Massarotti: How David Price Can Improve Red Sox
BOSTON (CBS) - David Price will make a difference, of course. The question is how much.
So for those of you who worry about the absence of a true No. 2 starter in the Red Sox' starting rotation as the team prepares for the official start of spring training next week, here is the mathematical argument: based on relatively recent Red Sox history, Price should be worth anywhere from 8-14 wins in 2016, which makes the Red Sox a contender for a playoff spot on the low side, a playoff team on the high side.
Forget Price's individual won-lost record. What really matters here is his impact on the team, and recent Red Sox history has shown that a front-end starter can make all the difference, regardless of what is behind him. From 1985 to 1986, for example, the Red Sox went from 81 wins to 95. The difference? The true arrival of Roger Clemens, who blossomed into the ace the Red Sox believed he could be during a 1986 season in which he won both the American League Cy Young Award and the Most Valuable Player Award.
Yes, Clemens had a historic season that year, the Red Sox going a preposterous 27-6 in his 31 starts. But even had the Sox gone, say, a far more realistic 20-13 during Clemens' outings, they would have won something along the lines of 88 games, which would have made them a playoff contender.
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Clemens remained at the front of the Boston rotation through 1996, overall an 11-year period during which the Sox had nine winning seasons and made four playoff appearances. Then he departed. In 1997, the Red Sox subsequently went 78-84, missing the playoffs and falling short of even postseason contention largely because they lacked a true front-of-the-rotation starter.
So what did they do? They went out and acquired Pedro Martinez.
Here's what people forget about Pedro: the first season was good, not great, particularly in September, when Martinez faded. Overall, the Red Sox went 22-11 in his 33 starts, going from 78 wins (in 1997) to 92. The Sox made the playoffs before they were bounced by the Cleveland Indians, but we all know what happened after that.
During Martinez' seven years in Boston, the Red Sox never once finished with a losing record, made the playoffs four times, reached three American League Championship Series and won a world title, the championship coming when he was flanked by Curt Schilling. (Or maybe it was the other way around.) The point is that Pedro alone made the Red Sox a playoff team during his seven years. When he got real help, they won a championship for the first time in nearly a century.
All of that brings us back to Price.
Now 30, Price doesn't have quite the same career track as either Clemens or Martinez, both Hall of Fame-caliber talents who won a combined 10 Cy Young Awards. But he's reasonably close. Already in his career, Price has won Cy Young Award and two second-place finishes. Even if he isn't Clayton Kershaw, he is a legitimate major league ace.
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From 2008-14, Price's career years as a starter, his teams have gone a combined 134-78 in his starts, an average of 19-11 per season. (Last year, Price's teams were 24-8.) That may not sound like much at first glance, but it's a .633 winning percentage (and 103-win pace) over the course of a regular season. If that remains true, the Red Sox, in theory, should go from a 78-win team to an 86-win team. (Interestingly, Las Vegas currently has the Red Sox over-under projected at 85.5 wins.)
Now, we know what you're thinking: that assumes that the pitchers behind the Red Sox are something remotely resembling respectable. And last year, they weren't.
Here's something that may surprise you: last season, in games started by Wade Miley, Clay Buchholz, Rick Porcello, Joe Kelly and Eduardo Rodriguez, the Red Sox were a perfectly mediocre 62-62. And you may be even more surprised to learn that in games started by Miley, whom Price has effectively replaced, the Sox were 15-17. That means the Sox were actually two games over .500 in games started by Buchholz, Porcello, Kelly and Rodriguez – a total of a 47-45 – in games started by the four men who project to back up Price in the Boston roster.
Look, we get it. Numbers aren't worth the paper they're printed on. When the games start for real, there is simply no way of knowing who will do what. But if you look at baseball history, the fact is that a front-end starter can make all the difference in the world, at least when it comes to turning a relatively mediocre (or below-average team) into a playoff contender.
If the Red Sox win David Price's starts 60 percent of the time this year – and his history suggests they will – we should have a baseball season again in Boston.
