Chris Sale happy to put injuries behind him and get back to normal routine

LAKELAND — Chris Sale has been a non-factor for the Red Sox pitching staff since he recorded the final out of the 2018 World Series. Since then, there have been more low lights than highlights.

The Lakeland grad suffered through 2019 season when he battled elbow issues that eventually required Tommy John surgery and caused him to miss the entire 2020 season. A series of freak injuries since his return has limited to just 11 appearances in the past two seasons, including just two starts last year.

Finally healthy heading into spring training for the first time in at least four years, Sale is ready to put the injuries behind him and return as one of the game's elite pitchers.

"I've been off a mound for about a month now twice a week, just throwing my stuff so it's nice to get back to a normal routine of baseball activity and get ready for a season," Sale said on Saturday.

Sale was in Lakeland along with former Dreadnaughts Drew Hutchison, Keon Broxton, Steve Pearce and Paul Wilson along with former coach Mike Campbell to work the Evan Michael Chambers Annual Baseball Camp at Peterson Park. More than 300 youths were in attendance.

Sale is entering is seventh season in the Red Sox organization. His first two seasons were very productive after the Sox acquired him from the White Sox for four players, including top prospect Yoan Moncada.

In 2017, Sale went 17-8 with a 2.90 ERA and finished second in the Cy Young voting. In 2018, he missed five starts but still went 12-4 with a 2.11 ERA — the lowest of his career as a starter. Although he struggled at times in the postseason, he had his best start against the Yankees when he allowed just two runs on five hits in 6 1/3 innings to earn the only postseason win of his career.

In 2019, then general manager Dave Dombrowski signed Sale to a five-year, $145 million extension of which there are two years remaining. Then the injuries struck, first the elbow that required surgery following a 2019 season when he finished 6-11 with a 4.40 ERA

Since recovering from Tommy John surgery that kept him out of the 2020 season, Sale has sustained a bizarre run of injuries that caused him to miss most of the 2022 season. First, a rib injury kept him out until July. In his first start, he threw 78 pitches in five shutout innings, allowing three hits, and appeared to be on his way to providing a boost to the Red Sox starting pitching staff.

However, in his second outing, he didn't make it out of the first inning when he got hit in his pitching hand and broke his pinky finger. That injury, he said, probably would have kept him out of for the remainder of the season. Any chance of him pitching in late September, however, ended when he broke his right wrist in a bicycle accident.

After a workout, he hopped on his bike for a quick 2-mile ride to Chipolte's when he hit a pothole going down a hill. Luckily, it was his non-throwing right wrist that he broke, but it still ended his season for good.

"I think pinky was the biggest blow just because there was a lot of work to get back to that point," he said. "To really only make one start. I was in the first inning of my second start. And that was basically the end of my seasons."

It's fair to say that the ensuing years after winning the 2018 World Series didn't go as planned for Sale.

"Everything is going great then the next thing you know, it's gone," Sale said. "It's perspective. You have to appreciate the good things and get through the bad times."

Sale added that during the time he has been out, he's learned to appreciate the minor things that he might have overlooked in the past.

"In years past, there were things that might not have been a big deal at the time, but you look back and show a little bit more appreciation and have a little more understanding for everything that is going on in the world and our communities and just know that things are never as good as you think or as bad as you think," he said.

The frustration of the fans of Sale being out with the injuries can be seen or heard on social media or talk radio, but Sale doesn't get caught up in that noise.

"For me, it's easy for me to shut that off," he said. "I have a zero social media presence. I would have to go out of my way to find those things. I just don't need to. It is what it is. For me, I just try to go out there and do my job."

The Red Sox certainly will need him to do his job if they are to have kind of success in 2023. They are a different team since that World Series team with home grown stars Mookie Betts (Dodgers) and Xander Bogarts (Padres) now playing out west. The pitching staff lost Nathan Evoldi from last year's staff and Michael Wacha, a free agent, also is like not returning, leaving Sale leading a group of seven pitchers competing for a spot in the rotation along with  The Red Sox probably aren’t a great fit with seven starters Corey Kluber, Garrett Whitlock, James Paxton, Nick Pivetta, Brayan Bello and Tanner Houck.

With the changes from even the team that came up two games short of the World Series in 2021 — designated hitter J.D. Martinez also wasn't resigned — expectations of the Red Sox contending in 2023 remain very low. Sale chooses to ignore outside perceptions.

"Expectations are everywhere, in sports, in baseball," Sale said. "You can't hold yourself to other people's expectations. You have to have a standard for yourself and have goals for yourself, and you do as good as you can to achieve it. It's very well known that talent only gets you so far. You can have all the talent in the world and not make the big league. ... I like the guys we have in our clubhouse. We have a good group of young guys. We have a good group of guys, veteran guys who have some experience, battle-tested guys, guys with championships, guys who have made names for themselves, made some noise in this game. It only takes the right mixture."

The Red Sox make it clear that they need Sale to be a major ingredient in that mixture.

“Chris Sale has to perform at the level we expect him to and let's see how we do on the field," Red Sox chairman Tom Werner said in a news conference in January.

Roy Fuoco can be reached at roy.fuoco@theleder.com. Follow him on Twitter: @RoyFuoco.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Chris Sale happy to put injuries behind him and get back to normal routine