A Realistic Look at the 2026 Red Sox: Part I

[moonslav59]

AL East and fWAR 2025 to Projected 2026:

TOR 44.3>48.1 (+3.8)

NYY 50.6>47.6 (-3.0)

BOS 43.6>45.6 (+2.0)

BAL 24.1>45.0 (+20.9) Huh?

TBR 31.0> 37.9 (+6.9) Huh?

[notin]

17 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

Didn't think this one out too much, but here is my last BTV trade offering:

Duran, Sandoval, DHam, Masas & $20M (about half of what Masa is owed)

for

Baty (3B) & Vientos (DH/1B/3B)

Between the $8M x 2 saved on Masa, $8M on Duran and $8M on Sandoval, maybe we can afford to sign a couple RP'ers.

A simpler trade, also accepted was Duran & Hicks for Baty. That might allow us to sign E Suarez to DH and not get Vientos for that. However, we'd still have Masa.

Maybe Duran + Masa + $18M for Baty, then sign Suarez.

So the Sox are unloading Yoshida to free up money for what exactly?  To sign Suarez and hope he can hit outside of Arizona?

Trading for Vientos is even worse.  So include Yoshida to reduce the return abd get back Vientos, who is essentially a younger Eugenio Suarez?  But not like a 25 year old Eugenio Suarez.  Vientos’ plays like a 35 year old Suarez and is ready to decline.

Baty is ok, but I’m not trading Duran for him.  And usingDuran to dump Yoshida/Hicks is equally bad.

The Sox are probably going to sit on their pitching until someone comes calling.  If they wanted Suarez, they’d have already signed him and done what every MLB team does - dump salary later…

[moonslav59]

3 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

We have a very good starting pitching staff. But Breslow has dropped the ball when it comes to offense, probably because Henry told him not to spend enough to make the team competitive. Time is getting late. Spring training is going to start in a few weeks and the team has not sufficiently improved.

Brez has spent a lot. He chose to spend way more on pitching than offense. I think JH would have let him spend the Suarez or Gray money on a bat, instead.

Take away what STL is paying and this is the winter AAV payroll choices:

Pitching: $72M

$41 Gray ($31M salary)

$26 Suarez ($7.5M)

$13,3 Chapman ($13M)

$1.6M Oviedo ($1.6M)

_____________________

Batting: $21.3M

$21.3M Contreras ($18M)

____________________

This points to Breslow being the issue more than JH, but I love improving the rotation from the top 3. I like Contreras, but I agree we needed/need more. If the budget is what stops Brez from adding a decent bat at 3B or 2B, then the roster construction choices made by Brez, as in maximizing pitching additions at the expense of bat additions is, IMO,  open for criticism and maybe even ridicule.

[JoeBrady]

10 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

On Duran/Hicks move: we'd have to dump Masa elsewhere to get Suarez.

That would be very counter-productive, imo.  If the added net cost to acquire Suarez is $14M, I'd prefer to spend that on the BP.

[moonslav59]

9 minutes ago, notin said:

So the Sox are unloading Yoshida to free up money for what exactly?  To sign Suarez and hope he can hit outside of Arizona?

Trading for Vientos is even worse.  So include Yoshida to reduce the return abd get back Vientos, who is essentially a younger Eugenio Suarez?  But not like a 25 year old Eugenio Suarez.  Vientos’ plays like a 35 year old Suarez and is ready to decline.

Baty is ok, but I’m not trading Duran for him.  And usingDuran to dump Yoshida/Hicks is equally bad.

The Sox are probably going to sit on their pitching until someone comes calling.  If they wanted Suarez, they’d have already signed him and done what every MLB team does - dump salary later…

Yes, yes and yes.

Vientos is a RHB with more power than Yoshida, and IMO should end up with a higher OPS. Yes, I prefer the prearb Vientos to the $18M x 2 Masa.

Baty would be the major plus.

[moonslav59]

Just now, JoeBrady said:

That would be very counter-productive, imo.  If the added net cost to acquire Suarez is $14M, I'd prefer to spend that on the BP.

AAV is $10.3M x 2 Hicks and $7.75M Duran in '26 and likely more in '27. Maybe we can count those two as $22-23M a year. We might get Suarez for that.

[JoeBrady]

46 minutes ago, harmony said:

Many have one-time top prospect Marcelo Mayer penciled in as a Red Sox starter but his WAR projections are remarkably similar to those of Ben Williamson, the current projected third baseman for the Mariners.

That's why I'm not sure that's a problem.  Williamson is a decent prospect, who is more glove than bat.  They had Suarez and are likely to pass on re-signing him.  They'd prefer the good, cheap long-term investment.  That's identical to Mayer, and imo, the way that BB should work.

