Red Sox were Johnny Cueto’s dream team
Johnny Cueto‘s agent recently told Peter Gammons about his client’s desire to play in Boston, which is unlikely after David Price signed with the Red Sox.
Dave Dombrowski openly discussed the Red Sox desire to sign David Price with the media weeks before actually inking the deal with the thirty year old lefty, and he also mentioned a possible back-up plan with Zack Greinke at the time. The name Johnny Cueto never came up, but it appears that Cueto wanted that to be the case.
On Friday, Peter Gammons discussed Cueto’s desire to play in Boston on his website. Gammons talk with Cueto’s agent Bryce Dixon. “Johnny really wanted to go to the Red Sox. His idol is Pedro Martinez. He wanted to be with him. When he threw the shutout in the World Series, one of the first things he said was, ‘did Pedro ever throw a game like that in the post-season?”
Considering Cueto is looking to cash in around the 200 million dollar mark (he turned down 120 million from Arizona), Red Sox fans can stop dreaming of a Price/Cueto 1-2 punch. Dixon went on to say that he feels Cueto will sign somewhere in the next week or so, with many MLB insiders thinking the Dodgers may be the likely landing spot.
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It seems that Boston was dead set on getting a starter on the open market, and they went and got the best one. Sure, the money is astronomical, but when you take a step back and see Greinke signing for over 200 million, Cueto’s asking price to be around the same, you start to understand that this is the new normal.
In his eight year career, Cueto is 96-70 with a 3.30 ERA and 1,171 strikeouts. No one doubts that he has “stuff”, but he also has a history of elbow and arm issues which is very scary for someone asking for such a commitment. He also saw his ERA balloon from 2.62 to 4.76 last season when he was traded from Cincinnati to Kansas City. The National League may be the best home for Cueto and whichever club he lands with.
It’s interesting to hear about Cueto’s love for Boston and Pedro, but if he is so serious about coming here, perhaps he’d be willing to take a monster pay cut to live out his dream? Yeah … didn’t think so.