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What would a Red Sox teardown look like?
With reports that the Red Sox would entertain a Chris Sale trade circulating, not to mention the team passing on re-signing Nathan Eovaldi at a very reasonable rate, you have to wonder whether Chaim Bloom & Co. might look to consolidate some unpopular business, treat 2023 as a bridge year, and move their focus to 2024.
What would that look like?
It could take many forms. It could involve keeping some players you would assume would be part of a teardown–even if they punt on 2023, signing Rafael Devers for 12 years would still be a good idea–or it could involve trading everyone over the age of 24.
I think the big things to focus on are contract length and years of service. These are clearly priorities to this ownership and this baseball operations department. Thinking about it in this way, it’s clear which guys could find their way out the door.
Here are a list of moves that could comprise a punt-on-2023 plan:
Trade Chris Sale for prospects…but not yet
What you’d get back for Sale is up for debate, of course, but if the trade market views him as positive value and you can get something for him–and you’ve totally abandoned the possibility of competing in 2023–then it is clearly a good first move.
He is under control for two more years totalling $55 million, which would not be super valuable to a rebuilding team. But for a competitor hoping for some upside, it could be a good gamble.
The timing on this move is crucial though. The chances on Sale being a positive asset right now are slim, so the team would be better off holding him for the first half, allowing him to show he’s healthy, and then move him at the deadline to a contender. This strategy should facilitate him not exercising his veto of the trade as true contenders will be better known in July than they are in January.
Trade Trevor Story for prospects or a shorter-termed, shorter-money starting pitcher
Another situation where if you can find someone in the market to view him as positive value, I think you have to consider it. There are reports that the Red Sox decision makers are split on whether he can be a shortstop. If you don’t feel confident he can be a shortstop, it would be crazy to keep him. If we’re living in this new world where the Red Sox are penny-pinching, why would you spend big on a second baseman?
I see two possibilities for flipping Story: for whatever prospects you can pull back, or for a starting pitcher who is maybe overpaid, but maybe not as much as Story is. I’d start by calling the Giants after their underwhelming offseason and gauging their valuation of Story.
Sign Triston Casas long-term
If the Red Sox are really going to start planning and roster-building, they need to get serious about locking in some of their young guys early on, before they start wanting to go year to year. There aren’t a lot of 1B comps on long-term, buy-out-arb-and-free-agency deals, but maybe you take a handful of 3B and OF situations (KeBryan Hayes, Austin Riley, Michael Harris II, Ryan McMahon, Eugenio Suarez), mix them around in a blender, and find a number over 8-10 years that everyone likes.
Sign Brayan Bello long-term
Same thing I said about Casas, but for a pitcher. Look around at some of the long-term deals young pitchers have signed the last few years (Blake Snell, Kyle Freeland, Spencer Strider, Sandy Alcantara) and find a number for 7-8 years that guarantees Bello big money and buys out at least a couple free agent years
Trade Alex Verdugo…or sign him long-term?
I’m not really a Verdugo guy, however there is value in a solid, average major leaguer, particularly one that can add value on defense in the outfield and competently play right field at Fenway, which is not easy.
I’d shop him, but if the Red Sox can’t find a decent prospect package back, I’d start talking to him about a contract to bypass free agency. Old friend Andrew Benintendi just got $75 million over 5 years and has put up better offense, but doesn’t have the glove value. If the Red Sox could lock Verdugo up for five years at a lower value (say, $60 million?) it would be a savvy investment for a big-market team. At that number, barring injury, Verdugo would retain trade value, so the Sox could pull the ripcord at any trade deadline if they no longer wanted him.
…and make the same decision on Rafael Devers
This is obviously the most important decision, and it’s kind of silly that I’m burying it here after Verdugo. I would, obviously, prioritize extending Devers, but if the price is truly beyond what the team could imagine being comfortable with–if he says he wants 14 years at $30 million per and doesn’t budge, say–then it’s time to trade him right now. Get as close to a sure-thing positional prospect as you can find, some potential high-end pitching, and some lower-league fliers, and move on.
Type up a big, long list of names to move at the deadline–and deliver on it
Virtually everyone outside of the extended kids, Masataka Yoshida, and Devers and/or Verdugo must be dealt at the deadline: Kenley Jansen, Kiké Hernandez, Chris Martin, Nick Pivetta, James Paxton, Christian Arroyo, Reese McGuire, Rob Refsnyder, and any other reliever or bit player you want, they’re all available.
