2011-2012 Offseason Thread

[Palodios]

jung' date=' it sounds like what you're saying is the Red Sox fell into the same trap the Yankees did in the early 2000's, trying to sustain championship-caliber teams and keep their hungry fanbase fed by plugging in high-priced free agents year after year, resulting in overpriced talent, wasted money and an aging team.[/quote']

 

Besides Ortiz, I can't think of a single player on this team that is on the wrong side of 30.

[example1]

Youk is in his early thirties, Scutaro is in his mid-late thirties, maybe a reliever or two (?), but otherwise you are right. The team is mostly in their prime years.

[Spitball]

I see the Yankees have signed Hideki Okajima. I'll miss the guy and hate seeing him in pinstripes.

 

Depending on how outrageous Boras's pricetag, I think Edwin Jackson is starting to look more viable as the number four starter. I don't mind trying Bard or Aceves in the rotation...but not both.

[SoxFanForsyth]

I see the Yankees have signed Hideki Okajima. I'll miss the guy and hate seeing him in pinstripes.

 

Depending on how outrageous Boras's pricetag, I think Edwin Jackson is starting to look more viable as the number four starter. I don't mind trying Bard or Aceves in the rotation...but not both.

 

nice use of italics.

[SoxFanForsyth]

Starting my move up to Boston tomorrow. Upon arrival, I plan to Occupy Fenway and protest against Cherry's lack of an offseason.

[FredLynn]

Starting my move up to Boston tomorrow. Upon arrival' date=' I plan to Occupy Fenway and protest against Cherry's lack of an offseason.[/quote']

 

I don't see how you can blame Cherry. The owners have given him no resources this year. I am no fan of Ben Cherington. I remain suspicious that he is just as much a fool as his predecessor, but lets be fair here. Its pretty clear that the owners have severely limited his budget, and really, who can he trade for prime SP? Youkilis? As one of the beat writers said, Youk is now worth .70 cents on the dollar. Our farm system is in shambles with no good SP ready to make the move up. I would grade Cherry "incomplete" right now.

[FredLynn]

Boy I am not sure you would have done enough better than Beckett to make it worth talking about. Kenny Rogers was available in that same year I think. Could have gotten Roger Clemens back for what it is worth. Bartolo Colon was available. Don't think I would really have jumped through hoops to latch onto one of those guys as opposed to Beckett.

 

On balance I am just not sure we can complain about Beckett and his contract. We have so many others that have been so much worse.

 

Beckett's contract is a bit top heavy with $$ IMO, but its far from the worst screw job Epstein perpetrated on the franchise. There are many many worse than Beckett's: Lackey, Crawford, Matsusaka, Jenks, Cameron....and on and on and on. Just because there were worse mistakes made does not make Beckett's contract a good one as compared to the contracts received by SP equal or superior to him. I mentioned a couple yesterday; there a lots more.

[Elktonnick]

I don't see how you can blame Cherry. The owners have given him no resources this year. I am no fan of Ben Cherington. I remain suspicious that he is just as much a fool as his predecessor' date=' but lets be fair here. Its pretty clear that the owners have severely limited his budget, and really, who can he trade for prime SP? Youkilis? As one of the beat writers said, Youk is now worth .70 cents on the dollar. Our farm system is in shambles with no good SP ready to make the move up. I would grade Cherry "incomplete" right now.[/quote']

 

I'd agree. I'd call Ben an "incomplete" incompetent as opposed to a complete incompetent:D

[jung]

The more troublesome contracts are ending in the next two years or have ended. That much is true. I had said as much. These contracts are ending and we already know about the ones that have ended. Did not think I needed to review those all over again but did not expect to have the current basket of signed players thrown up as a countering argument either. Although almost incredibly, we have real concerns that are not unfounded that the Sox are still not done with some of the old warhorses. And we all know who they are as well. So lets not suddenly put blinders on and suggest this has not been an issue simply based on the current basket of signed players.

