Salvaging the Red Sox's Disappointing Offseason with 5 Free-Agent, Trade Moves

There's doom hanging over the Boston Red Sox, and maybe a bit of gloom as well.

But what if there doesn't have to be?

A hard sell, I know. The Red Sox finished last in the American League East for the third time in four seasons last year. Far from a pick-me-up, this winter has seen them pass on Shohei Ohtani and whiff on Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Teoscar Hernández and Shōta Imanaga.

Instead, Boston has mostly been moving pieces around. It's nice that Lucas Giolito, Tyler O'Neill and Vaughn Grissom are in. But with Chris Sale and Alex Verdugo out, it's hard to look at the roster and see a team that's graduated from pretender to contender.

So, that "full throttle" comment team chairman Tom Werner made in November? Even he knows he messed up, telling Sean McAdam of MassLive: "Maybe that wasn't the most artful way of saying what I wanted to say, which is that we're going to be pressing all levers to improve the team."

Though this hasn't been the case so far, the good news is there's still plenty of offseason left. So, let's indulge by looking at what steps the Red Sox can take to bridge that gap.

Put simply, what the Red Sox have is a foundation worth building on.

They may have been a last-place team in 2023, but at least they had the most wins (78) of the six teams that ended up in the cellar. A sizable chunk of the credit belongs to 20-something hitters Rafael Devers, Triston Casas, Jarren Duran and Wilyer Abreu, who were collectively 25 percent better than average last season.

With Grissom, who's 23, and O'Neill, who's 28, now a part of the lineup as well, Boston has one of the best cores of young hitters you're going to find anywhere in Major League Baseball.

Pitching has been the Red Sox's biggest shortcoming over the last two seasons, but at least 24-year-old Brayan Bello is on an upswing after pitching 157 above-average innings in 2023. And in Kenley Jansen and Chris Martin, Boston has a two-headed bullpen monster that provided a combined 2.25 ERA last season.

I'd also wager the Red Sox have an opening to contend in 2024. The New York Yankees have certainly improved, but basically every other contender in the American League has moved either laterally or just plain backward this winter.

As for what the Red Sox lack, at least four needs stand out.

As the addition of Giolito came immediately after the subtraction of Sale, at least one more starting pitcher—preferably two, really—is a must. And with four left-handed hitters projected to bat in the top five slots of the lineup, a reliable right-handed hitter is also a must-have.

Despite Jansen's and Martin's excellence, Boston's bullpen only put up a 4.32 ERA last year. Another late-inning arm is a good idea, while a left-hander is a nice-to-have.

The budget, however, may be limited.

Though the Red Sox's ownership group previously delivered World Series wins in 2004, 2007, 2013 and 2018, chief baseball officer Craig Breslow's comments to Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe suggest said group isn't quite all-in right now:

"As I've gotten to know this organization better through the conversations I've had with ownership, they absolutely are still supportive of assembling a World Series team as quickly as we possibly can. But I think the reality is that it's going to require a step forward from the young position players. It's going to require the build-out of a talent pipeline of arms that we can acquire, we draft, and we can develop internally."

The Red Sox probably shouldn't be expected to go over the luxury-tax threshold in 2024 after ducking under it in 2023. If so, Breslow might only be able to add a maximum of $38.7 million in average salary. That's what you get when you take the luxury-tax threshold for 2024 ($237 million) and subtract the Red Sox's projected tax payroll ($198.3 million).

As for what could be done within these theoretical limitations, now's the time to enter "I would simply" territory with five moves the Red Sox might be able to make. They're sorted in descending order of impact, though the ideal scenario involves pulling off all five.

Barring a splash on Blake Snell or Jordan Montgomery that would hinder their capacity to make other moves, the trade market is the Red Sox's best hope of landing a top-of-the-rotation starter.

To this end, Alex Speier of the Boston Globe reports that the Red Sox are only interested in pitchers with multiple years of club control remaining. That would rule out Corbin Burnes and Shane Bieber, but not two hurlers Mark Feinsand of MLB.com says the Miami Marlins are open to discussing: Jesús Luzardo and Edward Cabrera.

Thus do I propose a deal that checked out on Baseball Trade Values' simulator:

• Marlins get: DH/LF Masataka Yoshida, SS/CF Ceddanne Rafaela, OF Miguel Bleis
• Red Sox get: LHP Jesús Luzardo, DH/OF Avisaíl García

Yoshida is owed $74.4 million through 2027, with García due $29 million through 2025. But by average annual value, this deal is basically neutral. Were Rafaela to make Miami's Opening Day roster, he and Yoshida (a trade candidate in his own right) would average $18.74 million in 2024. Luzardo and García will average $18.75 million.

