The Boston Red Sox reportedly have an agreement on a five-year, $90 million deal with Hanley Ramirez and a $100 million deal in place with Pablo Sandoval. But what does that say about Boston’s pursuit of a free agent starting pitcher, particularly Jon Lester?
“The team is still very much involved in trying to bring lefthanded starter Jon Lester back,” writes Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe. “Lester is meeting with other teams and will then go back for another round of talks to seek final offers. The Sox first offer was in the $110 million-$120 million range, but it appears they would go higher.”
We know the Red Sox have plenty of cash, but going for the trifecta of Ramirez, Sandoval, and a pitcher like Lester in a single offseason comes at a high cost. “The Red Sox have roughly $50 million under the luxury tax threshold with which to sign players in 2015, but making commitments of around $300 million to just three players would seem to put the Sox right back where they were in 2012, when they traded Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford and Josh Beckett to the Dodgers,” cautions Gordon Edes of ESPNBoston.com.
Now that the Giants are losing Sandoval, there is some buzz, including a report from ESPN The Magazine's Buster Olney, that San Francisco will shift some of its resources to pursuing Lester.
The Atlanta Braves met with Lester on Thursday, though it wasn’t clear whether progress was made on a deal, reports David O’Brien of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The Chicago Cubs have been mentioned as a leading candidate for Lester and clearly have the resources to make the highest bid.
I'm not going to keep praising them.
