With good reason, Garrett Crochet’s outing against the Pirates on Friday night was a very short one. Crochet handled just the first two innings of the 4-1 loss, but those six outs were enough to showcase some of the reason why he’s been the breakout pitcher in the American League this year and why he’s headed to Arlington for next week’s All Star game. Crochet was perfect, notching six outs on four strikeouts and two ground balls.
Through his first 20 starts this season, Crochet leads both leagues with 150 strikeouts – hitting that mark after the second inning Friday – and his 0.95 WHIP is good for fifth overall. The American League starter for the All Star game has not been announced yet, but Crochet has a strong case.
“If I was a fan, I’m circling the date that Crochet pitches,” manager Pedro Grifol said. “You are going to see something you don’t see that often. Big left-handed pitcher, throwing 97 or 98 mph, pounding the strike zone and competing his ass off.
“Remember this is a guy who everybody thought was going to be in the bullpen somewhere. A really good bullpen piece and now he’s one of the best pitchers in baseball. So, it’s been a remarkable first half.”
All the more remarkable because of the change in Crochet’s role. Lots of pitchers move from the rotation to the bullpen, but doing the reverse with very limited professional experience is a challenge. And doing that while emerging as one of the most dominant pitchers in baseball is even more impressive.
“He just stepped right up and jumped in feet first, being a reliever for his whole career and now just being an absolutely dominant starter, everything’s new to him,” Paul DeJong told CHGO. “I think he’s growing into his own, and I think he has electric stuff and he competes really hard out there, and that’s exactly what you want from a guy like that.”
Crochet’s first half performance has caught attention around the league, too. Pirates rookie sensation Paul Skenes, just named the National League starter for the All Star game, is among those who have taken notice of Crochet’s performance.
“He’s unlike any other pitcher I’ve ever seen in terms of how he moves,” Skenes said. “I don’t know a whole about his repertoire or anything like that, but I know how his body moves and it’s kind of what I pay attention to. It’s interesting. It’s really fun to watch, to watch him do it every outing for six or seven innings and punch out the guys he’s doing with the ERA all that. The stats speak for themselves but the way his body moves and the limited exposure I’ve gotten to watching him pitch, it’s fun to watch.”
Crochet himself hasn’t given a lot of thought to the All-Star game yet. He said he hasn’t thought much yet about when or whether or not he’ll pitch on Tuesday night. Instead, Crochet said his focus has been on preserving the good health that has helped make his first half performance possible. At 107 ⅓ innings, he has nearly doubled his previous season high.
Managing Crochet’s innings load has been a developing plan since spring training, but Grifol said that Friday’s short outing was pre-planned and that in the second half they would stick to starting Crochet on the five-day routine but limit his pitches thrown. This was the plan Crochet preferred over skipping starts.
“If workload management became a thing, would it be skipping a start or would it be kind of staying on routine and shortening starts, and that was what I voted for,” Crochet said. “Just a five day routine and being able to stay on that and get through the year healthy, that’s the goal.”
Grifol stressed the importance of allowing Crochet to experience making a full season’s worth of starts this year, even if his innings load drops significantly in the second half.
“It’s important for him to feel what 32 starts feels like,” Grifol said. “Obviously not six, seven innings. We’ll make those necessary adjustments. There’s something to be said to that, something to be said to taking the ball every five to six days and feeling it. Even if you’re not going deep in games, if you’re going two, three innings. That’s important.”
The 20 starts Crochet has made thus far are the first 20 of his career. And because of injuries – most notably needing Tommy John surgery that cost him the 2022 season and limited him to 12 ⅔ innings last year – staying healthy has been as important as pitching well.
Crochet could factor into the Sox’ long term plans, so managing his workload in a lost season is about protecting his arm for years when the team is winning. But looming over any Crochet-related proceedings this month is the possibility that he will be traded by the July 30 deadline. He’s under team control through 2026, so moving him would signal that the White Sox front office does not really expect the team to compete in the next two seasons. But any team trading for Crochet would need to put together an impressive offer, and because of the innings limit he’s under, getting him isn’t a move for 2024 but rather with a look to the future, which further complicates any negotiations.
But roughly two and a half weeks before that deadline, Crochet is still in Chicago. And in a few days, he will likely take the mound at some point in the 2024 All Star game. Whether or not he’s the starter, Crochet has been one of the American League’s best pitchers in the first half.
“I think he deserves it,” DeJong said of his teammate starting the All Star game. “I think he’s proved to the league how dominant he can be, and I would love to see him on that stage.”
