Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom last month didn’t rule out the possibility of Boston signing a free agent who received a qualifying offer from his most recent team.
Still, it’s hard to envision the Red Sox rushing to make that type of investment, as landing such a player would require Boston to surrender a 2021 second-round draft pick and $500,000 in international bonus pool money in addition to shelling out a massive contract.
On Monday, Bloom was asked how he values the second-round pick in question, seeing as the Major League Baseball draft can be somewhat of a crapshoot. And he offered a reminder that Boston drafted Jon Lester and Dustin Pedroia — two franchise greats — in the second round in 2002 and 2004, respectively.
“All draft picks are calculated risks to some extent. There’s no guarantees with any of them,” Bloom told reporters during a video conference. “Look, you can look at 2002 or 2004 to see just how valuable a second-round pick can be in this organization. It’s really valuable.”
Well played, Chaim.
Only four players remaining on the open market are attached to qualifying offers, thereby requiring the relinquishment of compensation beyond their next contracts: J.T. Realmuto, George Springer, DJ LeMahieu and Trevor Bauer.
(Marcus Stroman and Kevin Gausman accepted their qualifying offers — worth $18.9 million over one year — from the New York Mets and San Francisco Giants, respectively.)
These obviously are notable names, representing the cream of the crop in terms of this winter’s free agents. But it ultimately might not hinder Boston’s offseason maneuvering all that much.
Bloom is steadfast in his desire to build a sustainable contender — a goal that’s unlikely to be achieved by throwing around money and draft picks without a clear sense of direction — and could do the bulk of his work in the margins rather than make a sizable splash in free agency.
“You saw this past year in the draft, we didn’t have (a second-round pick), and as a result we had to navigate the draft very differently than we might have if we had had our pick in that round,” Bloom said. “It matters, it obviously has value, it gives you a very good shot at an impactful player, and so you just have to factor that in. It’s not an absolute one way or the other, but you can’t be blind to the value that you’re giving up in that scenario.”
In other words, expect the Red Sox to remain open-minded. Just don’t expect them to be reckless, especially given how well positioned they are in the draft after finishing 2020 with the fourth-worst record in MLB.
