Picking up the pieces

A day later, the sting hasn't subsided but it's time for the team to start the process of moving on

A day later and it’s still hard to believe that Xander Bogaerts is now a Padre. The Red Sox, probably like you and definitely like me, are in shock. The Boston Globe had a piece on GM Chaim Bloom’s reaction to hearing Bogaerts had picked San Diego. He probably looked a lot like me when I heard. We can get more into who is at fault for what here later, but right now there’s not much time to be shellshocked. Right now the Red Sox don’t have a shortstop or face of the franchise. So right now it’s time to find solutions.

Let’s run through some of them.

It’s worth pointing out that the level of satisfaction gleaned from any answers given will depend on the questions asked. So let’s ask some questions. What do the Red Sox want? Do they want a plug and play 1-to-1 replacement for Xander? Do they value having a face of the franchise? Do they want to refocus some of the money that had been earmarked for Xander into other parts of the team? Do they not want to spend the money at all and continue building a less expensive roster? Are they really and truly trying to win in 2023 or are they in a holding pattern while the top minor leaguers percolate through the system?

If the Red Sox do want to replace Xander straight up, if they do want a new face of the franchise to put on billboards and such, well, Carlos Correa is right there. You might not like that suggestion, but Correa is a better bet to stick at short longer and has more power than Bogaerts. He’s at minimum comparable and potentially simply a better option going forward. He’s also going to cost roughly what Bogaerts cost, and if the Red Sox weren’t willing to extend themselves for Bogaerts how likely is it they’re willing to do so, and potentially to go even further, for Correa? I’m guessing not very likely, but at least for now the option is there.

A slightly less expensive option is Dansby Swanson, recently of the Braves. Swanson is the best fielder of the free agent shortstops by a good margin, and last season he hit pretty well, if not quite in Bogaerts’ or Correa’s range. He would likely cost less than Correa, but then again the market is silly so who really knows? Regardless of how much, he’s not going to be cheap, so again, is that something the Red Sox are comfortable with? I don’t know, but it sure doesn’t seem like it.

If free agency isn’t the route the team wants to go down, there are a couple options, and the viability of those options depends on some stuff. First, the Red Sox have shortstops in two of the top three spots on their top 10 prospects list. Marcelo Mayer is 19 and ended last season in High-A. There’s no way he’s a viable option for the 2023 season but an accelerated timetable could see him in Boston sometime in 2024.

Currently fourth on the Sox Prospects top 10, Ceddanne Rafaela will be 22 in 2023 and ended last season in Double-A. Also he’s reportedly an excellent fielder (as is Mayer, for the record). It’s not crazy to think he could be in Boston sometime during the 2023 season.

Neither player is any kind of foolproof plan but the presence of both does mean the Red Sox might not need to lock up shortstop for the next decade. They could emulate the Yankees and find a stop-gap for a season or two while their top shortstop prospects develop.

I’ll be honest, I hate that plan. I hate it for New York, but I especially hate it for Boston right here and right now. First of all, if it works for the Yankees, it only works because the rest of their roster can pick up the slack, and that’s not the situation Boston finds itself. Aaron Judge makes up for a lot of mistakes, but the Red Sox don’t have Aaron Judge, nor do they have their version of Aaron Judge because they traded him to the Dodgers two years ago. But I digress.

If the team really isn’t trying to win (a view the departure of Bogaerts supports) then the Red Sox could sign Jose Iglesias or some other comparably below average player who could play the position adequately and start him at short in ‘23. If they build a strong enough roster around him, that might even look smart. It’s at least an option, if not a good one.

Another option is similar but more robust: trade for the next star shortstop. After some intense investigation on the electronic pages of FanGraphs, here are a few names that might be available.

Willy Adames, Brewers - Adames had a down season in ‘22 but was still an above average hitter and a well above average fielder. He has two years left of team control and the Brewers have made some noises about wanting to cut costs. He’s not the hitter Xander is, but he does have power and will take a walk.

Ha-seong Kim, Padres - Kim absolutely raked in Korea, but his power hasn’t translated since coming to San Diego. What has translated is his defense. He’s reportedly one of the best defensive shortstops in baseball, but the Padres, you might have heard, just signed a new shortstop to an 11 year, $280 million contract, so Kim is kinda out of a gig. He’s got two more years left on a four year, $28 million contract.

