The Red Sox have been focused on the future for a while but that future became the present in 2025. They responded with a very aggressive offseason, making many notable additions to the lineup and pitching staff.
Major League Signings
- LHP Ranger Suárez: Five years, $130MM (includes $3MM signing bonus and $10MM buyout on $35MM mutual option for 2031)
- IF Isiah Kiner-Falefa: One year, $6MM
- LHP Danny Coulombe: One year, $1MM
2026 spending: $17MM
Total spending: $137MM
Trades and Claims
- Acquired C Ronny Hernandez from White Sox for LHP Chris Murphy
- Acquired OF Braiden Ward from Rockies for LHP Brennan Bernardino
- Acquired C Luke Heyman from Mariners for RHP Alex Hoppe
- Acquired RHP Sonny Gray and $20MM in cash considerations from Cardinals for LHP Brandon Clarke and RHP Richard Fitts
- Acquired RHP Johan Oviedo, LHP Tyler Samaniego and C Adonys Guzman from Pirates for OF Jhostynxon García and RHP Jesus Travieso
- Acquired OF Isaiah Jackson from Angels for IF Vaughn Grissom
- Acquired Rule 5 RHP Ryan Watson from Athletics for IF Justin Riemer
- Acquired LHP Jake Bennett from Nationals for RHP Luis Perales
- Acquired 1B Willson Contreras and $8MM in cash considerations from Cardinals for RHP Hunter Dobbins, RHP Yhoiker Fajardo and RHP Blake Aita
- Acquired C Nate Baez from Twins for IF Tristan Gray
- Acquired RHP Gage Ziehl and PTBNL from White Sox for RHP Jordan Hicks, RHP David Sandlin, two PTBNL and $8MM in cash considerations
- Claimed C/IF Mickey Gasper off waivers from Nationals
- Claimed IF Tsung-Che Cheng off waivers from Nationals
- Acquired IF Caleb Durbin, IF Andruw Monasterio, IF Anthony Seigler and Competitive Balance Round B pick from Brewers for LHP Kyle Harrison, RHP Shane Drohan and IF David Hamilton.
Option Decisions
- 3B Alex Bregman: Opted out of deal with two years and $80MM remaining (not accounting for deferrals)
- SS Trevor Story: Declined to opt out of deal with two years and $55MM (including $5MM buyout on $25MM club option for 2028)
- RHP Lucas Giolito: Declines $19MM mutual option in favor of $1.5MM buyout
- Team declined $12MM mutual option on RHP Liam Hendriks in favor of $2MM buyout
Notable Minor League Signings
- Jason Delay, Vinny Capra, Devin Sweet, Seth Martinez, Tayron Guerrero, Matt Thaiss, Vinny Nittoli, Kyle Keller, Brendan Rodgers, Tommy Kahnle
Extensions
- None
Notable Losses
- Alex Bregman, Lucas Giolito (still unsigned), Steven Matz, Justin Wilson (still unsigned), Rob Refsnyder, Dustin May, Liam Hendriks, Nathaniel Lowe (non-tendered), Josh Winckowski (non-tendered), Chris Murphy, Brennan Bernardino, Richard Fitts, Cooper Criswell (waivers), Jhostynxon García, Vaughn Grissom, Hunter Dobbins, Jordan Hicks, David Sandlin, Kyle Harrison, Shane Drohan
The Sox have essentially been rebuilding since the Mookie Betts trade in early 2020. They did quite well in 2021 but were around a .500 team in the three seasons after that. In that time, young players like Jarren Duran, Wilyer Abreu, Ceddanne Rafaela and Brayan Bello established themselves as valuable contributors, but the focus remained on a core of prospects consisting of Roman Anthony, Marcelo Mayer, Kyle Teel and Kristian Campbell.
Teel was flipped to the White Sox as the headliner in the Garrett Crochet trade last offseason. The other three all cracked the majors for the first time in 2025. Campbell and Mayer weren’t overwhelming in their debuts. The long-term outlook on Campbell is now a bit concerning but Mayer’s struggles may have been related to injury, as he battled wrist issues and ultimately required surgery. Anthony’s debut was excellent and he looks like a star in the making.
The Sox went 89-73 last year and earned a Wild Card spot. Though they were knocked out by the Yankees, that performance and the arrival of their prospects indicated they had moved well into win-now territory.
Before the offseason could even begin, the front office took a hit. In September, the Nationals plucked assistant general manager Paul Toboni and made him their new president of baseball operations. It appears that the Sox were planning to promote him to general manager, which would have cemented him as the #2 guy on the front office masthead, under chief baseball officer Craig Breslow. Instead, he became the #1 guy in Washington. Boston’s GM search appears to be on pause.
Once the offseason began, Breslow was clear that adding to both the lineup and rotation would be priorities. Though the Sox had a good season in 2025, there were some clear holes. They were giving starts to Dustin May and Walker Buehler late in the year despite both pitchers having ERAs near 5.00. Prospects Connelly Early and Payton Tolle were pushed to the majors even though they had barely pitched at the Triple-A level. Lucas Giolito became a free agent at season’s end. The struggles of Campbell and the Triston Casas injury left them weak at second and first base. Alex Bregman triggered his opt-out, opening a hole at third. Shortstop would at least have continuity, as Trevor Story decided not to opt out of his deal.
It didn’t take long for the rotation to be addressed. A few weeks into the offseason, the Sox reached a deal with Chaim Bloom, who is now the president of baseball operations of the Cardinals. It’s rebuilding time in St. Louis, which meant established veteran players were available. The Sox acquired Sonny Gray for younger pitchers Brandon Clarke and Richard Fitts.
Gray is still a good pitcher but he wasn’t needed in St. Louis. He’s 36 years old and going into the final guaranteed year of his contract. Some Boston fans were underwhelmed when looking at Gray’s age and his 4.28 ERA last year, but there are reasons to be optimistic. His strikeout, walk and ground ball numbers were all strong. His ERA may have been inflated by poor luck on batted balls, which is why his 3.39 FIP and 3.29 SIERA look much nicer.
Though the results have still been good, the contract was tricky, even beyond his no-trade clause. Gray’s deal was backloaded, paying him $35MM in 2026, followed by a $30MM club option with a $5MM buyout. That means he was guaranteed $40MM. The Cards ate $20MM of that to make the deal work and Gray agreed to a slight bump. His contract was reworked at part of the trade so he now gets $41MM, in the form of a $31MM salary and $10MM buyout on a mutual option.
