Yasmani Grandal's career has been on a downward trajectory ever since he turned down a $17.9 million qualifying offer from the Dodgers in 2019 to take a marginally better one-year, $18.25 million deal with the Brewers. He still enjoyed a nice season in Milwaukee, but declined his part of a mutual option to go to the White Sox for four years and $73 million.
He had a great 2021 season with them, but struggles to stay healthy in the summer and all-around poor play in 2022 led to him losing starts behind the plate to Seby Zavala. The same cycle happened again with Korey Lee in 2023 before he hit free agency once more. He had to settle for a $2.5 million deal with the Pirates for 2024 and, despite acting as personal catcher to Paul Skenes for most of his starts, continued to put up poor numbers at the plate, and Pittsburgh didn't make any public moves to re-sign him.
Over the offseason, he reportedly turned down an offer from the Braves in February and was even considering calling it a day on his 13-year career. However, per FanSided insider Robert Murray, he agreed to a minor-league deal with the Red Sox on Thursday.
Former Dodgers catcher Yasmani Grandal had to settle for a minor-league deal with the Red Sox after considering retirement
A minor-league deal was always the best Grandal was going to get, if he was going to get anything at all. It's unclear if the offer from the Braves was for a major or minor-league deal, but if it was indeed a minor-league deal from Atlanta, there was a better chance that he would've seen some time in the majors, given Sean Murphy's brief stint on the IL to start the season and now Drake Baldwin's offensive slump.
Boston lost catcher Connor Wong to the 10-day IL on Tuesday and called up Blake Sabol to back up Carlos Narváez. Grandal could get a shot if Sabol continues to underwhelm, but he also hasn't been on a field since September and needs to get some reps in at Triple-A before the Red Sox decide if he looks like a viable option at all.
The Red Sox are far from a bottom-feeder team, but a minor-league deal after spending five (mostly lackluster) years with two bottom-feeder teams was never going to get him back onto a major league roster with a real contender.