The final marquee shortstop has come off the board and he’s not landing with the Red Sox.
Dansby Swanson has agreed to a contract with the Chicago Cubs, according to ESPN’s Jeff Passan. Kiley McDaniel reports it’s a seven-year, $177 million deal. That means Xander Bogaerts, Trea Turner, Carlos Correa have all found new homes and the Red Sox have a pretty significant hole at shortstop.
So what now?
Boston could explore the trade market, or if they want to keep things in house, move Trevor Story back to his old position. Although Story’s arm is a concern — his velocity has raised red flags — Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom believes his range would make up for it.
“It’s certainly something we’ve talked about and something we’re aware of,” Bloom said Tuesday. “Trevor is aware of it. It’s obviously not a secret. I would say a couple of things. One, we are optimistic that wherever he is playing, we’re going to be in a better position with that coming into the spring just having built that relationship and trust with him and being able to take an entire offseason to get in front of this . Two, his range is just so incredible. We saw that he can make throws on the run. When he has to put a little something on the ball, he can. I just think wherever we put him, he’s just going to get to so many balls that it’ll all pay off in the end.”