[FredLynn]

14 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Brez has spent a lot. He chose to spend way more on pitching than offense. I think JH would have let him spend the Suarez or Gray money on a bat, instead.

Take away what STL is paying and this is the winter AAV payroll choices:

Pitching: $72M

$41 Gray ($31M salary)

$26 Suarez ($7.5M)

$13,3 Chapman ($13M)

$1.6M Oviedo ($1.6M)

_____________________

Batting: $21.3M

$21.3M Contreras ($18M)

____________________

This points to Breslow being the issue more than JH, but I love improving the rotation from the top 3. I like Contreras, but I agree we needed/need more. If the budget is what stops Brez from adding a decent bat at 3B or 2B, then the roster construction choices made by Brez, as in maximizing pitching additions at the expense of bat additions is, IMO,  open for criticism and maybe even ridicule.

I don't see fortifying the starting rotation and improving the offense as mutually exclusive. A lot of money came off the books when Devers and others left and the fact is that the FLOPS are still LOWER THIRD in percentage of revenue taken in spent on player salaries. Henry is too cheap to give Breslow the green light to improve that flaw and the result is team that likely will not compete for a ring this year. Again.

[JoeBrady]

32 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

I know this team has issues- most glaringly at 3B or 2B and maybe both.

I don't see an issue with Mayer.  He's a highly-rated prospect that will face some challenges in his first full year.  Almost every rookie does.

[notin]

31 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

We have a very good starting pitching staff. But Breslow has dropped the ball when it comes to offense, probably because Henry told him not to spend enough to make the team competitive. Time is getting late. Spring training is going to start in a few weeks and the team has not sufficiently improved.

So they weren’t competitive last year?

The Sox had a top ten (really, too seven) offense last year.  And that was a team that got only 50 fewer plate appearances from Abraham Toro than they got from Rafael Devers, and got more PA from Romy Gonzalez than from Roman Anthony,,,

The offense should be improved this year, maybe not by much.  But it will be better than many present it is in their “if you’re not first, you’re last” mentality where fans value marquee named players over good teams…

[FredLynn]

4 minutes ago, notin said:

So they weren’t competitive last year?

The Sox had a top ten (really, too seven) offense last year.  And that was a team that got only 50 fewer plate appearances from Abraham Toro than they got from Rafael Devers, and got more PA from Romy Gonzalez than from Roman Anthony,,,

The offense should be improved this year, maybe not by much.  But it will be better than many present it is in their “if you’re not first, you’re last” mentality where fans value marquee named players over good teams…

They were better last year than the previous few years. We squeaked into a playoff spot and were promptly eliminated. This year I expected more; its seems I will not get it. Many of the pieces are in place to compete for a ring-we have a solid rotation and a stud in Anthony. But we lost Bregman and gave away Devers (a necessity) and Contreras is not going to compensate for those losses. We will be WORSE offensively, not better. Breslow is wasting a window of opportunity to compete for a ring because he is constrained by Henry's cheapskate limits and because he isn't very good at what he does-other than making excuses. I can't see us finishing better than 3rd in the ALE, likely worse. Its getting old.

[moonslav59]

4 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

I don't see fortifying the starting rotation and improving the offense as mutually exclusive. A lot of money came off the books when Devers and others left and the fact is that the FLOPS are still LOWER THIRD in percentage of revenue taken in spent on player salaries. Henry is too cheap to give Breslow the green light to improve that flaw and the result is team that likely will not compete for a ring this year. Again.

I'm all for JH spending more. My point is, if he won't and Brez was given a guideline on the budget, maybe he should have spent more on bats not arms.

He nearly spent on Bregman over Suarez, and that would have balanced the bats vs arm spending about evenly.

Our budget is $50M higher than 2024 and about $26M more than 2025 (AAV numbers,) so in a sense Brez has spent the Devers, Bregman, Gio and Buehler money, and then some. However, some was spent on Anthony, Campbell and upticks to Crochet and Chapman plus some minimal arb raises.

It's hard to count those as added spending, since none added anything to the roster/team. It counts to JH's wallet, though.

Since the new CBO will likely reset the whole lux tax tier and years being over matrix, this seems like the time to not worry about the tax lines. Losing bonus money and dropping draft picks hurts, but I think we can afford to take that future hit, as our farm looks good, and our core of young, controllable and relatively inexpensive players sets us up pretty well for the ext 3-5 years.

[Old Red]

11 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

I don't see an issue with Mayer.  He's a highly-rated prospect that will face some challenges in his first full year.  Almost every rookie does.

