The Anatomy of An Inning: Can Cooper Criswell Stick in the Rotation or Do the Sox Need to Trade For an Arm?

Welcome back to another edition of The Anatomy of An Inning. My name is Jacob Roy, and I pretend to know pitching better than the pitchers themselves. If you’re new here or need a reminder of what this is all about, I take an inning from the previous week of Red Sox baseball and break it down, one pitch at a time. Each pitch should have a purpose, I’m looking at each individually to try to go beyond the box score and tell the full story.

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The fifth spot in the Red Sox rotation has been a revolving door this season. Brayan Bello, Tanner Houck, Kutter Crawford, and Nick Pivetta have all been fixtures in the rotation aside from a few stints on the injured list, while the fifth spot has consistently read “TBD”. Garrett Whitlock once held the spot before going down with an injury. More recently, Josh Winckowski laid claim to the spot. After a bad outing against the Yankees, the spot once again appeared to be up for grabs. The name I saw pop up most often on Twitter was Cooper Criswell.

Criswell began the season strong, posting a 1.40 ERA over his first four starts. His next seven starts didn’t live up to that high bar: a 5.74 ERA in 31 innings. Still, fans seemed to want Criswell back in the rotation as they remembered his early outings, and on Friday night against the Kansas City Royals, they got their wish. Let’s dive into the outing and see what Criswell had going for him on Friday.

1st Inning - AB #1: Adam Frazier

Adam Frazier isn’t Aaron Judge, but he hits leadoff on a good team for a reason. He doesn’t expand the zone and puts the ball in play. The little power he has is to the pull side, typically on pitches up in the zone.

Criswell begins the outing with a sinker on the outer edge for called strike one. Frazier is likely looking middle-in on the first pitch of the at-bat, so even at 90 MPH, this plays.

Here’s a changeup at 0-1 that nicks the inside corner for called strike two. Criswell wants this one down and away but is a little late on the release and yanks it inside. With two strikes, I don’t want to give Frazier something good to hit. I would either try to execute the changeup away a second time or surprise Frazier with a cutter upstairs.

It’s another changeup, but it’s again skipped in. Criswell probably has to shelf this for now after two straight misses.

He goes back to the change a third time and it’s the best one yet, but Frazier fouls it off. Every pitch Frazier has seen so far has broken to the arm side. With two strikes, I’d go to something moving in the other direction. Personally, I would go with the cutter, but he could also try to throw a sweeper to the back foot.

It is the cutter, but it’s non-competitive for ball two.

Yuck. Criswell tries to throw my least favorite pitch in baseball — the back door, super slow sweeper with two strikes — and it’s hit into center field for a base hit. When you’re throwing this backdoor sweeper, you’re hoping the hitter thinks it’s breaking away from him and he watches it come back into the strike zone for called strike three. Frazier had already fouled off Criswell’s best changeup of the at-bat and looked comfortable in the box. Going into Friday night, Criswell had thrown the backdoor sweeper 46 times to lefties this season and returned just one whiff and seven called strikes. In two-strike counts, he’s generated one whiff and one called strike in 18 attempts. Stop this madness, for my sanity.

1st Inning - AB #2: Bobby Witt Jr.

I don’t know how much good a scouting report on Bobby Witt Jr. will do me. He rakes, plain and simple. A quick look at how he’s been pitched shows most pitchers attacking him away because he’s crushed anything on the inner half.

Here’s a sweeper that should be strike one, but Criswell misses his spot and Wong has to reach for it causing the umpire to call this one a ball.

Criswell follows it up with a sinker inside that Witt fouls off. Generally, I like these sinkers inside to same-handed hitters as they tend to generate ground balls. With Witt’s ability to hit balls on the inner half and Criswell’s lack of velocity, I’d be careful going back to this one.

At 1-1, the righty leaves a changeup over the plate and Witt grounds it into left field for a base hit. This is a mistake, and Criswell is fortunate it’s not punished even more than it was.

1st Inning - AB #3: Vinnie Pasquantino

Two on, nobody out. A groundout or strikeout would go a long way towards minimizing the damage here.

Sweeper. Way outside for ball one.

Changeup. Always way outside for ball two.

Ah, baseball. You really can’t put this on the pitcher. While Criswell does miss his spot, Pasquantino doesn’t exactly crush the ball. It’s a little roller that nobody can make a play on, and all of a sudden the bases are loaded. That’s just the way it goes sometimes.

1st Inning - AB #4: Salvador Perez

Bases loaded, nobody out. At this point, the inning is about minimizing damage. Ground balls and strikeouts are your friends.

Criswell starts Perez off with a sweeper on the outer half for strike one — free real estate.

