Borrowing Trouble....What happens to YOU If Bogaerts and Devers Go the Way of Mookie?

[Shaky Walton]

We'll never know exactly what happened with Betts. He says now he would have signed an equivalent deal to stay with the Red Sox but one was not offered.

From Gasper this morning:

I asked Mookie if he would’ve taken that contract to stay with the Sox. Anger management class sign-ups might be about to skyrocket in Massachusetts.

“Absolutely, I just didn’t get it,” said Betts without hesitation. “That’s the argument. I didn’t get it, so that’s why I am where I am.”

Yikes. The Sox would probably beg to differ with that damning characterization. The crucible of baseball in Boston never seemed an ideal fit for Mookie’s Jayson Tatum-like mien. He’s savvy enough not to demean or offend the dart-throwing Sox fanbase by saying the environment wasn’t for him.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/07/18/sports/la-mookie-betts-looms-cautionary-tale-what-future-holds-red-sox-their-unsigned-homegrown-stars/

As Gasper wrote, the Sox FO might disagree with that account, and maybe even fairly disagree.

But here we are again. Bogaerts is not signed, he reports that there have been no recent talks with the team, the Sox have apparently not made any progress with Devers, who many view as a generational talent, and trading Bogaerts at the deadline is likely on the table right now given the need to extract value for a possibly departing player and the fact that the Sox are flailing.

On a related note, the Sox allowed Kyle Schwarber to depart, even though he seemed like a perfect, albeit defensively challenged, fit for the team..

So here's my question:

Would the sum total of losing these two cornerstone, "face of the franchise" type players, after having lost Betts a few years ago, affect in any way your "Sox fandom"? Would your interest diminish? Would you go so far as to drop them?

My gut, immediate reaction to my own question, and the related ones, is "of course not, I'm a Red Sox fan, and have always been one."

On the other hand, it seems truly crazy to me that the Red Sox would be unwilling or unable to retain home grown players of this stature. And of course, nothing exists in a vacuum. The question is being asked in the midst of a roller coaster season in which the team seems unable to beat quality opponents or even win a single AL East series. And in which the titular head of the team, Chaim Bloom, has put together a squad that is woefully deficient in so many areas.

The irony is that even if Bloom, with Henry's blessing, did the "minimum" and brought back Xander and Rafael, or the "sub minimum," and brought back one of them, the team that he assembled is in danger of not making the playoffs, even with the expanded wild card format, and would likely be hard pressed to compete seriously, even if it did.

Still, even acknowledging that the anger with those calling the shots runs deeper than my main question, I wonder if actually losing those guys would change minds and hearts about this team. As my wife would say, it would be "a lot."

 

[Rovin Romine]

Removed by Mod Request.

I have no better, "Man that's an assumptive question" joke to replace it with. . .but man, that post is full of assumptions.

 

[Mugsy's Jock]

The sun will rise. The sun will go down. And I’ll have lunch.

 

[Jimbodandy]

The Sox are always among the top spenders. This ownership group has demonstrated a desire and willingness to spend money to win titles. They have won titles with this approach. No, I'm not going to abandon ship because my favorite binky is gone. They might make the wrong calls sometimes. There are examples of guys that they let walk who succeeded elsewhere, just like there are guys that we signed who were unproductive. But they're trying to win and spending to do it.

 

[soxhop411]

As i said in the Devers thread, Betts is so full of shit that red sox stats even called him out on it

if there was no pandemic after the mookie trade there was 0% chance mookie would sign the contract he did. Its getting to the point where i am starting to believe he clearly did not want to re-sign here

 

[Mr. Stinky Esq.]

As i said in the Devers thread, Betts is so full of shit that red sox stats even called him out on it

if there was no pandemic after the mookie trade there was 0% chance mookie would sign the contract he did. Its getting to the point where i am starting to believe he clearly did not want to re-sign here

Isn't the take-away that he's just not acknowledging that the pandemic changed his mind about testing free agency vs. taking a big extension (rather than that he simply did not want to re-sign in Boston)?

 

[Van Everyman]

Gasper gets at what I have been saying for a long time: not that Mookie hated Boston or anything, but rather that it was a grind of a place for somebody like him. Somebody who is a little more quiet and reserved. So I think part of him wanting to “test free agency“ was about him wanting to see what else was outside of Boston. And he got that in Los Angeles before hitting free agency and combined with the pandemic wanted to sign a contract before the money potentially dried up. It’s complicated but not that complicated in my mind.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

Speaking only for myself:

One of the great joys of baseball is watching homegrown players develop through the minors and then have success at the major league level.

Living in Portland has been a wonderful experience for me because I've gotten to see so many young players come through here and seeing them contribute to great major league teams. What made 2018 so amazing is that SO MANY of the players on that team were homegrown players.

