Red Sox Face Tough Decision For Athletics Series With Playoffs On The Line

With 12 games to go before the playoffs, the Boston Red Sox have a decision to make that could determine their entire season.

Thanks to a well-timed pair of off-days on Thursday and Monday, the Red Sox have had the chance to reset their pitching staff a bit over the past week. But how deep does that reset run?

Manager Alex Cora has yet to announce how the rotation will function for this week's matchups with the Athletics and Tampa Bay Rays. How he and the Red Sox's pitching braintrust decide to handle those matchups will have massive consequences.

Who pitches for the Red Sox this week?

In a normal situation, the Red Sox would throw their No. 4 and No. 5 starters on Tuesday and Wednesday against the Athletics, then follow with Lucas Giolito on his normal turn through the rotation on Thursday. That would leave Brayan Bello and Garrett Crochet to pitch Friday and Saturday against the Rays.

However, those No. 4 and 5 spots are by no means easy to navigate for Boston between now and the postseason. Thanks to injuries and the release of Walker Buehler, the only other options to start those games are three left-handers who were all called up from Triple-A since Aug. 29: Connelly Early, Kyle Harrison, and Payton Tolle.

Early seems like the obvious favorite to start Tuesday, after blanking the A's in his last start for five innings and racking up 11 strikeouts. He's on a full week's rest, while Tolle and Harrison both pitched on Wednesday in the A's series finale.

So here's the big decision: does Cora roll with another rookie or committee of rookies on Wednesday for game two of the A's rematch? Or does he bring Giolito back on four days' rest, which every pitcher does at least a handful of times throughout the course of the season, with Bello and Crochet to follow on Thursday and Friday?

On the surface, it seems wise to throw your best starters whenever possible, and without the Giolito/Bello/Crochet trio, the Red Sox wouldn't be sniffing the playoffs. Plus, if Crochet were to start this Friday, he could go again next Thursday in Toronto and be ready for Game 1 of a Wild Card Series on Tuesday, Sept. 30.

However, Crochet has been much more effective on five days' rest this season than four, and he's already 45 1/3 innings over his previous career-high.

Boston (82-68) leads the Texas Rangers, the first team outside the American League playoff picture, by just three games heading into the final two weeks of the season. Plus, the Rangers hold the tiebreaker, meaning the Red Sox's magic number to clinch a playoff spot is 10.

Every win counts from this point forward. The educated guess is that the Red Sox bring back all three starters on four days' rest, but until Cora makes an announcement, we'll be anxiously awaiting an answer.

UPDATE: The Red Sox have announced Early, Giolito, and Bello as the three starters for the A's series, according to MassLive's Chris Cotillo.

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