The Red Sox off-season has been a complete head scratcher with different messages sent by the front office but very little action. The highlight was Brayan Bello signing an extension that will keep him in Boston through his age 31 season. Unfortunately, the extension to Bello did absolutely nothing to improve the 2024 Red Sox as Bello was already in the starting rotation. The club made zero “wow moves” to try to get the team out of the cellar of the American League East. The playoff odds for the Red Sox have not been this low in a long, long time.
Red Sox fans have been spoiled over the last 2 decades. For someone who is about to turn 30, I hopped on the Boston train at the perfect time. The club’s 4 World Series titles are more than any other team in the 21st century. Winning breeds expectations. Boston became a team that the baseball world predicted would be in the playoffs and often were one of the top 5 World Series favorites year after year. Now, the playoffs are a long shot and the World Series isn’t even a thought.
One way you can tell if a team has changed their ways is how predictive metrics have evaluated the organization heading into a new season. Fangraphs has projected preseason standings dating back to the start of the 2016 season. That was right when Boston went into “win-now mode” with Dave Dombrowski at the helm. One thing that is very clear when looking at the projections over the years is that Boston’s chances of winning the division have declined rapidly and nobody believes they are legitimate title contenders anymore. Times have changed.
What the numbers say and who people are picking to win before the season starts do not always pan out. The teams have to play the games. Players get injured. Teams surprise. But the vibes are very different in 2024. In years past, Boston has been one of the more aggressive teams in the off-season, which has created buzz around the team heading into Spring Training as fans are excited to see the shiny new toy the team put under the Christmas Tree. But this season, who did Boston add? Tyler O’Neil? Sure, they did sign Lucas Giolito but now Sox fans won’t see him until sometime in 2025. And even Giolito was somewhat of a gamble coming off of a dreadful 2023. The team has done nothing to move the needle on a team that finished in last place.
The Red Sox could easily improve their odds by signing one of the remaining free agent pitchers to bolster the rotation. Shockingly, Jordan Montgomery and Blake Snell are still out there. With the loss of Lucas Giolito, even Michael Lorenzen could help. Adding a pitcher doesn’t put Boston back into the AL East title conversation but it could boost their odds of making this team competitive and competing for a Wild Card spot. With 23 M until the first luxury tax threshold and a team that reset the penalties last season, I think the fact that the organization is not making any significant moves is quite telling. CEO Sam Kennedy has said nothing that indicates winning World Series is actually the goal anymore. Putting a self imposed spending cap on the team when the club is worth billions doesn’t send a message that winning is a priority. It suggests there are other things that are more important than winning. And the projections see right through the lies.
When the advanced analytics, fans, and national media are all saying the same thing, there’s a good chance what they are saying is true. It’s possible that the 2024 Red Sox will surprise everyone this season. But there’s no doubt that when Boston steps onto the field on Opening Day in Seattle, they will have the lowest odds of winning that any Red Sox team has had in a long time.