Red Sox fans pay a fortune to buy tickets at Fenway Park. How are they thanked for all this?
By being entitled to an ordinary product on the ground. For five years, it's been quite difficult, let's say.
The club flatly refuses to invest money in the club. He sends contracts elsewhere (like Chris Sale) and wants to continue doing so.
Apart from Lucas Giolito, the club has not signed any big names. This differs a lot from the words of president, Tom Werner, who said that the club would be “full throttle” this winter.
Basically, that means all races. But since the Sox aren't competitive in free agent races, Werner has now decided that means something else.
Actually, no: he completely retracted. In interview with MassLivehe said that in hindsight, those were not the words he would have chosen to talk about his family's winter.
Maybe that wasn't the most astute way of saying what I wanted to say, which was we're going to pull every lever to improve the team.
Nobody is happy with our performance in recent years.
–Tom Werner
After defending himself by saying that the clubs that spend the most do not systematically win, he added that the Red Sox were not closed to making signings. He cited Trevor Story and Rafael Devers.
But when you listen to anyone speak in Boston, you sense that people are talking out of both sides of their mouth. They say something, but do they really mean it?
For example, seeing Craig Breslow, placed between the tree and the bark as head of baseball operations, say that the club is committed to winning quickly is interesting.
That said, in his eyes, winning quickly means with young people. It is therefore by exchanging Chris Sale for Vaughn Grissom that the club feels it can win.
He is right on one point: to win, you need good young people. But it also takes veterans who come to help and show the way.
And that, Boston refuses to sign enough. Breslow must deal with this reality.
There are still plenty of free agents left on the market. We understand that the Red Sox will not be the ones to go after them.
Basically, the owners are putting all the pressure on Breslow, but without giving him the means to achieve his ambitions.
In the end, we do not have a fixed line in terms of payroll: we trust Craig Breslow, who assured us that we were going to have a competitive club.
–Tom Werner
I'm really not against building with young people. That being said, when you have to trade Chris Sale because of money while you're looking for help in the rotation, it's not ideal.
Really not, even.
Breslow is in an impossible situation and it's a shame for him, but he will be heavily criticized when Boston doesn't have the depth to contend with the other teams in the division.
It'll take a little more than the potential return of Adam Duvall to save the franchise, say.