Swallowing that kind of money was enough for the Cards to not just flip Gray but also get a notable return. Fitts is a useful depth starter with options in the near term. With the Sox planning to make rotation upgrades, he was going to get pushed down the depth chart to a point where he would have limited utility.
Clarke is potentially the long-term prize. He hasn’t yet reached Double-A and walks a ton of guys. He still needs a lot of polish but he has high-90s velocity and gets strikeouts. Given his uncertain future, he’s exactly the kind of prospect who should be going from a win-now club to a rebuilder. The Sox get a reliable near-term upgrade while the Cards get the long-term gamble.
Shortly thereafter, the Sox made another rotation addition, once again from an old friend. They made a five-player trade with the Pirates, who are now run by general manager Ben Cherington. The headliners in the trade were Johan Oviedo going to Boston and Jhostynxon García heading to Pittsburgh. García is an exciting upper minors prospect but has no path to playing time in the crowded Boston outfield, so the Sox cashed him in for another arm.
Oviedo is far less established than Gray but there’s intrigue there. He seemed to break out as a viable mid-rotation or back-end guy in 2023 when he gave the Bucs 177 2/3 innings with a 4.31 ERA. He missed 2024 recovering from Tommy John surgery, came back in 2025 and looked even better, though in a small sample. He only made nine starts last year but had a 3.57 ERA and 24.7% strikeout rate. His walk rate was high but that may have been rust after his long layoff. Due to his missed time, he is only making $1.55MM this year and can be controlled via arbitration for one more season.
Before the holiday break came, the Sox circled back to Bloom. This time, it was for a lineup addition, with the Sox getting Willson Contreras. The former catcher made a pretty smooth transition to first base last year. Defensive Runs Saved put him just a hair below league average. Outs Above Average put him six above par. The defensive switch didn’t impact his offense, as he slashed .257/.344/.447 for a wRC+ of 124.
His contract situation wasn’t as onerous as Gray’s, as he was owed $41.5MM over two years. The trade ended up structured similarly, though the Cards only ate $8MM this time, a reflection of the fact that Contreras’s deal was closer to market value. Like with Gray, it was restructured to pay him an extra $1MM.
Once again, the Sox flipped out a useful depth starter. Like Fitts, Hunter Dobbins was going to end up down the depth chart, so was sent to a club with more room. Prospects Yhoiker Fajardo and Blake Aita were also included and could be the more notable pieces in the long run. But neither has reached Double-A yet and Fajardo hasn’t even turned 20 years old. As with Clarke in the Gray deal, the Sox have exchanged long-term wild cards for a near-term upgrade, landing the right-handed power bat they’d made a priority entering the winter.
As the calendar flipped to 2026, the Bregman question hung in the air as he remained unsigned and the Sox still had infield holes to address. Many felt that a return to Boston was the most likely outcome but it was not to be.
Bregman settled for a short-term, opt-out-laden pact last offseason but was now hoping to cash in. Breslow has shown an aversion to long-term deals. Bregman’s three-year deal was the longest free agent contract on Breslow’s ledger, as of the start of this offseason. The Sox did make Bregman a long-term offer this time but watered it down. Reportedly, the Sox got to $165MM over five years but with deferrals stretching decades into the future. Instead, Bregman went to the Cubs. That five-year deal also has deferrals but seemingly to a less extreme degree, and with a better sticker price of $175MM.
It’s a bit of an odd look for Boston, in the grand scheme of things. They signed Bregman a year ago and pushed Rafael Devers off third base, upsetting the face of their franchise. The relationship was apparently so damaged that Devers later spurned a request to play first base when Casas got injured. The Sox responded by shipping Devers to the Giants. Presumably, the Sox didn’t anticipate the dominoes falling that way when they signed Bregman. Regardless, the end result is that they completely abandoned their future with Devers in order to get one year of Bregman, then let Bregman slip away by losing a bidding war by a marginal amount.
They didn’t have time to ruminate on that big picture stuff and quickly pivoted. When Bregman turned down their offer, they seemingly just gave all that money to Ranger Suárez. A few days after the reports of Bregman joining the Cubs, the Sox and Suárez agreed to a five-year deal. The $130MM sticker price for Suárez was south of the $165MM offer to Bregman, but the former came with no deferrals. The exact net present value of the Bregman offer isn’t publicly known but his Cubs’ deal came with an NPV of around $150MM. Assuming that Boston was offering more extreme deferrals, the NPV would probably have been pushed pretty close to what Suárez accepted. Regardless, it set a new benchmark for Breslow, as he blew past his aforementioned free agency limits.
The Suárez signing bolstered what was already a very strong rotation. He is not a dominant pitcher, with his fastballs averaging in the low-90s last year, but he clearly knows what he’s doing. He posted a 3.20 ERA last year with a solid 23.2% strikeout rate, excellent 5.8% walk rate and strong 46.8% ground ball rate. Dating back to 2021, he has a 3.25 ERA.
Boston still had work to do and the specter of the Devers trade would again hover around their next two moves. The first one was effectively a salary dump. They flipped Jordan Hicks to the White Sox, with Chicago taking on $16MM of the $24MM left on that deal. In order to move that money off the books, Boston sent out pitching prospect David Sandlin and two players to be named later. They did get back one prospect and one player to be named later, but this was mostly the Sox selling Sandlin to save money.
The next deal was not about financial concerns. The Sox addressed their infield by acquiring Caleb Durbin from the Brewers. They also added some infield depth by netting Andruw Monasterio and Anthony Seigler in the same deal, in addition to a Competitive Balance Round draft pick (#67 overall). Durbin had a solid rookie season in Milwaukee with a contact approach, rarely walking or striking out. He stole some bases and his defense was good. He doesn’t have a lot of power but his profile could play well at Fenway Park. He’ll take over at third base while the Sox will give Mayer a shot at second. Free agent signee Isiah Kiner-Falefa offers cover at both position in a utility role.
The Sox sent three players to Milwaukee, including starters Kyle Harrison and Shane Drohan. The inclusion of Harrison had some echoes of the Quinn Priester trade. The Sox had acquired Priester from the Pirates, watched him post some mediocre results for a bit, then traded him to Milwaukee. Priester immediately flourished with the Brewers after the deal. In this case, the Sox acquired Harrison as part of last year’s Devers trade. His results last year were so-so. Now he’s been traded to Milwaukee and will open the season in that club’s rotation. Time will tell if he’s as immediately successful as Priester.
