Red Sox ‘Right Up There’ With Other Teams To Bring Back Veteran Reliever

Chris Martin plans to pitch one more season before retiring. But will the veteran reliever’s final MLB season come with the Boston Red Sox?

That’s unknown at the moment both for the 38-year-old and the Red Sox. Martin spent the last two seasons with Boston, but currently is testing his market in free agency.

While Martin has received interest from other teams, he certainly isn’t ruling out a return to the Red Sox.

“Free agent reliever Chris Martin was a visitor to the Winter Meetings today and met with some teams, including a brief chat with Alex Cora,” MassLive’s Sean McAdam wrote on the X platform. “Martin, who has plans to pitch one more year, put the Red Sox ‘right up there’ among his list of preferred teams.”

There were no specifics on the other teams pursuing Martin from McAdam, but ESPN’s Jorge Castillo reported the New York Yankees and Texas Rangers met with Martin. The Rangers aren’t a surprise since Martin, who decided he will retire following the 2025 season because he wants to spend more time with his family, is a native of Arlington, Texas.

Martin had the best season of his nine-year career with the Red Sox in 2023. He was one of the league’s top setup men as he recorded a miniscule 1.05 ERA to go along with a 1.032 WHIP in 51 1/3 innings. The 6-foot-8 right-hander spent a couple of stints on the injured list last season, but still managed to be effective with a 3.45 ERA in 45 appearances.

Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow even expressed interest last month in retaining Martin, but there is obvious some competition to fight off in getting that done.

“Obviously it’s pretty clear the value he had,” Breslow told reporters at the GM Meetings, per MassLive’s Christopher Smith. “We saw that when he was pitching and when we didn’t have him available to pitch. And so we know we have some work to do in kind of rebuilding the bullpen and obviously could see there being a fit there.”