Price-Sale Payroll Nightmare Stains Dombrowski's Red Sox Legacy
What has two heads, four arms, an injured elbow, a balky wrist, a combined 4.35 ERA in 2019 and is owed $62 million annually through 2022?
The answer, unfortunately for the Boston Red Sox and erstwhile president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, is the hobbled pitching duo of Chris Sale and David Price.nike nfl jerseys wholesale cheap
After winning three consecutive division titles and hoisting the Commissioner's Trophy in 2018, the Sox have crashed back down to earth. They're mired in third place in the American League East behind the archrival New York Yankees and scrappy small-market Tampa Bay Rays, and they will almost certainly miss the playoffs.
On Sunday, Boston fired Dombrowski, who took over in August 2015 and initiated an all-in era that included the aforementioned 2018 championship but also decimated the club's farm system and added weighty, possibly debilitating payroll obligations.
The Red Sox will pay $32 million to Price every season through 2022 and $30 million annually to Sale, plus an additional $27.5 million for Sale in 2023 and 2024.
On top of that, add $17 million for Nathan Eovaldi in 2020, 2021 and 2022. The Red Sox inked all of those contracts on Dombrowski's spend-at-will watch.
Consider 2018 AL MVP Mookie Betts, who's set to earn a massive payday in arbitration this winter before hitting free agency after the 2020 season, barring an extension. With all the cash Dombrowski tossed at the ill-fated rotation, can the Sox retain their franchise right fielder?
"It doesn't really matter who's there," Betts said of Dombrowski's ouster, per ESPN.com's Jeff Passan. "Nothing is going to change. This is proof that this is a business. I love it here, but definitely still a business."cheap nike nfl jerseys paypal
Although Dombrowski deserves a tip of the cap for guiding the Red Sox to a World Series win with a title-or-bust mindset, he's left them saddled with several albatross deals. The Sox also share a division with the powerful Yankees and ever-scrappy Rays, while the Houston Astros and Minnesota Twins are cementing their status as Junior Circuit heavyweights.
All hope isn't lost with Boston's high-priced pitchers. Sale posted 13.3 strikeouts per nine innings and a 3.39 FIP before his injury. Price, meanwhile, put up 10.7 strikeouts per nine and a 3.62 FIP. Even Eovaldi, despite his struggles, has fanned 49 in 48.1 innings.
"We'll get through this," Sale said Aug. 20, before he landed on the injured list, per Dan Shaughnessy of the Boston Globe. "It's not the end of the world. Could be worse."
