Breaking down Red Sox's QO options

The first significant deadline of the offseason is upcoming on Sunday at 5 p.m. ET, by which teams must decide if they are extending qualifying offers to any of their free agents. The qualifying offer this year is worth $18.4 million.

For the Red Sox, the one free agent it makes the most sense to extend a qualifying offer to is lefty starter Eduardo Rodriguez.

Though Rodriguez isn’t coming off his best season (13-8, 4.74 ERA), his underlying numbers -- including a career-best FIP of 3.32 -- shows that it was better than you think. Also, starting pitching is a crucial part of any team and Rodriguez is still in the prime of his career at 28 years old.

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If Rodriguez was coming off a better season, there would be no chance he would accept the offer. But in this case, it is intriguing because he could opt to come back to the Red Sox for one more season and try to put himself in a better place as a free agent a year from now. Also, the $18.4 million Rodriguez could earn from the Red Sox in 2022 (should he accept) is a nice bump from the $8.3 million he earned this past season.

For the Red Sox, it makes sense to extend the qualifying offer to E-Rod to make sure they get Draft compensation should he sign elsewhere.

The only way the Red Sox extend a qualifying offer to any free agent aside from Rodriguez is if J.D. Martinez decides to exercise the opt-out clause in his contract. Interestingly, Martinez’s deadline to opt out of his contract is also on Sunday at 5 p.m.

Given that Martinez would earn close to $20 million if he just remained with the Red Sox for next season, there’s no scenario in which he would exercise his opt-out clause and then accept Boston’s qualifying offer.

However, just like in the case of Rodriguez, the Red Sox would set themselves up for Draft compensation for Martinez should he sign elsewhere.

Martinez has put himself in a good position to test the market by having a bounce-back season in 2021, during which he led the league with 42 doubles while adding 28 homers, 99 RBIs and an .867 OPS. There also seems to be an expectation in the industry that the National League will add the DH starting next season, which would create more job opportunities for Martinez.

It should also be noted that if Rodriguez and/or Martinez decline qualifying offers, the Red Sox are still free to negotiate with them on a longer-term contract. It’s just that 29 other teams will have equal rights to sign them at that point.

Since the Red Sox don't receive revenue sharing and did not exceed the luxury-tax salary threshold in 2020, their compensatory pick if a player signs elsewhere after rejecting a qualifying offer would come after Competitive Balance Round B. The value of the player's next contract would not matter in that case.