Boston Red Sox: Ryan Weber should fill No. 5 spot in starting rotation

The Boston Red Sox have a few internal candidates who might be up to the task of filling the fifth starter role but Ryan Weber is the best option.

Assuming the Boston Red Sox starting rotation stays healthy throughout spring training, they’ve got their first four pitchers lined up as Chris Sale, Eduardo Rodriguez, Nathan Eovaldi, and Martin Perez. One can quibble with the order of Eovaldi and Perez based on how they look in Ft. Myers, but generally speaking the first four spots in the rotation are set for this season.

That brings up the question of who should be the fifth starter? With David Price heading to Los Angeles in the Mookie Betts trade and Rick Porcello heading to the Mets in free agency, the Red Sox lost two veteran pitchers who, when healthy, also ate a lot of innings. That immediately propelled  Eovaldi up from the fifth starter while Porcello leaving created the opening for the team to sign for Perez.

With the injuries to Eovaldi and Sale in 2019, Red Sox fans suffered through countless “bullpen games” and an endless parade of AAAA pitchers who made spot starts and lasted a few innings before a procession of relievers finished the game. Most of these games were losses and all were ugly and boring to watch. With the Red Sox having a hole in the rotation and no obvious way to plug it, we may be in for another season of this.

New Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom mentioned earlier this winter that the team would be amenable to using an opener this season, a concept pioneered in recent years by his former team, the Tampa Bay Rays. Similar in approach to the bullpen games the Red Sox used out of necessity last year, the opener is conversely a deliberate use of pitchers in much the same way except that usually, the pitcher that starts the game only throws one inning before giving way to a parade of bullpen arms.

With most Red Sox fans having no desire to see this done deliberately, the Red Sox should instead look to fill the fifth spot in the rotation with a traditional starter. Given the dearth of pitching depth the team has, especially in the minor leagues, the most likely candidates would seem to be one of the AAAA pitchers they used in 2019’s bullpen games. There are three of them currently on the 40-man roster: Darwinzon Hernandez, Hector Velazquez, and Ryan Weber.

First, their 2019 stats, including Brian Johnson, who was the other main spot starter last season.

Johnson: 1-3 W-L, 6.02 ERA, 31 K, 23 BB, 40.1 IP, 1.884 WHIP (7 starts)
Velazquez: 1-4 W-L, 5.43 ERA, 49 K, 28 BB, 56.1 IP, 1.527 WHIP (8 starts)
Weber: 2-4 W-L, 5.09 ERA, 29 K, 8 BB, 40.2 IP, 1.377 WHIP (3 starts)
Hernandez: 0-1 W-L, 4.45 ERA, 57 K, 26 BB, 30.1 IP, 1.747 WHIP (1 start)

Nothing too exciting there. Even keeping in mind that some of those numbers come from games they also appeared in relief, those aren’t great stats. It doesn’t get much clearer when the numbers are expanded to include their entire careers (keeping in mind that last year was Hernandez’ first season):

Johnson: 7-9 W-L, 4.74 ERA, 142 K, 73 BB, 171.0 IP, 1.550 IP (26 starts)
Velazquez: 11-7 W-L, 3.90 ERA, 121 K, 61 BB, 166.0 IP, 1.428 WHIP (19 starts)
Weber: 3-9 W-L, 5.04 ERA, 72 K, 21 BB, 114.1 IP, 1.294 WHIP (11 starts)
Hernandez: 0-1 W-L, 4.45 ERA, 57 K, 26 BB, 30.1 IP, 1.747 WHIP (1 start)

Right off the bat, let’s get this out of the way: Johnson isn’t on the 40-man roster after being released and then re-signed after clearing waivers, so he’s not a likely possibility. Velazquez has the better numbers in terms of win-loss record and ERA but otherwise these three guys are pretty similar.

Velazquez and Hernandez throw the hardest while Weber throws the softest but has a somewhat unorthodox delivery and pretty good movement on his stuff (when it’s working). He was impressive in his first Red Sox start in 2019 before getting knocked around in his subsequent appearances.

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While he might not be the best of the bunch, I think Red Sox fans have seen enough of Johnson and Velazquez over the last few seasons to know what they are. As for Hernandez, his control needs to improve and he needs to keep his walks down, but he also projects more as a reliever and not a starter.

Weber is not that much better but he might be an intriguing option to at least start the season in the fifth rotation spot. He’s relatively young at 29 (Johnson is also 29 while Velazquez is 31) and would be something different in a rotation filled with hard throwers.

He also seems to have finally found some stability in his career after bouncing around and said that he’s ready and willing to give being a full-time starter a shot. At the very least, he’d be someone different after seeing Johnson and Velazquez both seemingly hit their ceilings with this team over the last couple of seasons.

Ryan Weber isn’t going to go out there and win fifteen games for this team, but if he can give them some quality starts, eat a lot of innings (with that delivery, the wear and tear on his arm should be minimal), and keep the Red Sox in enough games where they’re at least in a position to win more often than not, he’d be a viable choice for the fifth starter. If he has a good spring training, it just might happen.