When the big league club seems reluctant to keep these home grown stars for whatever reason, it drives an emotional wedge between the fan and the team. I've seen X and Devers forever, since they were kids. Same with Mookie. It's a thrill to see these guys I've followed forever develop into major league superstars. When the MLB club allows them to walk or trades them before they can walk because they can't/won't pay them their market value, that really does leave a sour taste in my mouth.

Signing free agents is....fine, I guess. But I have no emotional attachment to Story, for example. He's a fine player and all but it's simply not the same from an emotional fan experience.

While the Sox want to win and to make a profit (and maybe even in that order!), they also need to be mindful of growing the game and making their fans happy. And irrational or not, keeping homegrown players around who are stars is part of that approach to me. I would like to see X and Devers be Sox lifers. I wanted the same for Mookie.

So to answer the question: if the Sox do not re-sign X and Devers and they depart, it will affect my connection to the team in a very negative and significant way.

 

[BigJimEd]

Would your interest diminish? Yes, absolutely. At least in the short term.

Would you go so far as to drop them? No. Not even close.

 

[InsideTheParker]

I couldn't say that my interest would diminish until I gave the new team, whatever it is, a chance. If the team as constructed by Bloom wins a bunch of games, I will be satisfied. If they flat out stank, I would probably watch an inning or two here and there.

 

[bg1025]

I’d be disappointed. Longest tenured and in my eyes basically the captain of the team. Oh…and my son’s name is Xander. So it’d suck, but I’d get over it. Unless somehow he ends up with the NYY. Yuck.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

There's a lot of people on this board who watch the Red Sox as if they're watching a person play fantasy baseball, without any real attachment. If Player X leaves, that person will just plug in Player Y and life will go on. And that's cool, no judgement from me. Honest. But that's not how I like to watch sports. One of the reasons why I love the Red Sox are the people that make/made up the team. Going back to Roger Clemens and Jim Rice and Dwight Evans and Dave Henderson (I realize he was here less than a year, but his ALCS homer is what made me the fan I am today) and Burks and Greenwell and Wakefield and Nomar and Pedro and Manny and Ortiz and Pedroia and Varitek and Lowe and Betts and Bogaerts and JBJ and Benintendi and Lester and so many more.

The reason why I'm a Red Sox fan--and a baseball fan really--is because for seven months a year, day-in and day-out, I follow these guys and are happy when they do well and grouse when they do poorly. And it's not because Devers happens to be the third baseman right at this very instance, it's because I've watched Devers grow and become the best third baseman in the league. I have made an investment in him. If the Red Sox let him go based on money, then that sucks. And I'm not going to get into "Well, the Red Sox are just being cheap" because that's kinda the answer. I roughly know how much the Red Sox are worth and I know that they make a profit. I roughly know how much that FSG is worth and I know that they make a profit. I know how much John Henry is worth and I know how much money that I spend on tickets, sodas, hot dogs, shirts and caps every year. It's disheartening to hear the billionaire owner of a billionaire business that runs a team making millions that "Player X just wants too much money."

Because I know that's not true.

And again, if you take the opposite view point, more power to you. I'm not sure why you give a shit about how much money John Henry and FSG make, but I couldn't care less. Watching the Red Sox with the best players (and they've had three who've come up through their system in the last ten years) is really the only thing I care about. Watching Chaim Bloom dumpster dive for the best value on a conga line of anonymous players is frankly really uninteresting. It might not be for you, and that's great--to each his own. But I enjoy watching stars that I have a tentative connection play for my team.

So yeah, I'll probably be really pissed with X and Devers leave. Will it be enough to ruin my Red Sox fandom? I don't know. I doubt it, but I have to say watching players leave and excelling elsewhere really sucks.

 

[BigSoxFan]

I love X but don’t love the prospect of paying his next contract. In fact, I outright hope we don’t. So, letting him go won’t impact me at all. Devers is a different story. He’s a young star hitter who probably hasn’t reached his offensive ceiling. Letting him go would piss me off unless some random team goes full Soto on him or something.

 

[ShaneTrot]

I am torn because these 10-12 year contracts force you to pay for the decline of the player. Cabrera is not homegrown but the Tigers have had him since he was 25 in 2008. He hasn't really been good since 2016 (he was decent in 38 games in 2018 with no power). They have paid him ~$31 million a year since 2017 and are on the hook for $32 million next year. Yikes! I know it's not my money but that stops the team from getting better unless they have a shitload of cheap young players. Would it be better to pay a Devers 5 years at 40+ million a year? Would he take it?

