Red Sox

The Red Sox are still in search of a starter despite their recent blockbuster move for Garrett Crochet.

Chief Baseball Officer Craig Breslow said after the trade that Boston will “continue to aggressively look for ways to improve the team,” whether by adding a starter and/or a right-handed hitter.

is Ken Rosenthal He listed several weapons he believes the Red Sox are involved with. The insider reconfirmed that the club has “inquired” about trading Luis Castillo from the Seattle Mariners and said they “can't rule out” opting free of charge agent Jack Flaherty.

Boston has long been linked to several Mariners starters in potential trade scenarios Sept. 13, when Rosenthal swam the concept that the Red Sox could trade first baseman Triston Casas to Seattle in exchange for pitching. This winter, the thought was changed into legitimate reporting by Rosenthal, amongst others.

Last weekend, Alex Speier of , reported that a Casas trade wasn't only a random thought. Speier said Boston was “open” to trading Casas for weapons, but didn’t specifically mention the Mariners in his story.

“An executive at an American League club said the Sox offered Casas as a headliner in talks for one of that team's arms and excluded Wilyer Abreu and the elite group of candidates (Roman Anthony, Kristian Campbell, Marcelo Mayer) from the proposal,” said Speier.

Regardless of whether Casas stays in Boston in 2025 or not, it is obvious that the organization isn’t giving up on refining its rotation. Castillo appears to stay a viable trade option for them as someone who’s a longtime and sturdy arm. The 32-year-old right-hander owns a profession ERA of three.56 and hit 3.64 in 2024 with 175 strikeouts in 175 ⅓ innings.

Castillo has played fewer than 25 games only twice in his profession: in his rookie season in 2017 and within the COVID-shortened 2020 season. He only had an ERA greater than 4.00 once (2018) and his opponents had in his MLB -Career batting average above .250 once (.255 in 2021).

If the Red Sox actually wish to strengthen their rotation, adding Castillo would do exactly that.

As for Flaherty, Rosenthal also noted that the Red Sox were thinking about signing him when he was a free agent last winter. Flaherty ended up signing a one-year cope with the Detroit Tigers. He was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers on the trade deadline last season.

The 29-year-old right-hander hasn't performed at the extent he did in 2019, when he finished fourth in National League Cy Young Award voting. However, Flaherty had one in all the higher seasons of his profession in 2024. He had a 3.17 ERA in 28 starts and struck out nearly 200 batters (194). Flaherty also had 10.8 strikeouts per nine innings and held his home runs allowed per nine to 1.3.

With top free agent starters like Blake Snell and Max Fried not on the roster, Flaherty's stock will likely rise as the remainder of the league looks for weapons. Boston is He is reportedly hesitant about signing Corbin Burnes. Therefore, an arm like Flaherty might make more sense for the club in the event that they don't wish to sign larger contracts.

Look, I understand how these people feel. Here, a handful of writers were chosen to wax poetic in regards to the superstars who made this yr's All-Star team. And the remaining of us were ignored, our rightful place on the list blatantly neglected as a consequence of a weird, overly complicated selection process.

We are those who’re being rejected. And we’re all on this together.

So here is our All-Star team, which not only consists of players of all sizes, but additionally features probably the most worthy players at each position whose names weren’t called on Sunday night and who – at the very least to this point – weren’t chosen for the Midsummer Classic.

Catcher

Patrick Bailey, San Francisco Giants

Neither league has a 3rd catcher this season (and you possibly can argue pretty easily that every league picked the correct two players behind the plate), but Bailey would have been a worthy addition (the league as an alternative selected outfielder Heliot Ramos and ace Logan Webb to represent the Giants). Throwing and framing metrics show Bailey as among the finest defensive catchers in baseball, and wRC+ mainly puts him on par with Salvador Perez on offense. Bailey only debuted last yr. He'll make an All-Star team sooner or later.

First Base

Christian Walker, Arizona Diamondbacks

A word of recommendation for anyone seeking to make an All-Star team: Try to not play in the identical league and at the identical position as Bryce Harper and Freddie Freeman. Those two were voted to an All-Star team for the eighth time this season. Walker has yet to make one. He has the third-most home runs within the NL (behind All-Star DHs Shohei Ohtani and Marcell Ozuna) and ranks Tenth within the NL in wRC+ (but still behind Harper and Freeman). Walker could still make the team if Harper's hamstring strain keeps him out of the All-Star game, however the Phillies appear to expect Harper to return this week.

Second Base

Brice Turang, Milwaukee Brewers

WAR isn't an ideal measure, but it surely's a useful shorthand for a player's overall impact. According to Baseball Reference's version of WAR, Turang is the fourth-best player in your complete National League. The FanGraphs version isn't quite as optimistic, but it surely still has him ranked twentieth within the NL, which is 30 spots higher — and greater than 1.5 WAR higher — than the NL's backup second baseman, Luis Arraez. While Turang doesn't have Arraez's batting average, he has more power, more stolen bases, and much better defensive stats. However, players have chosen Arraez.

