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This story is from Ian Browne’s Red Sox Beat newsletter. Click here to read the full newsletter. And subscribe to receive it regularly in your inbox.
Among the most revealing things Red Sox president of baseball operations Craig Breslow said at this week’s General Managers Meetings in Las Vegas is that he will take a comprehensive look at the team’s medical staff and its practices this season.
When Crochet went on the injured list in late April with left shoulder inflammation, there was a feeling he would miss a few starts and return in short order. He didn’t pitch again until Game 2 of the Wild Card Series, the night the Red Sox were eliminated at Yankee Stadium.
When Anthony suffered a right hand/wrist injury in Detroit on May 4, the left-handed hitter said he felt he would return a few days later as soon as his 10-day stint in IL ended. He did not play again until August 31, when a recurrence of the injury in Game 1 of the playoffs forced him off the roster.
“I think the way I approach any audit or inventory that we do here is to think about what the best-in-class employee type looks like, right? What does the best medical department and process look like, and then figure out where we are and figure out how to close the gap between the two,” he said.
“And so when we think about it, having experienced practitioners, you know, the actual hands on our players is the best we can find. It’s making sure that when players are injured, we’re making the right diagnosis. There’s a really close relationship between the medical staff and the players, the medical staff and the coaches, the medical staff and the front office, so that every front office and every entity in the front office fully understands the way things are.
“There are definitely things we can do better and we will look at all of those. So it will be a comprehensive review and then we will figure out where we go from there.”
Breslow was content to say that the Red Sox were regressing in 26 due to medical issues.
“Yeah, it’s probably unfair, it’s early for me to say we’re taking a step back. I feel comfortable that there have been some really difficult situations this year and maybe an opportunity to look at how we handled it,” Breslow said. “Whether it’s Garrett and he’s talking about feeling like he just had to miss a start or two. And then it was totally our understanding, including a conversation that required us to convince Garrett that this was the right thing to do, just skip a start and go into IL, and then when you start peeling back the layers here, you realize it’s a little more complicated.
“Or Roman [also]huh? So I think those situations gave us concrete examples of where we could do better, and I think that was the driver for that. [upcoming review].”
Breslow does not consider calling an independent auditor.
“Yes, it will be internally managed,” Breslow said. “I don’t think we’re going to reinvent how we do things here. I think it’s just looking at the process, being able to kind of go from wing to wing, from injury to getting a player back on the field. How we handled it, talk to the players, get feedback from them in terms of communication. Talk to all the people involved in the rehab process, then I think. What should it look like when you’re working at a really high level?'”