Though Devers was sent to San Francisco less than a year ago, the trade tree has already shot up to the canopy. The Sox got Hicks, Harrison, James Tibbs and Jose Bello in that deal. They quickly flipped Tibbs to the Dodgers to get Dustin May last year. May was a rental, so he’s gone. With Hicks and Harrison sent out this winter, Bello is the only player in the deal still in the system. Baseball America doesn’t consider him one of the top 30 prospects in the system. Boston did get Gage Ziehl and a player to be named later in the Hicks deal but had to give up Sandlin and two players to be named later. The Milwaukee deal brought in three players but also sent out three, so the branches of the Devers deal will keep spreading out for years to come.
Another key component of the Boston offseason was something they didn’t do. With Anthony’s graduation to the majors, the outfield felt crowded, with Rafaela, Duran and Abreu all in the mix, in addition to Masataka Yoshida. It felt possible that the Sox would flip someone out of that group, most likely Duran or Abreu, but they never did. It seems they will try to find playing time for the four primary outfielders by using the designated hitter spot. That could leave Yoshida as an overpaid bench bat, at least until an injury opens up some playing time.
There has been a lot of roster turnover when looking at the past year but it all adds up to put the Sox in what seems like a good position. They have a lot of young and controllable pieces in the lineup and rotation. They have enough outfield depth that they would still be in a good spot even if there’s a significant injury. They have one of the best rotations in the league. Injuries will inevitably pop up but Tolle is waiting in Triple-A. Kutter Crawford and Patrick Sandoval could get healthy during the season. Casas could also be in game shape in the coming weeks. Perhaps injuries will open a path for him but he could also end up as a notable deadline trade chip now that Contreras is at first.
The AL East is tough to predict. All five teams feel like contenders but they can’t all make the playoffs. Some team will hit roadblocks and end up having a disappointing year. It happened to the Orioles in 2025 and the Blue Jays in 2024. There are no guarantees for any club but the Sox appear to be in a decent position to stay strong over a long season.
How would you grade the Red Sox' offseason?
Photo courtesy of Andrew West, Imagn Images
I give it a solid B, maybe B+.
I like the Suarez signing and the trades for Contreras, Durbin, and Gray. Sticking to the Durbin trade, I think Monasterio will prove to be an underrated addition and netting Milwaukee’s draft pick essentially gets us our second rounder back that was forfeited to sign Suarez. Also, I think we will likely look back on the Perales for Bennett swap as a win a few years down the road, but still plenty of time for that one to go either way.
Was fine with trading Berny at the time beacuse I assumed that it was part of a larger plan to upgrade the bullpen, but they never really found a better lefty than them so that’s one move I’d second guess. I still think our bullpen looks very solid overall, but if there is one likely weak spot it’s lacking LHP depth behind Chapman so now in retrospect that’s a move I might nitpick. I’m not familiar enough with Oviedo’s game to know how I feel about that move yet. I like the Password so I was sad they traded him, also thought he would’ve been a bit more valuable than what he was ultimately able to fetch but that just goes to show how differently teams can be thinking vs. the public prospect rankings. But if Johan pitches well and holds down a rotation spot, all’s well that ends well.
Hated how they handled the Bregman situation, failing to land Alonso – or really, any other significant power bat. That was a known need that they even acknowledged in public, and proceeded to do nothing about it. So I can’t give them an A. But in general I am pleased which is more than I can say about most of the last 6 winters, so I’m not going to complain. I’m ready for baseball.
We need better luck with health this season, so hopefully Roman, Marcelo, Wilyer, and everybody rested up over the winter and are ready to come strong out of the gate. Can’t wait for opening day!
Dirty – Good post. Why do you think they had bad luck with injuries last year? On the SP side only Houck was significant. OF was very healthy except month for Anthony. Infield. was a couple months for Bregman, that’s it. Mayer, Casas and Abreu are always hurt. Story too, and he played almost every game!
I say it was bad luck more due to timing of the injuries and the impact they caused more so than the number of days lost to the IL.
Abreu was in a nice groove but then hit the shelf for a month at the worst time to where he wasn’t able to get locked back in to contribute for the playoffs.
Roman’s injury being just enough to keep him out through the Wild Card so we had to go into NY without our best player.
Bregman missing 6 weeks and then going from tremendously locked in at the plate to being a completely different player. Dropped from great in the first half (157 OPS+) to average in August (105 OPS+) and horrible in September (82 OPS+).
Narvaez playing through his knee injury and being worthless at the plate in the second half.
And then of course Casas and Mayer spent lots of time hurt, again. Which like you said, has become all too common.
Overall I would say that all adds up to pretty tough luck in the injury department. It’s a long season, I’m not expecting it to be injury-free, but I think it’s fair to say most years we should not be so unfortunate as to have 80% of our best players simultaneously either on the DL or playing (poorly) through lingering issues.
Dirty – I get what you’re saying. Me personally if you count on a Ln injury-prone player, You kinda made your own bed (Casas).
Abreu always starts out strong then fades, hopefully he can stay healthy all season.
For sure, it’s not like it was out of left field when it came to Cases and Mayer getting hurt, and it was known Narvy had a torn meniscus. People could’ve seen that coming and plenty probably would say they did. But I don’t think there was any reason to expect Roman, Bregman, or Dobbins (another guy I forgot to mention above) to miss extended periods of time like they did. And Abreu played 130 games in ’24, so I guess personally I wasn’t expecting conditioning to be an issue. Hope we get to see the WBC version of Wilyer Abreu all summer long! That would go a long way toward filling the pwoer void trading Devers created.
Good posts and here’s to a successful season. I not entirely sure what that would entail but I’m assuming some combination of playoff baseball and improvement from our young players. As a bills fan and Red Sox fan I’ve seen enough injuries to last for a while!
I’m not sure why so many people bring up Bregman when talking about a power bat. He really wasn’t one and really isn’t likely to be much of one going forward.
King – agreed. Bregman’s age and injury history now make him a player that I am glad was not re-signed. If injuries do not decimate the team, I think the Red sox will score enough runs considering their defense and pitching is much improved. You do not need to out slug opponents if your defense is not giving up unearned runs and your pitching is you in games.