 

[Salem's Lot]

If the Red Sox are playing competitive winning baseball then I will stay engaged and interested. I really don’t care how they get there from a team building standpoint. If they are non-competitive like they were this weekend, I’ll find something else more interesting to watch.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

I am torn because these 10-12 year contracts force you to pay for the decline of the player. Cabrera is not homegrown but the Tigers have had him since he was 25 in 2008. He hasn't really been good since 2016 (he was decent in 38 games in 2018 with no power). They have paid him ~$31 million a year since 2017 and are on the hook for $32 million next year. Yikes! I know it's not my money but that stops the team from getting better unless they have a shitload of cheap young players. Would it be better to pay a Devers 5 years at 40+ million a year? Would he take it?

But why does that cause us to wring our hands when the club has already benefited greatly by vastly underpaying a player at the beginning of his career when his production far outstrips his salary?

From 2007 through 2011 Dustin Pedroia produced 25.9 WAR per fangraphs. During that time he was paid a total of $12,087,000 for his services, despite the fact that he had produced roughly $169.8 million worth of value (per Fangraphs' $/WAR calculation). He was getting ripped off. In light of that, the Sox picking up the rest of his career through his decline phase doesn't seem like an egregious mistake, it strikes me as the rectifying of financial wrongs.

Clubs get so focused on not paying for a players' declining years that they lose sight of the fact that they've already won the financial battle given the lateness of free agency. if X gets re-signed and then is overpaid for the rest of his career....well, he's been getting ripped off to this point so it's just balancing the scales.

 

[E5 Yaz]

I love X but don’t love the prospect of paying his next contract. In fact, I outright hope we don’t. So, letting him go won’t impact me at all. Devers is a different story. He’s a young star hitter who probably hasn’t reached his offensive ceiling. Letting him go would piss me off unless some random team goes full Soto on him or something.

This is pretty much where I am. I see X as a diminishing asset for the length of his next contract, so I can already see the avalanche of posts decrying having given him the deal. Devers would be more frustrating although, at this stage, I follow the Red Sox less as a passion and more like studying the ongoing results of an experiment as it evolves.

 

[Captaincoop]

I've been less interested since Mookie left. As noted above, the attachment generally just isn't the same to guys who aren't homegrown. There are exceptions - I certainly loved watching Pedro and Ortiz after they were acquired from other clubs, but Alex Verdugo and Trevor Story...not so much.

If they let Devers go, my baseball fandom may be really tested. MLB has been harder to watch in general lately with the pitching changes, the shift, the ghost runner...watching Raffy hit is one of the only reasons I turn the games on these days.

 

[CarolinaBeerGuy]

I love X but don’t love the prospect of paying his next contract. In fact, I outright hope we don’t. So, letting him go won’t impact me at all. Devers is a different story. He’s a young star hitter who probably hasn’t reached his offensive ceiling. Letting him go would piss me off unless some random team goes full Soto on him or something.

This is basically where I am. If Xander were to take a hometown discount, great. Since that isn't going to happen, I'm okay with him leaving. Devers is different. I'll have a hard time following along if they don't re-sign him long-term.

 

[SoxFanInPdx]

Overall, I root for the name on the front, not the back. That's not to say that I don't care about the players on the team of course, but I want the organization to be focused on having long term success. Dealing Mookie sucked, but I'm one of those that believed he really had no interest in being there.

I love Xander, but him being a Boras client - I don't want the Sox to pay for a lengthy contract. Short term contract...fine.

Devers being dealt would really bother me. He's earned a new deal, has shown he can handle playing here, is an elite hitter and a decent 3B (fully expect him to be a DH down the line). I am already extremely annoyed that ownership hasn't been more aggressive or serious about extending him. If FSG doesn't want to pay for a guy like Devers - then who is worthy of it to them? It confuses me and is worrisome at the same time.

 

[moondog80]

Clubs get so focused on not paying for a players' declining years that they lose sight of the fact that they've already won the financial battle given the lateness of free agency. if X gets re-signed and then is overpaid for the rest of his career....well, he's been getting ripped off to this point so it's just balancing the scales.

This seems like a bizarro sunk cost. The surplus value the Sox got from Xander form 2013-2022 is completely irrelevant to the contract they should offer him going forward. It's just the way it is. And Xander is going to get his money somewhere, so no need to hold a bake sale for him. What you're saying does make sense within a contract though -- when teams sign a guy long term, they generally know that they won't be getting strong returns at the end, but that is balanced by the production they hopefully will get in the first half or so.

As for the question of how I would react if they left, impossible for me to answer without knowing the full slate of moves. Them leaving and the payroll going down by 50 mil and them leaving and the payroll remaining near the tops in MLB are very different scenarios.

 

[Mueller's Twin Grannies]

Speaking only for myself:

One of the great joys of baseball is watching homegrown players develop through the minors and then have success at the major league level.

