The Los Angeles Dodgers, gunning for their first World Series championship since 1988, have acquired Mookie Betts, one of the best players in the major leagues, and left-hander David Price from the Boston Red Sox, ESPN and The Associated Press report. As part of the deal, pending medial reviews, Boston is also sending the Dodgers an undisclosed amount of cash to help offset some of the $123 million owed to Betts and Price, the 2012 AL Cy Young Award winner who sat out part of last year with a wrist injury, in their contracts.
The deal will also reportedly give Dodgers outfielder Alex Verdugo to Boston and starting pitcher Kenta Maeda to the Minnesota Twins, who will ship pitching prospect Brusdar Graterol to the Red Sox in return. Betts was expected to leave Boston after the 2020 season as a free agent, but "the deal makes sense only in the complicated economics of baseball's collective bargaining tax, which penalizes a team for spending over a preset limit — $208 million for 2020," AP notes. The Red Sox are eager to dip below the threshold.
Still, AP says, "Betts' departure deepens the disappointment in Boston, where the New England Patriots sat out the Super Bowl for the first time in four years and face the prospect of quarterback Tom Brady leaving as a free agent. The Red Sox are now without the best player, the top executive, and the manager who led them to a franchise-record 108 wins and the World Series championship a year ago." Boston fired that manager, Alex Cora, after he was busted for a sign-stealing scandal with the Houston Astros in their 2017 World Series championships run.
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The Dodgers, who lost to the Astros in 2017 and the Red Sox in 2018, have won seven straight National League West titles, and Betts would turbo-charge one of the MLB's best offensive lineups.
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