It would be very ironic if Durbin ends up hitting more HRs this year than Bregman did last year… or this year.
He’s definitely a tier below Alonso and Schwarber and Bichette with the stick, no argument from me there. But he is still a good enough hitter that he counts as an impact player to me, and that’s before accounting for his defense and leadership. I have a feeling he will be missed and think he still has a few good years left, but I understand not wanting to go to 6 or 7 years on him. It just sucks that the way they handled it involved pissing off Devers to the point they had to trade him, only to be here a year later where we have neither of them.
where we have neither of them.
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Bregman’s contract was always interpreted as a one-year deal. This is not like he was a l/t RS player.
IRT to Devers, we basically traded Devers for Suarez + Durbin.
Dirty – He was definitely an impact bat the first few weeks of last year, but I agree with Ken he isn’t a “power” bat. He hasn’t had an SLG above .462 since 2019, it’s just the name recognition that has some people calling him a “power” bat.
He’s been a “power” bat only in 2018-2019 when he combined for a .561 SLG
Gee, I wonder what the reason is for his SLG to crash down to .448 from 2020-2025. Maybe I’ll ask Marwin Gonzalez, I bet he’d know ;O)
As for Raffy, he’d be gone even if the Sox never signed Bregman. It’s been documented they were adamant about getting a new 3B, and Arenado would have been the likely replacement.
That’s interesting, I guess I missed that story because I did not know they were dead set on replacing him either way. Defensively it was absolutely the right thing and if anything overdue. I’m fine with that part of it. But if they handled the situation with more tact he could be our 1B/DH – albeit a moderately overpaid one, but for 30+ HR and a 130 or better OPS+ every year, certainly not an overpay that kills you. The really bad overpays are the ones for unproductive players, which he is not close to being. Given the contract Schwarber just got ($30 M AAV at age 33), you could even make the point that Raffy is only overpaid in terms of years but not dollars.
They may have felt they would have an easy time replacing his slugging for cheaper, but lo and behold here we are almost a full year later and they haven’t, after striking out on all the big free agent bats and only being able to pry Contreras loose from the trade market.
Dirty – Yeah it’s been mentioned everywhere a deal for Arenado was ready to go if Bregman hadn’t signed last year.
“By most accounts, the Sox were ready to pull the trigger on an Arenado deal last February before they got creative and handed Bregman the opt-out stacked holdover disguised as a three-year deal.”
overthemonster.com/red-sox-comentary/94937/will-th…
That was a great read, thanks for sharing. I remember the constant speculation of Arenado being an option but I didn’t recall ever hearing anything was imminent or agreed upon. But it definitely makes sense. And I think their thesis on how the Sox approach negotiations is probably dead-on.
Dirty- I think a B+ is generous. I am more C+/B-. It just seemed like too often they were going for plan B or C because they were not getting who they wanted. I agree with you that we never did get the power bat and if the spring training games are any indication we could use someone who could hit homers on a regular basis.
I do think the pitching could make up for it. I am a bit concerned with Suarez’s numbers in the WBC and spring training. I am just hoping he is not hiding an injury and the results will improve dramatically once the season starts and he settles in.
I am looking forward to games that count and hopefully them winning the majority! I am happily ready to change my grade to that B+ or higher if all goes well.
because they were not getting who they wanted.
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I gave them a B+ because they did NOT chase those guys.
Joe- I don’t disagree that most of the players they were after got too big of a contract. We will see in time if they ended up being worth it. I think on occasion you need to be willing to overpay if the player is a big enough priority (Bregman for example). I was a bit surprised about Suarez getting as big of a contract since he was not someone who had been discussed much. I also was not expecting the Gray trade. Not that I am against it just taking into account his age not sure how many innings we can get. I likely should be saying a B as they should be improved compared to last year unless there are issues with any of the new pitchers.
That’s fair, they sure did have to do a lot of “pivoting” off of guys they supposedly were more interested in. I liked the backup plans enough that I was willing to give Breslow a break on that, but you’re not wrong and I can’t blame you for feeling that way.
Agreed on Suarez, I’m just trying to stay hopeful that it’s just a veteran who is easing into it and he’ll show us another gear in due time. Much rather see him do great work in the summer and October than the WBC, which he still could. Here’s hoping!
they sure did have to do a lot of “pivoting” off of guys
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I’m betting that’s the same for every team but the LAD. Most teams don’t get the players they target, and they all have contingency plans.
But more importantly, the only way to prevent a pivot is to overpay. For a very few elite players, like Judge, Ohtani, Skubal, etc., you simply pay the money. But the guys we pivoted from are all replaceable.
Dirty – I’m beginning to wonder if this spring is a repeat of 2019 when Cora didn’t have the pitching staff properly prepared to start the regular season. It’s kinda weird there are so many Sox pitchers who performed very poorly in their final ST appearance, when pitchers normally treat it as a regular season game.
Fever- It did seem strange how poorly our starting pitchers did in general for much of the spring. I don’t know what role the WBC has in that as it certainly is not like the spring training of the past.
Completely agree and I probably should have given them more credit for the positive moves they did make.
It really has been a while though since they last flexed their muscles and just went out and got a guy who was a major FA and made perfect sense for the team needs. When was the last time – Price? I’m struggling to think of a more recent example since so many of the major acquisitions of late have been by trade, or guys who signed late enough in the offseason that there’s no way you can argue they went all out to just make it happen.
Dirty – Nate was the last big free agent they signed with other teams competing for him, that was Dave in the winter of 2018-2019.
There was no serious competition for Yoshida and Story, despite their large contracts.
That’s right, I forgot they actually let Nate hit the market before re-signing him. But that sums it up, every big player they’ve signed in the last 10 years except Eovaldi, Price, and Yoshida has been someone they waited out until the offseason was pretty much almost over and capitalized on their slow market.
Martinez, Story, and Bregman are the three biggest outside names they’ve signed in that time, and Bregman was the earliest of the trio to sign – in mid-February. Story was a late March signing and JDM was late February. I guess you could argue they signed Yoshida pretty quickly, but then again they had to because of how the posting system works. And like you said, there wasn’t much competition for him and the contract was pretty much immediately derided as an overpay.
It would be nice if for a change they would remind us of the old days and just do what it takes to pony up and get a guy to sign, like what Theo did back in the day with guys like Schilling, Foulke, Renteria, Lackey, Dice K, etc.
