Boston Red Sox's Chris Sale on delayed season: 'I'm not getting paid, so no one can call me an overpaid (expletive)'
Boston Red Sox pitcher Chris Sale watches from the dugout during the fifth inning of the team's baseball game against the Philadelphia Phillies at Fenway Park in Boston, Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2019. Sale is receiving treatment for inflammation in his elbow that will shut him down for the rest of the regular season, another blow to the defending World Series champions whose postseason hopes appear all but dashed. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)AP
By Chris Cotillo | ccotillo@MassLive.com
Even if the MLB season does begin in the coming weeks, Red Sox ace Chris Sale won't pitch at all in 2020. But even though the left-hander is out for the season after undergoing Tommy John surgery in March, he still has a financial stake in baseball getting underway this season.
Sale, who is due to make $30 million in the first season of the five-year, $145 million extension he signed with the Red Sox next spring, previously lamented the fact he is letting down the club by getting hurt less than a year after signing a large contract. Speaking to ESPN's Marly Rivera this week, Sale joked that his current lack of income would prevent critics from remarking that he is overpaid.
"There's obviously negotiations between the players and the owners, and that's what I hope we can iron out sooner rather than later," he said. "On my end of it, I'm not missing any games that everyone else isn't missing. Plus, I'm not getting paid, so no one can call me an overpaid asshole right now."
Back in 2013, Sale signed a team-friendly extension with the White Sox that would turn out to be worth $56.5 million over seven seasons. After finishing in the top six in the voting for American League Cy Young award in each of those seasons, Sale was rewarded handsomely by the Red Sox one year before free agency, signing his new extension last March.
That extension -- considered team-friendly by many at the time -- has not panned out for the Red Sox so far, as Sale will miss the entire first year covered by the deal and much of the second season in 2021. In March, he held back tears as he discussed the guilt he felt over not living up to expectations in 2020. Speaking to Rivera, he downplayed the idea that the perception of him as an overpaid player has gotten to him in recent months.
"What my teammates, what my family, what my coaches think about me, that's first and foremost," Sale said. "Not to mention the fact that all these people were talking about how I was so underpaid and undervalued, that I wasn't making enough money for the production that I was doing. Then overnight, I'm an overpaid player. If the flag is that easily blown, you can't really pay attention to it."
Sale, who is hoping to rebound from a disastrous 2019 season by returning to form when he returns sometime next year, reiterated that his main goal is winning -- not maximizing financial earnings.
"People asked me when I was playing under a quote-unquote team-friendly contract, what my main goal was," he told Rivera. "It was always to win. Now that I'm making all this money and I'm not producing, my goal is still to win. It doesn't change for me, no matter who I play for, the money I'm making or however many years I have in the league. I play to win."