Surprise Suitor Reportedly Could Give Red Sox Competition In Pursuit Of Starting Pitching

Boston has another American League team to outbid

Scott Neville | Dec 11, 2023

Surprise Suitor Reportedly Could Give Red Sox Competition In Pursuit Of Starting Pitching /

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The Boston Red Sox are one of a handful of large-market teams expected to pursue the top starters on the market.

With the New York Mets, Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees and Red Sox expected to be among the teams looking to add multiple impact starters, another unexpected challenger has entered the arms race.

"The Royals are indeed interested in Marcus Stroman, as Jon Heyman reported, but Kansas City is casting a wide net in its search for pitching," MLB.com's Mark Feinsand wrote Monday. "Per sources, the Royals have also had discussions with Lucas Giolito, Michael Wacha and Jack Flaherty."

While the Red Sox should be able to fairly easily outbid the Royals for any hurler they have high interest in, the last thing chief baseball officer Craig Breslow needs in his debut season as the head of baseball operations is a more complicated path to acquire impact pitching.

The Royals will not affect the Red Sox's ability to add at the top of the market, think Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Jordan Montgomery and Blake Snell. However, Boston needs to acquire multiple starters and those in the Stroman, Giolito, Wacha tier also remain important.

With Kansas City having no chance to add the top arms on the market, it can go all-in for mid-level arms right now while the Red Sox are waiting for the big guns to sign before investing heavily into that tier of pitching.

The Red Sox would be wise to add any of the three starters reportedly linked to the Royals and should act accordingly, regardless of what the top hurlers are planning to do.

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Published Dec 11, 2023

SCOTT NEVILLE

Scott Neville covers the Boston Red Sox for Sports Illustrated's new page "Inside The Red Sox." Before starting "Inside The Red Sox", Neville attended Merrimack College, where he earned his Bachelor’s Degree in Communication and Media with a minor in Marketing. Neville spent all four years with Merrimack's radio station WMCK, where he grew as a radio/podcast host and producer. His propensity for being in front of a microphone eventually expanded to film, where he produced multiple short films alongside his then-roommate and current co-worker Stephen Mottram. On a journey that began as a way to receive easy credits via film classes, he received a call from "It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia" star Charlie Day. Day advised him to make a feature-length film, which he completed his senior year. While writing the film, Neville completed an internship for United Way as part of their NFL Partnership Program. Neville ran the blog for a team of interns and hosted an internet show called "United Way's NFL Partnership Series" where he interviewed NFL alumni. After college Neville wrote for SB Nation's "Over The Monster," a Red Sox sister site of the flagship brand. His work would eventually lead him to a job as a content producer with NESN, where he would cover all sports. After developing as a writer with the top regional network in the world, he was given the opportunity to join the Sports Illustrated Media Group in his current endeavor as the publisher of "Inside The Red Sox." The successful launch and quick rise of "Inside The Red Sox" led to Neville joining the Baseball Essential ownership group, a national baseball site under SIMG. Follow him on Twitter: @ScottNeville46 Email: nevilles@merrimack.edu