Snipping because this, right here, is the crux of the entire debate, and is, in some ways, exclusive to baseball.

It seems that baseball is the only sport that follows the draft-and-develop-and-promote-and-profit model, by and large, when compared to the other "big four" sports. Football drafts, but there is little development outside of camp. It has no minor league. It's sink or swim and the team can cut bait at any time, usually at minimal cost. Trading happens, but rarely one-for-one; it's almost always draft capital being exchanged. Basketball has a minor league, kind of, but most drafted players who make it to the NBA play with their team until the team deals them or they hit free agency and decide to cash in somewhere else. "Minor league" basketball players either carve out a brief career in the G league or wash out. Hockey is the only other sport that remotely follows the baseball model, but there aren't as many levels once you go pro and many draft picks end up playing for college or in another country before they even make the AHL or IHL. And some are lifers in those leagues, with only a select few making the jump to stay. And, because there's less focus on individual efforts (very few one vs. one plays in a hockey game, at least in the way that baseball has those match ups), it's harder to see the development in younger players during in-game action, so it is a little more difficult to form an attachment until the player becomes a star or integral to the team's success.

Only baseball has a young player go through multiple levels before reaching the highest level, which allows multiple places to get to know that player and become fans.

It almost seems like baseball is finally catching up to the way the other sports do business, where the player is just a commodity to be bought and sold, as needed. Investing in someone's career is probably no longer efficient, which sucks... but might be the way of the future.

 

[DisgruntledSoxFan77]

They go… they stay… I still have to go to work. My interest is lower now than it was earlier in life. I guess 4 championships makes the urgency feel less well, urgent

 

[Seels]

I stopped watching after they traded Mookie. I still follow along, and check in on box scores, but I've seen more games in person then games on TV in the last few years. There will be a point in time I feel the team takes it self seriously again. It isn't necessarily connected to winning. But that timer basically resets if they get rid of Devers.

I don't think teams can and should give out these crazy contracts to every person that they bring up. But to not give them out to any person they bring up makes me question what's the point of investing myself in them at all.

Maybe this is a problem for another thread, but it seems that every other sport has something in place to reward a team that is keeping a player that develop, even if it's something minor, like the comp picks in football. Baseball really doesn't have that in any meaningful way (I get that they too have comp picks, but the nature of baseball drafts being not felt for 4-5 years makes it really have next to no effect).

Baseball at large needs to find ways to better allow teams to keep their own players. Not franchise or whatever like football has, but something maybe like the Bird rights in basketball?

 

[BigSoxFan]

This seems like a bizarro sunk cost. The surplus value the Sox got from Xander form 2013-2022 is completely irrelevant to the contract they should offer him going forward. It's just the way it is. And Xander is going to get his money somewhere, so no need to hold a bake sale for him. What you're saying does make sense within a contract though -- when teams sign a guy long term, they generally know that they won't be getting strong returns at the end, but that is balanced by the production they hopefully will get in the first half or so.

As for the question of how I would react if they left, impossible for me to answer without knowing the full slate of moves. Them leaving and the payroll going down by 50 mil and them leaving and the payroll remaining near the tops in MLB are very different scenarios.

Them leaving and then the Sox paying lesser players market value would almost be worse for me. The Red Sox should never skimp on premium home grown talent. They passed on Mookie. Doing the same with Devers would not be a good look.

 

[Cesar Crespo]

Depending on who they replaced them with, my interest might even go up.

Change is exciting.

 

[TapeAndPosts]

I'll go on rooting for the Red Sox, and be excited about new players coming up and whoever we might acquire. As long as the team is well-run enough (not perfectly, but enough), my interest will remain, even if it waxes and wanes while life happens. But I'm a Red Sox fan, fandom that was forged entirely in players that are no longer here (Nomar, Pedro, Papi, Pedey and many others) and it's not going to vanish if Xander isn't around.

Maybe we were a little spoiled with Ortiz and Pedroia being franchise players who genuinely wanted to be here and would sacrifice their maximum possible payday to do so. Mookie was (is) a fabulous player and seemed like a wonderful guy, but we were not his first priority. You can't spend your life pining for people, even if they are wonderful people, who aren't interested in you. Disappointing for me personally but that's his choice. These new Mookie reports making him look a little disingenuous about what happened with the Sox make me a little sad, but we can't control it.

 

[brs3]

Remember when Devers smoked a bomb off Chapman in 2017? My MFY loving & Chapman hating wife and I bond over that bomb every time Devers comes up against the MFY. I love rooting for the same players year in and year out, and prefer the natural progression of letting guys walk in their later years. Enjoying Devers hit bombs off Chapman in a Rangers uniform won't be the same. The Red Sox can absolutely afford to keep X and Devers, they simply may not want to. They could've kept Betts, too.

