If only they could convince Joey Votto to waive his no trade... He's 34, and the contract isn't pretty, but for the three or so years that this group has together, he'd be perfect in this lineup.Right. Which is exactly what Cherington did when he looked at the offensive futility of the 2014 club, identified the best available bats on the FA market in Panda and Hanley, and signed them both.
What I'm saying the team should do now, is to identify it's greatest positions of need, put together a board of different players who would significantly improve the team at that particular point of need, and then work the phones like crazy to get it. Which is what Toronto did after 2014, when they got Josh Donaldson.
The 2017 Red Sox won the AL East and 93 games, and are bringing back essentially the same group of players. They don't need to reshuffle the deck, they need to stack it.
Here are the top qualifying 1B ranked by SLG% from 2015 to 2017:
1. Votto
2. Freeman
3. Goldschmidt
4. Encarnacion
5. Rizzo
6. Abreu
7. Cabrera
8. Bour
Votto refuses to waive the no trade. Freeman is under 4 years of control and the Braves are building around him (not to mention, the price, if Boston could afford it, would create even more holes). Goldschmidt is the one player who could have been on the block this offseason. He's only signed for 2018 + an option for 2019, but Arizona somehow made it to the postseason so there's no way they trade him before the deadline next year.
Rizzo/Edwin are going nowhere for obvious reasons. The realistic options are then, the bottom three:
Jose Abreu
- Contract: 2 years remaining, $23.5M
- Pros: coming off his best season since his rookie year (.304/.354/.552), the White Sox are rebuilding so he should be available, consistently on the field - averages 154 games per season.
- Cons: plate discipline leaves something to be desired (5.2 BB% last year), will be 31 years old, below average (albeit not awful) fielder.
- Suggested trade: Eduardo Rodriguez + lottery type prospect for Abreu.
Miguel Cabrera
- Contract: 6 years, $184M
- Pros: inner circle HoFer, best hitter in baseball over the last decade, averaged 156 wRC+ from 2014-2016.
- Cons: was terrible last year (.249/.320/.399), defense, the contract is an albatross
- Suggested trade: Who knows? It all depends on how much money DET is willing to eat. Will probably let Miguel bounce back and not trade low.
Justin Bour
- Contract: arb eligible 2018, earliest FA 2021.
- Pros: youngest (29), arguably coming off the best season of the three (.289/.366/.536), cheap and cost controllable for three seasons.
- Cons: injuries/doesn't have a history of staying on the field. not a long track record of extended success, may be most expensive in terms of prospect cost.
- Suggested trade: Groome, Chavis, and Beeks for Bour.
I refuse to talk Hosmer because he is a rich mans Mitch Moreland who will end up with a Jason Heyward type overpay.