MLB: Assessing Red Sox Offseason Moves — Part I (Devers + OFs)
While the 2022 Boston Red Sox season was still going on, I began writing a series of posts here on the many, many areas Chaim Bloom needed to address to put together a 2023 team.
By the time I was done, I published eight posts covering: a Rafael Devers extension, outfield, shortstop, designated hitter, in-house starting pitchers, free agent starting pitchers, bullpen, and later, catcher. I summarized those posts in this Offseason Primer.
This offseason isn’t quite over yet. While some pitchers and at least one position player have already made their way Fort Myers, reports indicate the Sox are continuing to explore more moves. They have about $8.25M under the first CBT threshold to spend according to @RedSoxPayroll.
Bloom has made at least one significant move late in all three previous offseasons he’s been in charge (Mookie Betts trade in 2020, Andrew Benintendi trade in 2021, Trevor Story signing in 2022), so nothing can be ruled out at this point.
But today, I’m going to start looking back at those posts and assess what the Red Sox have actually done.
It wasn’t easy, but Bloom and the Red Sox accomplished what I believed to be the biggest item on their to-do list this offseason: lock up Devers longterm.
I wrote extensively here about the Devers contract in its immediate aftermath.
By signing Devers to an 11-year, $331M extension, they gave out the biggest and longest contract in club history, the biggest and longest ever for a third basemen in MLB history, and the second-biggest contract handed out to any player this offseason after Aaron Judge’s $360M deal.
More importantly, the deal showed the Sox are still willing to pony up for premium talent. Devers is just 26, and his prime years are still ahead. This is his team.
Much has been made about how the Red Sox allegedly don’t have a plan: that’s absurd. The plan is to build a winner around Rafael Devers. It doesn’t take a degree in advanced biochemistry to realize that.
So far, the money has clearly not made Devers complacent. Video of his recent workouts in Florida show he’s taken his offseason conditioning work seriously. He doesn’t want a repeat of last year’s second half when a hamstring injury caused him to slash just .248/.325/.384 following a July IL stint.
One thing remains an unsolved mystery, though: we still don’t know if Devers is a Fudgie the Whale guy. We do know he has goats and peacocks on his ranch, so there’s that.
Part 2: Outfielders (and Bonus on this topic as well)
In my original post on this topic, I said the Sox needed a “difference-maker” to fill a glaring hole in the OF they had going into the winter. They didn’t end up signing or trading for any of the outfielders I mentioned in either of my posts, but that’s just because I left out someone who I should’ve mentioned in the first place.
At the Winter Meetings the Sox finalized a five-year, $90M contract with 29-year-old Japanese left fielder Masataka Yoshida. It’s the biggest contract ever handed out to a Japanese player, and bigger than many had expected. Yet when you look at what Yoshida accomplished in the hyper-competitive NPB for seven years, it’s not hard to see how special he can be with the bat.
Yoshida leaves NPB 6th all-time in wRC+ in the history of the league. He slashed .326/.419/.538 over those seven years. In 2022, he struck out just 42 times in 515 plate appearances. For his career he has struck out at just a 9.4% rate. He’s also averaged 23 HRs a year for the last four years.
He helped lead Orix to the Japan Series title in 2022 as well, knocking two HRs in Game 5 including this walkoff blast:
Do we know exactly what Yoshida will do against MLB pitching? No. But there’s a pedigree here that makes one think he’ll be more successful than most. His profile doesn’t rely on power, and contact skills should transfer from league to league. Yoshida is limited defensively, but should likely handle LF at Fenway.
Projection systems are bullish on who he can be at the plate, and if he can get to these numbers it would be a massive upgrade on what the Sox had in OF for most of last year:
I could not be more excited to see what Yoshida can do stateside, and I’m glad it’ll be happening in Fenway.
I came into the winter expecting the Sox to bring in one OF with an outside chance they’d bring in a second one. Because of the decision to move Kiké Hernandez to the infield following the departure of Xander Bogaerts and the injury to Story, the Sox did bring in a second starting OF in January in the person of 2021 World Series champion Adam Duvall.
I wrote a bit about Duvall here when it became clear the Sox were going to pursue right-handed bats in free agency. They stepped up their pursuit of Duvall following Story’s injury. Should Duvall revert to his 2021 performance offensively, he should provide most of Story was going to do at the plate. That year he hit 38 HRs with a .491 SLG% and finished in the 92nd percentile in barrel%, 82nd in xSLG, 91st in max exit velo and 70th in HardHit%.
There was also that time in 2020 when he hit 3 HRs in a game at Fenway.
Strikeouts will be an issue with Duvall: he was just 4th percentile in K% in 2021 and had an astronomical 32.1% K rate in 2022. But, the Sox were probably expecting a slightly better figure from Story, so they’d already built that kind of K figure into their lineup anyway.
Duvall was 4 Outs Above Average (OAA) in CF for the Braves in 2022 before a wrist injury ended his season after just 86 games. He may be best suited to play a corner spot at 34 years old, but he’ll be asked to patrol CF for the Red Sox at least to start the year.
Yoshida and Duvall will join Alex Verdugo in the starting OF with Rob Refsnyder penciled into the 4th spot. It’s unclear at this point who, if anyone, will make the team as an extra bench OF, but the Sox are bringing veteran Raimel Tapia into camp along with utility man Niko Goodrum on MiLB deals. Jarren Duran will also have a chance to make the team. I’ll discuss him more soon, but Adalberto Mondesi could also get some OF run when healthy.
Next time, I’ll discuss how the Sox addressed SS and DH over the winter.
