It will be weeks – if not months – before the Alex bregman situation resolves itself this offseason.

But even before Bregman officially opts out of the remainder of his deal with the Red Sox, we certainly know these two things to be true:

First, if the Red Sox wish to retain him, they’re going to have to give him a much longer contract than they did eight months ago – perhaps even twice as long.

Second, there’s going to be competition – and plenty of it. If Kyle Tucker is deemed the top free agent position player on the market this winter, then Bregman probably isn’t too far behind in terms of value.

last winter, Bregman attracted interest from at least three other teams beyond the Red Sox. And that was with a qualifying offer attached, which likely scared off other potential suitors.

Now, because players can’t be given qualified offers more than once, Bregman comes with no compensation which, in theory, shoudl expand the field of interested clubs.

Here are the teams who could be players for Bregman:

Chicago Cubs: A year ago,the Cubs reportedly made Bregman a four-year,$130 million deal and that was deemed insufficient.

The Cubs reached the playoffs this year, but were knocked out by the Milwaukee Brewers in the Division Series. They may well look at Bregman as the missing piece they need to advance further in the postseason.

But the Cubs have other issues, too. First, they need to make a call on Tucker, who is several years younger than Bregman more athletic, and undoubtedly, more expensive.

But the Cubs’ spending has been somewhat limited in recent years, much to the consternation of their fan base. According to Cot’s Contracts and Fangraphs, they were 11th among the 30 teams in spending last season.

Another issue: the Cubs have a young homegrown third baseman in Matt shaw, a Massachusetts native. Shaw was highly-touted last year,but struggled so much early in the year that the team had to return him to the minors. He had an .839 OPS in the second half of the season, so the Cubs could well decide to go with a far cheaper option at the position and spend the money elsewhere – or not at all.

Detroit Tigers: like the Cubs, the Tigers were players a year ago, and like the Cubs, they reached this postseason before flaming out in th

Pete alonso and the Risks of Long-Term Contracts for First Basemen

It’s clear that weather they re-sign Alex Bregman or not, the Red Sox could use additional righthanded power this winter. In that sense, free agent Pete Alonso would, on paper, make some sense. Alonso has averaged almost exactly 40 homers over the last four years and his righthanded pull power would play well in Fenway even if the left field wall might limit his homer totals. (Statcast estimates that instead of hitting 158 homers the last four years, he would have hit just 127 playing full-time at Fenway.)

But there are two elements to consider here. For one thing, Alonso is a well-below average defender at first base. He had -9 defensive runs saved last year and his OOA (outs above average) was similarly alarming,also at -9,placing him in the bottom two percentile ranking among all players.

And that brings up the potential risks of giving Alonso the kind of contract – seven or eight years in length at minimum – he’s said to be seeking. Over the last 20 or so seasons, some of the worst contracts in the game have been given to first basemen in their 30s.

“Those contracts become a problem in a hurry,” said a talent evaluator with another club. “You start battling injuries, the production falls off and there’s nowhere else to put them.”

The standard bearer for bad deals probably belongs to Albert Pujols. Pujols,who was a free agent just before his age 32 season – Alonso will begin next year at 31,for perspective – and landed a 10-year,$240 million deal with the Angels.

That proved disastrous for the club. In eight of his last nine seasons with the St. Louis Cardinals,Pujols amassed a WAR of 7.5 or greater each season, including seven seasons in which he posted a WAR figure of 8.0 or greater; with the Angels, he had a WAR total of 5.3 in his first year in Anaheim, then never came close to that again over his final nine seasons.

Miguel Cabrera was another cautionary tale. Like Pujols, he was a dynamic righthanded hitter who could hit for both average and power.