He hasn’t proven he can last a full year, and that’s a BIG issue.

[JoeBrady]

23 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Brez has spent a lot. He chose to spend way more on pitching than offense. I think JH would have let him spend the Suarez or Gray money on a bat, instead.

This is just a continuing re-hash of personal favorites.  It boils down to this:

• Half of us wanted a #2 and half wanted a good position player.
• Half of those that wanted a good position player, half wanted a decent+ glove, and half wanted to focus on hitting.
• Even among those that wanted a good hitter, some preferred pure power, and others wanted better all-around hitting.

The idea of Breslow blowing it has as much to do with personal preference as anything else.

[Old Red]

30 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Yes, yes and yes.

Vientos is a RHB with more power than Yoshida, and IMO should end up with a higher OPS. Yes, I prefer the prearb Vientos to the $18M x 2 Masa.

Baty would be the major plus.

No,No, and No on all accounts from both teams.

[JoeBrady]

28 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

We might get Suarez for that.

My question is more along the lines of why we would want to pay for Suarez when we already have Masa.  A right instead of a lefty, and occasionally fill in at 3rd is good.  But not worth $20M.  If Masa, Suarez and Mayer do exactly as projected, then Suarez gets 220 ABs.

[moonslav59]

3 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

They were better last year than the previous few years. We squeaked into a playoff spot and were promptly eliminated. This year I expected more; its seems I will not get it. Many of the pieces are in place to compete for a ring-we have a solid rotation and a stud in Anthony. But we lost Bregman and gave away Devers (a necessity) and Contreras is not going to compensate for those losses. We will be WORSE offensively, not better. Breslow is wasting a window of opportunity to compete for a ring because he is constrained by Henry's cheapskate limits and because he isn't very good at what he does-other than making excuses. I can't see us finishing better than 3rd in the ALE, likely worse. Its getting old.

I expected more additions to the offense, too. I kinda think Contreras will be about as good as Bregman on offense in 2026, but the loss of 3B defense hurts. Sticking to just the offense, that leaves replacing Devers. If you count just the 330 PAs from Devers in 2025, one can hand those to Anthony and say, there it is fixed.

I don't see it that way. We need a middle order bat with some power, I'd like him to be RH'd but at this point, I'd take anything. I'd even settle on two moderate positional improvements over one big bat. The problem is which two? One is easy: 3B or 2B, but the other would be?

Catcher?

2B or 3B and send Mayer to AAA (or use him in a trade for a surer bet at the plate?)

DH and DFA/trade Masa for nothing?

SS?

How do we do this and get JH to agree to the spending it would likely take to make happen?

[FredLynn]

5 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

I'm all for JH spending more. My point is, if he won't and Brez was given a guideline on the budget, maybe he should have spent more on bats not arms.

He nearly spent on Bregman over Suarez, and that would have balanced the bats vs arm spending about evenly.

Our budget is $50M higher than 2024 and about $26M more than 2025 (AAV numbers,) so in a sense Brez has spent the Devers, Bregman, Gio and Buehler money, and then some. However, some was spent on Anthony, Campbell and upticks to Crochet and Chapman plus some minimal arb raises.

It's hard to count those as added spending, since none added anything to the roster/team. It counts to JH's wallet, though.

Since the new CBO will likely reset the whole lux tax tier and years being over matrix, this seems like the time to not worry about the tax lines. Losing bonus money and dropping draft picks hurts, but I think we can afford to take that future hit, as our farm looks good, and our core of young, controllable and relatively inexpensive players sets us up pretty well for the ext 3-5 years.

And my point is that when you rank 23rd (or near that) in percentage of revenue spent on player salaries you SHOULD be spending more if you prioritize winning. Obviously Henry doesn't see it that way. He prioritizes profit, money in his voluminous wallet, over winning. Maybe he wanted to win years ago. Its clear that he wants to maximize profit now. Hey-its his team. He can do with it what he wants. But it does a disservice to the loyal fans of the team.

We will never win another ring as long as cheapskate Henry owns the team.

[moonslav59]

7 minutes ago, Old Red said:

He hasn’t proven he can last a full year, and that’s a BIG issue.

YES, and add to that, he has to prove he can even hit .700. He also has to show he doesn't need a platoon. That's a multidimensional what if. One might call it "multi-suspect."

[Old Red]

7 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

This is just a continuing re-hash of personal favorites.  It boils down to this:

• Half of us wanted a #2 and half wanted a good position player.
• Half of those that wanted a good position player, half wanted a decent+ glove, and half wanted to focus on hitting.
• Even among those that wanted a good hitter, some preferred pure power, and others wanted better all-around hitting.

