ORLANDO — Nearly the entire offseason board remains open to the Red Sox.
With their trades for starters Sonny Gray and Johan Oviedo before the start of the Winter Meetings, the Sox arrived in Central Florida with a hard-to-believe strength: significant rotation depth. With that strength comes options for the rest of the offseason.
The Sox immediately have nine experienced big league starters who appear on track to be healthy options for spring training: Garrett Crochet, Gray, Brayan Bello, Oviedo, Kutter Crawford (on track to be healthy in spring training after missing 2025 with multiple injuries), Patrick Sandoval (expected to be fully recovered from his 2024 Tommy John surgery), Connelly Early, Payton Tolle, and Kyle Harrison. There’s potentially more on the horizon, with prospects such as Luis Perales and David Sandlin (both likelier relievers than starters), as well as rehabbing righthander Hunter Dobbins.
Caveat: Pitchers are breaking more often than ever in the Icarian Era of pitching. On average, teams required 12 starting pitchers in 2025. Perceived surpluses often transform into actual shortages.
Nonetheless, as an organization, the Sox have amassed starting pitching options unlike anything they’ve experienced since Jon Lester and Clay Buchholz were matriculating through the organization.
The result? Executives for multiple teams seeking pitching identified the Sox as a potential trade partner.
“I think we’ve got pitching depth based on some of the inbound calls that we’ve received over the last couple of weeks. I think teams have recognized that there’s appeal to controllable starting pitching,” said chief baseball officer Craig Breslow. “If there are opportunities to use some of that depth in order to address other areas of the roster, we’d be willing to do it.”
With the additions of Gray and Oviedo, the team’s best priority is immediately a true power hitter in the middle of the order. With Gray and Oviedo accounting for roughly $23 million combined in luxury tax money, the Sox still have money to be in the mix for best free agent options such as Alex Bregman, Pete Alonso, and Kyle Schwarber.
“When there’s been the opportunity to improve the team, especially a team that’s been competitive and one that has hopes of competing deep into the playoffs, ownership has supported investing in it. This year is no different,” Breslow said of the Sox’ ability to pursue the best free agent position players. “So we’ve cast a pretty wide net with respect to how we can improve the team, and at least as we sit here today, there are a number of opportunities.”
The Sox have also checked in with the Diamondbacks — a team in need of rotation help — about the availability of star second baseman Ketel Marte, though one industry source downplayed the team’s pursuit of Marte, suggesting other teams had been more aggressive in trying to land the three-time All-Star.
Of course, such characterizations at this time of year come with a grain (or even a shaker) of salt. After all, the White Sox wiped the Red Sox off their dry erase board when discussing potential Garrett Crochet trade partners in the middle of the Winter Meetings last year; less than one day later, Boston had landed Crochet in a four-for-one blockbuster.
Meanwhile, even as they’re immediately prioritizing the addition of a bat, the Sox haven’t ruled out further upgrades to the best of the rotation. And with the Tigers unable and/or unwilling to squash trade rumors involving back-to-back AL Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal one year before free agency, the Sox — thanks to both their pitching depth and the ability to trade an everyday outfielder such as Jarren Duran or Wilyer Abreu who potentially faces a less-than-everyday role — should be able to assemble trade packages to be part of the conversation.
“People recognize the talent level across our outfield. And I think those four guys (Duran, Abreu, Ceddanne Rafaela, and Roman Anthony) make a lot of teams better, including ours,” said Breslow. “And so we have to listen because it would be, I think, irresponsible not to. But the bar we’re going to hold [for trading an outfielder] is really high, because each of those guys is capable of contributing multiple wins to our team.”
In short, the Sox haven’t had to rule out anything. They appear to have the money and tradeable players to seek best-end talent in both trade and free agency — and perhaps both. Breslow didn’t rule out the idea of adding multiple bats, for instance, as the Sox look to build on the brief postseason appearance of 2025 in pursuit of something much greater.
With few best players having moved at this stage of the offseason, the Sox are talking as if the range of possibilities in front of them is considerable.
“I don’t want to put limitations on what we may be able to do,” said Breslow. “I don’t think anybody would ever say, ‘We’re done. We feel like this team is good enough to go out there and win the World Series.’ Our goal is to compete for a World Series, and if there is some way of continuing to add to the team, even if we’re able to find [a middle-of-the-order] bat, we’re going to be open to doing it.”
But rhetorical openness is one thing — actions are quite another. It remains to be seen just how ambitious the Sox are in deeds rather than words.
Alex Speier can be reached at alex.speier@globe.com. Follow him @alexspeier.
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