sleep deprivation. “I’ve transformed on the inside. It’s a special feeling.”

That perspective will accompany him into a 2026 season that carries enormous expectations for both the club and its de facto pitching leader. Crochet, 26, is the lone holdover from last season’s Opening Day rotation, and he likes what he sees around him after chief baseball officer Craig Breslow overhauled the staff with an eye toward pitching and defense.

“Sonny [Gray] brings a ton of experience and a ton of strikeouts and innings over the past couple years,” Crochet said of the 36-year-old veteran who has been pitching in the majors since Crochet was in eighth grade. “Obviously, we’ve seen what Ranger [Suárez] has done in the NL and one of the better divisions in baseball, and also in one of the more hostile environments in baseball. So I think that we’re excited to see him meet the challenge in Boston.

“And [Johan] Oviedo has got an incredible profile. Just watching him throw bullpens and stuff like that, you see the pitch shapes and the arsenal as a whole. There’s a lot to like there.”

The retooled rotation skews older: Suárez is 30, Oviedo turns 28 next month, and rotation candidates Kutter Crawford and Patrick Sandoval are both 29. Even Brayan Bello, once considered one of the organization’s young arms, was born in May 1999 — a month before Crochet. Unless prospects Connelly Early or Payton Tolle force their way in, Boston’s youngest starter will also be its senior statesman.

“One of the real benefits of the staff that we’re bringing in this year is just the competitiveness amongst each other,” Crochet said. “Obviously not in a malicious way. But when you’re following a guy that’s going seven [shutout innings] and punching out 11, you want to do the same, if not better. And we’ve got a lot of guys on the team that are capable of that.”

Crochet’s own encore will be built on refinement. He spent the winter at Vanderbilt University, often working out alongside Gray, a fellow Commodore. There, with input from Vanderbilt staffer Tyler Herb, he transformed his seldom-used changeup — thrown just 4 percent of the time in 2025 — into a splitter. The adjustment required a new grip and months of trial and error, but the early returns have been encouraging.

“I was always pretty timid to buy into that,” Crochet admitted. “They kind of scare you growing up that it’ll give you the elbow bug. But I found one that works for me, and I’ve been recovering really well.”

Manager Alex Cora said the Red Sox will again monitor Crochet carefully, mirroring the 2025 plan that featured occasional shortened starts and extra rest days. Crochet admitted the strategy can frustrate him in the moment, but he understands the big-picture goal. His lone playoff start last October — 7⅔ innings of one-run ball against the Yankees on 117 pitches — offered a glimpse of what the club is protecting.

“I’ll probably still be [upset],” he said with a laugh. “I feel like that’s the nature of the game. It’s a little harder to see the big picture when you’re in it. But I’ve got all the faith in the world in Alex and this front office and the rest of the staff that they’re making the right calls.”

Cora, speaking less than an hour after pitchers and catchers completed their first spring-training workout, ended any suspense about the season opener. Asked whether Crochet would get the ball on March 26 in Cincinnati, the manager replied, “Let’s get that [expletive] over with.”

Crochet, ever stoic, responded with typical humility: “I’m still trying to work like I’m making the team.”