They are the Boston Red Sox, one of the most valuable and creative brain trusts in the game. That they benefit from average schmoes playing payroll analysts only works in their favor from a publicity perspective. They can pay anyone any amount and it absolutely would barely ding their bottom line. Please don't @ me on this, I'm not interested in dissecting the finances of an ownership worth almost 10 billion dollars. The ownership is a multi sport multi franchise conglomerate, where even if fans stopped attending games altogether, it would not impact the ability to field a competitive team. They do not require ticket sales or merch sales or beer sales to spend buttloads of money. Lamenting the cost of a player is weird to me, when you look at all of the subsidiary businesses the ownership has.

I'll always watch the Red Sox, but fully expect X and Devers to leave, and that's a huge bummer. 2023 will have a sparky bunch that take the town by storm, and maybe win the whole thing to wash way those pathetic tears of missing binkies.

 

[Ale Xander]

I've been less interested since Mookie left. As noted above, the attachment generally just isn't the same to guys who aren't homegrown. There are exceptions - I certainly loved watching Pedro and Ortiz after they were acquired from other clubs, but Alex Verdugo and Trevor Story...not so much.

If they let Devers go, my baseball fandom may be really tested. MLB has been harder to watch in general lately with the pitching changes, the shift, the ghost runner...watching Raffy hit is one of the only reasons I turn the games on these days.

This is exactly where I am
Although it depends where Devers ends up too.
And as much as I should be attached to my namesake, , that was 9 years ago, and I don’t care that much about where X ends up now. He seems to be too much like Jeter especially with the keeping the SS while a better defender comes in. Kind of agree with the E5 BSF position.

I will possibly watch more of the other team (if Devers leaves) than the Red Sox if it’s a team I moderately like now andespecially if it’s in the NL (Dodgers, Padres, Brewers. Mets etc)

but it won’t be the 1986-2019 years where I tried to watch as much Red Sox as possible

 

[moondog80]

Them leaving and then the Sox paying lesser players market value would almost be worse for me. The Red Sox should never skimp on premium home grown talent. They passed on Mookie. Doing the same with Devers would not be a good look.

Did the Cardinals regret the bad look when they passed on Albert Pujols and then averaged 94 wins over the next 4 years?

 

[Papo The Snow Tiger]

I've been less interested since Mookie left. As noted above, the attachment generally just isn't the same to guys who aren't homegrown. There are exceptions - I certainly loved watching Pedro and Ortiz after they were acquired from other clubs, but Alex Verdugo and Trevor Story...not so much.

If they let Devers go, my baseball fandom may be really tested. MLB has been harder to watch in general lately with the pitching changes, the shift, the ghost runner...watching Raffy hit is one of the only reasons I turn the games on these days.

The bolded part is where I'm at too. I wasn't very happy to see Mookie go, but from a baseball standpoint I could understand the reasoning. But if Xander and Raffy are allowed to go it would appear the Red Sox are truly being run like a small market team and will only keep players while they are relatively cheap and will let them go when the first big payday came due. I'd have to think we fans would be in for a perpetual talk of farm system rankings and the vague promise of a better tomorrow, and I don't know if I could keep interested in that. Financial flexibility is all well and good, but if you truly want to compete you have to make a commitment somewhere along the line.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Mookie was (is) a fabulous player and seemed like a wonderful guy, but we were not his first priority. You can't spend your life pining for people, even if they are wonderful people, who aren't interested in you. Disappointing for me personally but that's his choice.

Where has he ever said that? The guy wanted to get paid what he is worth, the Red Sox have the money, they chose not to pay him and shipped him elsewhere. Where has ever said that he didn't want to be in Boston, disliked the Red Sox or wished that New England would fall into the ocean?

The only comments I see from Mookie when discussing Boston was how much he loved it here and how much he wished that he could've stayed. The only thing that I see from the Red Sox is that they maintain that they couldn't afford him and needed financial flexibility. The first part of that statement is an absolute lie. They could afford him, they chose not to. Whether you want to think that the Sox are being cheap or sticking to a budget is your choice. But this wasn't a Kyrie situation here.

 

[Kliq]

Suggesting that people will drop the Sox cold is an unrealistic, absolutist argument where you either support the team fully, or completely ignore them. It's an unproductive discussion point.

Baseball, due to it's nature, is a sport that if you are invested in, you follow day-to-day and the team is going to lose a lot of games during the season, even if they are a good team that makes the playoffs. To make those losses and that day-to-day grind exciting, it helps to have players that you have emotional attachments too, and enjoy seeing them PLAYING the game. People will always support a winner, but that day-to-day investment through the summer gets much harder without the familiar star players.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

Did the Cardinals regret the bad look when they passed on Albert Pujols and then averaged 94 wins over the next 4 years?

