Are the Red Sox willing to trade Marcelo Mayer? With several big name free agents off the board, trade talk is starting to dominate offseason discourse and Mayer has been named as a possible return for someone like Ketel Marte. According to one source, the “Sox have shown reluctance to deal him, but haven’t treated his unavailability as an absolute.” Meanwhile, some wonder whether his stock has taken a bit of a hit after struggling against lefties last year and finding himself injured once again. (Alex Speier, Boston Globe)
One of the free agents who recently fell off the board is infielder Jorge Polanco, who signed with the Mets this week. While the Sox “kept tabs” on Polanco, the Red Sox did not ultimately make an offer. (Chris Cotillo, MassLive)
We seem to have a similar situation vis a vis Polanco’s former teammate, Eugenio Suarez:
“Lukewarm” is apparently not the word that’s being used to describe the trade talks between the Sox and Cardinals about Willson Contreras, though. While a deal isn’t exactly close, the Sox interest in the first baseman is now being classified as “significant.” Given the familiarity Cards boss Chaim Bloom has with the Sox system, it’s hard to believe a deal won’t get done if both teams want it to. (Katie Woo, The Athletic)
Speaking of trades involving the Big Three, we saw an interesting report earlier this week that the Red Sox reached out to the White Sox to explore re-acquiring Kyle Teel, who was traded away last offseason as the headliner of the Garrett Crochet deal. But Chicago reportedly has zero interest in moving Teel and has shut down discussions. (Ken Rosenthal, Will Sammon, The Athletic)
As for the ongoing Alex Bregman negotiations, if you’re the type of person who likes to read too much into online posting activity, note that Bregman recently changed his Instagram profile picture, removing any visual identifiers of the Red Sox. Scandalous!
