On this day, the Red Sox acquired RHP Austin Brice from the Miami Marlins in exchange for prospect Angeudis Santos. Following a lackluster 84-78 campaign in 2019, the Red Sox needed to make some changes. One area of focus was improving a pretty average bullpen. The 2019 Red Sox finished 17th in bullpen ERA at 4.40 to go along with a slightly better 4.14 FIP. While it featured some bright spots in Brandon Workman (10-1, 1.88 ERA), Marcus Walden (9-2, 3.81), Matt Barnes (5-4, 3.78), and rookie southpaw Josh Taylor (2-2, 3.04), the rest wasn’t as pretty.
Following an excellent 2018 campaign in which he was a key part of the championship bullpen, Ryan Brasier had a rough 2019 season going 2-4 with a 4.85 ERA in 65 games. Fortunately, this seems to have been just a down year for him, as he followed 2019 up with a good 2020 and 2021 (albeit in only 38 total games). Brasier is back for 2022 with a one year, $1.4 million dollar contract, and should be a solid member of our bullpen for years to come.
After a 3.43 ERA year in 2019, it isn’t very hard to tell why the Red Sox were interested in Austin Brice. He was a cheap reliever with a nice fastball that could induce a lot of strikeouts for us. Unfortunately, this wasn’t really how his career with Boston panned out.
Brice’s first appearance for Boston was on opening day of 2020 against the Baltimore Orioles. Because of the shortened MLB season, opening day was actually in late July instead of the spring as it usually is. Brice pitched an inning for the Sox and gave up one run while striking out two. With one out in the top of the seventh, Rio Ruiz hit a solo shot off of Brice to put a run on the board for the O’s. This was his first of the year. With a run surrendered and the score 13-2 Boston, Brice ended the top of the 7th by striking out swinging Pedro Severino and DJ Stewart consecutively. Phillips Valdez would replace the righty in the top of the 8th, and the Sox would hold their lead, winning 13-2.
Brice would give up three total runs in his next two appearances, raising his ERA to 9.82. On July 31st against the Yankees, Brice took the mound for his fourth appearance as a Red Sock. He started off the bottom of the 7th by grounding out Gleyber Torres for out number one. Up next: powerful righty Giancarlo Stanton. With a 1-0 count, Brice nailed Stanton, giving the DH a free pass to first. Brice struck out the next batter Aaron Hicks swinging for the second out. Stanton was off to the races for second base, but the veteran catcher Christian Vasquez caught him stealing, ending the 7th and ending the outing for Austin Brice.
Brice followed this up with four scoreless outings, lowering his ERA all the way from 9.82 on July 31st, to 4.00 on August 9th. He was beginning to look like a solid reliever for the Red Sox, but that changed on August 11th. The Red Sox hosted the future AL champion Rays for a four game series, with the latter taking every game. Austin Brice only played in game two, replacing Martin Perez in the top of the 7th. He started off his day on a high, striking out Ji-Man-Choi swinging… but it went downhill fast. With a man on first, former Red Sock Manny Margot doubled to center driving in Willy Adames and increasing the Rays lead to 3-1. Brandon Lowe and Yandy Diaz would drive in two more runs, and with men on first and third and a 5-1 Rays lead, the Red Sox didn’t want to take any more chances. Robert Stock came in to pitch with one away, and both Lowe and Diaz scored, raising Brices' earned run total to five. Austin Brice finished the day with 5 runs on 4 hits, 1 walk and 1 strikeout. His ERA rose all the way to 8.38.
Brice finished off his first year as a Red Sock with a 5.95 earned run average in 19.2 innings pitched. While his strikeouts per nine were expected to be high, I don’t think many expected 11.4. However, he only pitched 19.2 innings because of the shortened season, the lowest of any year since his first. To top it off, his walks per nine was horrible, at 5.9. After a bad 2020 season, it was time for 2021.
2021 started off well for Brice. He pitched two and two third scoreless innings in his first three appearances. His downfall started on April 11th against the Orioles, where he pitched two thirds of an inning, giving up three earned runs while striking out and walking two. After a one hit outing on May 15th, Brice was sent outright to Worcester. He was called back up right before the All star break, but not for long. On July 10th, Brice pitched his first and only game back in Boston, pitching two innings giving up one run, walking one and striking out three. He was DFA’d on July 16th and sent to Worcester the following day, where he spent the rest of his Red Sox career. Brice was granted free agency by the Sox on October 15th, officially ending his tenure with the club.
As for Santos -the infield prospect we traded to the Marlins-, he lacks any power, but is good at drawing walks (29 walks in 51 total games last year), and is an above average infielder. In 51 games between rookie ball and Low A and High A ball, Santos slashed .194/.312/.252.564, with no homers and 10 stolen bases. While he’s yet to hit a homerun in his minor league career, he is only 20 years old and at 6-1, 168 pounds still has time to grow and possibly develop some power.
After reviewing the trade and both players involved, my conclusion is that the Marlins probably slightly won. Austin Brice had some solid appearances for us, but some really bad ones to complement the good. After two years, Brice is most likely out of Boston for good, but you never know in baseball. Angeudis Santos is still in the Miami Marlins organization, and while you can never tell for sure the future trajectory of a prospect, he looks like he could be a solid bench player for them in a few years.
So what do you all think? Did the Sox win, the Marlins, or is there no clear winner? Feel free to let me know on my twitter @redsoxreactions, as well as any feedback and/or blog recommendations!
Thank you!
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