Perhaps. Perhaps not.

After winning a couple of WS with Pujols, they haven't won one since he departed. There may not be a direct correlation but Pujols' blood was still quite warm when he departed for Anaheim.

Maybe he would have made a difference in the near-misses they had in 2012 and 2013, though. Perhaps not, but there's an opportunity cost there.

 

[Bob Montgomerys Helmet Hat]

There was only one time in my fandom that I had to step away for a while, and that was after the ‘86 season. I just couldn’t get myself to watch the first part of ‘87, but eventually I came back.

Losing a player would never get my interest to wane. Watching the Sox is too important a part of my life and I would just be punishing myself. I agreed with the Mookie trade, even though I loved him. I’ll be sad when X is gone, but I get that this likely will be a bad contract. I’ll be pissed, really pissed, if Raffy isn’t re-signed. He’s the guy to build around. But if he goes, I’ll still be watching and rooting when the opening pitch is thrown next game. And I’ll be counting the days to Mayer, Yorke, etc
Contrary to others, I actually enjoy watching my teams win with intelligent team building. I don’t want to be the Yankees of old. I understand that many don’t feel this way, but I do. I enjoy the off the field strategy as well as the on the field strategy.

 

[TapeAndPosts]

Where has he ever said that? The guy wanted to get paid what he is worth, the Red Sox have the money, they chose not to pay him and shipped him elsewhere. Where has ever said that he didn't want to be in Boston, disliked the Red Sox or wished that New England would fall into the ocean?

I... didn't say he said those things. (Wished New England would fall into the ocean?) I said that unlike Ortiz and Pedroia, he prioritized maximum salary over being in Boston. He's welcome to do that, but staying in Boston was not his first priority. And everyone is welcome to their own personal choices, but for me at least I don't think it's emotionally healthy to pine for a person who did not make the relationship a priority.

 

[BigSoxFan]

Did the Cardinals regret the bad look when they passed on Albert Pujols and then averaged 94 wins over the next 4 years?

Not sure I see the connection. Pujols was much older than Devers.

 

[Pablo's TB Lover]

I'm in the boat of understanding letting X go a LOT more than Devers in the name of "sound baseball decisions". The Sox history has been littered with guys that played their 30s out in a separate organization on the back half of their career: Boggs, Clemens, Vaughn, Nomar, Pedro (not homegrown, but beloved). But Devers would be a gut punch, maybe even more so than Betts just due to the fact as a business decision you could argue Betts' body type may not hold up way into his 30s whereas Devers absolutely profiles as a guy who could extend his career as a slugging 1B/DH in the future. And the through line of Big Papi to the next LH power guy who could be a fixture of the franchise, and while not as much an extrovert with the media is effusive in his joy playing the game, cannot be ignored.

Short answer is I'll be mildly disappointed in X leaving but personally will lose a lot of my connection with the team if Devers was to go within the next year. Doesn't mean I won't follow the team or something drastic, but it will probably reduce my enthusiasm to attend in-person games. I guess the follow up is I may have Dombrowski partly to thank for that, because in an ideal situation balancing the farm with free agents we would have some guys behind Devers already gearing up to be the homegrown face of the team going forward, to soften the landing. It's taken awhile to right the ship and finally start to get some ML-ready youngsters cycled through.

 

[Archer1979]

I'm pushing 60 and eyeballing retirement so I have a dramatic lifestyle change coming up. I've had periods where the team didn't interest me (the earliest being after the Lynn/Burleson/Fisk) departures, but that was equal parts puberty and what I call the Steve Renko-era. The honest answer is that I'm not sure, but if they're not putting a competitive product on the field and looking to keep the cost low when they can easily afford putting a goo team on the field, I imagine that there are going to be a lot of other options that will help me pass the time to my inevitable dirt-nap.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

I... didn't say he said those things. (Wished New England would fall into the ocean?) I said that unlike Ortiz and Pedroia, he prioritized maximum salary over being in Boston. He's welcome to do that, but staying in Boston was not his first priority. And everyone is welcome to their own personal choices, but for me at least I don't think it's emotionally healthy to pine for a person who did not make the relationship a priority.

Of course you didn't say anything about New England falling into the ocean, it was a joke. Lighten up.

But you keep saying that Mookie didn't make the relationship (I'm assuming between him and the Sox) a "priority" and that's not correct. He didn't leave here. He was traded. If anyone in this relationship was downplaying the priority, it was the Sox who traded him.

 

[snowmanny]

I love X but don’t love the prospect of paying his next contract. In fact, I outright hope we don’t. So, letting him go won’t impact me at all. Devers is a different story. He’s a young star hitter who probably hasn’t reached his offensive ceiling. Letting him go would piss me off unless some random team goes full Soto on him or something.

