Red Sox deny meeting with Boras and Damon

DALLAS -- Surely, Scott Boras will be canvassing the Wyndham Anatole hotel in Dallas beginning today, when baseball's winter meetings commence, slipping in and out of teams' suites to discuss client Johnny Damon.

However, Boras and Damon evidently did not make a stealth visit to the Hotel Commonwealth in Kenmore Square last Friday, as reported in Sunday's Boston Herald. According to the Herald, there were ''strong indications" Damon and his wife, Michelle, accompanied Boras in face-to-face contract negotiations with Lucchino during the weekend. The paper also reported ''the Damons, Boras, Lucchino, and the Sox official's wife were seen leaving an executive conference room at the Hotel Commonwealth in Kenmore Square on Friday night in good spirits, which provided a clear indication that the Sox are making a sincere effort to re-sign Damon before the end of baseball's annual winter meetings."

Lucchino, in an e-mail exchange last night, labeled the Herald article ''100 percent false," adding that the club had ''no meetings with Scott in Boston last week."

''There was no such dinner, no such meeting at the Hotel Commonwealth or anywhere else, no such discussion with spouses present, no dinner with Scott Boras, no one from our front office exiting a conference room, etc.," Lucchino said.

''The report was completely and utterly wrong."

On its website, the Herald indirectly quoted Boras as saying Damon's presence at the meeting was unusual, given that clients don't normally sit in on negotiations. The Herald also cited Boras as saying he'd met with another undisclosed team last weekend to discuss Damon.

Boras, when reached last night, acknowledged he was contacted by the Herald over the weekend but said he spoke to the paper only in generalities. He said he told the Herald it would be unusual for a player to sit in on a negotiating session. But he said he answered no questions that directly addressed whether he and Damon had met with Lucchino. When read the comments indirectly attributed to him, comments that seemed to affirm that a meeting had indeed taken place, Boras intimated that he’d been taken out of context and said Lucchino’s version of the story sounded accurate.

Lucchino declined to comment when asked what contact the Sox have had with Boras since the club made its initial offer to Damon. In mid-November, the team, according to a well-placed industry source, offered Damon in the neighborhood of $27 million to $30 million over three seasons, though that offer might have included an option year. Boras publicly has been making a case for a seven-year deal.

Lucchino, meanwhile, is expected to arrive here today for the four-day winter meetings. With a dearth of talent available on the open market, the meetings are expected to feature widespread trade talks. The Sox are expected to figure prominently in those talks, given that Manny Ramírez and David Wells have both asked to be moved and that the trade rumor mill is grinding out the names of other Sox players, among them Matt Clement, Trot Nixon, and Doug Mirabelli.

Even if the Sox hold on to Ramírez and Wells, they have publicly stated the desire to add a second baseman, a lefthandedhitting first baseman, a righthanded-hitting fourth outfielder, and bullpen depth, particularly a lefthanded reliever. The only lefty reliever on the club's 40-man roster is Lenny DiNardo. The club could make a push to re-sign Mike Myers, though they'd have company in that pursuit. The Yankees, A's, and Mets are all believed to be interested in Myers, who held lefties to a .158 average last season and has limited them to a .195 average since 2002.

Jed Hoyer, the Sox' assistant to the GM, said in a Friday conference call that ''probably five teams" have ''strong interest" in Ramírez.

The club, as of Friday, had scheduled meetings here in Dallas with 13 teams that appeared to be possible trade matches. While Hoyer said Friday that signing Damon to a new deal is ''our priority," it's unlikely that the team will return to Boston at week's end with Damon under contract.