Report: Adam LaRoche, Mike Napoli On Red Sox Radar

by Zach Stoloff on Thu, Nov 8, 2012 at 11:11AM

In August the Red Sox traded their incumbent first baseman in Adrian Gonzalez, and have since been left with a gaping hole at the position.

That hole has yet to be filled as free agency begins in earnest, and suffice to say the Red Sox are looking at existing major-league options from outside the organization to fill that role. One of those options may be Adam LaRoche, who spent the last two seasons with the Washington Nationals, according to Fox Sports’ Jon Morosi.

The 33-year-old free agent is coming off one of the best seasons in his career, in which he hit 33 home runs, knocked in 100 runs and won his first-career Gold Glove. Though 2012 was something of an outlier for LaRoche, he’s been a consistent performer throughout his career, never hitting less than 20 home runs in a full season.

Additionally, he spent six games with the Red Sox in the middle a wild 2009 season during which he played for Pittsburgh, Boston and Atlanta — being traded twice in the course of nine days. The Red Sox gave up shortstop Argenis Diaz and minor-league pitcher Hunter Strickland to obtain LaRoche on July 22, before sending him to the Braves for Casey Kotchman on July 31.

According to Morosi, LaRoche is also being pursued by the Rangers, while any number of reports contend that Washington is still interested in retaining his services.

The Boston Globe’s Nick Cafardo believes that LaRoche isn’t the only player of interest as he says Mike Napoli is also on the team’s “radar.”

Sources: #Rangers, #RedSox pursuing Adam LaRoche. He is expected to reject #Nats qualifier. Story here: on-msn.com/STcZRI @mlbonfox

— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) November 8, 2012