 

As you might have been able to see from the earlier post I am more concerned that the Sox change the direction of their FA and team building approach to one that results in a more balanced team. My point in this regard is still the same. The Sox in my view end up blocking and eventually trading guys that should find their way to the big club maybe not as star players but as integral parts of this team. Instead we end up often blocking them, ignoring them as soon as they hit any snag that suggests they are not the second coming of Tony Conigliaro and eventually trading them. Then we bring in the Mike Cameron's (another guy intended to make the fan base all a-ga-ga over who we have sitting on our bench) and the Jenks of the world who cost to much and give us nothing. But they do make the oblivious Sox fan base oh and ah now don't they.

 

I have seen this discussion in one form or another several times here. Often one of our posters will take a different route to get to the same place that I have gotten to by reminding us that not every signing can be for a star player and not every member of a 25 man squad can be some sort of star player either. The discussion persists precisely because the Sox have crossed the line between signing star players and building a more balanced team.

 

My point is that not only can a team not make every signing for a star player but a team cannot expect every guy toiling down there in the minors to turn into Jacoby Ellsbury. It is not happening. However there are players down there that should turn into integral, contributing parts of this team even if they are not All-Star material. One of these days, probably past the reign of JH and LL this team will become more interested again in building a champion and less interested in eliciting ohs and ahs from the fan base for picking up aging war horses that end up giving us nothing.

[jung]

Pumpsie,

 

I saw your post mentioning guys that might be more viable than Beckett but I was going back to the guys that were available at the time of the Beckett signing and maybe I was mistaken in thinking that was actually where the discussion was heading....who else was available at that time and at what price that would have been a better signing than Beckett was. Looking at that list, I just don't know that I would have been all over any one of those guys in place of Beckett.

[FredLynn]

I hope you will. Your argument about Beckett hinges entirely upon finding a better answer to that question.

 

While I don't agree that its necessary to find better alternatives back then to have an opinion about Beckett's contract (I already mentioned a couple of guys that are at least as good or better than he is from an ERA standpoint that are getting less money or the same money but are superior to him), other alternatives BACK THEN that could have been considered more cost effective are Rich Harden and Eric Bedard. Yes, Harden flopped for a couple of years, but at the beginning of 2010 we didn't know that would happen. Nor could we have predicted Bedard's injury problems. Or Beckett's 2010 season when his ERA was 5.78.

Thats just a couple of guys we could have signed that may have been alternatives to overpaying Beckett. Maybe we could have signed someone else who is better the next year with the savings.

[FredLynn]

Pumpsie,

 

I saw your post mentioning guys that might be more viable than Beckett but I was going back to the guys that were available at the time of the Beckett signing and maybe I was mistaken in thinking that was actually where the discussion was heading....who else was available at that time and at what price that would have been a better signing than Beckett was. Looking at that list, I just don't know that I would have been all over any one of those guys in place of Beckett.

 

Here is the complete list. Admittedly, not real impressive. That still doesn't mean that we aren't overpaying Beckett compared to guys like CJ Wilson and Jerrod Weaver.

 

Starting Pitchers

Brandon Backe HOU

Josh Beckett * BOS

Erik Bedard SEA (

Daniel Cabrera ARZ

Bartolo Colon CWS

Jose Contreras COL

Doug Davis ARZ (

Justin Duchscherer OAK (

Adam Eaton COL

Kelvim Escobar LAA

Jon Garland LAD (

Tom Glavine ATL

Mike Hampton HOU

Rich Harden CHC (

Livan Hernandez WAS

Tim Hudson * ATL

Randy Johnson SF (

John Lackey LAA (A)

Braden Looper * MIL (

Jason Marquis COL (

Kevin Millwood * TEX

Brett Myers PHI

Vicente Padilla * LAD (

Carl Pavano MIN (

Brad Penny SF

Odalis Perez WAS

Andy Pettitte NYY (

Joel Pineiro STL (

Sidney Ponson KC

Jason Schmidt LAD

John Smoltz STL

Jarrod Washburn DET

Todd Wellemeyer STL

Randy Wolf (A)

[jung]

Pumpsie,

 

This is an interesting discussion to me because I actually think it is part of the larger discussion about the Sox and their FA and team building approach of recent memory. In fact that is precisely why I think at least for me the fact that on balance the Beckett signing is one of the better ones is relevant.

