Red Sox release veteran left-hander

The Red Sox announced that left-hander Richard Bleier, who was designated for assignment on Monday, has been released.

Bleier, 36, came over to the Sox in the offseason deal that sent Matt Barnes to the Marlins. That transaction hasn’t worked out especially well for either side, as Barnes allowed 5.48 earned runs per nine innings before undergoing hip surgery in July that he seems unlikely to return from this season. Bleier, meanwhile, made 27 appearances for Boston this year with a 5.28 ERA and has now been cut from the roster.

The southpaw had signed a contract extension while with the Marlins prior to the 2022 season, a pact that followed his 2.95 ERA over 68 appearances the year prior. The two-year, $6M deal covered 2022, which was supposed to be his final arbitration season, as well as 2023 and came with a club option for 2024. He was paid $2.25M last year, is earning $3.5M this year with the 2024 option valued at $3.75M with a $250K buyout.

Bleier went on to have a solid 3.55 ERA last year before this year’s disappointing results. There’s still over $1M left to be paid out on that deal, as well as the buyout on the option. The combination of that money and his struggles this year meant that no club was going to claim him on waivers and take on that contract. But he has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment while retaining the money, so the Sox have simply skipped the formalities and sent him to the open market. They will still be on the hook for the remainder of the contract.

He’ll now be free to sign with any club, who would only be responsible for paying him the prorated league minimum, with that amount subtracted from what the Sox pay. Despite his 2023 numbers, he will likely still garner interest. He had a 3.09 ERA over 144 appearances in the 2020-2022 period and his peripherals this year aren’t drastically different. His 55.2% ground ball rate in this season is shy of his 60.5% rate in the previous three years, but not by much. His 3.8% walk rate is right in line with the 3.9% mark from the preceding seasons. His 12.1% strikeout rate is certainly low, but even in the more successful 2020-2022 period he was only at 16.9%.

Bleier’s inflated ERA this year is likely due to a couple of factors. His 65.8% strand rate is shy of his own career rate and league average, pushing some more runs across. On a related note, his 17.9% rate of fly balls leaving the yard is a career high. He has a 4.25 SIERA on the year that’s over a full run better than his ERA and closer to his career marks.

Now that the trade deadline has passed, teams have few options for adding talent and depth to their systems. Since Bleier has a track record of success and comes with virtually no financial cost, he’s likely to latch on somewhere.