Red Sox fans shouldn’t expect short term competitiveness
Red Sox Nation is among the best fanbases in sports, but we tend to be impatient. The Boston Red Sox have a plan that doesn’t mesh well with such a trait.
The Boston Red Sox offseason has been dead quiet, to say the least. There are teams previously irrelevant such as the Chicago White Sox and the Texas Rangers who are starting to load up, and there are the usual suspects in the New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers who are reloading. Meanwhile, the Red Sox are… just chilling, really.
This has drawn the ire of many fans, understandably so. The Red Sox are usually among the teams in the mix for that marquee free agent or trade acquisition. Everyone knows the team is dialing back to get under the luxury tax threshold, but for some, that reality is still difficult to accept.
The organization will never admit it publicly, but I don’t think it takes a psychic to realize that they don’t truly care about being competitive in 2020 or even 2021 for that matter. Why else would they be exploring trades involving Mookie Betts or David Price?
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By 2021 at the latest, those two will likely no longer be members of the Red Sox. They may not be the only ones gone either. For us fans, it may be easier to just lay back and accept that we are probably going to be spending the better part of the next two years rooting for the Yankees to lose more than we will be for the Red Sox to win.
The Rangers went out and dealt for Corey Kluber. The Yankees signed Gerrit Cole. The White Sox are getting everybody.
The Red Sox have signed…
*drum roll*
… Martín Peréz! Oh, and Chris Mazza!
We can assume that the organization’s plan here is to have another championship window at some point after 2021. Until then, the expectations for the Red Sox should be tempered. That’s not to say they’ll be among the worst teams in baseball, but they likely won’t be top tier either.
It could take longer than two years to replenish the farm system. On the bright side, the team might be willing to spend again after that time as well. One can be hopeful that in the meantime they will be able to field an entertaining product, but with their current goal of shedding payroll, the Red Sox will certainly be worse on paper in 2020 than they were in 2019.
Next. Red Sox All-Decade team from 2010-2019. dark
All this frustration may end up being worth it if it ends up resulting in a string of playoff appearances that include at least one World Series victory in the 2020s. Anything short of that, and it will be hard to forgive the Red Sox front office for presumably punting in the short term while the Yankees have their best chance to win a title.