With the next shortstop up and coming - the Sox are extremely high on Jose Iglesias - Scutaro will serve as a bridge to the next generation of homegrown talent.
“We were looking to upgrade at shortstop,’’ Epstein said. “We were pretty clear about that going into the winter. Right from the start, we identified Marco as the best free agent and a guy who would be the best fit for this ball club.’’
Scutaro signed a two-year deal for at least $12.5 million ($5 million per year with a $1 million signing bonus and $1.5 million buyout) with a club option at $6 million or a player option at $3 million. The deal got done before the winter meetings because there was another team in hot pursuit. That team - the A’s - nearly stole Scutaro.
“There was a team that was making a real good offer, but I can say this, I took a little less money just to come here, to have a chance to win a ring,’’ Scutaro said yesterday.
Scutaro had a career year in 2009, despite battling plantar fasciitis in his right heel that ended his season two weeks early. His batting average (.282), on-base percentage (.379), and slugging percentage (.409) were all career highs, though Scutaro has only been an everyday player the last two years.
“When someone has a career year, a best of his career year at age 33, I think you have to look at it with some scrutiny, and we did at the beginning of this process,’’ Epstein said. “You want to see if you can identify factors that contributed to it, how many of those factors are repeatable, and how many are just random or luck. The more we looked at Marco’s career, and broke down his performance from the time he played in the minor leagues through his transition period into the big leagues to his career as a utility guy to the last couple years, it’s clear there’s been improvement.’’
Epstein cited Scutaro’s plate discipline, his contact rate, his ability to hit the ball hard to all fields, and his “legitimate pop at times to the pull side’’ as reasons the Sox don’t foresee a significant regression.
