Ryan Sherriff has gone through his fair share of ups and downs throughout his baseball career. The 33-year-old pitcher announced his retirement in September, but the lefty is open to a comeback after some offseason encouragement.
Sheriff started his career with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2017 and 2018, spent time with the Tampa Bay Rays in 2020 and 2021, and was most recently with the Boston Red Sox last season.
Sherriff joined WEEI’s Rob Bradford on the Audacy original podcast “Baseball Isn’t Boring” to discuss how he felt being designated for assignment in Boston last year and why he’s leaving the door open for a major-league comeback.
“It’s a crazy path. I decided to elect free agency after I got DFA’d,” Sherriff said (5:10 in player above)/ “I took it very very personal, I don’t know why and I shouldn’t have and my agent at the time told me don’t take it personal, but I did. I took the DFA extremely personal and I think it was because everything leading up to spring training.”
Sherriff was pitching well in spring training but got sent down to minor-league camp, and continued to pitch in major-league spring training games despite that. The southpaw allowed just six hits with no walks to go along with eight strikeouts in 6.2 innings across seven spring training appearances.
“There was one point I went into the office with the farm director and I asked him why did I get sent down?” Sherriff recalled. “I don’t even remember the words that he told me but we were talking about the roster at Triple-A and I was told that I wasn’t sure if I was going to have a spot even in Triple-A after performing the way I performed.”
He was eventually called up to the Red Sox in May, allowing two earned runs on six hits and two walks with five strikeouts in 6.2 innings – including in both games of a doubleheader. After that, though, Sheriff couldn’t feel his arm and was sent down to Triple-A. Less than a week later, he was designated for assignment and chose free agency.
“I took that extremely personal. How are you going to throw me in back-to-back games – and I pitched outstanding, and I’m on the phone with the GM saying you got some extremely good hitters out – and go ahead and DFA me?” Sherriff continued. “I took that personal, maybe I shouldn’t have, but I did. It was just the mindset I was in.”
Sherriff was then signed by the Los Angeles Dodgers, but his arm couldn’t recover after one outing at Triple-A. He announced his retirement in late September.
But now, after working with younger players and a few conversations, Sherriff is open to a comeback.
“If I get signed, amazing. My goal is not to be the average 88-89 (miles per hour) lefty like I was. My goal is to be the 93-95 lefty that I was in 2021,” he said. “But if I don’t get signed, great. If I do get signed, amazing. It’s just the process now.”