Red Sox recall Cooper Criswell, who tosses 6 innings Friday night, and make flurry of other roster moves
The Red Sox made a flurry of roster moves ahead of Friday night’s 6-1 loss to the Royals at Fenway Park. Boston recalled right-handed pitcher Cooper Criswell, who made the start and was named the International League Pitcher of the Week for July 1–7.
Criswell pitched six innings, allowing five runs—only two earned—on eight hits and allowing a pair of walks.
“Any time you give the ball to a starter, you want to give your team a chance to win,” Criswell said. “But I thought I could have done a little better job tonight.”
The Royals seemed to have figured out Criswell early on, scoring four runs off the righty through the first two frames. This included a three-run second inning, which started with Kansas City collecting three straight singles before Salvador Perez plating a run with a sacrifice fly. Bobby Witt Jr. tacked on another run off Criswell in the fourth inning with his 16th homer over the Green Monster in left center field.
“With him, they’re going to put the ball in play,” Cora said. “The line looks bad, but he gave us enough. With him, we have to be on point defensively.”
Criswell is coming off a great start on July 6 for the WooSox, tossing six scoreless innings of one hit ball while striking out eight batters. This will be his second stint with the major league team. He has dominated at Worcester, posting a 1.40 ERA in five starts there.
The Red Sox also placed right-handed reliever Justin Slaten on the injured list with right elbow inflammation, while recalling lefty Cam Booser.
“He’s been grinding through it probably the last 15 days, and he wasn’t able to bounce back from the last one in New York,” said Cora. “I think it’s smart to put him on the IL. We’ve got the All-Star break, and hopefully he’ll be back right after the Dodgers series [in Los Angeles that follows the break]. It’s his first time pitching this much, and obviously we’ve got to be careful with him.”
Slaten has tossed 42 2/3 innings this season, including a scoreless frame in the win over the Yankees on Sunday.
“The stuff that the [training staff] has us doing [is huge],” he said. “Every day when we come in here, they’re just making sure we feel right. They have a plan for us. There are some days you come in you feel really good, and some days you come in and not feeling that good.”
Cora said that Slaten’s injury is considered minor and could come off the IL following the All-Star break. His injury isn’t a surprise to the club, considering the high-leverage situations Slaten has pitched in this season.
“When he became one of our high-leverage guys, the workload is a lot,” Cora said. “The effort is different. He’s been good. It’s just with this injury, it took him longer than expected. For us to push him in this series for one game and then something else happens and we lose him for a month, it just doesn’t make sense.”
Booser tossed a clean inning in relief of Criswell and lowered his ERA to 2.90 for the year. The southpaw is back following the series against the Yankees last weekend.
The Red Sox also optioned newly acquired righty Trey Wingenter to the WooSox. Wingenter made his Red Sox debut on Tuesday night against the Athletics. The righty was roughed up by Oakland in the top of the ninth inning; surrendering three earned runs off two hits while walking one and striking out one.
