Deal with Mariners discussed

As a possible contingency plan if they lose Johnny Damon, the Red Sox have discussed a deal with the Mariners that would involve Matt Clement going to Seattle and center fielder Jeremy Reed coming to Boston, according to a source with direct knowledge of the discussions.

Reed, 24, hit .254 with 3 homers, 45 RBIs, and a .322 on-base percentage last season.

The Sox, at last check, had offered Damon four years and $40 million, and during yesterday's press conference announcing Jed Hoyer and Ben Cherington as co-GMs, the team reaffirmed its commitment to bringing him back.

''We want to sign Johnny Damon," said team president and CEO Larry Lucchino, who with Hoyer will spearhead the Damon negotiations. ''We have every intention of doing so."

Damon's agent, hard-line negotiator Scott Boras, said during last week's winter meetings that he had multiple offers. Asked if the Sox had reason to believe Boras is bluffing, Lucchino said, ''I'm not going to talk about that specific element of this negotiation. I think the best way to try to sign Johnny Damon, as we very much want to do, is to be silent on public commentary."

Cherington said ''the chances are good" that both Damon and Manny Ramírez will return, an indication that the Sox have not found fair value in potential deals for Ramírez.

''Manny has expressed a desire to play elsewhere, and we've tried to satisfy that desire," Cherington said. ''But we have to remember this is a Hall of Fame-caliber offensive player. Those are really hard to replace in a trade. We have to get something or some things back that have an immediate value to the team."

Decisions still to come

Hoyer indicated that the Sox figure to hire a director of player development (Cherington's old position) and a director of pro scouting. They also will determine the futures of Craig Shipley and Bill Lajoie, who along with Cherington and Hoyer formed the Sox' core baseball operations staff at the winter meetings last week in Dallas.

Shipley's title, which hasn't changed since Theo Epstein departed, is special assistant to the GM. Lajoie was an adviser to Epstein who resigned when Epstein walked away but rejoined the club at Lucchino's urging. Lajoie worked as de facto GM at the winter meetings; the 71-year-old Lajoie took special pride in getting together with 65-year-old Atlanta GM John Schuerholz to work the Edgar Renteria-for-Andy Marte deal.

But Lajoie's three-month contract expires next month, and he's been treated in the recent past for leukemia. Lucchino said he hopes both men return.

''[Cherington and Hoyer] have great relationships with these two," Lucchino said. ''They have major things to contribute and have contributed those things in the last several weeks."

Lucchino said Lajoie wasn't feeling well yesterday, intimating that the strain of the winter meetings had caught up with him.

More from Renteria

Renteria yesterday slipped on his new No. 11 Braves jersey and predicted he would find a better fit in Atlanta than he had in his uncomfortable season with the Red Sox.

In an interview with the Globe Sunday, Renteria cited the Fenway Park infield as a main source of his discomfort, and yesterday he cited the treatment of the Fenway Faithful.

''This was my first time. I didn't know how to handle it," he said of hearing boos from the hometown fans. ''Nobody likes to get booed. You see me play, I always start slow. Maybe the fans didn't know anything about me."

Renteria described himself as a ''quiet guy." He said of Boston: ''It's a little tough there."

Renteria also seemed to back off his criticism of the field at Fenway, saying, ''I'm not making excuses. I always say I make errors. The field doesn't make errors."

And his agent played down the idea that Renteria ''wanted out of Boston," as he had told the Globe.

''It seems like they were really pushing to trade him; there's no way to soft-sell that," agent Jeff Lane said.

None of this fazed Schuerholz, the Atlanta GM.

''We could not have acquired a more perfect player for us than Edgar Renteria," he said.

Granite state of affairs

Cherington (Meriden) and Hoyer (Plymouth) join Kansas City's Allard Beard (Rochester), San Francisco's Brian Sabean (Concord), and Baltimore's Mike Flanagan (Manchester) as major league GMs with New Hampshire roots. ''It's pretty good for a small little state," said Hoyer, who was born in Minnesota and lived in North Carolina but spent most of his formative years in New Hampshire . . . Epstein's Nov. 2 going-away press conference was attended by John Henry and Tom Werner but not Lucchino. Yesterday, Lucchino was present for the GM announcement, but Henry and Werner were not. Henry responded to multiple questions in an e-mail yesterday but did not address a question asking why he was in Florida rather than Boston. Lucchino said Werner is due in town today. Yesterday's 3:30 p.m. press conference wasn't announced until after noon, and Lucchino made it sound like a last-minute thing. ''We just thought it was important to get it out today," Lucchino said. ''There was so much speculation. It was beginning to leak out." . . . Manager Terry Francona, now a year-round Massachusetts resident, will narrate '''Twas the night before Christmas" tomorrow at Symphony Hall during the 22d annual ''A Company Christmas at Pops" . . . The Sox, who released a limited number of tickets in their initial 2006 offering, reported selling more than 217,000 tickets in a single weekend.

Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.