Pablo Sandoval’s 2016 Weight Loss ‘Improvements’: What Was Pablo Doing Over The Offseason?

Pablo Sandoval not only let the Red Sox down with his 2016 weight loss regimen, but he is now being rude about it by deflecting blame.

At the beginning of the 2015 season, Sandoval, one of the MLB’s hottest young prospects, inked a 5-year, $95 million contract with the Boston Redsox. One would think, then, that Pablo has a certain duty to take care of his body and put up some impressive numbers that would at least come close to justifying his huge paycheck. In a face-to-face with WEEI’s John Tomase, however, Sandoval argued that he has no such obligation.

“No, I don’t got nothing to prove. I just prepare myself to perform well, for my teammates to perform well, to try to get to the World Series. That’s what I’m doing.”

It didn’t appear Pablo had been “preparing to perform well,” though, when he arrived at Fenway Park on Sunday to show off his “new-and-improved” bod. Sandoval had supposedly been working out over the off-season due to very lackluster performance in ’15. Many assumed Pablo’s primary goal in improving his condition would have been to slim down, as Sandoval was a little too chunky for comfort last season, but apparently that is not the case.

Reporters and teammates observed that Pablo, who has in the past acquired the nickname “Kung-Fu Panda,” seemed just as large, if not larger, than ever before, showing that Pablo Sandoval’s 2016 weight loss program had been a failure.

Pablo Sandoval looks like he actually ate a panda in the offseason

(pic via @BR_MLB) pic.twitter.com/7Za9QcY6KC

— NOT Baseball Tonight (@NOTMLBTonight) February 22, 2016

Or had it?

Red Sox manager John Farrell had ordered Pablo to improve his overall condition over the off-season, which sounds like an indirect request for Sandoval to shed some pounds.

But Pablo told ESPN that weight loss is not even something he considers when working on his personal conditioning and that he did not take what Farrell asked him to do as a weight-related request.

“I don’t weigh. I don’t weigh in at all,” Sandoval said. “I just do my work, try to do everything I can out there. I don’t weigh at all in the whole offseason. I just try to get better, be in a better position and, like I say, be an athlete.”

What Pablo actually did accomplish during his unconventional 2016 offseason training regimen in lieu of weight loss is unclear, although he attempted to weigh in on the subject.

“I started working out to prepare myself to be an athlete in the field. So that’s what I do. I don’t try to lose weight. I don’t try to do nothing. I just try to put in my work, feel better, the things that I can do in the field to be better are better, so that’s what I do.”

To Sandoval’s credit, though, he has managed to have some great seasons while being overweight in the past, having performed at MVP levels on the San Francisco Giants, where the very nickname “Kung-Fu Panda” was assigned to Pablo because of his surprising agility and athleticism for a man of his girth.

So maybe Sandoval knows what he is doing by scrapping his 2016 weight loss program and really does have alternate method of athletic conditioning that works for him. After all, being heavy didn’t stop Babe Ruth from becoming an MLB legend.

Needless to say, Red Sox fans are really hoping that there is indeed a method to Pablo’s madness, as Pablo Sandoval is one of the proven superstars that has to come through for the team to make it competitive in 2016.

Although much of the Bosox Nation’s hopes ride on Sandoval’s proven abilities, he is certainly not the fan favorite he was in San Francisco. This is largely because of his seemingly blasé attitude about the team’s overall decline in 2015, points out Bosox Injection. If Sandoval does not come through on his claim that he is better prepared this season, it is sure to put Pablo even further in the doghouse.

[Photo by Rich Gagnon/Getty Images]