Dirty- That was why I gave them a lower grade. Joe was right in his comments about the players we were after being overpaid and likely not worth the contract they got, but if the main goal for the offseason was to sign Bregman (whether that was good or not) they should have gotten him. Hopefully it all works out in the end.
Fever- Looks like Crochet is just fine, I guess I didn’t need to worry. It may just be that when he gets into real game action he naturally kicks into that next level.
It was interesting that none of the new offensive players got a hit and Durbin got an error, while all of our regulars from last year got at least one hit. I think there is much more pressure on the new players who are trying to prove to the fans they belong there. I think all of them will settle in and have a solid year. I have really high hopes for Durbin.
Uncle – The Crochet situation didn’t make sense. He was visibly upset with himself during that last ST game, and he confirmed it after the game, which obviously leads us to believe he was trying for good results as if it was a regular season game. I’m not gonna put too much thought into it though, if he was holding back for concerning reasons we will soon find out.
Yeah Contreras looked really bad in the WBC and while he’s an obvious improvement over guys like Toro and Lowe, I’m expecting a very average offensive season from him around 20 HR with a .780 OPS.
I’m not concerned about Durbin’s defense, but I don’t think he’s gonna get a GG nomination this year. IKF is a much better fielder, but can’t hit especially against LHP which is why starting him over Monasterio was asinine. There is definitely a possibility of offensive regression with Durbin for the many reasons I outlined in prior posts.
BTW – If it makes you feel better, Bregman didn’t do much at the plate yesterday and he committed an error.
The Red Sox front office confuses me more than any other. At times it seems like they have no plan. The Betts trade was horrible. The Devers/Bregman situation was a mess. They trade Teel and then ask for him back later. They’re all over the place on extensions. Regardless, they will make the playoffs and possibly contend. Their player development has certainly carried them.
It certainly does feel like they’re just making it up as they go at times. Being a fan of this team is a roller coaster ride, but a damn fun one most of the time.
As much as I appreciate Breslow, this is sometimes what happens when you put a former player in that job with no real GM helping him out. He flies by the seat of his pants because he doesn’t know what he’s doing sometimes
lefty – Exactly! I’ve been saying that since he was hired. Prior to Bloom, there was a HOF executive in the Sox front office every year since 2002 …. Dombrowski and Lucchino.
Theo and Cherington both had Lucchino mentoring them, in fact Lucky surrounded Theo with a superteam of highly experienced executives (and Bill James).
Who does Breslow have? Sam Kennedy, nuf ced.
I don’t think it’s a silly thing they gave Teel away then checked in on him again, every gm would’ve take Crochet for Teel, but since Teel is still a good player who’d fit with the sox, why not check in again and see if there’s any way to get him back.
I agree. Trading for Crochet was a no brainer, and unfortunately as awesome as a prospect as Teel was, that’s the cost of doing business.
On the other hand, the White Sox have also had another awesome young catcher emerge alongside him in Edgar Quero. It makes perfect sense to give them a call and see if they’re high enough on Quero to the point they’d be interested in exchanging Teel back for a couple other guys at different positions. If they don’t, they don’t, but no harm in asking.
Heck, if they’re actually all in on Teel, I’d be just as happy to ask them about their price to move Quero.
The fact that CWS had Quero makes me think that Teel wasn’t a necessary part of the deal. This is all assumptions but: They probably wanted a top prospect, Anthony clearly off the table. So Mayer, Campbell, Teel. The Sox were in love with Campbell, so it probably came down to Mayer and Teel. CWS has Colson Montgomery at SS, so it was probably a toss up between those two.
That being said, given the complete lack of C depth with the Red Sox I would have said Anthony and Teel were untouchable. Get the deal done elsewhere, there’s enough firepower.
I think the Red Sox love of guys like Campbell and Tolle, guys who have one trait that evaluators love but guys that they need to really develop, will come back to bite them when they can’t magically teach those guys all the other hard parts of the game.
You could be right. I would also say though that many young catchers often either flame out or need a long time adjusting to the majors, maybe the presence of Quero didn’t deter them from another great catcher prospect because they may have viewed it as improving their odds of winding up with an impact catcher. If they end up with two, they’ll be able to trade one for a boatload because there are way fewer of them than there are good shortstops.
Those definitely were all assumptions.
Joemo I think one of those guys isn’t like the other.
KC had a great 2024 and rocketed up the charts as a prospect. He did it so much so that he was labeled as can’t miss by a lot of fans. The problem that I pointed out was the end of the 2024 season when he was promoted to AAA Worcester. When he arrived he was ripping through the minors and for the first week he ripped through AAA as well. The problem was after that and up to the point they shut him down. AAA pitchers are pretty savvy and it didn’t take them long to take advantage of that hitch in his swing and the propensity to dive out over the plate. They started to bust him in and then get him to chase down and in breaking pitches and he struggled to end the season. I remember one at bat at the end of the season in 2024 after striking out he went back to the bench shaking his head, he was shut down shortly after.
If we then are objective in 2025 his spring training was awful offensively. He didn’t earn the right to second base he was not only bad defensively he had a horrible offensive preseason. He was given the position at second anyway and for the first month big league pitchers tried to beat him away with fastball and breaking pitches but that was his strength and he hammered the ball. Fast forward to the next month and big league pitchers started throwing inside and he hasn’t recovered since.
Payton Tolle is a completely different animal. Yes he rocketed through the minors like KC. Yes when he started his journey through the minors he relied on his four seam and slider and he was somewhat exposed in the big leagues in 2025. If you think he is a one trick pony then you clearly have watched him pitch in spring training. His last two outing especially show how far his pitching repertoire has come.
Payton Tolle is now throwing a two seam sinking fastball to go with his four seamer out of the same arm slot. This is the type of fastball quality that makes Bryan Woo so good. He has also seemed to of scrapped that slider for more of a hard cutter and his curveball has shown to be a very effective swing and miss pitch. The only secondary pitch that hasn’t taken a giant leap forward is the kick change. He still seems to be having trouble with that pitch. It doesn’t matter though he has enough secondaries now to be a very effective starter and I expect we will see him by mid season and he will never look back. Tolle I’m very confident in him being at worst a middle rotation starter and KC otoh might be a bust due to his poor defense.
Bruin – Great post as always!
So do you agree Tolle should have remained with the club, either as a starter or as a reliever?