In any case, the Marlins would upgrade at designated hitter and take on Boston's No. 3 and No. 5 prospects as ranked by B/R's Joel Reuter. Rafaela, notably, could be the shortstop they're known to be seeking.

The Red Sox would get a lefty with a career strikeout rate of 10.1 per nine innings and club control through 2026, plus a right-handed hitter they could try at DH. Or, perhaps, dump in favor of someone else.

Even if, as they would under the previous scenario, the Red Sox end up with García, their best move would be to cut him and pursue a better right-handed hitter.

Like, for instance, Jorge Soler.

Héctor Gómez of Z101 Digital reported on Jan. 11 that the Red Sox were the front-runner for him. However, on Thursday the Toronto Blue Jays were listed as the front-runner by Jon Heyman of the New York Post. Signing the 2021 World Series MVP would be a bold move, and one that would come with risks.

FanGraphs has the 31-year-old Soler projected for a three-year, $48 million deal that would average $16 million per year. That's a solid chunk of change for a bat-only player, and this particular bat-only player isn't really the kind of dead-pull hitter who could regularly make a molehill of the Green Monster.

All the same, Soler is coming off a 36-homer season and has averaged 38 homers per 162 games dating back to 2019. Sans the 44 long balls they got from Justin Turner and Adam Duvall last year, the Red Sox indeed need that kind of power.

Speaking of the righty Duvall, he may be the preferred route, with the Red Sox and Los Angeles Angels considered to be his two finalists, per Heyman.

Even if Luzardo and Soler were to come aboard as solutions for Boston's biggest problems, there would still be another in the form of uncertainty at the back end of the rotation.

In lieu of assuming that Tanner Houck or Kutter Crawford could hack it in the No. 5 spot, the Red Sox would do well to bring in someone with a more proven track record. Someone like James Paxton.

He was on the Red Sox in 2023, of course. And according to Rob Bradford of WEEI, they would like him back in 2024:

Though Paxton, 35, faded in his last three outings of 2023, he had previously put up a 3.34 ERA with 93 strikeouts against 23 walks in his first 16 starts. Especially for a mere No. 5 starter, more of that would play nicely in 2024.

Besides, Paxton might just be the best non-Snell, non-Montgomery option left on the open market. And he should come cheap, with FanGraphs forecasting a one-year, $8 million deal.

One of the nice things about Boston's current pitching staff is how many guys could work in the bullpen if starting doesn't work out.

It's not just Crawford and Houck, who've done quite well in relief over the last two years. It's also Nick Pivetta and Garrett Whitlock, the latter of whom has been lights-out with a 2.65 ERA for his career coming out of the pen.

But if the Red Sox fancy a proper late-innings type, there's always Robert Stephenson.

Though not necessarily front and center, Chris Cotillo of MassLive reported in December that the 30-year-old righty is somewhere on the Red Sox's radar. Their interest is presumably based on the utter waste he laid to hitters down the stretch of 2023.

After joining the Tampa Bay Rays on June 3, Stephenson made 42 appearances and pitched to a 2.35 ERA while permitting just a .139 batting average. His slider (which Statcast thinks is a cutter) was among the best pitches in all of MLB.

There's been enough buzz on Stephenson to wonder if FanGraphs' two-year, $10 million projection is underselling him. But it's also been a quiet winter for relievers, with only Reynaldo López securing an eight-figure average in a multi-year deal.

Apropos of Boston's minor need for a second left-hander in the bullpen, pickings are regrettably slim on the open market. Especially, that is, if they want someone affordable.

Honestly, it may be Matt Moore or bust.

The lefty has gone on quite the journey since he was one of MLB's top prospects in the early 2010s, but he's lately arrived at a stable place. Albeit with stops in four different cities, he's pitched to a 2.20 ERA across the last two seasons.

The 34-year-old did have reverse splits in 2023, allowing an .874 OPS to lefties and a .623 OPS to righties. But there was some bad luck involved there, specifically on his curveball.

Going once again to FanGraphs, Moore is projected to earn $7 million in a one-year deal. That could, if anything, be overestimating it. But I'd rather have Moore at that rate than fellow lefty Aroldis Chapman at a projected $7.5 million, given the latter's tendency for volatility.

Put these five moves together, and you get the Red Sox shedding $18.74 million in average value and adding $54.75 million. That's a net gain of $36.01 million, putting them roughly $3 million shy of this year's luxury-tax threshold. We did it, folks.

Of course, it's worth reiterating that only the Red Sox know their budget and that all of this amounts to little more than fan fiction. But between them and me, at least one of us is actually trying here.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.