Why Boston May Make a Strong Run for Aaron Judge

Saturday August 27, 2022

This scenario is familiar. The Red Sox stopped investing in pitchers over 30 years old several years ago. When Jon Lester was nearing free agency, they insulted him with a low offer and traded him midseason.

The team finished last in 2014 and 2015. Faced with losing market share and an agitated fan base, the Red Sox brought in Dave Dombrowski, who signed 30-year-old pitcher David Price to a $217 million, seven-year deal.

Lester signed a deal with the Cubs that pays him $155 million over six years. A few years later, the Red Sox traded for Chris Sale and gave him a five-year, $145 million contract extension, even though there were many worries about his durability.

Sale has said that he owes Lester for his big payday. All it took for the Red Sox to stop being smart with their money was some bad PR and results on the field.

Sounds familiar, right?

With a payroll above the luxury tax, the Red Sox will likely finish last this season. Their $207 payroll is deceptive. They rank 13th in MLB spending since Chris Sale’s extension, and 15th if you exclude Trevor Story, who was signed to replace Xander Bogaerts.

Chaim Bloom was told to cut payroll and streamline the Red Sox. Last year, they were two wins away from the World Series, but this year they’re embarrassingly thin. The Red Sox entered 2021 without a first baseman, corner outfielder, or enough bullpen depth.

Because of this, they’ve been criticized and given the name “Boston Rays.” Every night that goes by, the mood inside Fenway Park gets worse.

A run at Aaron Judge during the off-season could change a lot of these ideas.

It seems likely that the Red Sox will let Xander Bogaerts go. They reportedly made him a ridiculous offer in Spring Training, and he’s been very vocal about how upset he is this season. Recently, the star shortstop told Alex Speier of the Globe that he “doesn’t know what’s going on.”

Enter Judge.

The slugger, who is 30 and will be 31 in April, is the clear favorite to win AL MVP. So far, in 121 games, he has hit 48 home runs and driven in 105 runs. He is on track to break Roger Maris’ AL record of 61 home runs in a single season.

If the Red Sox went after Judge and maybe stole him from the Yankees, it would quiet the loud people who are complaining about how cheap the Red Sox have become. This week, Dan Shaughnessy of The Globe brought up the idea in a column.

Don’t worry about the fact that Judge would likely be a bad investment. He has had to deal with injuries his whole career and strikes out a lot. As he moves into his 40s, he seems like the kind of person who is most likely to break down.

It doesn’t make much strategic sense to give Judge a huge contract worth more than $300 million while letting Bogaerts walk away. But the Red Sox have been reactionary under John Henry, even though they talk a lot about analytics.

The team’s owners thought that they needed “hot guys,” so they got Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez. Then, after a terrible 2014 season, they needed to get people interested again, so they signed Hanley Ramirez and Pablo Sandoval.

The list keeps growing.

Of course, the Red Sox aren’t likely to sign Judge. They could say they tried, though. Desperate times call for desperate PR campaigns.

What do you think, leave a comment below?