Personally I’m not very confident in Moran or Watson. I’m guessing Tolle could be called up within a month or so, but not before some close games are lost because of the middle relievers.
FPG,
I think Tolle was rightly sent down to AAA to continue to hone his secondaries. He has shown me so much improvement in the secondaries I am more convinced that his ceiling is that of a number 1 starter. My guess is he will absolutely dominate AAA hitters and force his way into the rotation by mid season either due to injury or one of the five starters not being effective.
If all goes well for Boston and no injuries and the starters are all very effective, a pipe dream I know, then at the very least I think they will have to put him in the big league pen to end the season. I think it’s the right move to continue to develop him as a starter in AAA. If you throw out his first spring training start there is argument to be made he was the most dominant pitcher on the team this spring.
Side note FPG and all Red Sox fans after hearing what was said about Eyanson on the backfields and seeing what he did in the breakout game a week ago he’s the guy to watch.
He’s gone from throwing 93-94 in college to holding 97-98 touching 100 this spring. His secondaries are absolutely filthy. The one inning I watched the Orioles hitters had no chance against this guy. When he was drafted I watched an interview with this guy and told a buddy of mine that’s the guy to watch. I also wouldn’t sleep on Hayden Mullins. I think they might finally convert him to being a reliever this year him Tyler Samaniego I expect big things out for the pen this year as long as the move Mullins to the pen.
Bruin- Do you see KC getting his offense figured out well enough to handle major league pitching? I assume if he could hit well enough he might be able to provide passable defense in the outfield or at 1st. I hate to give up as he seemed to have raw talent and certainly was hyped up enough.
I think the more I read about Tolle the more I realize his upside is higher than I had envisioned.
Don’t know that name. I will try to remember to follow Eyanson. Samaniego certainly seemed to put himself on the radar this spring and had plenty of opportunities. I wondered if he might even make the team. The stats did not seem to justify giving Watson a place on the roster. Plenty of young guys to be rooting for!
Soto – That’s like saying I really like the Mustang I bought and it doesn’t matter if the salesman conned me into paying $200K for it. Overpays are bad no matter how good the return has been.
I would be shocked if they have even a little regret trading Teel in the Crochet trade. What is the harm in circling back to see if you can reacquire him? They also have Quero so it would not be completely out of the question for the White Sox to listen on one of them.
I think I heard that Quero is not a gem defensively. Anyone hear the same? I could look it up, but… just relying on the rest of you.
The Betts trade was the previous FO so really needs to be let go at this point. The Devers/Bregman thing is as much on Cora as it is the FO. Cora was the largest driving force behind the pursuit of Bregman, and also the one who kept “selling” the notion that he was going to play 2B when he knew all along he was planning on having him supplant Devers at 3B. IMO Cora doesn’t get near the heat for that mess turning into what it did as he deserves. The Teel stuff though is all on Breslow. It appears he made that decision between headlining the trade with Teel or Mayer based solely over hanging onto the higher rated prospect at the time (Mayer) vs an assessment of which one filled future needs of the team better (Teel). Hopefully he learned from that.
The situation with Devers was Devers fault. 100%.
Here is how it went down.
Devers showed up early to spring training and was unable to even take live batting practice let alone practice in the field because of his shoulders. His 1st batting practice against live pitching was March 15th, 10 days before the season started. At that point he still could not take infield practice. Even though he couldnt physically perform at 3B he threw a hissy fit when asked to move to DH and refused.
Subsequently the Red Sox signed Bregman to play 3B. That signing was after they found out that Devers could not play 3B because of his injuries.
Months later they asked Devers to practice at 1B because Casas was out for the rest of the season and once again he threw a hissy fit and refused.
All of that was his fault and his fault alone.
Ken – YES!!! Mayer was the higher rated prospect, and I do think the uncertainty surrounding Story was also a factor.
Either way, competent young catchers who can hit well are like gold and Breslow should have known that. Obviously the ChiSox knew that, which is why they accepted Teel even though they already had Quero.
B. I’d go for an A had they added a top tier bat like Bichette or Alonso, but what they did feels like it has the team in a good spot to contend (and admittedly with less long-term overhead that a Bichette or Alonso would have required). Haven’t felt so optimistic about the Sox rotation in years.
Getting rid of Devers, his bad attitude and worse glove, and the money he was owed almost pushed it to an A for me but ultimately I voted for a B.
Really glad Breslow did not overreact to losing Bregman by going after a future DH like Alonso or another really bad glove like Bichette. Instead he got the RHB we needed at 1B and a good glove with high contact at 3B
The rotation is the best we have seen in a long time.
Let’s get ready for some baseball that counts.
I was really hoping for a Schwarber reunion, though he re-signed with Philly so quickly it seems likely he was not seriously looking to leave the Phils. If that is indeed the case, can’t hold that against the Sox FO (at least not Breslow’s FO, different story with Chaim who let him leave in the first place), but I’ll still always be sad thinking of what could’ve been with him.
The problem with Schwarber is each time he was a free agent the Sox already had a player locked into the DH spot leaving no roster spot for Schwarber. Or in the case of this year needing the DH spot to rotate multiple players through along with the 3 OF spots.
King- The issue was that in every case that I can remember Schwarber would have been a huge upgrade to who we had at DH. I think there was the potential to lock him up early on for a more reasonable contract and imagine the impact he could have had. I know we can’t go back and time to move on. We made plenty of moves to improve the team, so should be a fun season.
Didn’t realize that a trade that occurred mid season would impact the off-season grade 🤷♂️
Base – agreed, for all the reasons you stated.
1) Devers bad glove, bad contract, and bad attitude needed to go.
2) Alonso, Bichette, and Schwarber can’t play D, and the Red Sox were already the worst defensive team in the MLB.
3) The grades at 1B, 2B, and 3B defensively will help the upgraded pitching immensely (not to forget 2 gold glovers in the outfield)
4)IMO, the offense will score enough runs to win a lot of games the defense and pitching cost them the last few years making them a playoff team again
I’m gonna give’em a 4 for a couple reasons, A. I don’t necessarily like the alphabet grading system & 2. It’s Opening Day, so there’s that. Carry on. 🤣
Solid B. They finally addressed the rotation with real pitching upgrades. Defensively they should be a much better team. The only miss is they didn’t land a bigger bat than Willson Contreras
The thing about Mayer’s struggles being related to injury is that Mayer is injured for a significant portion of the season pretty much every year. Dude’s got real Bobby Crosby vibes.