The Sox could bring back prospects or simply more years of control–for example, they might cash a year and a half of Pivetta to a contender looking for depth for a different starter who is in the majors, but has four or five years left and the Sox think has room to grow. The important thing is to get some sort of value back, rather than letting guys hit free agency for nothing, like they did for certain franchise shortstops.
What do you have at the end of this? A 75-win, completely forgettable 2023, but maybe in 2024 you’ve got the seeds planted for the next competitive run for this club.
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3 paths forward for the Red Sox
So the Padres signed Xander Bogaerts for eleventy trillion dollars over nine centuries.
I see three paths forward for the Red Sox strategically, setting aside ownership or front office changes, merely what they can do with the roster. Let’s look at them from most to least likely.
Path 1: Unsatisfying competence
The first possibility is–based on the history of this iteration of the front office–the most likely: Chaim Bloom and Co. search high and low for bargains, signing players no one cares about to contracts that seem vaguely reasonable, to mixed results. They continue to be #InterestKings in the trade market, but get beat out on Sean Murphy and Bryan Reynolds. They combine a handful of Brandon Nimmos and Jean Seguras and Justin Turners, maybe they even bring back a familiar face or two from the JD Martinez/Michael Wacha pile. They structure the deals to stay ever so slightly under the luxury tax (which, according to Cot’s, they are $43 million under) and then re-evaluate the roster at the deadline, should they surprisingly compete.
Despite the fact that virtually no one wants them to pursue this path, I rate it at about 90% likely.
Path 2: Bailing on 2023 and focusing completely on 2024 and beyond
Seeing how the fanbase and greater baseball world has reacted to their tepid forays into roster building, the Red Sox pivot and completely bail on 2023. Ownership gives Bloom a vote of confidence and says to continue to proceed with his/their vision of efficiency and financial prudence. They trade Rafael Devers for every prospect under the sun–or, shudder, staple Chris Sale’s contract to him and take back less, a la Mookie Betts and David Price–and focus entirely on developing Triston Casas and Brayan Bello and anyone else who might be close. They even tip-toe around the trade market for Trevor Story, seeing if anyone wants him for a song. And they fill out the roster with one- or two-year deals, opening themselves for taking back salaries of other teams’ unwanted players with prospects who offset the value. They skyrocket up the minor league rankings, promote aggressively from within, and get back to spending in the 2023 offseason after yet another last-place finish.
Doesn’t that sound fun? While frustrating to punt on yet another season, in many ways I’d rather see this path than the previous, but using a complex algorithm called estimation, I rate it as a 9% likelihood.
Path 3: Panic-reacting to the Bogaerts fallout/accusations of complacency
Fans and media members alike are excoriating the Red Sox organization, not just for perceived cheapness, but for the communication around said cheapness. They pitched themselves as so emotionally connected to Bogaerts, and so determined to bring him back…and then they got beat by $120 million. On the flight back from the Winter Meetings, they remember they’re in a massive market, they remember that elite talent leads to winning, and they try to correct their mistakes. They sign Carlos Correa for more than Bogaerts got over the same term, as well as add Koudai Senga to the rotation to give them enviable pitching depth. Having blown through the luxury tax, they bring back Christian Vazquez to split time with Reese McGuire and add Jean Segura as an extra infielder, allowing them to rotate regular players through the DH spot. They improve every aspect of their roster in the near term without sacrificing prospects. Oh, and they re-sign Rafael Devers for the remainder of his career, no opt-outs, no options, no funny business.
All it costs is money.
And while that would be both the most fun and in the best interest of the 2023 season, I rate it as a 1% chance.
And that may be high.
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Projected contracts from the MLBTR Top 50 that I like for the Red Sox
The Red Sox are allegedly planning for big spending this offseason, but it’s been underway for awhile and all they’ve done is sign a middle reliever. Cool. (MLB really needs to figure out a way to get back to the days of the hot stove).
So I thought it might be fun to read through the MLB Trade Rumors Top 50 free agent list from a different perspective: If their predictions are accurate, which contracts would I be happy to see the Red Sox end up with.
(1) Aaron Judge, 8/$332 million. I obviously don’t expect to be in on him, but Aaron Judge is awesome, it would be awesome to have him.