I feel the same way. And it isn't as if the Red Sox aren't going to pay for SOMEONE'S declining years. They are currently paying for Sale's declining years. They are still paying for Price's declining years. For all we know they are paying for Story's declining years.
You know what? Pay Devers and if you are stuck with him as he declines in eight years maybe it prevents you from signing the next Sandoval and Hanley. Or Crawford. I'd rather see the full arc of Rafael's career in all its pain and glory. Are we all pissed that the GMs of the past didn't dump Williams and Yastrzemski (edit: at their peaks)?

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

I feel the same way. And it isn't as if the Red Sox aren't going to pay for SOMEONE'S declining years. They are currently paying for Sale's declining years. They are still paying for Price's declining years. For all we know they are paying for Story's declining years.
You know what? Pay Devers and if you are stuck with him as he declines in eight years maybe it prevents you from signing the next Sandoval and Hanley. Or Crawford. I'd rather see the full arc of Rafael's career in all its pain and glory. Are we all pissed that the GMs of the past didn't dump Williams and Yastrzemski (edit: at their peaks)?

Kind of a false equivalence given that Williams and Yastrzemski (mostly) played in the reserve clause era where no one was making budget breaking salaries nor signed to guaranteed deals for such salaries. Even with those guys making big bucks relative to their time, it could be off-set by the fact that everybody else was getting paid peanuts, and if they truly reached the end of their productivity, the team could just release them and owe them nothing more. Williams and Yastrzemski were never a hindrance to the Sox improving the roster around them, whereas (for example) a 37 year old Rafael Devers who's making $35M and hitting .210 in the DH spot is taking up money and a roster spot that could possibly be better utilized. To be clear, that's not an argument against extending Devers for a long time, just pointing out that Ted and Yaz were in a completely different world compared to modern baseball.

 

[moondog80]

Maybe he would have made a difference in the near-misses they had in 2012 and 2013, though. Perhaps not, but there's an opportunity cost there.

You do know that the Cardinals got to play someone else at 1B after Pujols left, right? They didn't have to take an automatic out when is spot came up, and there was someone else to receive throws at 1B on ground balls?

In 2012-13, Pujols put up a WAR of 5.3. The Cardinals mostly had Allen Craig at 1B, who put up a WAR of 5.1 (over the exact same number of games, as it turns out). Allen Craig was being paid 2.5 million, total, over those two years, so the Cards, whose team payroll did not go down, were able to spend more in other areas. And of course, they were not stuck with the disaster of the last 4 years of his contract where the Angels paid 114 million for a player who was below replacement level. It's beyond absurd to suggest that decision was anything other than a massive, franchise-altering win for the Cardinals, both short term and especially long term.

This doesn't mean the same thing will happen with Devers who, as someone else mentioned, is younger. But the idea that a team needs to simply pay a home gown player whatever he wants is absurd. Good organizations set a price and don't get swayed by the idea of bad press if/when a player signs elsewhere

 

[DennyDoyle'sBoil]

There's a lot of people on this board who watch the Red Sox as if they're watching a person play fantasy baseball, without any real attachment. If Player X leaves, that person will just plug in Player Y and life will go on. And that's cool, no judgement from me. Honest. But that's not how I like to watch sports. One of the reasons why I love the Red Sox are the people that make/made up the team. Going back to Roger Clemens and Jim Rice and Dwight Evans and Dave Henderson (I realize he was here less than a year, but his ALCS homer is what made me the fan I am today) and Burks and Greenwell and Wakefield and Nomar and Pedro and Manny and Ortiz and Pedroia and Varitek and Lowe and Betts and Bogaerts and JBJ and Benintendi and Lester and so many more.

The reason why I'm a Red Sox fan--and a baseball fan really--is because for seven months a year, day-in and day-out, I follow these guys and are happy when they do well and grouse when they do poorly. And it's not because Devers happens to be the third baseman right at this very instance, it's because I've watched Devers grow and become the best third baseman in the league. I have made an investment in him. If the Red Sox let him go based on money, then that sucks. And I'm not going to get into "Well, the Red Sox are just being cheap" because that's kinda the answer. I roughly know how much the Red Sox are worth and I know that they make a profit. I roughly know how much that FSG is worth and I know that they make a profit. I know how much John Henry is worth and I know how much money that I spend on tickets, sodas, hot dogs, shirts and caps every year. It's disheartening to hear the billionaire owner of a billionaire business that runs a team making millions that "Player X just wants too much money."

Because I know that's not true.