As goes Anthony, so go the Red Sox. Of course, that’s barring a pitching meltdown. They need a handful of players to have excellent seasons. I’d say Duran, Abreu, Durbin, Story, Contreras, Rafaela, Mayer. If those guys do what they’re capable of, the lineup will be plenty to support pitching.
hayzee – My God man, if you can fit all seven players in your hand you must have Johnny Bench beat!
One thing that has been a bit under-reported this off-season was the structure of the Ranger Suarez contract. The Red Sox are only paying him 6mil in 2026 with the majority (70mil) being paid in the last two years of the contract. This is exactly the opposite of what you would want from a large market team as front-loaded contracts with deferrals allows for lower AAV numbers for CBT purposes.
I’m happy with the off-season in general, but Ranger’s backloaded contract along with the Hicks money-dump show just how cash-strapped they are right now. Hopefully it doesn’t restricted them when it comes to in-season moves.
I don’t see a problem with backloaded contracts. Revenue should increase and so should the CBT thresholds.
Possibly (we should be less certain given the CBA status), but they’re still paying an overall surplus in order to spend tomorrow’s money today in terms of the CBT number. If they front-loaded the contract with a lower total value and/or added deferrals then they would have even more money to spend in the future.
The Red Sox know this but chose to structure the contract as-is due to a lack of funds or unwillingness to spend more.
Suarez’s contract counts for CBT purposes as $26 million/year for 5 years. Frontloading, backloading, they don’t matter for CBT purposes. It only matters when the player is traded, and a new AAV is calculated based on what’s left of the contract. (So, hypothetically, a team that acquired Suarez for the last two years would be looking at a CBT yearly hit of $35 million, not a carryover of the $26.)
Another example: Roman Anthony is being paid $2.65 million this year. His CBT hit for the same year? 16.25 million!
The CBT treats front-loaded and back-loaded contracts the same, but by front loading contracts, as the Dodgers commonoly do, it provides more value to the player, allowing the team to lower the overall value, and therefore the CBT, in other ways.
Ideally every large market team should be looking to front-load contracts coupled with deferrals as the Dodgers do on their large free agent signings.
For Suarez the 130mil contract is valued at closer to the $115mil he was expected to sign for than the 130mil because he’s making the majority of the money in the later years (it’s 7,15,30,30,35,35,10) – if the Red Sox had inversely front-loaded the contract they could have signed him for closer to 100mil and saved ~6mil year toward the CBT. The only reason to backload in the manner they did is due to a lack of cashflow or budget available.
To put it simply: it’s always better to get 35mil now and 7mil in 5 years rather than 7mil now and 35mil in 5 years. For those who are rich the difference is far greater than it is for most as they can generate more value from the interest on their investments (this is the reason why deferrals between owners and players work as well).
@Horace
That’s not how it works anymore.
The last CBA changed the rules so there is now an adjusment for all front-loaded and back-loaded contracts. With Devers, for example, the Red Sox will incure ~2mil per year dead charge toward the CBT throughout the rest of his contract because it was backloaded to a much lesser degree.
That would explain the $2million/year assigned to Devers that I see in Cot’s Contracts for upcoming years–thanks. I’m feeling a little dense in that I’m not glomming onto the reasoning yet.
That’s exactly it.
I don’t think that’s how deferrals work. Pretty sure that, as long as you pay the $130M over the 5 years of the contract, there are no deferrals.
Suarez’s deal has no deferral money
RS CBT hit is 26M
If they trade him after the 2027 season. The receiving team’s CBT hit would be @32M.
And that’s presuming the new deal doesn’t throw a monkey wrench in all the fuzzy math CBT business
Backloaded deals are always better financially presuming the same total money. The strategic loss may outweigh the financial gain. Suarez’s deal is skewed heavily backloaded. Who knows?
Presuming Bregman means no Suarez. I like the pivot. If they’re equally productive as their history says. I’ll take the SP. Add Suarez is younger and 40M less over 5 years
SP SP SP.
That’s not how contract trades work anymore.
There’s an adjustment for all backloaded/frontloaded contracts – there’s no advantage in terms of trades since the last CBA.
Backloaded contracts are a good thing based on time value of money. $30 million in 2030 is the equivalent of about $24 million today if you discount at 5%, which you can easily earn on investment grade-rated bonds right now. Not a huge deal from the CBT POV because his salaries are averaged out for those purposes. It also presents less cash flow issues because his big salaries don’t kick in until after Story, Yoshida, Gray, Contreras, and Sandoval’s salaries roll off the books over the next couple years. The only risk from the resource perspective is if you think we are going to get an aggressive salary cap after the lockout. While the owners are definitely going to be fighting for something in that department, I think even if they are successful we end up with a system that doesn’t have a ton of teeth. Closer to the NBA model where there’s a million ways teams can go over the cap without issue rather than the NFL model that is far stricter. The NFL model only works because of non-guaranteed money, which is going to be a non-starter. But that’s a whole separate conversation so I’ll cut myself off here.
Exactly, it’s better for John Henry to backload the contract while it’s better for Suarez to frontload the contract. But by CBT, they’re identical.
So by backloading the contract it artifically inflates the CBT, which is the exact opposite of what each team should be doing IF they have the money to operate that way – clearly the Red Sox do not at this time.
Solid signings and trades, time for the KIDS to show their stuff, I also went B because I think their defense will be much better and that will help translate to more W’s and less E’s….
I went with a B for all the same reasons most everyone else said. I suppose we’ll see if they can win without a big 30-40 HR guy. There are threats up and down the lineup though. Outside of Durbin, every guy is a legit HR threat. We shall see.
But speaking of Durbin, I believe he is trophy of the entire off season. We’ve been fortunate lately to see highly touted young players get to BOS and have varying levels of success. Durbin finished 3rd in ROY voting last year. I mean, what a steal. Granted I think Harrison will be solid, but to get a young disciplined player who fills a huge hole at 3B was outstanding. It saved Breslows butt from the Bregman ordeal and I would bet Durbin will be in the 2 hole before long. (That’s batting second, you sickos)
I’m pumped for tomorrow. I don’t remember being this optimistic for a Red Sox season since the mid-oughts. They made it through ST with no injuries and have a full roster ready to go. Let’s go Sox!!! Tremendously locked in!