Shortstop

Francisco Lindor, New York Mets

Had Philadelphia Phillies shortstop Trea Turner (who was out for an prolonged period as a consequence of injury) not been voted the NL starter, there may need been room for Lindor, who ranks seventh within the league in fWAR. But Elly De La Cruz of the Cincinnati Reds (replacing the injured Mookie Betts) was voted by the players and the league selected CJ Abrams because the Washington Nationals' lone representative, leaving no room for Lindor or Willy Adames of the Milwaukee Brewers. A complete of 40 players have at the very least 2.5 fWAR to this point this season, and nine of them are shortstops (11 if you happen to count the versatile Willi Castro of the Minnesota Twins and Josh Smith of the Texas Rangers). Shortstop withdrawals were inevitable, even with seven chosen from the 2 rosters.

Third Base

Jordan Westburg, Baltimore Orioles

Five third basemen are in the highest 18 in American League fWAR, and there just wasn't enough room on the roster for all of them. The fans voted for José Ramírez, the players voted for Rafael Devers, and the league selected Isaac Paredes to represent the Tampa Bay Rays. Westburg was the underdog. He may need made it if he had been listed as a second baseman – he played a few third of his games at second base – but Westburg, Paredes, and Smith have pretty similar numbers, and there just wasn't enough room for all of them.

Outfield

Willy Castro, Minnesota Twins
Colton Cowser, Baltimore Orioles
Brandon Nimmo, New York Mets

Castro doesn't exactly fit an All-Star ballot. He's played at the very least 20 games at five different positions — second base, third base, shortstop, center field, left field — and sometimes played multiple positions in a single game. Despite all that movement, he posted a wRC+ of 130 and the sixth-highest fWAR of any qualified outfielder in either league. Still, he didn't make the AL team. Neither did Orioles rookie Cowser (or teammate Anthony Santander) or quite a lot of other outstanding defensive players (most notably Daulton Varsho of the Toronto Blue Jays). The NL outfield was a bit more open, but Nimmo had at the very least pretty much as good a likelihood as any outfielder on the NL bench.

Designated hitter

Brent Rooker, Oakland A's

David Fry is considered one of the primary half's most surprising stars. He's made double-digit starts at catcher, left field and designated hitter — with a handful of innings at first base, third base and right field — and he's helped the Guardians stay in first place with the Tenth-best wRC+ amongst players with at the very least 200 plate appearances. Rooker, nevertheless, has similar offensive stats (155 OPS+ to Fry's 161) while having nearly 100 more plate appearances and hitting greater than twice as many home runs (18 vs. 8).

Launcher

Ronel Blanco, Houston Astros
Jack Flaherty, Detroit Tigers
Luis Gil, New York Yankees
George Kirby, Seattle Mariners
Christopher Sanchez, Philadelphia Phillies

If you last checked three weeks ago, you may have thought Gil was a sure-fire candidate for the AL team. In mid-June, he had a 2.03 ERA after 14 starts and appeared like a worthy substitute for the injured Gerrit Cole at the highest of the Yankees' rotation. But Gil's final three starts — before a Sunday night game against the Red Sox — ended with three straight losses and a 14.90 ERA, pushing his season ERA right down to 3.41, Fifteenth-best within the AL. Four starters with an ERA under 3.00 didn't make either team (Blanco, Sánchez, Brady Singer of the Kansas City Royals and Jake Irvin of the Nationals). The same goes for the key league leader in strikeout-to-walk ratio (Kirby) and the leader in xFIP (Flaherty), who also has the third-best strikeout rate and fourth-best expected ERA. However, it's inevitable that some select starters will opt out, which suggests a number of the initial losers will find yourself making it, too.

Relief launcher

Trevor Megill, Milwaukee Brewers

The first-place Brewers added two players to the NL starting lineup, but none to the bench (three of their infielders would have merited consideration) and none within the bullpen (they’ve the fourth-best bullpen ERA in the key leagues). Closer Megill and setup man Bryan Hudson rank fifth and sixth in Win Probability Added, and either of them would have been a legitimate addition, however the NL Players' Ballot chosen two non-closers (Matt Strahm and the Philadelphia Phillies' Jeff Hoffman), forcing the league to make use of five of its six at-large spots to search out individual representatives from the Mets (Pete Alonso), Nationals (Abrams), St. Louis Cardinals (Ryan Helsley), Chicago Cubs (Shota Imanaga) and Miami Marlins (Tanner Scott). The only real at-large selection within the NL went to Webb.

