Red Sox Rumors: Players potentially on trading block as deadline approaches

The Red Sox don’t plan on trading their young core at the deadline.

The MLB trade deadline is rapidly approaching in this shortened season, leaving the near future in doubt for several Boston Red Sox players. CEO Sam Kennedy insists that the team isn’t waiving the white flag despite a 6-13 start that has them sitting in the basement of the American League. While a decent winning streak could vault the team back into the hunt, the Red Sox realistically need to consider themselves sellers with an eye on the future.

Appearing on WEEI’s “The Greg Hill Show” on Thursday, Kennedy confirmed that the Red Sox have had trade discussions with other clubs. Boston’s brass will listen to offers but the expectation is that veterans without a long-term connection to the franchise will be deemed expendable rather than blowing up the roster by dealing their young core.

"“You look at this team and we still have a really young group of core players that you’d like to see with the Red Sox for a long, long time,” Kennedy said. “We’d never label anyone untouchable, just given the fact that sometimes to re-tool and restructure for the future, you do have to sometimes make difficult decisions, as you saw with the Mookie (Betts) transaction. I don’t think anybody would be untouchable as it were, but there are certainly guys who have grown up in the system that we’d like to keep with the Sox for a long, long time.”"

Trading Betts to the Dodgers is all the evidence we need that nobody is untouchable but the circumstances of that deal are entirely different from the concept of trading their remaining young stars. Betts was on the verge of free agency and asking for more money than the Red Sox were willing to spend.

That’s not the case for the core they intend to keep together. Let’s explore which players will and will not be on the trading block as the deadline approaches at the end of this month.