{"id":101492,"date":"2025-10-01T21:19:29","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T21:19:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=101492"},"modified":"2025-10-01T21:19:29","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T21:19:29","slug":"red-sox-make-head-scratching-catcher-change-for-brayan-bello-ahead-of-pivotal-wild-card-game-against-yankees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=101492","title":{"rendered":"Red Sox make head-scratching catcher change for Brayan Bello ahead of pivotal Wild Card game against Yankees"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Red Sox make head-scratching catcher change for Brayan Bello ahead of pivotal Wild Card game against Yankees originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Last night, the Boston Red Sox won game one of the Wild Card series against the New York Yankees in a nail-biter. Now, they have a chance to eliminate the Yankees, and with Brayan Bello on the mound, it could be easy.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>However, the Sox made a head-scratching decision when it comes to Bello; they&#8217;re\u00a0starting catcher Carlos Narvaez over Connor Wong, who was pretty much Bello\u2019s exclusive catcher this season.<\/p>\n<p><strong>MORE:\u00a0Red Sox&#8217; Lucas Giolito gets disastrous injury update for possible postseason return<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Why does this matter? Well, Bello himself has pointed out that Wong is a big reason why he finally took a huge step forward this season.<\/p>\n<p>Last season, Bello finished with an ERA of 4.49 and a WHIP of 1.361. This season, Bello finished with an ERA of 3.35 and a WHIP of 1.236. He also had his ERA dip under three for a portion of the season, as he was really dealing.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p><strong>MORE:\u00a0Red Sox predicted to trade for $75 million three-time All-Star as Dustin May upgrade<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The only conceivable reason that Narvaez is going over Wong is due to hitting, as Wong has had a terrible year, hitting in the .100s and below. However, in his last 25 games, he\u2019s been doing much better, hitting .225 with 16 hits, six RBI, and seven runs scored. For reference, Narvaez is hitting .241 this season.<\/p>\n<p>Hopefully, Narvaez can call pitches as good as Wong for this game. Otherwise, they\u2019re risking a lot with the Wild Card on the line.<\/p>\n<p><strong>MORE\u00a0BOSTON RED SOX\u00a0NEWS<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Red Sox insider reveals amazing news regarding the postseason return of injured rookie star Marcelo Mayer<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Red Sox linked to $13 million AL East rival star pitcher to replace Dustin May in backend of rotation<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Red Sox predicted to reunite with former No. 1 overall prospect in case Alex Bregman departs in free agency<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This just doesn&#8217;t make much sense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":101493,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[47,757,730,729,1627,758,2657,40,2947],"class_list":["post-101492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb","tag-boston-red-sox","tag-brayan-bello","tag-carlos-narvaez","tag-connor-wong","tag-dustin-may","tag-lucas-giolito","tag-mandatory-credit","tag-new-york-yankees","tag-sox"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.6 - 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