The Red Sox should have such a balanced line-up that they don’t need a 30+ HR guy to score a lot of runs (although I think they will have 2 in 2026). The Blue Jays were an out away from winning the WS and their top 2 HR hitters were Springer (32) and Guerrero (23). I think the Red Sox will finish in the top five in runs scored in the AL this season. With their pitching depth, they could be playing in November! Play ball!
D.
To me, Boston has been very hard to understand for a couple of years; inconsistent designs on roster construction from year to year, high turnover in the management/FO, bizarre helter-skelter internal evaluations of their own players, and an Ownership that seems…erratic and sometimes tone-deaf.
Betts, Story, Bregman, Devers, Sale, Yoshida; these players and their situations in/with BOS played out in ways I think most other teams would have avoided. And on the flip side, they’ve been one of the more aggressive teams in signing up the young core (Bello, Campbell, Devers, Anthony, Rafella, Crochet). They’ll spend on their own unproven talent, but then nickel-n-dime/nit-pick prime/proven players? Their public statements and actions are frequently misaligned.
This off-season was an even further illustration of the discombobulated approach. Losing both Devers and Bregman in the lineup is a big self inflicted wound. Last year’s lineup was a better opening day line-up than this years. Anthony is no-doubt impressive, and budding superstar. Wilson Contreras is solid, but not (yet?) at the level of Devers or Bregman. But it’s Boston, not Cleveland; the AL East, not the Central, seems very light in the lineup.
Sonny Gray and Ranger Suarez do make the rotation better. But the rotation depth might not be robost for 162. Furthermore, is their rotation such an obvious strength to offset having the only lineup without a 30 HR hitter in the AL East? (Okay, yes, Story hit 37/35 HR in COL(!) in 2018/2019(!!))
No 30 HR hitter in the lineup. A pitching staff that needs to be healthy w/o under-performance. They were a sub .500 team for 3 years, then last year were suddenly better. Maybe that was more to do with TB and BAL having colossal aborations than pure progression of their team (stadium in TB, BAL having every wheel fall off the wagon).
Sorry. The ‘D’ is a bit harsh, but I honestly don’t see how ’26 team is better then the ’25 opening day team. And it’s Boston, who have the dollars and prospect capital to make any number of competitive moves (as they had in previous off-seaons), it seems like they did a lot of moving around just to end up further back.
I’ve been wrong before, and I could be wrong here, but I’m trying to be honest and fair. I do feel for the fans of BOS; it seems like a hard organization right now to have much trust/faith in. Idk.
2 cents, and out!
Play ball!!
Not a Red Sox fan, but the people giving a C grade seem crazy to me. Just adding Sonny Gray and Ranger Suarez to starting staff gets them in strong B+ territory. Not resigning Bregman could turn out to be a smart move in long run. I gave them a somewhat generous A, and feel they are most likely team in AL East to challenge Toronto.
don – On the NESN/Red Sox pregame show, all three guys picked the Sox to win 90-91 games and none of them believe they will win the division. One likes the Yankees, another likes the O’s, and another likes the Jays.
What a burn that Hamilton didn’t make the list of Notable Losses.
swan – Kinda ironic considering today he had a hit, 2 walks, scored 2 runs, drove in a run, stole 3B off old friend Newcomb, all while playing both SS & 3B.
I think you could give the Red Sox an A or B+.
Yes, one of Breslow’s stated offseason goals was to acquire a powerful right-handed hitter, but given who was on the market (Alonso, E. Suarez), I can’t call Bregman and Bichette power hitters, so the Red Sox took a different approach.
They acquired Wilson Contreras, finally solving their long-awaited first base problem and thus replacing Bregman’s bat.
The Red Sox also addressed their infield, which had been defensively inconsistent in recent years.
Durbin is exactly the type of player the Sox have been missing.
This guy is a beast, he’s stubborn, and he’ll play until his last breath.
Many are already comparing him to Pedroia in terms of playing style and personality, and I couldn’t agree more.
Marcelo Mayer earned his spot in spring training—well deservedly so. I hope he stays healthy.
I’d love to see what Marcelo can do in a full, healthy season.
The starting rotation has been strengthened by the experienced Sony Gray and Ranger Suarez.
I’m really happy that Early won the battle for the last spot on the team; I’m really rooting for him.
I think Bello and Early will have a strong season this year.
Oviedo will start the season in the bullpen, which should strengthen him.
Our outfield is excellent – I think any MLB coach would be envious of such an outfield and such versatility.
While previous seasons were less encouraging, this year there is more confidence that this team can achieve a lot.
Both Contreras and IKF are ex catchers…. maybe IKF should get his gear back on then they wouldn’t have to carry Wong… then his 6 million dollar contract would actually be worth it….. Or when Casas is ready, maybe Contreras can catch when Narvy is off and again no need for Wong…. yes there is sarcasm in this post… so don’t take this as serious.
It’s a solid A- for me.
At times it definitely looked haphazard, but by the end of the offseason the Sox ended up with what might be the best rotation with both quality and depth, a very strong outfield that is 4 deep in case of injury, and an infield that is solid across the board offensively and should field much better than last year.
Most of what they traded away was lower quality depth peices which would have been hard pressed to get a lot of playing time anyway, so they didn’t lose much despte everything they got in return. I think the trades were generally A/A+
They missed out on the big bopper 40HR type of bat, but I’m more or less ok with that. I don’t think the Alonso contract is going to age well in the final few years of that deal, and Bregman may be similar. Schwarber would have been nice to see back on the team though.
Contreras will probably hit 20-25 HRs and while Durbin may only hit 10-15 HRs, he may hit 30-40 doubles playing pepper with the Monster all season long, so a .750 OPS wouldn’t surprise me.
I am concerned about Story staying healthy all year, but I guess that’s why they signed IKF? And I also worry about Bello regressing as some of his peripherals weren’t great last year, but they have the pitching depth to cover for him if that happens.
In short, I think the floor has been raised at many positions and they have the depth to weather injuries and give time off during the season to keep everyone fresh. I think they contend for the East, but fall a game or two short, making the playoffs as a wild card team with something around 92-93 wins.
I give it a B to B . I was disappointed that they could not get Bergman as I thought he fit well. As to one of the earlier comments about Casas’ in jury being inevitable, that was just not true. He was hustling o first and just stepped wrong and destroyed his knee. Don’t diss the guy for an injury.