The offseason is here, with this week's GM meetings serving as the launching pad. So, what will be the Red Sox' t-shirt cannon message used to kick off what figures to be fork-in-the-road few months?
Turns out, the mantra was one born about a month earlier.
"[Bogaerts is] our first choice. That’s not going to change,” Bloom told the Globe out at the Las Vegas get-together. “Part of our jobs is to explore every option to field a contending team next year and put together a really good group. We need to explore every possible way to do that, but Bogey’s our first choice."
Sounds good, right? Well, unfortunately those words have less bite than when Bloom uttered a similar refrain a month ago.
The owners can give Bogaerts the pat-on-the-back we-really-like-you, like they did at season's end. And Bloom can proclaim his priority. But the fact of the matter is that the Red Sox have let their leverage slip away, leaving the shortstop with an introduction to a whole new world.
One has to ask: If Bogaerts is the Red Sox' top priority on Day 1 of the offseason, why wasn't he prioritized in such a manner when it sure seemed like the shortstop was looking for this kind of love throughout the past seven months?
What will be interesting in this case is how much ownership gets behind the all-in-on-Xander Express. Up until recently, the constant with the the organization's top decision-makers was that if they wanted a player - truly wanted a player - they were going to get that player.
That narrative has done an about-face.
The wave of players we have seen the Red Sox connected with throughout the past couple of years, only to land somewhere else, has people in the industry murmuring about how the team seems to be a day late and a few dollar short.
The Bogaerts situation, however, is more than just suggesting the Red Sox are "interested" in a player. As Bloom told the Globe, "Bogey, is Option A." If that is the case, the Red Sox - with all that is at stake - simply can't default to Option B.
MLB.com reported the Red Sox are kicking the tires on second basemen, with the idea of moving Trevor Story back to shortstop, just in case. Fine. But what should be understood is that if Bogaerts is valued in the way Bloom suggests, there shouldn't be a need for a fail-safe.
This isn't "we're keeping tabs" on Kyle Schwarber, only to watch the player get double of what the Red Sox were offering. We aren't talking about a free agent the team will welcome back if the price is right.
Bogaerts has been identified as the be-all, end-all - the signature move for Bloom's offseason. That's an umbrella this regime has never lived under.
We're about to see exactly what kind of temperatures the Red Sox are willing to endure in what is setting up as the hottest of Hot Stoves.
