WORCESTER — Red Sox minor league pitcher Shane Drohan had no idea what senior director of player development Brian Abraham could be texting him about the final Friday of spring training.
“Gimme a call when you have a chance,” Drohan said Abraham asked. “I was like, ‘I don’t know what this is about.‘”
Abraham delivered good news. The major league team was scheduled to fly out of Fort Myers on Sunday, March 23 for two exhibition games in Monterrey, Mexico, before their regular season opener in Texas on March 27. Drohan was one of the minor leaguers who the Red Sox selected to take with them.
“I was like, ‘Let’s do it,‘” Drohan said.
The 26-year-old received even more good news the day before leaving for Mexico. The Red Sox penciled him in to start the second game.
“Really cool, man,” Drohan said. “There were a lot of fans there. Really passionate fans. Loud. It was just awesome.”
Drohan — who was assigned to Triple-A Worcester to begin the 2025 season — pitched 2 ⅔ scoreless innings in Mexico to cap off an impressive spring training. He tossed 6 scoreless innings, allowing just two hits and one walk while striking out five when Boston promoted him from minor league camp to pitch in two Grapefruit League games.
He’s putting himself back on the map as a prospect again after a difficult couple of years, including undergoing shoulder surgery in February 2024.
“It was awesome to be back in like the true game setting,” Drohan said about pitching in Mexico. “And then just watching all these guys show out.”
Drohan, a 2020 fifth round pick out of Florida State, rose to Boston’s No. 3 pitching prospect in 2023 after six dominant starts for Double-A Portland to begin the season. He allowed just five runs in 34 innings (1.32 ERA). Opponents had just 19 hits against him (.161 batting average).
But Drohan struggled after receiving a promotion to Worcester in mid-May, and the Red Sox decided to leave him unprotected in the 2023 Rule 5 Draft.
The White Sox drafted Drohan but returned him to the Red Sox last June, three and a half months after he underwent surgery.
The southpaw pitched in two games for the WooSox last August after being returned and he struggled. He allowed five runs, nine hits and eight walks while striking out eight in 7 innings.
“The muscles just need the time to grow back,” said Drohan, adding that the surgeon told him he would never pitch at 100% in 2024.
Drohan spent the offseason getting bigger and stronger.
“I put on good weight. I’m up to like 212 now,” the 6-foot-3 Drohan said. “And then the shoulder is pretty much fully recovered from that surgery. … The rotator cuff muscles are fully there now.”
Drohan and the Red Sox discussed multiple goals entering spring training.
“We had a lot of boxes coming into spring that we wanted to check and I felt like I checked them all off,” Drohan said. “We’re trying to get me to throw harder, which the velocity was seriously up — anywhere from like 94 to 97.”
His velo is returning to where it was early in 2023 when his fastball touched 99 mph.
The Red Sox also wanted Drohan to throw more strikes this spring — which he did.
“And then I added another pitch,” Drohan said. “I added a slider. So just working that into the games and stuff and just getting a feel for it.”
The slider was a pitch he initially began thinking about adding to his pitch mix during the offseason. He mentioned it to the Red Sox on the phone during the winter and they told him, “We’ll see when you get there.”
“Just because we wanted it to be closer to kind of like that game speed so you can really see all the shapes of your stuff before you go and add (a pitch),” Drohan said. “And then once I got to spring training and that volume was there, they were like, ‘OK, there’s a big gap between the cutter and the curveball, so let’s add the slider.‘”
He said he threw it a lot during spring training games and feels confident with it.
“Especially with all the new technology and stuff that we’re provided, I think it’s a lot quicker to bring it into the game,” Drohan said. “So it’s really only one or two bullpen sessions and then, ‘Hey, let’s start ripping it in the game.’ Because that’s really where you’re gonna get the feel for it and the confidence.”
He said his changeup is still his best secondary pitch.
“I was just excited to get going,” Drohan said. “Spring was fun. It’s exciting to be healthy again. It’s just like the main thing. I’m 100% healthy for the first time in a while. And I’m excited to show what I can do when I’m healthy.”
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