The Red Sox and Jarren Duran failed to agree to terms on a 2025 salary before Thursday’s deadline to exchange figures. They are separated by just $500,000.
Red Sox' Jarren Duran reacts to his double against the Tigers in the first inning Aug. 30. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)AP
Duran is asking for $4 million. The Red Sox offered $3.5 million.
If the two sides are unable to reach an agreement soon, they will head to an arbitration hearing in late January or early February.
Those hearings can get ugly because the front office has to argue its case on why the player doesn’t deserve the salary he has requested. The player has to sit there and listen to it.
“I have my feelings about arbitration. It’s kind of like a bad process to be honest with you and it doesn’t make sense,” manager Alex Cora said Saturday at Fenway Fest.
In February 2023, starting pitcher Corbin Burnes went to an arbitration hearing with the Brewers. He told reporters that the team said things that were “tough to hear” and “tough to take.” Burnes also told reporters, per ESPN, that the Brewers put him “in the forefront” of why they missed the postseason in 2022 and he felt it hurt their relationship.
So are the Red Sox concerned about heading to an arbitration hearing with Duran, who’s extremely tough on himself and has been open about feeling self doubt in the past?
“That’s not my area,” Cora said when asked if he would like the Red Sox to avoid a hearing because Duran is so tough on himself and might take things personally.
Would the Red Sox benefit from avoiding the hearing?
“Like I said, that’s not my area,” Cora said. “You’ve gotta ask (chief baseball officer) Craig (Breslow) but I think we’ll be OK. We’ll be OK. Actually I texted with Jarren yesterday. He’s doing well. So we’ll see what happens in the upcoming weeks.”
Team president Sam Kennedy called arbitration “such a difficult process.”
“I don’t like arbitration,” Kennedy said. “That’s why I’m not involved with it. So it’s a better question for Brez. It’s a necessary evil I guess. It’s how our industry works. But making an argument for value for a player under your control and someone who is so important, it is difficult to have those conversations. I’m confident we will get to a conclusion one way or another. And we’re just focused on how important Jarren Duran is for what we’re building here — breakout season, one of the most elite players in the game and we’re really lucky to have him.”
Like Cora, Kennedy also wouldn’t say whether the sides would benefit from avoiding a hearing.
“You have to make all the pieces fit,” Kennedy said. “Brez has the toughest job in the building. So it’s a necessary part of roster construction and it’s how our industry works in terms of making all the pieces fit together. So it’s something we have to do. But I don’t think the front office or players or their agents look forward to (it) in any shape or form.
“Look, Jarren is a centerpiece of what we’re building here,” Kennedy added, “Just really, really happy to have him.”
