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The Boston Red Sox Wednesday, December 16, 2020 * The Boston Globe Scott Boras serves up a tasty case for Jackie Bradley Jr. Alex Speier and Peter Abraham One of the highlights of the offseason baseball calendar comes when agent Scott Boras holds court with reporters during the Winter Meetings to discuss his clients, often employing unexpected and elaborate metaphors. On Tuesday, he did not disappoint when discussing his client, longtime Red Sox center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr. While the cancellation of the Winter Meetings this year prevented Boras from holding court in customary fashion, he nonetheless met remotely with reporters Tuesday afternoon. His characterization of the market for Bradley was novel. “JBJ is kind of the PBJ of the major leagues. He’s sweet, smooth, and spreads it all over and covers it well,” Boras said. “What Jackie does in a defensive runs-saved environment has been popular.” Bradley led MLB in the Statcast-generated defensive metric of Outs Above Average, getting credit for recording seven more outs on balls hit to the outfield than an average center fielder in 2020. According to Defensive Runs Saved, Bradley was five runs better than the average center fielder, eighth best in the majors. Boras suggested Bradley’s offensive performance in his age-30 season in 2020 — career highs in average (.283) and OBP (.364) that were fueled in part by a career-high willingness to hit the ball to center and left field, along with a .450 slugging mark and seven homers in 55 games — likewise has made him a popular target in free agency. “I think the fact that he has really illustrated a dimension of a different approach, particularly going the other way, his OPS was well over .800, that seems to be very attractive to a lot of clubs,” said Boras. “They ask a lot of questions about it, what adjustments he’s made. “When you have a world champion, someone who has done what Jackie’s done, being as young as he is, being as efficient as he is, as great of a teammate as he’s been, he’s received a lot of attention and we expect something very grand here going forward.” Might that something grand come from the Red Sox? “Certainly we’ve had the discussions. They’ve certainly expressed the interest and let us know that he’s a clear part of the Red Sox’ support hose, let’s put it that way,” said Boras. “We know that he’s had great success there, he’s a winning player, and the Red Sox’ intentions are to advance their winning ways, certainly beyond what happened in ’20. As with most free agent players, we get notice of interest, then we’ll wait and see how the market unfolds moving forward.” Meanwhile, earlier in the day, Sox manager Alex Cora discussed his potential outfield alignment during an appearance on MLB Network Radio. Alex Verdugo, Cora suggested, could move to center in Bradley’s absence. “We do believe that he’s athletic enough to do that,” Cora said. “He’s got the instincts. His first step is pretty good. He can do it.” For now, the Sox have Verdugo, Andrew Benintendi, and newly signed Hunter Renfroe as outfielders. “That would be the alignment: Benny in left, Alex in center and Hunter in right. That’s a pretty solid outfield,” Cora said. “But obviously the season doesn’t start tomorrow. Let’s see what the offseason brings and what Chaim [Bloom] and the group decide to do. But we do feel comfortable with Alex playing center field.” Cora also said lefthander Eduardo Rodriguez “is going after it” as he returns from missing last season with a heart condition related to having COVID-19. “He’s started playing catch,” Cora said. “As of now, he’s on pace to be ready for the start of the season. Obviously, we’re not going to push him. We’ve got to be very careful. It’s something very serious. I’m glad that he’s upbeat and going through his workouts as normal as possible.” Cora was less specific about Chris Sale, who had Tommy John elbow surgery nearly nine months ago. “I hate putting timetables, he’ll be ready for X day during the summer,” Cora said. “One thing for sure, he’s progressing the right way and he’s upbeat,” Cora said. Agent Scott Boras says a full baseball season is a must Michael Silverman Some owners might think otherwise, but with a successful but shortened 2020 season behind it and a COVID-19 vaccine on the horizon, Scott Boras and the players union are full steam ahead on getting in a full 162-game season in 2021. “The reality is it’s not a question of whether we can do it, because we’ve already done it — that unknown is erased,” said Boras in a Zoom call with media on Tuesday. “I don’t know how you use anything other than we’re going to support and advance the integrity of the game and provide a full season knowing what we learned in 2020 because the question’s been answered.” In a USA Today article Tuesday, anonymous owners expressed skepticism about playing a full season or beginning it at its regularly scheduled time. In response, Players Association lead negotiator Bruce Meyer told The Athletic on Tuesday that “To be clear, and as we’ve made clear to the league, players are planning on showing up for spring training on time for a full 162-game season as set forth in the collective bargaining agreement and the league’s previously-issued schedule.” Boras was quite clear about what’s wrong with a shortened season. Starting pitchers who were limited to well under 100 innings this season need to take a modest step forward, to say around 150 in 2021, if they are to be back at full strength in 2022, said Boras. And hitters, particularly power hitters, need a full season to get their timing down and produce like they are supposed to. “It’s very important that professional players with expectations and large contracts that they be given the normal course — they have contracts to execute,” said Boras. Boras expressed his dislike for how rules for the 2021 season have not been set during an offseason when teams should be team-building yet they don’t know yet the size of the roster and if there will be a designated hitter in the National League like there was in 2020. Because players in particular support the universal DH, Boras suspects the upcoming CBA talks after next season have something to do with the whispers about delays. “This deals with safety and deals with building teams — if we’re going to try and marshal a negotiation around a giveback, I think it really hurts the game and hurts the development of teams and fan bases that follow them,” said Boras. He said each club has dealt with the fluid rulebook differently. “Some clubs have really been standard operating procedure, trying to acquire the best players and move forward,” he said. “There’ve been other clubs that have said to us ‘We have interest in your players but we want to get more direction from our ownership as to what we’re going to do.’ ” Boras sounded as if he was not going to be impressed with poor-mouth cries from owners of baseball teams from what happened with the pandemic’s impact on normal operations. “One thing we know is that baseball is very successful,” said Boras. “We had a major league baseball team sell for a record value in the middle of the pandemic, we had major TV contracts, over billions of dollars, negotiated during the pandemic, we’ve had billion dollar investments made in multi-purpose use projects around stadiums in Chicago and San Diego and San Francisco and many others, plans are in the works.” Boras brought up that teams are not the only ones to lose money in 2020. “Players lost two-thirds of their salaries — everybody lost,” said Boras. “Any company in baseball, myself included, everybody lost a great deal because of the fact we were not operating on normal levels.” Profits were down, he said, which is another reason why the industry needs to return to a full schedule. “A lot of teams lost profits, great profits,” said Boras. “But we know this — in operating the game and having baseball games, teams make money. We do have the records of the [publicly owned] Atlanta Braves and in their quarter when their team was playing, they were making millions of dollars, even without fans. We know that players playing baseball games make money for major league teams. The best we can do is try to get players on the field.” Boras had quips ready to go. With Jed Hoyer now leading the Chicago Cubs with the departure of Theo Epstein, Boras called him “the Jedi.” And Boras approved the hiring of another ex-Red Sox executive, Jared Porter, as the Mets GM. Boras said that instead of buying a hamburger, the Mets went with “the Porter-house” steak. Boras also issued his stamp of approval on the Phillies hiring ex-Red Sox president Dave Dombrowski to take over their baseball operations. “He’s won everywhere he’s gone, he’s dealt with an ownership in Detroit and Boston that’s really supported the advancement of creating a World Series-caliber club and they’ve been successful in doing so,” said Boras. Four things to know about Hunter Renfroe, the newest Red Sox outfielder Hayden Bird The Red Sox signed outfielder Hunter Renfroe on Monday to a one-year deal worth $3.1 million (with potential bonuses that could push it up to $3.7 million).

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