Jake Bennett Spring Outing Should Put Him on Everyone’s Radar
Red Sox prospect was impressive in spring outing.
Spring Training is all about getting answers to questions that you have regarding the roster. For the Red Sox, it lies within the fifth starter spot, who can take over for Romy Gonzalez in a platoon role, and whom is going to play second base. There’s plenty to digest. What this also allows you to do is get more eyeballs on prospects in the system and get more familiar with them. One prospect who has managed to grab the attention of everyone in a short glimpse is Jake Bennett.
Bennett was part of the extremely rare prospect for prospect trade with the Washington Nationals. Former friend Paul Toboni traded Bennett to the Red Sox in exchange for Luis Perales. Perales was a pitcher that was on the cusp of being part of the Red Sox pitching plans, but instead land Bennett who is more of a Breslow guy. Big, lanky, good extension, swing and miss guy. Bennett has the tools that Breslow covets and potential that he can tap into.
Bennett missed the entirety of the 2024 season, but in 2025 was able to rise from Single-A to Double-A. Across the systems, he posted a 2.27 ERA with a 2.96 FIP. Of course the results are important, but so is the progression with his overall stuff and how it’s playing against his competition. This is the piece that the Red Sox fans got a great glimpse of in his spring training appearance against the Twins Tuesday afternoon.
After missing an entire year, the big thing was going to see how his velocity looked. That’s precisely where the storyline was with Bennett and the eyes he opened. In 2025, Bennett was a pitcher that mainly sat at 94 MPH and topped out at 96 MPH with his four seam fastball. Putting him in the Red Sox pitching laboratory has evidently done wonders, as the velocity has spiked up.
In this start, Bennett sat at 96 MPH and topped out at 98 MPH. Being able to sit where you topped out at a season ago is spectacular and being able to max out your velocity to 98 MPH is a big step forward. The outing only got better and was more encouraging as it went on.
Bennett pitched two innings, throwing 15 pitches total. Furthermore, he finished with a 35% chase rate and a 27% whiff rate. The things you love to see out of your pitchers. Bennett also had a 63% strike rate which is encouraging and one of the best pitches of the day for him was his cutter.
As much attention as the 98 MPH four seamer got, the cutter was magnificent. Of his four total whiffs on the day, three came off the cutter which also registered 60% and also a 63% CSW (called strikes and whiffs). Magnificent. Bennett saw the velocity spike on the pitch in his second inning of work compared to his first, going from 87.8 MPH to 88.5 MPH.
Bennett is a guy who likely will begin the year in the minor league systems. If he is continuing to pitch with this type of velocity and maintains the effectiveness with his secondaries, he could be knocking on the door to this team and be a contributing factor. This pitching pipeline continues to impress and the depth continues to shine through.
Fastforwad two weeks later, and an additional unsuccessful start by Bennett; I wanted to offer a little more now that we have a little more context to draw from. Bennett's velocity was up in his second start, but his command and control were not. This is part of the growth process and Bennett is experiencing normal growing pains which come from adding significant velocity. Bennett didn't add .8 of 1 mile per hour to his Fastball. He added just under 4 miles per hour on average. That not only affects his fastball and sinker, but also his breaking balls and changeup.
Remember his changeup was his advanced pitch coming into the Red Sox organization and the one pitch which already graded as an above average Major League pitch.
Why do I mention these things?
I want to remind fans that we need to be patient when a pitcher makes big changes like this. It might take Bennett a few starts before he begins to look like his old self command and control wise, or it might even take a full season added to next off-season before we see what's possible with Bennett's improvements.
This call for patience also applies to Oviedo and Tolle. Frankly, Tolle's ability to move through the system like a sky rocket last year is neither normal nor common. Now, the conversation about Tolle and his stuff/performance is on par w/Bennett & Oviedo. They all have pitches which they feel comfortable with and a way of pitching which they had cultivated for years, and now they are subtlely changing. These subtle changes need time and repetition to stick.
That is why I wouldn't be surprised if Oviedo started in Worcester if Crawford and/or Sandoval prove to be ready for Opening Day.
Either way, things look bright for Bennett and his Red Sox brethren. Breslow and his pitching development team really have done a wonderful job developing pitching prospects and improving the prospects with previous MLB experience. It feels good to say the team I root for is good at developing pitching.
Do you believe Bennett's rise make Sandoval and Crawford expendable? Tradable?