 

I do think you did get the gist of what I was saying. I did not see anybody on the list that blew me away and made me say that I would have thrown a major effort into signing XXX instead of Beckett although some of those guys have had better results none so much so over the entire period till now that it detracts from the value of the Beckett signing. As we so often mention here, toiling in the AL East presents it own challenges for a SP and there are not that many on the list that have gone that route.

 

I do accept your point about CJ and Weaver as examples. Weaver for sure. CJ probably needs to do it over a longer period. I guess given the Sox propensity to hold onto every star (be he a Red Sox star or a major league star) to long, I am not sure I would have expected them to have tossed Beckett to make a play for CJ or somebody like Weaver but I get that point Pumps. In fact it is in part the gist of my larger argument.

[DirtDog]

It completely boggles my mind that any intelligent fan thinks Cherington is doing a bad job. Since when does a successful offseason mean going and paying $XX,000,000 on the best player available. Look what that got us the last 3 years.

[a700hitter]

It completely boggles my mind that any intelligent fan thinks Cherington is doing a bad job. Since when does a successful offseason mean going and paying $XX' date='000,000 on the best player available. Look what that got us the last 3 years.[/quote']We can't judge Cherries yet, because he really hasn't done much yet. Of the things he has done, here is the record. He made no attempt to sign Papelbon leaving us with a tremendous hole on the pitching staff. He has yet to fill that hole. Melancon could be a nice addition, but he isn't going to fill the 8th inning and closer's spots. He offered arbitration to Ortiz which should pretty much lock the Sox into a huge overpay for 2012 as Ortiz will get $14-15 million. Lastly, he looked like a dupe with regard to the managerial situation. It may be unfair to say that he is doing a bad job, but it is really impossible, at this point, to conclude that he has done a good job.

[example1]

Weaver was never available. He has never been a free agent. His contract should be compared to Lesters, not Becketts.

 

Mow, Jung, you have mentioned a few times that the Sox should stop trading away their prospects who could otherwise be providing organizational depth; however I haven't seen you actually name those prospects or trades. There are a few I can think of but I wouldn't say it is a huge number.

 

The trade I would most want back was the Victor Martinez trade, because Justin Masterson is the exact kind of pitcher they could use right now. Hagadone would also be nice for depth. Otherwise who are you talking about? I also think if they hadn't acquired VMart they would have been much less successful for a couple seasons, so that wasn't a catastrophic trade.

 

When Theo was here he initially talked about 3 year cycles. The team can make runs of about three years in length before needing to retool. He openly acknowledged that they couldn't be a WS contender every year. In 2010 he mentioned a bridge year, the fanbase freaked our, they had some huge injury problems, ratings dropped, fans got mad, ownership promised some excitement, they traded for Gonzalez and signed Crawford and fans and experts alike thought they were a great team. You know the rest.

I guess I would just say that 2011 was one of the years where the Sox were going for it all. Like 2004 and 2007 they made big offseason moves to improve significantly.

 

In 04 it was Schilling and Foulke, in 07 it was Matsuzaka, in 11 it was Gonzalez and Crawford.

 

Basically I think the philosophy is a multi year approach with heavy runs at a super team roughly every 3 years, and merely very good teams the other seasons. Throughout that time they strive for depth with prospects at different levels based on where in the cycle they are. This offseason confirms that for me. No huge trades (yet) and not breaking the bank for expensive FA. If they were in the making the run mode this year they would have spliced with wilson or Darvish.

