Boston Red Sox five biggest player busts from 2010-2019
By Mike Towle
We take a not-so-sentimental look back at the Red Sox’s five biggest player busts of the decade. Spoiler alert: Hanley Ramirez not included.
The concluding 2010’s were a decade comprised of a fascinating mix of highlights for the Boston Red Sox (World Series titles in 2013 and 2018 top the list), lowlights (the infamous September belly flop of 2011 and back-to-back losing seasons in 2014 and 2015 come to mind), and unsolved mysteries (i.e., the chaotic Bobby V cameo of 2012, Allen Craig‘s injured foot, and the Chris Sale and Nathan Eovaldi contract extensions).
While casting their vision toward 2020, the Red Sox now plug ahead with their fourth GM/Baseball VP/Baseball Chief of the decade. Now batting in the cleanup spot (literally) is still-new Baseball Chief Chaim Bloom. His apparently antithetical mandate is to pare a bloated payroll and annoying luxury-tax bill down to under $208 million and zero, respectively.
As we can clearly see, bad signings and self-sabotaging trades are young Chaim’s kryptonite going forward. There is no space for Dombrowskian waste. No more doling out nine-figure contracts or extensions without taking a closer look at the MRI’s and X-rays of those involved. Even spending, say, and let’s pick a number at random, just $4 million to bring back a popular first baseman with some batting bop (two seasons of it, anyway) is deemed too lavish an expenditure.
While Bloom exercises caution, patience, and scrutiny figuring out what moves to make, he also has to exercise restraint regarding moves not to be made, mindful the Red Sox had their share of player busts during the decade, the archival remnants of which are exhumed on the following five pages.
Just a heads up to cut down on the suspense before turning the page: Hanley Ramirez didn’t make this list, as tempting as it was to thusly dishonor him. If this list were 10 busts deep, maybe. In his favor, he did have one borderline All Star-worthy season (2016, when he hit 30 home runs and drove in 111) as well as two so-so seasons – which is about what you’d expect to get these days for a five-year deal worth $110 million.
The five busts of the decade follow in reverse order of relived angst: