The errors and the high salary don’t give Lugo too much trade value but he does have good major league experience at short, and he is better than many shortstops in the league. The Red Sox must choose if they want to have him back as the starter and hope he becomes the player they thought they had when they offered him the big money deal or they can have an expensive backup versus moving him and eating some of his salary. Last year it seemed like a no brainer to deal Coco when they had a surplus of outfielders but keeping him ended up working out so maybe the same model could be followed with Lugo. WEEI’s Alex Speier had some thoughts on what might happen to Julio Lugo on The A Blog:
The Sox are open to having Julio Lugo return as a means of achieving excellent depth at shortstop at the start of the 2009 season. At the same time, the team is also exploring potential ways of moving him, whether an exchange of “bad” contracts with another team or by eating salary in hopes of getting a prospect. The Red Sox and White Sox (who are looking for a shortstop) could not find a fit for an exchange that would involve the likes of Lugo and Nick Swisher.
The Tigers might make a sensible fit, since they have a vacancy at shortstop after opting out of Edgar Renteria’s contract. (Detroit is also looking for a catcher and relief pitchers.) They also have a couple of contracts in Dontrelle Willis (2 years, $22 million remaining) and Nate Robertson (2 years, $17 million) that match up reasonably closely with Lugo’s two years and $18 million remaining.
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