Vibe check: Recent Juan Soto Red Sox rumors need a dose of reality

We still have no idea just where Juan Soto will decide to sign this winter, with everyone from the Yankees to the Mets to the Dodgers getting a chance to woo the superstar outfielder (and his agent, Scott Boras) in the coming days. But while we're still very much in the land of smoke and mirrors, one team in particular seems to have garnered some buzz in the rumor mill: the Boston Red Sox.

Coming off a disappointing 81-win season in 2024 — their third straight without a playoff appearance — Boston entered this offseason determined to get aggressive this winter, using the money and enviable prospect depth at its disposal to vault itself back into the AL pennant picture. This was music to the ears of Red Sox fans, who'd grown sick of watching the team hem and haw its way to middling payrolls as owner John Henry seemed more and more interested in running his soccer team than his baseball team. With more money to spend and a young core of talent to build around, all arrows were pointing up.

That momentum continued in the early days of the offseason. Boston landed an in-person meeting with Soto and Boras, a sign that the team really was serious about a return to its formerly big-spending ways. And this didn't seem like a token visit, either: Insiders including ESPN's Jeff Passan and the New York Post's Jon Heyman insisted that the Red Sox were a force to be reckoned with in the Soto sweepstakes. Soto once considered Boston "his favorite team," and if Henry and Co. really were ready to turn over a new leaf, maybe this wasn't such a pipe dream after all.

All of which sounds good, in theory. But amid all the hoopla in New England recently, let's not forget that Red Sox fans have been here before, with this very same group of executives. And it should take more than a couple weeks worth of big talk for Boston to earn back the trust it had lost over several years of mediocrity.

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John Henry, Red Sox brass doesn't deserve benefit of the doubt when it comes to Juan Soto

Remember this time last year, when Craig Breslow introduced himself as Boston's new chief baseball officer by pledging to be "full-throttle in every way"? When the dust settled that offseason, all he and his team had to show for it was one great trade (Tyler O'Neill), one disastrous one (Vaughn Grissom for Chris Sale) and an instantly injured Lucas Giolito. "Full-throttle," indeed.

And this is far more than a one-year trend. For most of the 2020s, Boston has watched its payroll slide steadily back toward the pack: 8th in 2020, sixth in 2021, fifth in 2022, and then 12th in both 2023 and 2024. This past season, there was a payroll gap of some $125 million between the Red Sox and the league-leading New York Mets. Meanwhile, whether it was with the Pittsburgh Penguins domestically or Liverpool abroad, Henry's other teams benefitted from his largesse. For a team that had spent its way to four World Series titles from 2004 to 2018, it was a stunning turn of events.

Maybe there really is fire behind all the recent smoke. Maybe this year really is different, and Henry and the Red Sox are ready to finally start spending like the Red Sox of old — the team that ran the highest payroll in baseball as recently as 2019. But empty rhetoric hasn't been the problem in Boston of late; on the contrary, there's been plenty of that. Actually putting their money where their mouths are has, and until someone actually signs on the dotted line, Boston shouldn't earn the benefit of anyone's doubt.