The idea of Breslow blowing it has as much to do with personal preference as anything else.

Didn’t Brez say he wanted to add a big bat? That I believe was also along with the idea that they resigned Bregman. Has that been accomplished?

[moonslav59]

1 minute ago, FredLynn said:

And my point is that when you rank 23rd (or near that) in percentage of revenue spent on player salaries you SHOULD be spending more if you prioritize winning. .

I've never disagree with this, and my bet is we are no longer 23rd.

Not that being 15th or 16th changes the point made all that much.

[Old Red]

1 minute ago, moonslav59 said:

YES, and add to that, he has to prove he can even hit .700. He also has to show he doesn't need a platoon. That's a multidimensional what if. One might call it "multi-suspect."

I agree on all.👏

[moonslav59]

2 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

We will never win another ring as long as cheapskate Henry owns the team.

I disagree with this. A top 6 spending team with all the young and controlled players we have has a clear shot at winning it all in the next 3-5 years.

[JoeBrady]

6 minutes ago, Old Red said:

No,No, and No on all accounts from both teams.

That seems impossible.  Most trades will get a yes from one side or the other, unless it is a bad fit.  But the RS need a 2B/3B, and the Mets need another outfielder.  One of us should do this eagerly.

[FredLynn]

1 minute ago, moonslav59 said:

I've never disagree with this, and my bet is we are no longer 23rd.

Not that being 15th or 16th changes the point made all that much.

The only information I have is for 2025 during which we were 23rd well behind such powerhouses as the A's and the Royals.

Henry sucks as an owner.

[Old Red]

4 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

That seems impossible.  Most trades will get a yes from one side or the other, unless it is a bad fit.  But the RS need a 2B/3B, and the Mets need another outfielder.  One of us should do this eagerly.

 

5 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

That seems impossible.  Most trades will get a yes from one side or the other, unless it is a bad fit.  But the RS need a 2B/3B, and the Mets need another outfielder.  One of us should do this eagerly.

No one wants Masa, and I don’t believe Duran will be traded unless it’s for something bigger than that.

[notin]

13 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

And my point is that when you rank 23rd (or near that) in percentage of revenue spent on player salaries you SHOULD be spending more if you prioritize winning. Obviously Henry doesn't see it that way. He prioritizes profit, money in his voluminous wallet, over winning. Maybe he wanted to win years ago. Its clear that he wants to maximize profit now. Hey-its his team. He can do with it what he wants. But it does a disservice to the loyal fans of the team.

We will never win another ring as long as cheapskate Henry owns the team.

You’re more obsessed with spending than winning.  I don’t think that’s even up for a counter argument…

[notin]

3 minutes ago, Old Red said:

 

No one wants Masa, and I don’t believe Duran will be traded unless it’s for something bigger than that.

I’m going to type 5 words I have never typed before and God willing, will never type again. <deep breath>
 

I agree with Old Red.

[moonslav59]

6 minutes ago, Old Red said:

Didn’t Brez say he wanted to add a big bat? That I believe was also along with the idea that they resigned Bregman. Has that been accomplished?

He might have convinced himself Contreras is a "big bat."

Willson does have an .817 OPS since 2013. Only 28 batters have more PAs and a higher OPS than that in MLB, so there is a smidgeon of support to that belief.

Want some context?

.817 is 10 less than Alonso's 3 year OPS.

It's 7 points higher than Duran's.

It's 21 points higher than Bregman.

14 more than Tatis.

24 more than Paredes & Machado.

Yes, Contreras is aging and has declined, so the 3 year numbers might be misleading, but one could say Bregman's 2025 numbers were an outlier and his downward trend has been evident before his half year spurt to start 2025. How about just 2025?

Only 43 batters had more PAs (563) and a higher OPS (.791) than Willson. Bregman did not meet the PAs cutoff of 550, but Willson's OPS was higher than Duran's and only about 20 points from top 30 status.

He's not a "big bat," I agree, but he comes pretty close- kinda like how close Gray is as a #2 SP'er. I fully understand how "coming close" has become the Sox mantra under Brez- both in key negotiations and in on the field results. I do think the Ranger signing rose above the "came close" trend. I think combining Gray & Contreras makes for a very significant gain, maybe just not in the areas we needed most.

 

[moonslav59]

14 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

The only information I have is for 2025 during which we were 23rd well behind such powerhouses as the A's and the Royals.

Henry sucks as an owner.

Okay, but we are spending $26M more than 2025, so you have to figure that "23" is outdated.

The A's and Royals have such low revenue numbers that they shouldn't even be allowed to have a team.