[a700hitter]

Latest On Andrew Bailey

By Tim Dierkes [December 28 at 12:47pm CST]

 

Athletics closer Andrew Bailey likely will be traded to the Red Sox or Rangers, tweets ESPN's Buster Olney, who notes that both suitors have interest and the chips needed. Earlier this month the Rangers won the right to negotiate with Yu Darvish and the Red Sox acquired Mark Melancon, but reports indicated both clubs remained interested in Bailey. The Rangers might have an excess of starters if they sign Darvish and keep Alexi Ogando out of the 'pen.

 

In a report a week ago, Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports noted that the Rays are also in on Bailey.

[Elktonnick]

It completely boggles my mind that any intelligent fan thinks Cherington is doing a bad job. Since when does a successful offseason mean going and paying $XX' date='000,000 on the best player available. Look what that got us the last 3 years.[/quote']

 

Ya! Ben Cherington:D

[FredLynn]

Weaver was never available. He has never been a free agent. His contract should be compared to Lesters, not Becketts.

 

Mow, Jung, you have mentioned a few times that the Sox should stop trading away their prospects who could otherwise be providing organizational depth; however I haven't seen you actually name those prospects or trades. There are a few I can think of but I wouldn't say it is a huge number.

 

The trade I would most want back was the Victor Martinez trade, because Justin Masterson is the exact kind of pitcher they could use right now. Hagadone would also be nice for depth. Otherwise who are you talking about? I also think if they hadn't acquired VMart they would have been much less successful for a couple seasons, so that wasn't a catastrophic trade.

 

When Theo was here he initially talked about 3 year cycles. The team can make runs of about three years in length before needing to retool. He openly acknowledged that they couldn't be a WS contender every year. In 2010 he mentioned a bridge year, the fanbase freaked our, they had some huge injury problems, ratings dropped, fans got mad, ownership promised some excitement, they traded for Gonzalez and signed Crawford and fans and experts alike thought they were a great team. You know the rest.

I guess I would just say that 2011 was one of the years where the Sox were going for it all. Like 2004 and 2007 they made big offseason moves to improve significantly.

 

In 04 it was Schilling and Foulke, in 07 it was Matsuzaka, in 11 it was Gonzalez and Crawford.

 

Basically I think the philosophy is a multi year approach with heavy runs at a super team roughly every 3 years, and merely very good teams the other seasons. Throughout that time they strive for depth with prospects at different levels based on where in the cycle they are. This offseason confirms that for me. No huge trades (yet) and not breaking the bank for expensive FA. If they were in the making the run mode this year they would have spliced with wilson or Darvish.

 

You don't like Weaver in that group, fine. Lets look at Dan Haren. His career ERA is 3.59, better than Beckett's, and he WAS available by trade. And even Derek Lowe has a better career ERA and is earning less than Beckett (admittedly some of his time was in the NL). History is littered with guys who are better than Beckett and who earn the same or less. I can't look them all up, but in this link you can find some of them:

 

http://mlbcontracts.blogspot.com/

 

As for the rest of your post, I agree: we cannot really be in the World Series every year. But come on: its been three years since we even won a single playoff game. With our payroll we should be doing better than that. This year will be yet another down year, most likely.

I hold Epstein primarily responsible for the current state of affairs.

[a700hitter]

I hold Epstein primarily responsible for the current state of affairs.

He was running the show. We have a bloated MLB payroll and the team is poorly constructed. There was apparently little thought about the role that CC would play. The minor leagues is bereft of any talent that can help the big club for several years.

[iortiz]

You don't like Weaver in that group, fine. Lets look at Dan Haren. His career ERA is 3.59, better than Beckett's, and he WAS available by trade. And even Derek Lowe has a better career ERA and is earning less than Beckett (admittedly some of his time was in the NL). History is littered with guys who are better than Beckett and who earn the same or less. I can't look them all up, but in this link you can find some of them:

 

http://mlbcontracts.blogspot.com/

 

As for the rest of your post, I agree: we cannot really be in the World Series every year. But come on: its been three years since we even won a single playoff game. With our payroll we should be doing better than that. This year will be yet another down year, most likely.

I hold Epstein primarily responsible for the current state of affairs.

 

This is what I've been saying, and I agree.

