Last spring, the Boston Red Sox were determined to get out in front of contract extensions for many of their young stars.
The Sox inked Brayan Bello and Ceddanne Rafaela to team-friendly deals and approached Triston Casas and Tanner Houck about signing long-term. Both players opted to wait until after the 2024 season in hopes their value would increase, and Houck delivered.
The 28-year-old righty posted a 3.12 ERA with 154 strikeouts and 38 walks in 178.2 innings. He clocked a career-high 30 starts and became Boston’s sort-of ace in a strange season for the pitching staff. Despite posting the best season of his career, Peter Abraham of The Boston Globe reports that the Red Sox haven’t returned to Houck to resume contract extension discussions.
“We’re just hanging out, business as usual. Me and the wife are happy. I’m not worried about it. I plan to play this game for a long time. I’ll be fine. But if you’re asking me if I’d like to stay here, sure I would. I love it here,” Houck said.
Red Sox haven’t inquired about contract extension with Tanner Houck since last year
It’s strange that the Red Sox haven’t turned back to Houck to get him to sign long-term. Maybe they feel he boosted his price too much last season — the Sox have still shown no inclination to spend serious money besides the signing of Alex Bregman. They could also be zeroing in on their No. 1 extension priority: Garrett Crochet.
Crochet is projected to be one of the most dominant starters in MLB this season, and Boston would surely like to extend him before he can make that happen and further raise his already-high asking price. The lefty set a hard deadline to have all extension negotiations completed or postponed by Opening Day, as he won’t discuss contract terms during the season.
Tanner Houck revisited the topic of a potential contract extension with the Red Sox.https://t.co/bsbcygLG4B
— NESN (@NESN) March 19, 2025
After last season’s performances, the Sox should extend both Crochet and Houck, but the team only sacrificed four top prospects for one of them. Now, Houck will have to post another great season to keep the team interested in him and maintain his recently raised price tag. Based on his spring performances, that could be difficult.
Houck has allowed seven runs on nine hits over 10 innings of work in Grapefruit League games. Spring training doesn’t count for anything and 10 innings is a small sample size from which to jump to conclusions, but Sox fans are hoping Houck can right the ship to get the contract extension he deserves.
Houck will be Boston’s No. 2 starter in 2025 and will get the ball in Texas during its opening series. He’ll begin his next campaign for a contract extension with a full season of 30 starts under his belt, with experienced pitchers like Walker Buehler and Lucas Giolito alongside him to learn from.
