After filling in for about 100 innings in 2024, the Red Sox quietly resigned Cooper Criswell as pitching depth in 2025. There’s no doubt that Criswell was useful with an ERA/FIP of 4.08/4.15. That’s solid production for the back of a rotation, to say nothing of a minor league depth guy. But depth is what Criswell was signed for and depth is what he provided. Unfortunately for him, when the Sox rotation looked like it might be one the verge of collapse after May (the month not the Dustin), Brayan
Bello and Lucas Giolito both turned things around. There were sill issues, they pushed very hard for Joe Ryan at the top end of the pitching market and acquired the pitcher May anyway because they needed arms. Plus the many callups from the minors. But there was enough depth to not need Criswell more than one or two times a month, usually out of the ‘pen.
The Good
Criswell did most of his work in Worcester this past season, tossing 65 innings of 3.70 baseball and striking out 68. Solid enough. He made just seven appearances in the majors in 2025, although he did collect his first career save. He wasn’t quite the hero he was in 2024 with a 3.57 ERA and 5.11 FIP, although 17.2 innings is not a large sample. He had 9 strikeouts and 5 walks. It was a perfectly cromulent MiLB veteran call-up season. The Red Sox won four of the seven MLB games he pitched in.
The Bad
We could argue about his small MLB sample and the gap between his ERA and FIP but really the “bad” was that Criswell was hurt in September. As Dustin May imploded like a red giant star, the most likely option to replace him was missing in action. That did give us some electric outings from Payton Tolle and Connelly Early, but I’m sure the steadier hand of Criswell would have been appreciated.
Best Game or Moment
August 1. Fresh off failing to find a first baseman or top-end starter, the Red Sox were welcoming the Houston Astros to Fenway Park. At the time the Sox were losing momentum and the Astros ascendant. And there was no one to make the start on that fateful Friday night. Breslow summons Criswell to Boston. And he tosses seven innings of one-run, one-hit baseball. A brilliant outing against a team running around the league telling everyone they were back! The game took 10 innings so he didn’t get the official win, just the one in our hearts.
While he had nothing to do with it, if you forgot, that game ended with the Roman Empire providing some offense:
The Big Question
Is Cooper Criswell enough? No. But he doesn’t have to be all the depth himself. Thankfully the farm is just beginning to offer some young pitchers available to provide quality major league innings.
2026 and Beyond
As you may have inferred from The Big Question (or simply remembered from a few days ago) Cooper Criswell is back! As a pre-arbitration player the Sox brought him back for just a hair over the MLB minimum (a cool $800k). As the SoxProspects guys said on their latest podcast, one nice feature about getting this deal done early is should there be a roster crunch and the Sox try to DFA Criswell to slide him through waivers he’s on a guaranteed deal so that money would have to be paid. The claiming team couldn’t then simply release him to free up a roster spot for themselves. $800k isn’t a lot but that little bit of friction might be enough to give the Sox the ability to keep Criswell through a roster crunch.
