It looks as though the frugal, bottom-line Red Sox are here to stay, and other thoughts

Or are you perhaps one of the loyal legions who think Red Sox ownership trimming costs and saving money makes the fan experience more enjoyable — as if you are some kind of profit-sharing partner with John Henry?

Barring something unexpected, it’s pretty clear that the 2022 Red Sox are the Bottom Line Red Sox. The Sox have about $20 million to spend under the luxury-tax threshold, but don’t seem interested in big-money talent, while most of their competition has been aggressive.

At Fenway South, not overspending seems to be the primary goal. The Sox repeatedly insist that prudence is the way to go. Develop the farm system. Don’t make big splashes you will regret later. It’s all about payroll flexibility and “nimbleness,” being good every year instead of going all-in this year.

“The important thing is to focus on what you are doing, not to focus on what everybody else is doing, and not to focus on what kind of splash you might be able to make,” baseball boss Chaim Bloom said.

Manager Alex Cora said Friday he’s still busy “recruiting,” adding, “I do believe we’re going to add, but we’ve just got to be patient.”

I asked him if he’d be satisfied if this is his team.

“I think we got a good baseball team,” he said. “Obviously there’s a few things we have to find out about the bullpen, but if tomorrow’s Opening Day, I feel good with it.”

Travis Shaw was Friday’s big acquisition. Oh, and Franchy Cordero is back in the Sox clubhouse.

Ladies and gentlemen, say hello to your 2022 Boston Red Sox. And get ready for fourth place in the American League East (thank goodness for the Orioles). Tampa Bay by the Charles has become the reality we feared when bargain-basement Bloom was hired from the Rays to make the Red Sox a lean, bottom-line ball club.

The Sox still have a high payroll, of course. They can always point to that. But that’s only because Dave Dombrowski was a drunken sailor on the way out the door, throwing bags of cash at Chris Sale and Nate Eovaldi. The Sox are paying Xander Bogaerts $20 million this year but show no signs of extending him and will likely let him go the Mooke Betts route (Bogaerts can opt out after the season).

Meanwhile, Sox ownership hopes you keep ponying up those sky-high Fenway/NESN prices, delighted with the game plan of your management team.

Not me. While most teams (the Jays and Yankees, for instance) have made trades and spent money to improve since the lockout ended, the Sox have thus far stayed the course, hiring cost-friendly relievers who may or may not help. Bloom has not committed big money to any player since taking over the Sox in the winter of 2019-20. He saved a bundle by trading Betts.

See me in September if I’m wrong, but I believe the success of 2021 is going to haunt the Sox. They think they have it figured out. And they have a portion of sheep-like constituents who accept everything the club does, because, well, this ownership group has delivered four World Series winners.

True that. Those trophies are real and great. Unfortunately, they have become the legacy that allows the ‘22 Sox to coast on past successes with immunity never granted to previous Sox regimes. I mean, where’s the outcry in this spring when the Sox have become a do-nothing organization?

The “new philosophy” Red Sox showed their hand in late September of 2019, when they were stumbling to a third-place finish, three weeks after firing Dombrowski.

On the night of Sept. 27, 2019, Henry, wingman Tom Werner, and Sam Kennedy laid out the future.

“One of the things we observe is that there are teams that make the playoffs with half the payroll that the Red Sox have,” said Werner. “We intend to be competitive every year, but the solution to that isn’t always having the highest payroll in baseball.”

“We need to be under the CBT [competitive balance tax],” added Henry. “That’s the goal.”

It was the goal then. It’s the goal now. No more reckless spending.

Bloom was hired to carry out this mission, and he’s succeeding. His 2020 team finished in last place, but in ‘21, he hit on some junk-pile scraps and now that’s the Fenway Way: turn other people’s trash into gold.

And while you are doing it, make sure to plant word that you have “interest” in every high-priced free agent, such as Freddie Freeman. The Red Sox find a way to make folks think they are “in” on everybody. But it’s never serious. Instead, Bloom hires a soft parade of guys with 5.50 ERAs and hopes one of them hits.

Do you care?

Hope so. All are welcome to disagree, but I remember the old days when hungry/angry Red Sox fans demanded more from the folks in charge of one of New England’s public trusts.

▪ Quiz: Name the Red Sox catcher who is the only player in big league history to hit into a triple play and hit a grand slam in consecutive at-bats (answer below).