There are three words tattooed in capital letters on Luis Gil's throat, and so they are as loud because the screams he lets out after an enormous strikeout.

“GOD BLESS ME.”

For Gil, the New York Yankees' rookie prodigy, it's a public message in an unusual place and with personal (and blunt) meaning.

For opposing hitters, it's the final thing they see before he delivers the wild fastballs that put him on the short list of possible starters for the American League on this 12 months's All-Star Game.

Gil, who faces the Baltimore Orioles at Yankee Stadium on Thursday afternoon, has a 9-1 record in 14 starts this season.

The 26-year-old also leads the AL with a 2.03 ERA and a .142 batting average. His 96 strikeouts are sixth-most.

He does this with a heater that averages 96.8 mph — sixth-fastest in MLB, based on MLB Statcast — a changeup that hits just below 90 mph and a slider. This got here after he was surprisingly named to the rotation to switch injured leadoff hitter Gerrit Cole in spring training.

“It starts with the fastball,” manager Aaron Boone said. “He's top-notch. He's special. He can be relied upon. … To see him strive to get better and learn from everything he's been through, build a really solid routine — that's what's really satisfying about Luis.”

And while his biggest concern is keeping the Yankees in first place within the AL East, his Christian faith will remain his predominant motivator.

Luis Gil neck tattoo pic.twitter.com/J8auyC6cuL

— Eddie Garcia (@Eddieonfox) May 30, 2024

The idea behind the tattoo is easy.

“It's just a message to God to protect me,” he said last week through a translator in Kansas City.

He wanted it somewhere where it could be seen.

“It’s a reminder to ask for protection,” he said.

How he got there wasn't that easy.

Gil said that in his childhood within the Dominican Republic, he all the time felt like there was a greater power in his life.

“I've been in some really good situations. … For as long as I can remember, I've been able to see things unfolding around me,” he said.

He didn't turn into deeply religious until he was 15 or 16. That was after he signed with the Minnesota Twins. The $90,000 bonus he received wasn't a life-changing amount, especially in comparison with the seven-figure contracts other teenagers from the Dominican Republic were signing on the time.

But the prospect to possibly someday pitch in the most important leagues? That felt like a blessing.

“From that moment on,” he said, “my strong faith developed.”

He described religion as “a good way to anchor myself in something that could help me in my career and to make me aware of the opportunity that was coming my way, something that would help me along the way.” He added that he prays as soon as he wakes up and just before he goes to sleep.

The tattoo wasn't Gil's first, though. His arms and the side of his neck are covered in coloured ink, a few of that are religious symbols. He had a lot of them when he made his MLB debut on August 3, 2021.

But Gil added the neck art within the winter. Yes, it was painful.

“But it happened quickly,” he said.

He had just undergone shoulder surgery when he was traded to the Yankees in exchange for outfielder Jake Cave at age 19. In 2022, Gil needed to undergo Tommy John surgery, which kept him out of motion for the remainder of the 12 months and most of 2023. He knew that in 2024 he might get a likelihood to ascertain himself within the Bronx.

With the tattoo he wanted to specific much more clearly what he felt in his heart.

“It’s a way of being grateful,” he said.

His teammates like it.

Starting pitcher Marcus Stroman has more tattoos than Gil. He is roofed with them from his legs to his neck to the back of his head.

“I love someone who has the confidence to get a neck tattoo,” Stroman said. “I think a lot of people in society think, 'Oh, a neck tattoo, you can't get a neck tattoo.' But I think that speaks to a person's confidence because in American society, it's always so frowned upon, I guess.

“I had these ideas too. But once you’re feeling comfortable and assured about who you might be as an individual, I'll get my whole body tattooed. It doesn't change anything except the opinions from outside.”

Left fielder Alex Verdugo is also tattooed, but he has a limit: he does not allow tattoos on his hands, neck or face.

“My mom doesn't really like tattoos,” he said. “She's already mad enough concerning the small tattoos I actually have. … It takes a variety of confidence to get one in your neck. I've avoided that spot, however it works for him, right? I like it. Maybe I'll get one on my neck, too.”

Rookie catcher Austin Wells remembered what he thought when he first saw Gil's neck tattoo.

“Probably somewhat shocked,” he said. “But I believe it's working for him.”

Wells said he did something similar to Gil. When Wells suffered a fractured rib in spring training in 2022, he was banned from practicing for weeks. He used the downtime to add to his tattoo collection, getting a Chi Rho – a Catholic marking symbolizing the Holy Trinity – inked on the inside of his forearm.

On Wednesday, the excitement surrounding Gil's tattoo reached new heights. Several Yankees players wore the same navy blue shirt as they walked around the clubhouse and during pregame practice.

The writing on her chest?

“GOD BLESS ME.”