Sonny Gray didn’t want to come out of the game, and now nobody knows if he’s coming back to Boston. The 36-year-old right-hander was pulled with two outs in the fifth inning of the Red Sox’s season-ending 9-2 loss to the Yankees, and he made his frustration clear afterward, as ClutchPoints reported.
“I think I’m the best pitcher in the American League going through the order the third time. I think that’s a fact,” Gray said, per MLB.com. “I would have liked to live or die with me in that moment.”
The Hook
Per ClutchPoints, Gray had thrown 70 pitches over 4 2/3 innings with one earned run and five strikeouts when manager Chad Tracy went to the bullpen. Tracy explained that when your team is “struggling to score runs and you’re already trailing, you feel like you’ve got to be aggressive and go.”
It didn’t work. New York outscored Boston 18-2 in the two-game sweep (Max Fried got his flowers for that one).
The IAHHM Take
Gray backed up the talk this season. ClutchPoints has him at a 2.72 ERA over 169 innings, which is ace work at any age. Now he’s a free agent with a reported $30 million mutual option for 2027, and when asked if he’d return, he said, “I don’t know.” He also said step one is “to not make any rash decisions,” with retirement on the table.
Teammate Garrett Crochet put it best, telling reporters there’s “something to be said about going out on your own terms.” Losing Gray would leave a real hole in Boston’s rotation, especially in an AL East this tough.
Was Tracy right to play it aggressive, or should Boston have let its best arm ride? And does Sonny run it back or walk away?
Source: ClutchPoints | Additional reporting: MLB.com, NBC New York