Tim Anderson, White Sox - Anderson’s power has dropped off dramatically over the past two seasons, but he’s still a plus defender at short who can be counted on to hit .300 every year. He’ll be 30 in 2023 where he’ll make $12.5 million. He has a $14 million club option for the 2024 season as well. Rumors have swirled that Anderson’s name on the trade block, but there hasn’t been anything concrete. The White Sox, being the White Sox, would probably love to save the $36 million Anderson will make over the next two seasons.

Bryson Stott - Stott was a rookie in 2022 who played 127 games for the NL champion Phillies. He started 75 of those games at shortstop and acquitted himself well, though not well enough to stop Dave Dombrowski from spending $300 million to replace him. The Phillies are in go-for-it mode right now and Stott is penciled in as their starting second baseman, so perhaps he’s not available but given how the Phillies obviously feel about him, maybe there’s a deal to be had here .

Eguy Rosario - This one is more of a shot in the dark. Rosario is a 23-years-old prospect with the Padres, currently ranked fifth in their system by MLB Pipeline. He’s not strictly a shortstop, but he can play the position in addition to second and third base. He made his major league debut with San Diego this past season, playing in just seven games, but he hit quite well in Triple-A before the promotion and in Double-A the season prior. He’s more of a hit over power guy, but looks to be roughly a league average hitter, which is pretty good for a shortstop. Given the fact that the Padres have at least three shortstops and over $500 million ahead of him means perhaps they’d consider moving him for something they need more than a backup shortstop to the backup shortstop to the backup shortstop to the backup shortstop to the backup shortstop to the backup shortstop.

Though who knows. AJ Preller is just nuts.

There are probably players I didn’t think of in consideration as well, but it wouldn’t shock me if the next Red Sox shortstop was name-dropped above. Unless… there’s one scenario I didn’t cover, and that is the Red Sox decide to do what seemed deviously obvious from the day he was signed, and that is moving Trevor Story back to shortstop.

There’s been a lot of talk about how Story’s arm isn’t up to shortstop standards anymore, but I’ll be honest and say I didn’t notice that this season when watching him. Maybe I just missed it, I don’t know. But if the Red Sox think he can play short for a season or two before Rafaela and/or Mayer are ready, then that might be their best bet.

There’s one other extremely awful thought I had in the car earlier today that I’ll share with you now. The Red Sox could use Rafael Devers to acquire a shortstop. For example, would the Giants trade Marco Luciano for Devers? What would the Dodgers give up? Would the Twins trade Royce Lewis?

Once you start going over the possibilities, there are some interesting options, though of course all require trading Devers. But, come on now, that’s totally on the table, right? The Red Sox didn’t want to pay hundreds of millions to keep two Hall of Famers in Mookie and Xander, what makes you think they’ll be willing to pay that for Devers? Maybe they will, but I sure haven’t seen any evidence of it yet.

Maybe there’s a way they use Devers to fill multiple holes. Like, for example, would the Twins trade Luis Arraez and Royce Lewis? Would the Giants trade Kyle Harrison and Marco Luciano? No, probably they wouldn’t. But if we’re talking trading Devers, there have to be big names on the table coming the other way. So maybe they would.

Speaking of the table, everything is on it now. The Red Sox had just started patching the holes in their quilt before the Padres shot a cannon ball through it. Now the Red Sox have to get creative. Not only have they lost their shortstop, but they’ve lost the six wins he created last season as well. They can cover the hole a bit but they’re not going to fix that problem by moving Trevor Story 90 feet to the left.

The truth is there is no way to fully replace Xander Bogaerts. Carlos Correa won’t do it because it’s more than just about the production on the field. It’s about the connection between the fans and the team. Sure, Correa or Swanson or whomever they end up plugging in could grow on us, but it won’t be the same. It can’t be the same.

But that all said, the ball is squarely in Chaim Bloom’s court now. This is his mess. He has to find a way to fix it, or quite frankly he’ll likely be out of a job. This is as close to a ‘bottom of the ninth bases loaded down by three’ situation as any GM gets. Let’s see what Bloom can do.