After more than a month of back-and-forth discussions concerning slugging free agent first baseman Mark Teixeira, the Red Sox find themselves right back at square one.
The front office still has a need to find both the catcher of the present and the catcher of the future, but other than that, it is beginning to look as if the same team that made it to Game 7 of the ALCS last autumn will remain largely intact. The New York Yankees swooped in and snatched Teixeira for eight years and $180 million -- a deal that the Sox were wary to match after they had placed an organizational value on the switch-hitting, Gold Glove first baseman. Many in Red Sox Nation were dumbstruck by the Yanks' surprise move, but some others were happy that Kevin Youkilis, Mike Lowell and David Ortiz will be returning to the Sox fold without any need for a trade.
Before the announcement, manager Terry Francona had hinted that the Sox wouldn't succumb to pressure to sign Teixeira or any other player, and his thoughts turned out to be prescient when Scott Boras and his first baseman/client chose the Bronx over Boston, Baltimore and Washington.
"We don't feel the need to go sign somebody for more years than the organization is comfortable and put the organization in peril, potentially," Francona said at the winter meetings in early December. "We have had a lot of good young kids come through our system and we have some veterans, and it's a very good mix.
"As we found out, it doesn't guarantee you're going to win the World Series, but I think our organization is in pretty good shape."
Fences will have to mended with Lowell after his name was bandied about in trade rumors over the last month, but the club is indeed in good shape headed to spring training in February.
