During an appearance on Sirius XM’s MLB Home Plate on Sunday morning, Red Sox assistant general manager Ben Cheringtonaddressed the right thumb condition that nixed a possible trade of Mike Lowell to the Rangers:
“Even at the end of the playoffs, in our exit physical, he barely made mention of it,” Cherington said in the interview. “It’s just one of those things as a player you get used to being a little dinged up at the end of the season. I think that’s how he felt it. And then Mike, as many players do, sort of took his customary break after the season, let the body heal and then when he went to pick up a bat again recently as per his normal schedule he still felt a little bit in there and so wanted to get it checked out.”
With surgery now scheduled for the thumb, get used to hearing the Red Sox saying very complimentary things about Lowell. It will be a constant theme between now and spring training. You’ll hear about the wonderful progress he is making on his rehab, or how the Red Sox are confident he’ll be even better than he was last season. They’ll say whatever they can to boost his value headed into spring training. But while you hear these things, you have to understand how frustrated the Red Sox are with Lowell for not having the problem addressed sooner. Not only because of the nixed trade, but what might have happened had the Red Sox stayed with the status quo. Lowell likely wouldn’t have had the thumb examined during the offseason at all had Texas not tentatively agreed to a trade. They have every reason to be be furious with Lowell, even if they will say otherwise publicly.UPDATE: FOXSports.com’s Ken Rosenthal predicts that “Mike Lowell will never play another game for the Red Sox” regardless of whether or not the trade with the Rangers is truly dead. He writes that they’re unlikely to simply release Lowell, but “eventually will complete the kind of deal they tried to make with the Rangers, paying most of Lowell’s salary to make him disappear.”
