What Will Sonny Grey Look Like With the Crimson Sox?

When the Crimson Sox traded for Sonny Grey, they knew they had been getting an old-school starter with seven pitches. He’s obtained a sinker and a four-seamer. He’s obtained a cutter, a conventional slider, and a sweeper. He’s obtained a curveball and a changeup. The normal slider is the one one of many seven that Grey doesn’t throw recurrently; the others all noticed at the least 15% utilization towards righties or lefties in 2025. Grey is 36 years previous. He’s a three-time All-Star with 330 begins and 125 wins below his belt, and a profession ERA of three.58. At this level, you would possibly assume that he’s about as completed a product as you may discover, however you’d be improper, and that appears to be a part of the explanation he’ll be pitching in Boston subsequent 12 months.

In 2024, the Crimson Sox made waves for throwing fastballs simply 36.6% of the time, the bottom mark ever recorded and nearly definitely the bottom mark of all time. That quantity went up in 2025, largely as a result of they added Garrett Crochet, who owned a brand-new sinker to go along with a four-seamer that was one of many best pitches in baseball 2024. However it wasn’t simply Crochet. Brayan Bello introduced again the four-seamer he’d ditched in 2024. A finally-healthy Lucas Giolito threw four-seamers at his highest charge since 2020. With Aroldis Chapman changing Kenley Jansen, the nearer function noticed fastballs substitute cutters. In all, the Crimson Sox completed the season with a fastball charge of 48.3%, the Eleventh-highest within the league. That’s fairly a bounce-back. The Crimson Sox had been very explicitly attempting to get away from fastballs, however because the 2025 season confirmed us, the broader aim was to have their pitchers throw their greatest pitches extra typically.

That brings us to Grey, who throws the kitchen sink however nonetheless throws fastballs 40% of the time. In 2025, he led together with his four-seamer towards lefties and his sinker towards righties, throwing each pitches 29% of the time in these conditions. Shortly after the commerce went by way of, Boston’s chief baseball officer Craig Breslow mentioned it with reporters. MLB.com’s Ian Brown printed a quote: “Will probably be an amazing match for Bails [pitching coach Andrew Bailey] and the remainder of the pitching group and the philosophies they’ve by way of leaning into power and doubtlessly away from slug and pitching away from fastballs when you’ve gotten secondaries as your greatest pitch.”

That alone made me curious to see whether or not and the way Grey would possibly look completely different when he fits up for the Sox subsequent 12 months. Grey fanned these flames additional throughout his introductory Zoom name with the Boston press. Our resident interview ninja David Laurila requested whether or not Grey is open to altering his pitch combine this coming season. The reply was so thorough and considerate that David printed the entire thing earlier right now. You must learn it! However the brief reply is sure. Grey is not only open to adjusting his pitch combine. He’s enthusiastic about it. He’s enthusiastic about speaking pitch design and pitch shapes. He’s already talked to Bailey – excuse me, Bails – a number of instances and can be speaking to him once more right now. He’s assured in his means to spin the ball, and he is aware of “that’s a cult in Boston.” Understanding all this, let’s have some enjoyable Grey’s repertoire and interested by what would possibly change. Let’s begin together with his pitch combine, courtesy of this useful new Baseball Savant breakdown:

Deemphasizing the four-seamer looks like the apparent precedence. The pitch averaged simply 91.7 mph in 2025, placing it greater than three full ticks under the league common. It’s not a horrible pitch, however it’s now not a standout, even towards left-handed batters. In 2025, they put up a .411 wOBA towards it, and it graded out as under common by way of run worth.

The excellent news is that the sweeper looks like it may simply take in a few of that four-seamer utilization. It’s been Grey’s greatest pitch in every of the previous three years, each in line with the stuff metrics and Statcast’s run values. To be clear, Grey already throws his sweeper so much, particularly to lefties. Among the many 77 righties with a sweeper who threw at the least 500 pitches to lefties, his 16% charge was the fifteenth highest – but when any staff goes to provide a pitcher license to steer with a flexible pitch, it’s the Crimson Sox. Bello was simply behind Grey at 14.5%, and Boston traded for 2 of the pitchers forward of him on that record, Dustin Could (37.7%) and Jordan Hicks (20.7%), on the deadline. Furthermore, when you check out Baseball Prospectus’ arsenal metrics, you’ll see that almost all of Grey’s pitches tunnel greatest with the sweeper anyway.

Main with the sweeper towards lefties would doubtless have a number of knock-on results, which is to say that it might require a little bit of an overhaul, usage-wise. It’d imply backing off the curveball a bit in order that lefties couldn’t simply sit on one thing sluggish and flexible. It’d imply mixing in some backdoor sweepers that simply catch the surface nook on the lookout for known as strikes; proper now Grey primarily throws backfoot sweepers on the lookout for swings and misses. It might additionally make sense to throw a number of extra sinkers due to the best way Grey’s pitches transfer. He has a particularly excessive launch level, and his four-seamer has a tiny little bit of lower relatively than arm-side run. It’s principally a cutter (and as Michael Rosen identified to me final night time, Grey’s cutter is principally a gyro slider). That vertical orientation permits the four-seamer’s motion to reflect the curveball higher, whereas the sweeper and sinker, with their horizontal motion, make a extra pure pair:

I’m positively not saying that Grey ought to simply turn out to be a sinker-slider man towards lefties. The curveball continues to be nice, and the sinker isn’t going to be a pitch he needs to throw an excessive amount of to lefties. That is simply what looks like the logical technique to reorganize an arsenal if the targets are to throw your greatest pitches extra and deemphasize your fastball. The desk under exhibits Grey’s numbers towards lefties over the previous three seasons, and it’s very clear that the sweeper has fared higher than the curveball. Breslow particularly talked about a concentrate on slugging proportion, and the sweeper’s is greater than 255 factors decrease than the curve’s and the four-seamer’s! Though the sinker has gotten fewer whiffs than the four-seamer, it’s additionally carried out higher by nearly some other metric:

Issues aren’t as clear-cut towards right-handed batters. Grey’s strategy towards righties could be very easy, and it’s been the identical for almost his total profession: pound the nook low and out of doors.

That plan permits Grey to rack up known as strikes and maintain hitters from barreling up the ball. I doubt it’s going to alter abruptly in his age-36 season. Towards righties, Grey already leads with the sinker and sweeper. He may ramp again as much as the place he was at first of the last decade, throwing these two pitches roughly 70% of the time, however these weren’t essentially his greatest years, and each pitches took a step again by way of effectiveness in 2025, whereas the cutter carried out a lot better. If the Crimson Sox like what they see within the cutter, they could attempt to emphasize it a bit extra, however I’m unsure that’ll occur. It’s potential that Grey will flip the dial to 11 and see if he can succeed as a 40% sweeper man. I’d personally like to see this, however I’m unsure both the Crimson Sox or the man who completed in second within the Cy Younger voting as just lately as 2023 are able to get fairly that excessive.

Together with his steep arm angle, cutterish four-seamer, and abundance of seam-shifted wake, Grey is an interesting pitcher. This text is simply conjecture as a result of it’s enjoyable to consider what he may tweak. It’s what I is likely to be speaking about if I’d simply signed him, however I’ve no method of realizing know what the Crimson Sox are considering. I haven’t even talked about Grey’s changeup, as a result of it’s not that a lot of an element proper now, however it would possibly make sense to have him attempt some form of variation on the conventional circle change grip he makes use of now. I’ll be watching intently when he lastly pitches in entrance of Statcast cameras subsequent spring.