{"id":555395,"date":"2026-02-05T03:12:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T03:12:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/555395\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T03:12:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T03:12:16","slug":"red-sox-to-sign-isiah-kiner-falefa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/555395\/","title":{"rendered":"Red Sox To Sign Isiah Kiner-Falefa"},"content":{"rendered":"

8:30pm:\u00a0Kiner-Falefa is guaranteed $6MM, reports Chris Cotillo of MassLive<\/a>.<\/p>\n

6:53pm: The Red Sox reportedly have an agreement with infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa<\/a> on a one-year contract, pending a physical. Salary terms for the ALIGND Sports Agency client remain unreported. Boston\u2019s 40-man roster will be at capacity after the signing, so no corresponding move is required.<\/p>\n

Kiner-Falefa will apparently be the Sox\u2019s answer at second base after they lost\u00a0Alex Bregman<\/a> to free agency. Boston kicked around much bigger possibilities on the trade and free agent markets (e.g. Ketel Marte<\/a>,\u00a0Brendan Donovan<\/a>,\u00a0Isaac Paredes<\/a>,\u00a0Bo Bichette<\/a>) but couldn\u2019t find a deal to their liking. They reportedly prefer to keep Marcelo Mayer<\/a> at third base and were looking for a quality defensive player whom they could plug in at the keystone.<\/p>\n

A former Gold Glove winner, Kiner-Falefa qualifies on that front. He took home the defensive honor at third base as a member of the Rangers in 2020. He\u2019s a plus defender at any of second base, third base or shortstop. He has more experience on the left side of the infield but carries strong marks from Defensive Runs Saved (+12) and Statcast (+2 Outs Above Average) in nearly 600 career innings as a second baseman.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The flip side is that Kiner-Falefa isn\u2019t going to provide much at the plate. He puts the ball in play but has some of the lowest exit velocities in the sport. He has never reached double digits in home runs in a season, nor has he turned in a .700 OPS in any of his eight years in the majors. Kiner-Falefa is coming off a .262\/.297\/.334 showing across 459 plate appearances between the Pirates and Blue Jays. He\u2019s a .262\/.311\/.349 hitter in more than 3300 trips to the dish over his career. He\u2019s a solid baserunner despite average speed, stealing double digit bases in each of the past five years.<\/p>\n

Second base was a weak point for the Red Sox last year.\u00a0Kristian Campbell<\/a> faded after a monster April and was back in Triple-A by the end of June. He posted disastrous defensive grades and no longer<\/a> seems to be an option at the position. Chief baseball officer Craig Breslow has suggested a few times they view Campbell primarily as an outfielder. He\u2019s a good enough athlete to have some promise as a defender on the grass, but Boston\u2019s crowded outfield isn\u2019t going to afford him many opportunities until someone suffers an injury.<\/p>\n

The Sox used Romy Gonzalez<\/a>, Ceddanne Rafaela<\/a>, David Hamilton<\/a> and Nick Sogard<\/a> there in the second half and got just a .242\/.292\/.333 showing down the stretch. Rafaela is an elite defensive outfielder whom the Red Sox prefer to play in center field. Gonzalez hits lefties well but profiles as a short side platoon bat. Hamilton and Sogard are utility players on a team that expects to contend. Kiner-Falefa probably should be as well, yet there weren\u2019t any clear regulars available in free agency at this stage of the offseason.<\/p>\n

Kiner-Falefa is a right-handed hitter whose offensive profile doesn\u2019t change regardless of the pitcher\u2019s handedness. Gonzalez should still take the majority of at-bats against lefty pitching. Kiner-Falefa could slide to third on those days if the Sox want to shield Mayer from same-handed opposition. They might also prioritize having him on the field behind ground-ball pitchers like Brayan Bello<\/a> and\u00a0Ranger Su\u00e1rez<\/a> while plugging Gonzalez in for a little more offense on days when\u00a0Garrett Crochet<\/a> or\u00a0Sonny Gray<\/a> take the mound.<\/p>\n

It appears the Sox had pushed close to their financial comfort zone after signing Su\u00e1rez and trading for Gray and Willson Contreras<\/a>. According to RosterResource<\/a>, Boston had around $257MM in luxury tax commitments before this deal. They\u2019re a few days removed from giving up<\/a> a mid-tier starting pitching prospect, David Sandlin<\/a>, to dump $16MM of the $24MM remaining on the\u00a0Jordan Hicks<\/a> contract on the White Sox. (Boston also picked up minor league pitcher\u00a0Gage Ziehl<\/a> in that trade.) If the cash considerations are evenly distributed, they saved $8MM on the 2026 payroll, some of which they\u2019re now reallocating to Kiner-Falefa.<\/p>\n

The Sox are above the $244MM first tax threshold. They\u2019re second-time payors who pay a 30% tax on their first $20MM in overages, so they\u2019re currently set for a minimal tax bill. That was also the case last year, as they paid a $1.5MM fee for going nearly $8MM above the line. The tax rate climbs to 42% for spending between $264MM and $284MM. There are no draft penalties associated with going into the second penalization tier, so that\u2019d largely be an arbitrary stopping point if that\u2019s where ownership sets the budget.<\/p>\n

Chris Cotillo<\/a> of MassLive<\/a> first reported the Red Sox and Kiner-Falefa were nearing a one-year deal. ESPN\u2019s Jeff Passan<\/a> confirmed an agreement was in place.<\/p>\n

Image courtesy of Stephen Brashear, Imagn Images.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"8:30pm:\u00a0Kiner-Falefa is guaranteed $6MM, reports Chris Cotillo of MassLive. 6:53pm: The Red Sox reportedly have an agreement with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2290],"tags":[5,2057],"class_list":{"0":"post-555395","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-baseball","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-isiah-kiner-falefa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116015840880820652","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}