FORT MYERS, Fla. — Nearly every move the Boston Red Sox have made over the past four seasons has come with an eye toward the future. Building a sustainable roster around a young core has been a phrase repeated ad nauseam by Red Sox leadership.

Like many teams in baseball, the Red Sox have admired the Atlanta Braves’ model of locking up homegrown talent.

But so far, outside of Rafael Devers’ 10-year, $313.5 million deal signed last winter (and to a lesser extent, Garrett Whitlock’s four-year, $18.75 million pact in 2022), they have yet to sign any players from their emerging young group.

Brayan Bello and Triston Casas are the most obvious players next in line for contract extensions and it appears that process has begun with Casas.

The 24-year-old first baseman arrived in Red Sox camp on Sunday, fresh off a busy winter, and revealed he and his agency (MVP Sports Group) have begun extension talks with the Red Sox.

“Of course we have,” he said. “Nothing enticing though.”

“I want to be here forever,” Casas added. “This is not a bad place to play. It’s actually the best, I think, so I’d love to be here.”

Casas later elaborated a bit on the contract process with The Athletic, noting the talks began “pretty recently.”

Triston Casas, fashion icon. pic.twitter.com/wb7sKSYERI

— Red Sox (@RedSox) February 8, 2024

“I guess they hadn’t really been interested in me until now,” he said with a smile. “I’m always interested in it. I would like to spend the rest of my career here. Obviously it’s been such a small sample size and we don’t know what the future holds, even if I’ll continue to be a good player or not. So there’s a lot of stuff that’s left up to chance when there’s a lot of money on the table. But ultimately, I just need to go out, play well and everything else will take care of itself.”

Outside of signing Devers long-term, the Red Sox have not had the best track record recently in signing their homegrown stars. But Casas said he hasn’t put much thought into how that will affect his process.

“Obviously I’m really curious about it,” he said of contract negotiations. “I hear about it from other outlets in the league. It seems enticing, but it’s really nothing that I need. Thankfully, my family’s well off. I have money from generations. So yeah, anything that they’d be giving me is something that I wouldn’t be needing anyway. So that’s why it just makes my job so easy, clear-headed to just come out and play the game that I need to, that I have no pressure to try to make money or need any more than I have.”

Casas wouldn’t offer specifics of the numbers the Red Sox put on the table so far. He isn’t putting pressure on himself to perform for a contract, but he’s likely looking for a deal that’s comparable to what similar players in the league have made.

He said he’s looking for “(a contract) that sets me and my family for the rest of my life. I don’t know what that looks like. I’m low maintenance. I don’t need a lot. I got a small family. I don’t need much, but something that I think would suffice (for) the work that I put into it my whole life would be nice.”

Casas is only entering his second full season in the league after debuting in the final month of the 2022 season. Last year, after a slow start, he finished third in American League Rookie of the Year voting, with a .263 average, .856 OPS, 129 OPS+ and 26 homers in 132 games.

The numbers are even more impressive after that slow first two months of the season, one in which many wondered why he hadn’t been sent to Triple A. But the Red Sox liked his approach at the plate and were convinced he’d find his rhythm. The patience paid off. In 85 games, from June 1 through Sept. 14, when his season ended in shoulder inflammation, he was one of the best hitters in the league, hitting .299 with a .953 OPS and 18 homers.

Triston Casas reacts after hitting a two-run homer against the Mets on July 22. (Maddie Malhotra / Boston Red Sox / Getty Images)

“I feel like I can do this job, man first base for the Boston Red Sox, for the next 20 years,” he said. “So it’s not in my personality to feel like I need to get rushed to get to any deal, or try to prolong my career more than it already is. I know I’ll play through any contracts so I’m not worried about money or ages or times or years. I know, I’ll be here for a long time.”

To avoid more shoulder injuries this season, Casas revamped his workouts this winter. After the season ended, he took another two weeks off to reduce inflammation and then did physical therapy for another two or three weeks before he felt back to normal.

“Everything structurally in the shoulder was great,” he said. “It took some inflammation getting flushed out for me to feel better.”

He’s not sure exactly why the inflammation cropped up, but noted he found an imbalance in his program because he hits left-handed but throws right-handed.

“Swinging with one hand and going in the opposite direction with so much force and torque from a swing to where I’m releasing my top hand and coming off the bat and also going in the other direction to forcefully throw a ball, it was just a lot of stress throughout the year,” he said. “I’m going to look to manage that workload a little bit better and did a lot of strengthening this offseason for it. Took my throwing program a lot more seriously so I can carry on throughout the whole year. I’m not feeling those symptoms, but it’s just a lot of wear and tear. We do a lot of wear and tear on our bodies. This is one of the most physically demanding sports, whether the impact of it is brunt or not. It does take a toll on us. So just managing it and trying to strengthen our muscles as much as we can to withstand that much workload is where my focus was at this offseason.”

Aside from the shoulder rehab and his regular workouts, Casas had a busy offseason. He made a point to be at several in-person workouts and gatherings with various teammates throughout the winter. Casas spent time in Fort Myers with teammates, traveled to the Dominican Republic for a hitting session and went to Texas to partake in Trevor Story’s infielders camp. He made two trips to Boston, one for a series of charity events with teammates at the Jimmy Fund and Boston Children’s Hospital around the holidays and another to participate in the Rookie Development Camp at Fenway Park.

Manager Alex Cora called Casas his MVP of the winter for being so involved.

“He was amazing,” Cora said. “He went to every camp that we came up with. I give him credit, actually, it was fun to have him around. He went to the Dominican, he went to Dallas, events with hospitals in Boston. That’s what we want, right? The guys that embrace this whole madness.”

Casas just viewed it as doing his part to build team chemistry.

“I wanted to work on camaraderie, like building team unity, whether it was a get-together at a dinner, or coming over here to Fort Myers to have a dinner or to go to visit the group down in the Dominican or going to Texas to get with that group,” he said. “It wasn’t like I was going there and we were just doing whatever. We were getting there and getting stuff done. So I felt it was a good space to be productive and what better people to deal with than my teammates that I’m hopefully going to spend a lot of time with for the next couple of years.”

Casas said he hopes to limit stretches of bad results this season, like the one he endured to start last year, and spent a portion of the winter focusing on his defense.

“I felt like that was the biggest area that I could have improved on from last year,” he said. “I put a lot of emphasis into that this offseason and I really like where I’m at with my footwork. I like where I’m at with how I’m moving. I’m going to try to continue those trends throughout the spring training into the season and even in-game, I think there’s a lot of things that I could work on, just reading swings better and it’s going to come with learning our pitchers in spring training, learning their pitch characteristics, matching them with the swing type that hitter has and just try to be in the right place. Be a little bit more anticipatory instead of just being a robot out there and just being in a certain position, and trying to read the game a little better as well.”

Casas is doing all the right things to earn a long-term deal in Boston and now it’s on the Red Sox to lock up one of the pieces of their future.

(Top photo of Triston Casas: WooSox Photo /Ashley Green / USA Today Network)