J.D. Martinez Is The Keystone Of Boston's Off-Season

The Red Sox Outfielder/DH's decision is set to define the team's off-season

J.D. Martinez has a decision to make and it’s a bit like the proverbial first domino to fall. But, instead of pushing that domino in one direction, Martinez can pick any direction and achieve entirely different results.

So what does this mean? What are those outcomes? Who what when where why? Let’s get into all that in a moment, but first, this is Sox Outsider, a Red Sox newsletter by me, Matt Kory. Hello! I’ve written at The Athletic, FanGraphs, Forbes, and a bunch of other places, and now I’m covering the Red Sox right here. You can read this for free by subscribing! All you have to do is push the button below and toss your email address in there. Super easy!

Let’s start with the details. J.D. Martinez has a player option for one year and $19.375 million left on the five-year contract he signed with Boston after the 2017 season. If he exercises it, he’ll be a Red Sox for one more year at that amount. If he opts out of his contract, he’ll become a free agent and the Red Sox won’t have to spend $19.375 million on J.D. Martinez. That’s basically it. Basically. But the details and impact of that choice will create ripples through Boston’s off-season.

The Atlanta Braves won the 2021 World Series last night, and that kicked off baseball’s off-season. It also starts the clock on J.D. Martinez. He has until five days after the Series ends to decide what he’ll do. If he opts in, the Red Sox have their DH for 2022 and about $20 million fewer dollars to play with. If he opts-out and becomes a free agent, then there are more decisions to make.

What other decisions? First, do the Red Sox offer Martinez a qualifying offer? The qualifying offer is essentially a one-year deal at $18.4 million (the amount is set ahead of time for reasons that aren’t worth getting into). If the Red Sox make that offer, Martinez can accept it, in which case he’s a Red Sox for one year at that price, or he can turn it down and become a free agent. If he turns it down, the Red Sox get draft pick compensation if/when Martinez signs with another team. The exact kind of draft pick they get will depend on the deal he signs.

It seems obvious that if Martinez opts-out, the Red Sox will offer him the QO because the money is so close to what he just left on the table. It would effectively be as if the Red Sox had offered Martinez the same contract twice.

Red Sox: Would you like [takes lid off of plate] this?
Martinez: No, thank you.
Red Sox: Oh, ok. [puts lid back on plate] In that case, how about [takes lid back off plate again] THIS?

Nobody ever accepts anything when being offered the second time. Has anyone ever said, “Would you like to buy [item]?” to you, you said, “No thanks,” they said “Are you sure you?” and then you changed your mind? "Am I sure? Well, when you put it that way no, I’m not sure! I’ll buy it!”

“Are you sure?” is effectively the Red Sox offering Martinez the qualifying offer. But, by turning down the QO, Martinez will cost a draft pick in addition to whatever money a prospective team spends to sign him. That might not matter for a guy like Carlos Correa, but for a 34-year-old DH looking at a two (or maaaaaaaybe three?) year deal, it’s a significant added cost. Turning down the QO could hurt Martinez’s market.

For the Red Sox, Martinez’s opt-out potentially opens up a roster spot and some money to spend. Want the Red Sox to bring back Kyle Schwarber? That gets a lot more difficult to see if Martinez stays put. But if he goes? Suddenly there’s a DH spot for Schwarber on the roster. If Martinez stays, yes, they could still re-sign Schwarber, but doing so puts a lot of the team’s money into DH/defensively deficient corner outfielders, at least for 2022, and it’s not like this team has no other issues to address. Realistically, it’s probably Martinez or Schwarber for Boston. Alternatively, the Red Sox could spend Martinez’s money on trying to bolster their pitching staff or on a Rafael Devers contract extension. Those things aren’t all financially equal, but you can make a dent in a few items with $19 million.

The other option worth mentioning is that if Martinez opts-into his existing deal the Red Sox could try and trade him away. It’s no secret Chaim Bloom wants a more flexible roster and a $20 million DH who moonlights as a bad left fielder is pretty much the opposite of flexible.

What could the Red Sox get for Martinez in a deal? Likely this would be one of those ‘addition by subtraction’ deals where the Red Sox would eat some of Martinez’s money to facilitate a trade. In other words, this isn’t going to rebuild the farm system in one swoop, or at all, probably.

So with a trade on one hand and draft pick compensation on the other, the Martinez saga won’t immediately be solved by Martinez opting in or opting out. That said, we’ll have a lot more clarity on Boston’s off-season plans once Martinez makes his decision.

So what is he going to do?

The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal has said recently he expects Martinez to opt-out. The Boston Globe’s Peter Abraham has said he thinks Martinez will opt-in. We’ll know in five days (or sooner) but I don’t think the financials here are too complicated. Martinez isn’t going to make $19.375 million in 2022 if he opts-out. His play would be to try for a smaller average annual value (AAV) but more total dollars spread out over multiple seasons. For example, a two year $28 million contract, though even writing that here feels high to me.

The thing is there are potential issues with Martinez that could push back against him getting even that kind of deal. For one, he’s not young. He’ll be 34 next season, and even though he had a good season at the plate, at this age he’s not going to bring value in the field or on the bases. He’s a DH in a 30 team league but where only half the teams have DH spots (that could change with a new CBA but that’s not known now and won’t be known in five days when Martinez has to make his decision). His hitting has been in modest decline for a few seasons now, and while he’s still a very good hitter, he’s not the hitter he was when the Red Sox gave him that contract. Throw in the draft pick prospective teams would lose in order to sign him and it’s hard for me to see Martinez doing better than his current contract.

Of course there are other reasons Martinez might opt out. Perhaps he has had enough of Boston and wants to play elsewhere. Maybe. Perhaps he really wants the security that comes with a multi-year deal. Maybe. If those two maybes are true then opting-out makes sense even if it results in less money for Martinez.

But even if he stays in Boston, it’ll likely be for only one more season, and definitely for only one more if Martinez doesn’t want to sign an extension. Also, there’s a good bet that Martinez can replicate his 2021 numbers in 2022, so the question I would ask is, ‘will there be a big difference between what Martinez can get as a 34 year old DH on the market and what Martinez can get as a 35 year old DH on the market?’ I’m guessing there is not a substantial difference between those two options. So, if I’m JD Martinez, I’m taking the $19.375 on the table, then figuring out the rest next off-season.

From Boston’s front office’s perspective… well, I’ll put it this way. I suspect if Martinez opts out the Red Sox front office will throw a party. Chaim Bloom would probably be all too glad to try and replace Martinez’s production at a fraction of his current salary. That said, while the Red Sox front office might rather have the cash and roster spot, I’m not sure there is a bad option here for Boston. If Martinez stays, the Red Sox will have to suffer through another year of having a very good hitter bat in the middle of their lineup. If he goes, they’ll have money to spend, an extra roster spot to shuffle mediocre relievers through, and maybe another high draft pick to burn next draft as well. We just won’t know which it is until Martinez makes the call.