Christian Vazquez, like a sizeable chunk of the Boston Red Sox fanbase, isn’t exactly impressed with how the team handled the Xander Bogaerts situation.
The longtime Sox shortstop is a San Diego Padre now, inking an 11-year, $280 million deal this offseason. That marked the end not only of a lengthy run in Boston, but also a weird year in which Red Sox executives constantly voiced their desire to retain Bogaerts, only to lowball him at pretty much every turn in the negotiation process.
Regardless of the on-field logic behind letting Bogaerts walk, the optics of the entire situation were ugly.
Vazquez, who was sent to the Astros at the 2022 trade deadline and since has signed with the Twins, told Audacy’s “The Bradfo Sho” he thought Bogaerts “100 percent” would be back
“I was thinking he was coming back to finish his career there. He is a big part of that organization before, but it’s a business. I don’t know, he’ll look weird in another uniform.”
“The people don’t get the inside of what happened inside the clubhouse and all that stuff. He deserved more respect from the front office, everybody. He’s a star, I think you need to respect that. Respect what he did for the organization – he got two rings with that organization. I feel like he deserved more than that."
There are fair arguments on both sides about whether retaining Bogaerts made sense given the contract he ultimately landed. That notwithstanding, Bogaerts deserved for the situation to be handled better than it was.
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