All I Know Is Pain

Worst Birthday Ever. Insert "Hurt" by Johnny Cash.

Well, it happened. Our greatest worry coming into the offseason occurred late Wednesday night. The San Diego Padres and Xander Bogaerts agreed on an 11-year, $280 million contract that will keep him on the west coast until his age 41 season.

There aren’t words in the English language that can describe how I was feeling. I genuinely wanted to throw up. I was innocently playing Call of Duty with the boys and made the mistake of checking my phone between matches, and quite literally threw my controller and headset across my living room (the controller is now slightly damaged and turns off randomly).

Jon Heyman @JonHeyman

Bogaerts to Padres. $280M 11 years

This goes all the way back to spring training. I think they definitely could have gotten this done for maybe half the years and half the money. It is asinine how much the front office has screwed around and treated these situations like they’re not that important. I mean, what the HELL are they doing?

What do they think the future of the Boston Red Sox looks like when they keep letting these franchise guys get away? Now, $280 million for 11 years is a little much for me at Xander’s age, but the Padres weren’t leaving the Winter Meetings without a bang I guess.

Jaxon Lahner @JaxonLahner

After a little more deep thinking about this Xander contract, 11 years is way too much. Obviously. I would’ve rather cut it off at 6-8 then worry about it later. Now we can either go get Dansby which I’d be ok with for a couple years or slide over Story and use Arroyo at 2nd. Oof

The man, the Prince of Aruba, the face of the franchise, and the captain of the Boston Red Sox is gone. This brings me to my next point, Rafael Devers. It was easy to say that if they lost out on Bogaerts you might as well trade Devers because he’s not going to want to stay here.

I don’t completely believe in that to a T, but, I do think it does make it that much harder to get him to sign for a little less when his best friend is not here. Regardless, Raffy is the next target and the obvious next number-one priority.

Jordan Moore @iJordanMoore

Red Sox essentially let the face of the franchise walk out the door twice in the span of three seasons. Mookie Betts in 2020 and now Xander Bogaerts in 2022. Both of those guys won a World Series for the franchise. Unforgivable.

I need to stop writing about this team before I throw my laptop at the wall. Follow me on Twitter to watch my struggles and voice my frustrations at the front office.

Follow Jaxon on Twitter @JaxonLahner

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