FORT MYERS, Fla. -- The start of the 2022 season is now just eight days away, a reminder of how quickly a condensed spring training can be.
On one hand, the promise of Opening Day is a welcome one, especially after the winter lockout. But its pending arrival is also a reminder that time is running out for the Red Sox to conduct some important off-field business.
Spring training is ordinarily a period during which teams look to complete contract negotiations with players whose deals are nearing an end. Due to the more relaxed nature of spring training, it's often a conducive time to work on such business. In the last three years alone, the Sox have secured long-term contract extensions within this window for both Chris Sale and Xander Bogaerts.
Once the season begins, however, both teams and players generally prefer to shut down such talks, out of concern that they could become a distraction -- not just for the player involved, but the entire team.
There is no shortage of players in this category for the 2022 Red Sox: J.D. Martinez, Christian Vazquez, Kiké Hernandez and Nathan Eovaldi are all eligible for free agency after this season.
Meanwhile, Bogaerts famously has an opt-out in his deal after 2022, and Rafael Devers is under control for just one more season after this one.
Red Sox ownership and management have frequently noted that retaining Bogaerts and Devers are priorities for the club. And chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom told NESN earlier this month that he would be approaching some players to initiate talks.
But if any progress has been made, particularly with Bogaerts and Devers, there's little public evidence of it.
Each team conducts is business differently. The New York Yankees have All-Star outfielder Aaron Judge in the final year of his contract and have publicly stated they will make a contract extension offer to him before Opening Day.
The Sox, by contrast, are operating far more stealthily.
"This is that time of year,'' acknowledged Bloom to BostonSportsJournal.com. "It's not true with all players, but a lot of players like to have things resolved, one way or another, by Opening Day. And so, whenever we're engaged, we're mindful of that.''
Bloom noted that the team doesn't have a hard-and-fast deadline for contract extension talks, pointing out that the Sox arrived at a two-year extension with reliever Matt Barnes in the middle of last season.
"It's so individual -- to the situation, to the guy,'' said Bloom. "Some guys, (extension talks) might come up organically in the course of random conversations with the player over time. With other guys, it won't come up so you don't want mess with anybody's head and broach it if it's not something that they're prepared to engage on. It really is case by case.''
The fact that one key starting pitcher and as many as four everyday players could all walk after this year might not seem optimal for a team. That creates some uncertainty with the club, but Bloom said it's a fact of life and brings no additional sense of urgency to his job.
"You'd prefer to have it on a more rolling basis,'' he said, "but this is just the nature of the game. I think the important thing is just to make sure that you're doing your best to factor everything into making decisions that are in the organization's best interest. We want continuity. We want guys to be here. We also need to make sure we're mindful of what that could look like over a multi-year period, that we don't get so jammed up (with long-term deals) that we can't take advantage of opportunities.
"So there is a balance. Obviously, when you have a number of guys heading for free agency at the same time, it might become a little harder to navigate those tradeoffs. But at the end of the day, we just try to be mindful of the bigger picture while also making sure we're taking each individual situation for what it is. I think that's what good for the organization, and ultimately, if you're dealing with any player, it's good for the player, too.''
With Bogaerts and Devers, the Sox do have some time. Bogaerts can't opt-out until after the season, and there would be time for the Red Sox to engage with him in October or November after he assesses the market and makes a decision.
For Devers, the Red Sox have all of next offseason to extend him past 2023. At the same time, however, there's the risk that if he arrives next spring without a new deal in place, the Sox could respond to the uncertainty by trading him, as they did when Mookie Betts arrived in camp in 2020, seven months away from free agency. Fearful that they risked losing Betts for only a draft pick in return, the team shipped him to the Los Angeles Dodgers, enraging the fan base.