Are they open to adding another left-hander to their bullpen? Sure.

The Red Sox have made a pair of significant moves to upgrade their bullpen, adding right-hander Bobby Jenks (pending a physical that was rescheduled from Saturday to Monday) and right-hander Dan Wheeler. But the team's relievers skew quite clearly right at this point, with Jenks and Wheeler joining holdovers Jonathan Papelbon, Daniel Bard and Scott Atchison in the Red Sox bullpen.

And so, the Sox will keep tabs on the free-agent and trade markets to see if there is a left-handed reliever to be added. But the team is more in position to wait and see if something falls into its laps, rather than feeling any sense of compulsion to add a southpaw to the bullpen.

The Sox were willing to give a multi-year deal to Scott Downs, the top left-hander on the market this offseason. But they were unwilling to go to three years on the former Blue Jays reliever, and watched him pack his bags to join the Angels. While the team expressed some interest in Brian Fuentes this offseason, the team was no longer setting its sights on him as of earlier this weekend.

The Sox are firm believers that multi-year deals for middle relievers are bad investments. The team has already made one exception this offseason in agreeing to a deal with Jenks. It is unlikely that the team would make a second exception for Fuentes or another left-hander just for the sake of featuring more arms from the left side.

There are a couple of reasons for that stance. First, the team believes that it could have satisfactory in-house options from the left side.

First, there is Felix Doubront. In a small sample (40 plate appearances) at the big league level, the 23-year-old held lefties to a line of .189/.225/.351/.576 while striking out 11 of the 40 lefties he faced. While he offers the Sox potential rotation depth in case of injuries, he is also viewed as a player who can contribute in the short term out of the bullpen.

"He obviously has the ability to start maybe in the near future. Maybe the way our team sets up, maybe he's in the bullpen. Whether it's for a year and then transitions into a starting role, I don't think there would be anything we'd do that would throw him or knock him back," manager Terry Francona said at the winter meetings. "He holds runners, he throws strikes. He's not afraid of his fastball. He's a really interesting guy. Kind of a nice name to have when you're looking at building your bullpen, knowing that you have a lefty with three months service time that you feel confident you can give him the ball somewhat late in the game. That's a nice feeling."

Francona typically prefers to have two lefties in the bullpen so that he does not wear one out by making him warm up in every pivotal situation that features a left-handed hitter. While the Sox have not yet committed to the idea of carrying a second lefty in the bullpen this offseason, they have a pair of players whom they expect to compete for that spot in Rich Hill and Andrew Miller, both of whom signed minor league deals last week. 

Hill made a late-season cameo with the Sox, holding lefties to one hit in eight plate appearances, and striking out a pair of southpaws. In 357 career plate appearances against lefties, he has held them to a line of .216/.327/.355/.682 while striking out more than one-quarter of the left-handed hitters he's faced.

As for Miller, his career struggles have included both left-handers and right-handers, both of whom have an OPS of over .800 against him. (His command struggles have actually been worse against lefties (.404 OBP against) than righties (.380).) That said, he is 6-foot-7 and left-handed, and so if (big, huge if) he can straighten out his mechanics, he potentially could emerge as a left-on-left weapon.

The Sox' need for a second left-hander might be mitigated somewhat by the talents of the right-handers whom they feature. Both Scott Atchison (.645  OPS against by righties in 2010; .839 against lefties) and Wheeler (.635 career OPS against by righties; .833 by lefties) profile as pitchers who are not ideally suited to retire lefties.

But Jenks has been better against lefties on a fairly consistent basis throughout his career, having held them to a .243 average and .648 OPS in 2010 (compared to .277, .689 by righties) and to a .231 average and .617 OPS in his career (compared to marks of .241/.661). He has an ability to bury a nasty curveball at the feet of left-handers, resulting in excellent strikeout rates against lefties.

Bard, meanwhile, was dominant against lefties in 2010. He blew away southpaws, holding them to a .141 average and .462 OPS compared to marks of .215/.627 against righties. Some of that might have been luck -- lefties had a ridiculously low .162 batting average on balls in play against Bard, vs. a fairly standard .297 mark by right-handed hitters -- but the fact remains that Bard showed an ability to shut down opposing left-handers.

The Jenks-Bard-Papelbon trio, at least on paper, should serve as the backbone of the bullpen. Beyond that, everyone else represents scaffolding.

That being the case, the team would be comfortable with the current composition of its bullpen. If an established, effective left-handed reliever should find his market dry and becomes available at terms to Boston's liking -- short years and short money -- then they would be willing to add an arm.

But while such an outcome is possible, it is not something that the Sox feel they must do. As of now, the Sox are operating from a position where they can tweak their 2011 roster -- including their bullpen -- by choice rather than necessity.