The Boston Red Sox have obtained third baseman Trevor Story from the Colorado Rockies on Thursday in exchange for pitching prospects Luis Guerrero and Brian Keller, the team stated on Thursday.
The 31-year-old Story, who has played his entire eight-year MLB career with the Rockies, is batting .227 with 15 home runs and 30 RBI in 95 games this season. A 2023 NL All-Star, he’s in the fifth year of six-year, $60 million deal signed in 2021. He has a $11 million base salary this season and is due $15 million in both 2025 and 2026.
While Story has displayed power at Coors Field, his hitting away from Colorado has been a different story. The new Red Sox third baseman has a career batting average of .206 and career OPS of .655 on the road, compared to .253 and .811 at home. He has hit .136 in 36 at-bats with zero home runs and five RBI in his career at Fenway Park.
The Red Sox had been seeking help on the left side of their infield, with Christian Arroyo designated for assignment earlier this month and Pablo Reyes and David Hamilton struggling to chip in. Arizona Diamondbacks slugger Eduardo Escobar had been rumored as an option, but the two teams were reportedly unable to get close to a deal, according to Ken Rosenthal.
The Red Sox are 55-45 and sit 3.5 games behind the Baltimore Orioles for first place in the AL East. They’ve come out of the All-Star break struggling, with a 2-3 record, having just lost two of three to the Blue Jays. They begin a seven-game homestand Friday against the Seattle Mariners.
What to make of this trade?
For the Red Sox, this is an absolute no-brainer, as predictable as a deadline deal can be. The hot corner has been an abyss of woe in Boston for a while now; Story fills that need. He’s no superstar, but that’s fine; the Sox just needed a capable humanoid at third. It’s a glove-over-bat profile because while Story makes a ton of hard contact, he’s immensely whiff- and strikeout-prone. Perhaps that changes now that he’s free of Coors Field and all its wonkiness.
For the Rockies, this qualifies as a shocker. Despite the franchise’s sustained run of non-competitiveness, they’ve been incredibly averse to trading away players they view as cornerstones. For other teams, completing trades of any kind with the purple mystery in the mountains is considered quite a chore. Perhaps this trade is a sign that Colorado, jolted awake by its historically bad 2024, is pivoting from those isolationist ways. Perhaps they just really liked Guerrero and Keller. — Verducci