At 0-1, Criswell goes to the sinker and gets it inside. Unfortunately, Perez is looking for something on the inner half. Because the pitch is just 89 MPH, he’s able to keep his hands inside the ball and drive it to left field for the sacrifice fly.

As far as outcomes in a bases-loaded, no-out situation go, this is one of the better ones. At the same time, this is as good a pitch as you can ask for out of Criswell, and Perez is still able to drive it to left field. He has to be perfect, and even when he is, things can go poorly.

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Criswell got the next two hitters to ground out and pop out. The at-bats weren’t particularly interesting though, so I’m going to jump ahead in the game. Credit to Criswell for getting out of the jam, but we’re on to the next inning.

2nd Inning - AB #1: MJ Melendez

This is actually the second pitch of the at-bat, but it’s not important. Criswell makes a good pitch to get a ground ball, but Romy Gonzalez can’t come up with it and Melendez ends up on second base. It may have been a close play at first, but either way, it’s not a bad pitch from Criswell and probably should have been the first out of the inning.

2nd Inning - AB #2: Maikel Garcia

We’ll skip this at-bat, it’s just a sacrifice bunt to get Melendez over to third.

2nd Inning - AB #3: Kyle Isbel

No need to watch this at-bat either, it’s just Criswell missing four straight times to walk the last man in the order and turn the lineup over.

2nd Inning - AB #4: Adam Frazier

Frazier comes up with runners on the corner and just one out. Remember the last at-bat, Frazier singled on a sweeper after being down 0-2.

Criswell starts Frazier off with a sweeper. Frazier is out in front and fouls it off, indicating he was looking for a fastball to hit. Naturally, the inclination would be to not throw a fastball, but Frazier has already handled his changeup and sweeper in this outing, so Criswell is left in a tough spot.

Here’s a changeup that’s left over the middle of the plate and fouled off. Frazier hangs his head because he knows he missed one. It’s 0-2 again; I’d go with another sinker, ideally buried down and away.

Alright, this isn’t the worst pitch in the world. It’s a cutter in a good location and Frazier is out in front. Criswell could follow this up with a front-door sinker, or a changeup on the outer half.

It’s a changeup that should be down and away, but it stays up and Frazier hits it back up the middle. Again, not a terrible pitch, but when you don’t have to gear up for velocity, it’s easier to stay on off-speed and breaking pitches.

2nd Inning - AB #5: Bobby Witt Jr.

Here’s another at-bat we don’t need to watch. Criswell hits Bobby Witt with a 73 MPH sweeper to load the bases again.

2nd Inning - AB #6: Vinnie Pasquantino

Changeup, fouled off for strike one.

He follows it up with a sweeper that’s again fouled off. That’s two swings now where Pasquantino is out in front. At 0-2, there’s no need to throw a fastball with the hitter looking for one.

Criswell goes to the sweeper, it again stays up, and Pasquantino hits it deep to right field for the sacrifice fly. At 0-2, this needs to be out of the zone where the hitter can’t do anything with it on contact.

2nd Inning - AB #7: Salvador Perez

Two outs now, any out will get you out of the inning.

Here’s a sweeper, off the edge for ball one. You can’t see it because the video is just the sacrifice fly but trust me.

Here’s another sweeper that probably should be called strike one, but it misses the spot and runs the count to 2-0.

A third sweeper, ball three.

Criswell goes back to the sweeper for a fourth time, this time for a called strike. Although he missed with three sweepers in a row, I actually like this pitch. Perez is probably looking for something breaking towards him on the inner half. All strikes are the same, but this is as low-risk as it gets in a 3-0 count.

Here’s another sweeper and another called strike. Full count. At 3-2, Criswell has an interesting dilemma. He has a chance to get the hitter out, but he does have a base open, so he can be careful. His sweeper is just about the only pitch he’s hit his spot with, so it’s probably the safest bet at avoiding a serious mistake.

This is a pretty good pitch, but Perez gets the bat on it and flips it out to left field for the base hit for another run. Jarren Duran makes a great throw and cuts down a runner at the plate to end the inning, but the damage is done.

The second inning isn’t entirely on Criswell’s shoulders because the inning started with an unfortunate error. He even made decent pitches that went for base hits. At the same time, he walked a batter, hit a batter, and gave up some hard contact after getting ahead in the count. Criswell can get strikes, but if he doesn’t have all of his pitches working and can’t change speeds effectively, he’s going to have a hard time putting hitters away.

Criswell made it through six innings on Friday night but surrendered five runs. To me, that illustrates why an addition to the rotation is necessary. Criswell is a fine pitcher to make a spot start, we’ve already seen his approach work for a few starts. At the same time, he’s not someone you want to hand the ball to every five days to keep you in a game through a playoff chase. He’s a five-and-dive guy at best, and if you want to keep your bullpen fresh, you need more than that out of your rotation.