Dead Line

As of this moment Boston is in last place, and not playing well. They are also, with a solidly mediocre 50-50 record, 3.5 games out of a playoff spot. They are Schrödinger’s Baseball Team. They are simultaneously dead and alive.

The trade deadline is 6 PM on Tuesday 8/2. Between now and then they need to choose which side of the line they’re on, and act accordingly.

I mean, in reality they can make choices well after that deadline. Mike Myers, Bobby Kielty, and Dave Henderson were all post-deadline acquisitions that contributed to pennant-winning teams. However, to be fair those teams were not in last place at the deadline, with several teams ahead of them in the playoff hunt. Regardless, at some point they need to make a decision about the season, and I suspect they made that decision months ago: we’re building toward 2023 and beyond, and if we have success before then we can count ourselves lucky. In that sense, 2022 is already dead.

One of the things that caught my eye when visiting the Fangraphs articles on the top 50 players in terms of trade value (thread here) was that Boston has exactly zero players on the list. Granted, part of that is they traded away one of the people on the list a few years ago. But even setting that aside, they don’t have anyone on the roster who provides that level of trade value. Nobody worth a damn is locked up long-term except Story (who has started off slow/injured) and Whitlock (who isn’t going to provide huge trade value unless he’s a starter). Devers and Bogaerts have value as players, but they’re potentially free agents relatively soon. If they’re setting up for the future can they make a deadline deal that helps accomplish that, given what they have to trade?

I’m going on the record as saying (checks online to see if any Red Sox players have been traded while typing this paragraph) Bogaerts and Devers will still be here after the deadline. So will nearly everyone else. Bloom wants value, and with many teams in the hunt value is not as likely to be attainable at the trade deadline. At least that’s my guess. Like, I totally see Bloom upgrading on backup catcher at the deadline. I don’t see him winning the Soto sweepstakes let alone entering the Soto sweepstakes.

So let’s talk trade deadline. Who do you think is going? Where will they try to improve?