▪ Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich is selling his Chelsea football club. The Chicago Cubs owners and Woody Johnson of the Jets are making bids. Any reason Bob Kraft wouldn’t try to buy?

▪ Bookmakers are wondering about big wagers placed on the Buccaneers three days prior to Tom Brady announcing his comeback.

▪ Call me old-fashioned, but is anyone remotely bothered when our heroes use the F-word while addressing full stadiums on live television? David Ortiz was celebrated for saying “this is our [expletive] city” in 2013, and everybody seemed thrilled when Kevin Garnett dropped two F-bombs in a single sentence while speaking to the Garden sellout during his number-retirement ceremony.

I mean, does this stuff still get kids in trouble in school, or is it OK there also? Hope Big Papi knows it won’t play well in Cooperstown.

▪ While we are on the topic of retired Celtic numbers, here’s a word on the prospect of adding Ray Allen to the rafters at the Garden: No.

KG said, “Ray’s next,” last weekend, but here’s hoping the Celtics stop the madness. Allen played only five of his 18 NBA seasons here, played for three other teams, and had nowhere near the impact of Paul Pierce or Garnett.

Danny Ainge should be up there before Allen. He won two championships as a player and ran the team for almost 20 years, winning another championship and drafting Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Robert Williams.

▪ Red Sox lefty prospect Jeremy Wu-Yelland has what Dennis Eckersley will call “great moss.”

▪ The Dodgers have added The Cooler to their broadcast team. Adrian Gonzalez. That’s a worse idea than Tony Massarotti.

▪ The Naomi Osaka saga took a bizarre and troubling turn last weekend when the former No. 1 tennis player in the world felt the need to address the crowd after a second-round loss in which she was heckled by one fan in a crowd of 10,000 at Indian Wells. Osaka fell apart after the heckler shouted, “Naomi, you suck!”

Osaka, who recently took three months off to deal with mental health issues and ambivalence toward the sport, asked to have the heckler removed, lost, 6-0, 6-4, to Veronika Kudermetova, then took the microphone and addressed the crowd, referencing an episode in which Venus and Serena Williams were jeered at Indian Wells 21 years ago.

▪ Hope men’s basketball coach Ed Cooley stays at Providence.

▪ They lost to Murray State Thursday, but it was good to see the San Francisco Dons (college home of NCAA champs Bill Russell and K.C. Jones) back in the Big Dance.

▪ Next Friday (March 25) marks the 75th anniversary of Holy Cross men’s basketball (freshman guard Bob Cousy was a contributor) winning the NCAA championship with a 58-47 victory over Oklahoma at Madison Square Garden.

▪ I’d rather watch women’s professional tennis than men’s professional tennis. Give me the NCAA women’s softball tourney (quick games, tons of action) over the men’s World Series in Omaha. Just please just don’t insist — in the name of equality — that the WNBA get the same attention as the NBA, or that the NCAA women’s hoop tournament would generate the same interest as the men’s tourney if only it got the same coverage.

Coverage reflects interest. It’s not the media’s job to generate interest with coverage. All athletes and leagues are worthy. But folks like what they like.

▪ The UConn women, a No. 2 seed in the East, are gunning for their 14th consecutive Final Four.

▪ Why we love high school sports: Streamed Newton North vs. Needham state tourney boys’ basketball while I sat in my hotel in Florida last weekend. Huge crowd. Noticed Newton AD Mike Jackson mopping sweat off the court during timeouts. Hope parents and townsfolk appreciate all that coaches and school support staff do for our kids.

North plays BC High Sunday night in Lowell for the Division 1 state championship. Coach Paul Connolly’s Tigers won back-to-back state titles in 2005-06 when Division 1 guards Anthony Gurley (Wake Forest, UMass) and Corey Lowe (Boston University) patrolled the court.

▪ Congrats to former BU men’s soccer coach Andy Fleming, a Braintree native and Archbishop Williams grad who just stepped away as head coach of men’s soccer at Xavier.

▪ Bob Lobel reports that while playing behind the dish for the Apple Creek Merchants, he once threw out Bobby Knight attempting to steal second base in an Ohio softball game and that “no chairs were thrown.”

▪ Bet you didn’t know that Neil Diamond was a scholarship fencer at NYU and a member of an NCAA championship team in 1960.

▪ Quiz answer: Scott Hatteberg against the Rangers in 2001.

Dan Shaughnessy is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at daniel.shaughnessy@globe.com. Follow him @dan_shaughnessy.