Aroldis Chapman's Opening Day Save Left Slight Room For Concern

Aroldis Chapman closed out Opening Day’s victory in typical Chapman fashion. He carried himself with the confidence and swagger you want from the man tasked with shutting the door on the opposition night after night. He tossed 11 pitches to claim his first save of the season, but something felt different about this outing. Even if you weren’t watching the radar gun on the (now much larger) NESN score bug, the southpaw's fastball looked like it lacked the zip we’re accustomed to. We were spoiled last year when he would reach back and sling it over 100 mph, but he still averaged an impressive 98.4 mph in 2025. That was more than five miles per hour faster than the average for left-handed pitchers last season. His so far lone outing in 2026 saw him average out at 97.3 mph. That’s still ridiculously fast, no question about it, but the pitch lacked the movement and control he brought to the table last year. Could this just be early season rust he’s shaking off, or is his age finally starting to catch up to him?

If we look back at Chapman’s spring training stats, it starts to paint a clearer picture. He appeared in seven games posting a 5.40 ERA over 6.2 innings, allowing four earned runs, one home run, three walks, and 10 strikeouts. While spring training stats need to be taken with a giant grain of salt, especially when Chapman was clearly only throwing his off-speed pitches at the end of the Grapefruit League season, it’s hard to ignore what seems to be some form of regression over a (very) small sample size.

Chapman’s pitch mix on Opening Day was something else that peaked my curiosity. In 2025, Chapman features his four-seam fastball as his primary pitch, throwing it 40% of the time. His second-most-used pitch was his sinker, clocking in at a 34% usage rate, followed by his slider and splitter at 15% and 11%, respectively. During his first save of 2026, though, things were different. His four-seam fastball was still his primary pitch at 55% usage, but his slider was his second most used at 27%, then the splitter and sinker tied for third at 9%. While those percentages are sure to change throughout the season, him leaning on his four-seamer more than half the time while only throwing his sinker once was surprising.

Logic would tell us that since his pitches were all clocking in slower than usual, that his command would have been spot on. If you were watching the game, you’d know that was far from the truth. Gone was the Chapman who was throwing gas while painting the corners that we grew accustomed to in 2025, and back was the Chapman that seemed to not quite know where the ball was going once it left his hand. If we look at his heat maps from the outing on Opening Day, we see a pitcher struggling to find the zone. If his slider is going to miss high like that this season, he’s going to get knocked around eventually.

Rust is likely playing a big factor here; he wasn’t able to pitch in the World Baseball Classic, which robbed him of some leverage outing during his tune-up for the season. If you're optimistic, that's the stance you'll take. But Father Time waits for no one.

Chapman is 38 years old and has had a storied major league career. His resurgence to top-tier closer in 2025 was remarkable, and he was rewarded with a contract extension late in the season, but there were calls from some people to cut bait and trade him at the deadline last year because they didn’t believe that the resurgence was sustainable. If he is starting to feel his age, it’s entirely possible that we’ve seen the best version of Chapman come and go. Even a version of the closer who is at 75% of what he was last year would be effective, but it'd make late-game situations far more nerve-racking for the Red Sox.

This is something to monitor, at least while the cold weather permeates the late-spring schedule. If Chapman's heat rises with the weather, this may be a conversation we can avoid having for a while yet.