Red Sox pursuing Alex Bregman — with one big caveat
A house divided can complicate things, and that seems to be the case for the Red Sox and their pursuit of free agent Alex Bregman.
The Red Sox are among the teams believed to be strong bidders for Bregman, but that pursuit is getting a little complicated because some inside the organization aren’t as bullish on Bregman as others, according to MassLive.
The report said Boston manager Alex Cora and team president Sam Kennedy are high on the idea of bringing in Bregman.
However, chief baseball officer Craig Breslow and other members of the baseball operations staff are a bit wary of the Gold Glove winner.
The exact reason for Breslow’s hesitancy is a bit of a mystery, according to the report, but it could have something to do with the decline in his OPS over the past two seasons, which dropped from .891 in 2022 to .804 in 2023 and then to .768 this past season.
Cora was on the coaching staff in Houston during Bregman’s first full year in the majors and saw firsthand what the infielder can do.
“He’s a complete player. He’s a player who’s been on winning teams his whole career — good defender, offensively he’s really good. He’s a guy a lot of people are talking about and I do believe he can impact a big league team, a championship-caliber team. He’s that type of player,” Cora told reporters at the winter meetings in Dallas on Monday.
The expectation is that Bregman will land a contract somewhere around $200 million for at least seven years.
The other teams expected to be in the hunt for Bregman include the Yankees and Tigers, along with the Astros, where he has played his entire career.
He declined a six-year, $156 million to remain in Houston last month.