Red Sox Lefty Hurler Prospect Could Be ‘Front End Of The Rotation Arm’

Boston's director of pitching is excited about the team's 2024 second round pick

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The Boston Red Sox are committed to transforming their pitching staff, and a lot of the necessary changes could come from within.

While chief baseball officer Craig Breslow will be dutifully purveying the free agent and trade markets this offseason, he’ll also be monitoring the many talented arms developing in the Red Sox farm system.

One of those key prospects is 21-year-old lefty Payton Tolle, whom Boston selected with the No. 50 overall pick in the 2024 Major League Baseball draft. At six-foot-six and 250 pounds, Tolle is a powerful pitcher who promises to make a lot of noise in the minors in 2025.

Red Sox director of pitching Justin Willard recently discussed Tolle with NESN’s Tom Caron and Boston Globe’s Alex Speier on NESN’s “310 To Left” podcast.

“Payton’s an interesting guy for sure,” Willard said. “Big, physical. I think he’s weighing 240 (pounds), 250 now, 140 pounds of skeletal muscle mass. … In the draft, you just saw the fastball playability, and the extension was huge. … You could see this guy being a front end of the rotation arm. And that’s really, really exciting, especially from the left side. There’s not that many guys out there with his profile, and the guys that are, they have a lot of big league success.”

Tolle was a dominant two-way player in college before he ultimately decided to focus on pitching. After transferring to Texas Christian in 2024 following two successful years at Wichita State, Tolle was named the Big 12 Conference Pitcher of the Year.

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