Crochet hits the gas in White Sox debut
When Garrett Crochet was drafted by the White Sox with the No. 11 overall pick just over three months ago, he immediately drew comparisons to Chris Sale.
That drew some expected snickers, considering Sale was one of baseball's top pitchers with the Sox and Boston from 2011-18 before being slowed by injuries and having Tommy John surgery in April.
Crochet (CROW-shay), limited to 3⅔ scoreless innings at Tennessee this spring before COVID-19 hit, was asked about the comp. He gave a wise answer.
"I definitely see those, but it's tough to make on me as I haven't achieved anything close to what Chris has achieved," Crochet said. "But it's nice to see. Actually, when I was developing a slider I tried to shape it the same way Chris does."
A 6-foot-6, 220-pound left-hander, Crochet joined the Sox in Cincinnati Friday night and made his major-league debut in a 7-1 loss to the Reds.
He's bigger than Sale, a 6-6, 185-pound lefty, and Crochet flashed a really big fastball - hitting 101 mph twice and four more at 100 mph - in 1 scoreless inning of relief against Cincinnati.
"It was awesome," Crochet said. "My body felt weightless. I felt like I was on top of the world and just truly living the dream. I was able to get the first two guys out and I was pretty confident going into the third guy. Got ahead and was able to get him out. I felt pretty good, just knowing I could go out there and get outs at the big-league level."
Working the sixth inning, the 21-year-old Crochet struck out Brian Goodwin and Jose Garcia before getting Tucker Barnhart on a groundout.
While he is still projected to be a starting pitcher for the Sox, Crochet is launching his career out of the bullpen and already looks like a weapon for the playoffs.
"It's pretty hard to put into words," Crochet said. "Something I didn't necessarily foresee for myself a year ago today. But it's something that's been kind of building up and it's something I was looking forward to. Just glad I was able to get out there today.
"It's an incredible feeling knowing they value me to be here and help them on that run and just knowing that I was coming into the group of guys that were meshing well and were playing good baseball, I knew I had to just come in and fall in line and that I was going to have a good group of leadership guys to lead me."
Crochet takes Evan Marshall's roster spot. The Sox put Marshall (shoulder inflammation) on the 10-day injured list earlier on Friday.
Tough night:
In his second major-league start for the Sox Friday night, Jonathan Stiever allowed 6 runs in 2⅔ innings and gave up 4 homers, including Jesse Winker's 3-run shot in the third.
"I felt pretty good with my stuff, it was just a matter of leaving too many pitches over the plate," Stiever said. "Not finding sort of that rhythm to keep them off-balanced. They got good swings on pretty much anything I was throwing. The slider, that was a pitch that was really just causing me trouble."