And again, if you take the opposite view point, more power to you. I'm not sure why you give a shit about how much money John Henry and FSG make, but I couldn't care less. Watching the Red Sox with the best players (and they've had three who've come up through their system in the last ten years) is really the only thing I care about. Watching Chaim Bloom dumpster dive for the best value on a conga line of anonymous players is frankly really uninteresting. It might not be for you, and that's great--to each his own. But I enjoy watching stars that I have a tentative connection play for my team.

So yeah, I'll probably be really pissed with X and Devers leave. Will it be enough to ruin my Red Sox fandom? I don't know. I doubt it, but I have to say watching players leave and excelling elsewhere really sucks.

Pretty clear from your Mookie posts that you feel this way. And it's completely legitimate. I actually don't think there is anyone that disagrees that it's best when the guys stay -- everyone feels that way. But it's a bit like shouting at clouds. The trends are against you. It's really not just the Red Sox. You just can't fall in love with players in 2022 and if you do you're going to be perpetually disappointed. Maybe you get lucky here and there. Maybe it will work out for Devers or Xander. But in the long run, this is just not the way of professional sports.

Not saying something you don't already know. But you're going to be disappointed. If not now, eventually. It's just inevitable. I'm not saying it's going to turn into European soccer. But it's going to get more like that than it is going to get less like that.

 

[Shaky Walton]

Suggesting that people will drop the Sox cold is an unrealistic, absolutist argument where you either support the team fully, or completely ignore them. It's an unproductive discussion point.

I don't mean to be defensive but that was not the actual question. It was a secondary question. And I agree, that' an unlikely result for most fans. Though I do think that some fans reach a tipping point and I have heard people say that "after [insert trade, free agency loss] happened, I stopped following."

The main question posed here was:

Would the sum total of losing these two cornerstone, "face of the franchise" type players, after having lost Betts a few years ago, affect in any way your "Sox fandom"?

I just now added the bold and italics to make the point.

But yeah, I was wondering about the extent to which losing either or both of these players would affect people here and not expecting that many would say "that's it, I'm done!"

 

[Merkle's Boner]

It would definitely impact my interest and I would probably give up my season tickets. When all is said and done, I invest over $5000 a season in this team, and it’s really the only way I can show my satisfaction or dissatisfaction to the front office. I’m not naive enough to think they actually give a shit about my money, but it’s what I got. I love the Sox, but I really love the players. I’m excited for Mayer to make it so I’m sure I’ll come back. But to say that having two stalwarts leave won’t have any effect on my interest would be a lie.

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

We know that ownership has more money than most teams, even more than most small nations.

This doesn’t mean they don’t want to make money in each of their businesses. Sure it would be great if the Sox had the first Billion dollar payroll, keeping all the home grown players and adding the best free agents,.

But that is unrealistic. Owners don’t run public amenities. They are in it to make more money.

 

[geoflin]

I'll always be a baseball fan and always be a Red Sox fan. But my interest and level of paying attention is currently waning for this year because they're not playing well and don't look like a playoff team to me. Next year and future years I'll begin with great interest and hope but how long that lasts will depend on the quality of the team.
I fully expect X to be elsewhere next year and it won't bother me. I think he'll ask, and receive elsewhere, more than the Red Sox want to pay and more than he's worth. Devers is another story. I want him signed for at least the majority of the rest of his career. If the Red Sox don't sign him I fully expect that the Yankees will, he's perfect for them and they have the money. It would be very disheartening to have to watch him play there.

 

[Comfortably Lomb]

There's a lot of people on this board who watch the Red Sox as if they're watching a person play fantasy baseball, without any real attachment. If Player X leaves, that person will just plug in Player Y and life will go on.

This is me. These guys are just cogs in a machine and there's always a next guy to watch. Will I care at all if Bogaerts or Devers are gone if the Sox continue to spend and win? No. But I do think there's some value to placating the emotionally attached fans since they help pay the bills.

At the same time, I think the group of fans whining about Mookie and who will whine about Bogaerts and Devers are a small portion of the fan base who just happen to be particularly vocal on this forum. The sports talk crowd, who have been starved for things to whine about due to the unbelievable success of the Red Sox over the past few decades.

 

[DennyDoyle'sBoil]

We know that ownership has more money than most teams, even more than most small nations.

This doesn’t mean they don’t want to make money in each of their businesses. Sure it would be great if the Sox had the first Billion dollar payroll, keeping all the home grown players and adding the best free agents,.

But that is unrealistic. Owners don’t run public amenities. They are in it to make more money.

I think one aspect that is good for fans is that the team is owned by the same group that owns the broadcasting entity. So they will be more finely tuned to ratings. It's not like ratings will matter every five years during a renewal. They have a day to day ongoing advertising revenue stream and eyeballs matter and so if they ever start to lose viewership, it will become a critical issue fast.

Ratings were pretty strong last year. Not very clear what it would take until the team felt pressure, but I think NESN in the end is the key pressure point.