(2) Carlos Correa, 9/$288 million. Carlos Correa is also awesome, and it would also be awesome to have him. Like Judge, not exactly a popular player in this market, but he is a true superstar and Boston should be in the market for all superstars.
(4) Xander Bogaerts, 7/$189 million. If Bogaerts stays under $200 million or under 8 years, I think it’s probably a pretty good piece of business. I think my preferred outcome would be Philadelphia or Seattle overpays for him early and then we get aggressive on Correa.
(11) Kodai Senga, 5/$70 million. Personally, I don’t think there’s any way he goes for this little based on the number of teams interested and the fact that many of them are large markets. Sign me up.
(23) Nathan Eovaldi, 2/$34 million. Seems like an excellent compromise for a known commodity. I imagine he’ll work hard to pull another year from someone.
(26) Christian Vazquez, 3/$27 million. Good with a staff, known commodity, and we have no good options. I’m sure the organization is all fired up about making do with the cheapest possible guys, but this is a perfectly reasonable deal for a reliable veteran.
(40) Jean Segura, 2/$18 million. If we get cheap at shortstop, I wouldn’t be heartbroken to shift Story back to short and have Segura in at second. He’s a real baseball player.
(43) Michael Brantley, 1/$15 million. Good bat, no commitment. I’d love to see him or Conforto added in tandem with a trade of Verdugo and/or Duran.
(44) Michael Conforto, 1/$15 million. See above.
(49) Mike Clevinger, 1/$10 million. Seems like a no-brainer one-year gamble.
What did I learn from this exercise? I’m not in love with a lot of free agents, and the ones I like are either elite players, familiar faces, or rentals of known quality guys.
Piecing it all together, my ideal offseason would be extending Devers, adding Correa, Senga, Vazquez, and Brantley, bringing back Eovaldi, collecting a pick for Bogaerts, and trading Verdugo, Duran, and Houck for prospects. How’s that for being both a buyer and seller, Chaim?
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Every big team should be in on every big free agent
I am an analytical person by nature, and I by and large agree with the way that thoughtful, analytically driven sports teams build their talent. But one issue that has bothered me more than a reliance on a certain arcane stat or a resistance to spending money is simply the obsession with timing.
In Major League Baseball, particularly, every big team should be in on every big free agent, regardless of their circumstances. Particularly when that free agent represents a rare opportunity.
My case in point to friends has been, for years, Bryce Harper, who hit free agency ahead of his age 26 season. Harper was the rarest of rare: an uber-prospect who had actually delivered on the hype, the LeBron James of baseball, whose impact was only dimmed by the fact that single baseball players can only impact a team of 26 so much. The only concern for Harper was durability, as he played under 120 games in three of his seven seasons in Washington.
But he was also a Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player and six-time All-Star and one of the more marketable players in the game. His postseason numbers were not exactly Big Papi, but they also weren’t A-Rod. He was, barring injury, a sure-fire Hall of Famer.
Which made the lack of interest in his services somewhat confusing. Sure, if you go back into the MLB Trade Rumors archive you’ll see notes that eight teams had checked in on him, or that there was interest beyond what was being reported…but the only real known interest was from the Dodgers, Giants, and Phillies. The Dodgers only wanted a shorter, higher-AAV deal; the Giants balked at his eventual price, a then-record 13-year, $330 million deal with Philadelphia.
The problem is, that’s just three teams: Every other big team should have been in there making an offer. The Yankees should have been dying to put him in pinstripes, a chance to put a premier player into their market. Same for the Cubs, same for the Mariners, same for the Mets. And don’t get me started on the Red Sox, who presumably were saving their money in case they needed to re-sign Mookie Betts, Andrew Benintendi, Xander Bogaerts, and Rafael Devers.
These teams made excuses that don’t matter–they might need the money elsewhere; they already had a guy at the position; or, my least favorite, that the timing wasn’t right.
Who cares?
When you have endless revenue streams and a rabid fan base, you should do everything to acquire the best players, and figure out the other stuff later. Worry about your luxury tax issues with other positions; cheap out on a second baseman if it’s such a big deal. Maybe don’t play so much for a fourth starter.
And stop worrying that your farm system isn’t perfectly aligned to produce major leaguers every season, like the Dodgers. If you know what you’re doing, you’ll get there eventually.
Were the Phillies on the verge of a championship in 2019? No. But they are now, and because they smartly invested in one of the best players in baseball when he was available, they now have him–still very much in his prime–for what should be a pretty competitive period for them.
