Crochet has a playoff message for Red Sox fans amid troubling start

Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Garrett Crochet. Jesse Johnson-Imagn Images

Garrett Crochet has a playoff message for Red Sox fans amid troubling start

By Daniel Morrison | Last updated Apr 20, 2026 2:20 PM ET

It's only April, but the sky is falling for the Boston Red Sox. They're in the lower levels of the AL East standings. Worse than that, ace pitcher Garrett Crochet suffered his second blowup start in a row on Sunday.

Against the Detroit Tigers, Crochet threw 5.0 innings, giving up five earned runs in the process. It was a marked improvement from his 1.2 innings and 10-earned-run effort in his last start, against the Minnesota Twins, but it also wasn't the kind of bounce back that would inspire confidence.

The problem for the Red Sox is that Crochet isn't alone. Pitching was supposed to be the strength of this team, but they're just 21st in all of baseball in team ERA entering Monday, at 4.35 as a unit. Boston is combining that with an offense that is tied for worst in baseball, with just 13 home runs, and is 20th in batting average.

Nothing is going right, and a team that had playoff hopes feels like it's on the ropes in April.

Garrett Crochet has a message for fans with October on their minds

The standard in New England is that the Red Sox make the postseason. Crochet knows that, and he wanted to make something clear to Red Sox fans: That's still very much on the table.

"You can't be out of the playoffs in April," Crochet said after Sunday's loss. "There's still a lot of time for us to start playing our best baseball. If we were doing it right now, that really wouldn't matter a whole lot either."

At a very practical level, Crochet is right. Nobody has come out of the gates firing in the AL East. At 13-9, the New York Yankees lead the division. That's with an upcoming three-game series against one another, a series against the Baltimore Orioles and a series against the Toronto Blue Jays that could completely flip the division if all goes well.

On the other hand, that run of games could begin to make the playoffs look impossible. Even in a marathon season like MLB offers, it's hard to come back from a massive hole where you're chasing the entire division.

To get there, the Red Sox need Crochet at his best every fifth day. A year ago, that meant pitching to a 2.59 ERA and 11.2 strikeouts per nine innings.

"It sucks that I feel like I am moving in the right direction, and I also happened to lose the game for us," Crochet added on Sunday.

Perhaps, Crochet is right, he is moving in the right direction and the Red Sox offense and the pitchers around him will follow that direction. For now, it's been a struggle to imagine playoff baseball in 2026 for Boston.

Daniel Morrison

Dan Morrison is a writer originally from Massachusetts, now residing in Florida. He spent four years at On3, working on the National News Desk there. Prior to that, he’s also contributed at Underdog Dynasty.

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