Red Sox: Free-agent targets Boston needs to be contenders in 2021

Red Sox must get in on Jeremy Jeffress before the bidding war

Jeremy Jeffress, the long-time Brewers reliever and current Cub, is set to hit free agency this offseason, as Chicago continues to hope that Craig Kimbrel can return to his past self. What is extremely interesting about Jeffress though, is that he is currently projected to receive a contract of just one-year, $3 million. For a reliever with a career 3.08 ERA who had an ERA of 1.54 last year, this is beyond a bargain.

Yes, Jeffress is going year 33 season and has a history of injuries, but for the dominance he portrayed last season, he is a must add for the struggling Boston bullpen.

Typically, teams should stay away from older players due to their heightened risk of injury and their likelihood to lack the durability of younger players, but I think this Red Sox team is the rare example to that rule of thumb. With $36 million in potential cap space, signing these older players with more to prove allows Boston to get them for cheap and on short term contracts. In doing this, Boston is able to instill a win now mantra, without long-term investments that will only lead to salary trouble further down the road.

With that being said, the worst case scenario with a majority of these signings ends up being that the team once again has a bad year, but will still come out of the season with payroll space to improve. None of these players who have been listed so far will leave the team worrying about financial problems a few years down the road, which eliminates a huge problem for Boston.