All signs seem to be pointing towards Pablo Sandoval signing a contract with the Boston Red Sox for somewhere in the $100 million for 5 years range.
Sandoval agrees to Red Sox deal, as Boston looks for free agent sweep - CBSSports.com
Sandoval will receive close to $100 million for five years, people familiar with the deal say, following news Hanley Ramirez is close to a deal with Boston, as well. The Red Sox were reported by the Boston Globe to have originally offered $95 million, but they may have gone up a bit from there.
The deal apparently isn't quite done and Sandoval's agent says that the Padres are still contenders but it doesn't look promising from the tweets I'm reading this morning.
8:14 a.m.: Asked if the Padres are still in play, Vasquez said, "Yes. Pablo will make his decision today."
With the news still up in the air I'm unsure if I should proclaim that I never liked him anyway or just be excited that the Padres are at least attempting to make a big free agent acquisition. In truth even if the Padres do sign Sandoval, their rebuilding can't end there. He's not going to carry this team into playoffs by himself. The Padres had Chase Headley for years and years and were still incapable of doing much of anything. Still it'd be one less position you'd have to worry about and focus could be then put on the many other weaknesses.