So when you see the Cubs talking about intelligent spending, or the Red Sox talking about spreading risk and maximizing marginal free agent dollars per win, and they don’t even think about talking to an Aaron Judge or Carlos Correa unless they can get some kind of deal, remember that these kinds of players only come around so often. If you’re a big club with big resources, you should do everything you can to be in on them.
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Is hitting the ball harder the key to Jackie Bradley, Jr.’s offense?
Jackie Bradley, Jr. is showing signs of breaking out of his half-season slump.
The World’s Streakiest Hitter (patent pending) has been awful all year, and there is virtually no statistic that will tell you otherwise. Red Sox manager Alex Cora has taken every opportunity to tell anyone who will listen that Bradley is due to break out because of good signs in his hitting, namely that he’s hitting the ball hard lately: Hard hits mean better swings, more power, fewer balls on the ground — presumably good stuff all around. And he’s seen some results of late, with hits in five of his last nine games, including three on Sunday.
I started looking into JBJ’s career stats, however, and an odd correlation pops up.
Bradley has played a significant part of the season every year since 2014 (we’ll throw out his 2013, where he appeared in 37 games, for the purpose of this analysis). Based on wRC+, he’s had two above-average offensive seasons — 2015 and 2016, highlighted in the subsequent charts — and three below-average offensive seasons (all numbers via Fangraphs):
YEAR PA AVG OBP SLG wRC+ 2014 423 .198 .265 .266 46 2015 255 .249 .335 .498 123 2016 636 .267 .349 .486 119 2017 541 .245 .323 .402 90 2018 254 .189 .283 .297 60 Note that his 2017 most closely resembles his career numbers, which, after nearly 600 games, we can probably safely assume is his baseline talent level offensively (about 10% worse than league average). But in total, Bradley’s inconsistency is pretty plain: He’s all over the place. His 2014 and 2018 seasons are awful, 2017 is at least acceptable for an all-world defensive center fielder, and 2015 and 2016 are really good.
Now let’s look at his hard-hit numbers:
YEAR SOFT% MED% HARD% 2014 13.5% 51.5% 35.0% 2015 16.7% 51.3% 32.1% 2016 16.0% 48.1% 36.0% 2017 17.5% 49.2% 33.3% 2018 12.0% 51.9% 36.1% Highlighting the same two good years for emphasis, you can see some strange correlations. One of his best offensive seasons, 2015, featured his worst hard-hit rate; two of his highest soft-hit rates were his two good years, with his best being his average year.
You can see similar correlations in his line drive/groundball/flyball breakdown:
YEAR LD% GB% FB% 2014 18.0% 46.4% 35.6% 2015 15.6% 48.1% 36.4% 2016 18.4% 47.3% 34.4% 2017 18.4% 49.0% 32.6% 2018 20.9% 44.9% 34.2% His two bad years feature his lowest groundball percentages; 2018’s numbers show that he is indeed hitting a bunch of line drives, but it hasn’t correlated to success — though I should note that he has a BABIP of .247, 45 points below his career mark, so you could argue he’s merely been unlucky.
As someone with a passing interest in advanced stats — not an MIT degree or a certainty that I know what I’m talking about — my take on these numbers, combined with what my amateur eyes tell me from having watched a lot of his games, is that when he’s struggling he’s trying too hard to break out of it — swinging hard, trying to crush the ball in desperation.
So, last chart: Let’s check out his pull numbers:
YEAR PULL% CENT% OPPO% 2014 36.1% 36.5% 27.4% 2015 45.5% 32.1% 22.4% 2016 46.0% 34.3% 19.8% 2017 41.9% 33.6% 24.4% 2018 48.7% 30.4% 20.9% My amateur hypothesis isn’t totally right, the numbers aren’t as nicely correlated as my other charts. However, his 2018 is his career-high PULL%, and he’s hitting by far his lowest CENT%. Now, hitting the ball hard and pulling the ball aren’t necessarily synonymous, but I think it stands to reason that a desire to hit the ball harder might cause you to swing harder, which often results in earlier swings, earlier contact, and pulling the ball.
The solution might not be as simple as hitting the ball hard, it might also be in placement: JBJ might want to consider trying to think about hitting the ball to all fields — or even more simply, just try to hit the ball right back at the pitcher up the middle, and he might find himself tapping into his more career-norm performance.
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Scott Priest 