What's with the interest in Kepler? He rode the gopher ball to a career high in homers in 2019 and has been a league-average or worse hitter since. Doesn't make consistent hard contact, is injury prone. He's an alright defender and a better base runner than Verdugo but why give up anything talent-wise for a soon-to-be-30-year-old corner outfielder who doesn't hit for power and who's been worth all of 5 WAR over the last three seasons total? He's the older slightly more competent version of Verdugo and maybe a ~1 WAR upgrade at max without Verdugo's ceiling, that doesn't seem like a good use of resources or a roster spot.
My interest anyhow is that he is a plus defender in RF (alright sells him short), which we need in our home park, and a batter who has been underrated by his recent results. He's also on a very reasonable contract, the end of his extension with Minnesota — 1 year $8.5m, with a club option at $10m/$1m buyout — and it sounds like he should be available for very little.
I like him a lot better if we are also acquiring a big RH bat to DH, such as the also-rumored-to-be-available Rhys Hoskins.
You’re missing a ton of context with the Yoshida thing. They’re being criticized because a lot of MLB writers and MLB “sources” are saying it was an incredible overpay and Yoshida has zero MLB history for people to fall back on. Who knows how Yoshida turns out and I am really hoping he hits his statistical projections but there are reasons why people are questioning the decision making
The team that wins the bidding is almost tautologically the team that is willing to pay more than other teams think the player is worth (e.g. SD and Xander, as mentioned by others above).
I say this as someone who thought Yoshida should be one of our top targets from the beginning of the offseason, but I think the "zero MLB history thing" is oversold and the result of an unwillingness to look deeper into the situation. Sure, not every hitter has succeeded who has come over from NPB. But most of these guys who didn't translate were good players in NPB, not perennial MVP-candidate/batting champion types with more walks than strikeouts and OPSes above 1.000, etc. etc. etc.
Everyone is eager to suggest that Bloom and the Sox FO are constantly misreading the FA market, but I think the Red Sox may have signed one of the better outfield contracts of the offseason, given that the comparison is the Andrew Benintendi deal with Chicago, the Brandon Nimmo deal with NYM, Judge reupping with New York at a $40m AAV, etc. The Giants' deal for Haniger is also pretty good, and I'm sure there are a few more that I'm forgetting.