Clay Buchholz Should Be Fighting For His Spot In Red Sox Rotation
By Matt Dolloff, CBS Boston
BOSTON (CBS) -- Lost in the Boston Red Sox's whirlwind of success to start the 2016 season is that Clay Buchholz, one of their most maligned starting pitchers in recent years, continues to struggle.
Buchholz continues to get bailouts from the offense. He continues to make excuses for his poor performance. He continues to face no threat to his spot in the rotation, take the mound every fifth day, and survive with no consequence. And so the cycle goes.
The Red Sox aren't even playing a lot of great teams right now, and Buchholz still can't get with the program.
With Joe Kelly and Eduardo Rodriguez close to returning from injuries, Buchholz's rotation spot should be on the line in his next start. But it isn't: manager John Farrell has already said that Buchholz is safe in the rotation, even after allowing five runs in six innings against the Houston Astros Saturday afternoon.
Buchholz has allowed five earned runs in five of his eight starts this season and escaped two of them with no-decisions, including Saturday. If not for David Ortiz's typical late-inning heroics, the big conversation surrounding Saturday's game would have been the continued struggles of Buchholz, even as other Red Sox starters have pitched well or rounded into form with Christian Vazquez behind the plate.
The most exasperating part is that Buchholz can't seem to figure out what's wrong, or just admit that he had a bad day.
"It's really frustrating. You play to win, we won the game, so that cures a little bit of it," Buchholz told reporters after the game, ironically referring to his mood when most would read that as what really happened here, which was a bailout by Ortiz and the unstoppable Red Sox lineup.
Buchholz seems to think he's just been unlucky and needs to catch a break.
"When you miss with pitches and you're not going well, the guys at the plate seem to square it up, and every time they're squaring it up off right now off of me it's with runners on and usually a home run," he said on Saturday. "I've got to find a way to get around it."
Unfortunately for Buchholz, his opponents' batting average on balls in play (BABIP) for the season is .285, which is actually slightly below the league average. This indicates that, if anything, the hitters could use a smidgen of luck against Buchholz.
Meanwhile, Joe Kelly starts for the Pawtucket Red Sox Monday night and is close to returning to Boston, and president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said he probably won't move to the bullpen. Eduardo Rodriguez still needs to make at least one more rehab start before making his season debut, but his return could also be imminent. Steven Wright hasn't come close to pitching himself out of the rotation.
That leaves three major league-caliber starters and one open rotation spot. Buchholz has done very little to deserve security. Unless the Red Sox plan on going with a six-man rotation, they should really be considering (for real, this time) to find a way to remove Buchholz from the rotation.
You may ask "What do you want them to do?" The simple answer is, "Something that's not Buchholz giving up a run an inning." See what Buchholz can fetch in a trade, if anything. If his value is shot, designate him for assignment. Move him to mop-up duty in the bullpen if you have to. Hell, make up an injury, throw him on the DL and send him down to Pawtucket! Don't give me anything about money; the team can afford to take the hit. The way Buchholz has practically stamped a guarantee on five earned runs in his starts, he shouldn't be safe; there's virtually no reason for Buchholz to still be gifted such a luxury.
This is far from the first article to call for Buchholz's head in the rotation. This is also far from the first time that Buchholz has failed to pitch up to his capabilities and deflect more blame with each passing failure. How much longer does the team need to put up with this headache? How much longer than a contending team, which the Red Sox are right now, continue to allow Buchholz to drag behind the back of the train? It's going to slow them down at some point; the team shouldn't have to wait for the 31-year-old to get to where he needs to be.
It's only a matter of time before Buchholz gets injured again; maybe that will happen sooner rather than later and make Farrell's decision easier. But this one shouldn't be difficult: Buchholz is pitching himself out of the rotation and should be on the verge of getting the boot.
But it's not happening this week, apparently. So for now, you will have to endure another painful cycle, or two, or twenty.
Matt Dolloff is a writer for CBSBostonSports.com. His opinions do not necessarily reflect that of CBS or 98.5 The Sports Hub. Have a news tip or comment for Matt? Follow him on Twitter @mattdolloff and email him at mdolloff@985thesportshub.com.
