Joe Kelly, Next Out the Red Sox ‘Pen?

Boston Red Sox RHP Joe Kelly was optioned to Triple-A Pawtucket after a June 1st massacre against the Baltimore Orioles; now, he’s back and throwing 101 MPH.

Kelly, the Red Sox 28-year old right-hander, only lasted 2.1 innings allowing seven earned runs on seven hits and raised his ERA up to a jaw-dropping 8.46. Since then he has thrown good innings down in Pawtucket, and was asked by the Red Sox staff if he would come out of the bullpen.

Kelly made his first appearance for the Red Sox since June 1st and it came out of the bullpen after a good outing by newly acquired Drew Pomeranz, which still resulted in a 4-2 loss against the Detroit Tigers.

“Right now we obviously need another arm in the bullpen and it’s something that [we] might need another guy at the back-end of the bullpen eventually with our guys getting hurt,” Kelly said before Sunday’s 8-7 win at Fenway Park. “And right now if I could fill that role and I could have some success in it, I mean it’s going to be great for all of us.”

Monday night had its positives and negatives for Kelly, he allowed one run on two hits in just one inning. The good part was how he was filling up the zone with his velocity, hitting 100-101 mph on his fastball at times. The bad part was every pitch was pretty straight forward with no tail or movement, which in the Major Leagues hitters will get you where the sun don’t shine if you pitch like that on a consecutive basis.

You see guys like Yankees RHP Dellin Betances and Cubs newly acquired LHP Aroldis Chapman locate their fastball in a place where you can’t get hurt (low), or the fact that Chapman can burn away any hitter in the league with his 105 mph fastball. In Kelly’s first appearance out of the pen he learned the hard way with hard hits from Tigers OF Justin Upton (Triple) and C James McCann (Single) that resulted in an insurance run in the Tigers victory.

Already without Craig Kimbrel and Koji Uehara, the Sox need someone who can really step up in the bullpen, a few names come to mind in RHP Junici Tazawa and newly acquired RHP Brad Ziegler. Kelly who wishes to be in the conversation did not pitch in Sunday’s game, Starter Rick Porcello won his 13th game, but he needed three relievers to get it.

Bottom-line is this team will need a bullpen to close out games as the season continues on and hopefully Kelly can come out of his shell and aid the needs. The July 31st MLB Trade Deadline is quickly approaching, and with all these moves I still think they need more pitching. Everyone is saying how good the Red Sox are playing yet they are still 2 1/2 games behind the Baltimore Orioles in the American East.

This team has without a doubt the best 1 through 9 in terms of offense in baseball, and one of the top defenses as well. If these pitching woes continue to happen, say goodbye to October baseball because it won’t happen this offense can’t carry the team all season (although it has this far).

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