Red Sox’ Chris Murphy Has Ligament Damage In Elbow

11:50am: The Red Sox fear a “high grade tear” in Murphy’s ulnar collateral ligament, reports Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com. He’s receiving additional testing and opinions.

8:51am: Red Sox left-hander Chris Murphy underwent an MRI yesterday after experiencing recent elbow discomfort, and that imaging revealed ligament damage in his pitching elbow, reports Alex Speier of the Boston Globe. The Red Sox haven’t yet determined whether surgery will be the next step, though that’s the typical outcome for injuries of this nature. A treatment plan will be finalized in the coming days, per Speier.

The 25-year-old Murphy was slated to enter the season as one of the Sox’ top depth options in the rotation. He made his big league debut last season, tossing 47 2/3 frames with an unsightly 4.91 ERA but much better secondary marks. Murphy fanned a solid 23.1% of his opponents against an 8% walk rate and kept the ball on the ground at a 44.7% clip. All of those stats were right in line with or even slightly better than the league average. Metrics like FIP (3.70) and SIERA (3.88) painted a much more favorable picture of the rookie’s work than his base earned run average.

Boston is set to open the season with Brayan Bello, Nick Pivetta, Tanner Houck, Garrett Whitlock and Kutter Crawford in a rotation that’s already lost top offseason signee Lucas Giolito for the season. Murphy, fellow lefty Brandon Walter and right-hander Cooper Criswell are all on the 40-man roster and were expected to be among the first names up should further injuries compromise the projected rotation. While it’s not yet clear he’ll miss the season, Murphy will at the very least no longer be an option in the early portion of the season.

Whether the injuries to Giolito and Murphy prompt the Red Sox to look for additional depth in the rotation remains to be seen, but it’s a rough development for any club to lose its No. 1 and No. 6 or 7 starters before the season even gets underway. The Sox have long been connected to lingering free agent lefty Jordan Montgomery, and others still on the market include Michael Lorenzen and Mike Clevinger. There’ll also surely be some names returning to the market in the coming days as veterans on minor league deals with other teams are informed that they’ve not made the cut with their current organization.

If Murphy ultimately requires surgery, he’ll be eligible to spend the season on the major league 60-day injured list, as he suffered the injury while in big league camp. He’d accrue a full year of service time and pay while undergoing surgery and rehabbing. He currently has just 81 days of MLB service time, giving the Sox six full seasons of control over him. Murphy won’t be arbitration-eligible until after the 2026 season and isn’t on track for free agency until the 2029-30 offseason.