 

On the other hand if we sign a SP and Madson/Bailey I really believe that this team can be a serious contender team (regardless that an extra RF OF would be a very nice to have). As E1 said once, we have the core. The problem with this team now and then is/was the pitching (rotation, BP, depth). This core is a premium one, but we need a couple of moves in our pitching and hope that our 1-3 stay healthy if we want to run as real contenders, otherwise we will face next season with a lot of question marks.

[RonVermette]

I'm more hopeful that we're going to get Garza & Bailey(or their equivalent). That's all we need to be a better team next year. The rest will be tinkering around the edges.

[a700hitter]

Matt Garza Talks Heating Up

By Tim Dierkes [December 28 at 12:53pm CST]

 

Trade talks for Cubs starter Matt Garza are heating up, writes David Kaplan of Comcast Sportsnet Chicago. Kaplan says the Blue Jays, Yankees, and Red Sox are involved, but the Cubs' asking price is "incredibly high."

 

Yesterday, MLBTR's Ben Nicholson-Smith took an in-depth look at Garza's contract situation; he's under team control through 2013. Cubs president Theo Epstein said on Friday that Garza is "exactly type of pitcher we want to build around," but he'll listen on everybody. So far this winter trade values have been established for Gio Gonzalez, Mat Latos, and Trevor Cahill, but all of them came with at least four years of team control.

The Sox should ask the Commissioner to step in. We are supposed to get compensation for Theo. We should get preference in a deal for Garza.

[a700hitter]

I'm more hopeful that we're going to get Garza & Bailey(or their equivalent). That's all we need to be a better team next year. The rest will be tinkering around the edges.

I would be very happy if that's how things turn out.

[iortiz]

The Sox should ask the Commissioner to step in. We are supposed to get compensation for Theo. We should get preference in a deal for Garza.

 

At least BC should raise his hand and voice in this one.

[jung]

Masterson is a good example and it has been kicked around here quite a bit. However I do think Masterson probably has more potential than the kind of player I am really more interested in for this discussion. Casey Kelly is a bit more ball player than I am talking about here as well. Maybe Fuentes is more like the kind of mid pack player I am talking about.

 

Portland and Pawtucket may have decent years this year and they have the next batch of players that will either be traded away or will move up. Will the Sox trade them or play them? Does all of our support cast have to come by way of FA? The only guys that have come up out of the Sox farm system are guys that become stars and that is in part my point. Every once and awhile a McDonald comes up for a cup of coffee. The only guys the Sox keep are the Ellsbury's, Lester's and Pedroia's, guys that have stardom written all over them. They make it up to the big team. I guess we are going to see more guys come up this year but will this be by design or out of necessity, a byproduct of the wasted free agent dollars of the past few years. In other years would the Kalishes, Redicks, Doubront's etc just be traded away?

 

I do think that 2011 was supposed to be one of those all in years and they were surely the "editors" choice all over baseball as the season started.

 

However I think 2011 makes the point. Teams built with more balance and more depth can stand the grind of the 162 to get to the playoffs. I think a focus on pitching will always be the right thing to do in major league baseball but I think teams that strive for less of a drop off between the starting line up and the guys playing behind them will on an ongoing basis have a better chance of getting to and through the playoffs than teams that expend most of their mindshare hammering out the top 8 without getting much done to support them. That would include in my view how they handle their farm system.

 

As I said in a different post I never had a problem with AGons comment about the grind that the networks turned 2011 into for him. I believe him to be factually accurate in his portrayal of the role the networks play in baseball and all professional sports scheduling and travel in the modern era. I did not like AGons publicly using it as a rationalization for his late season performance but he is factually correct in my view.

 

 

I think in the coming years baseball teams that ignore this and especially teams that have a shot at winning it all will find themselves with their front line guys just plain done by year end as AGons was this year or injured or both.

 

Teams will have to be better prepared to rest their front line guys during the season so they are better rested and/or less dinged up by the end of the season. At the same time they will have to be able to sub in guys such that the drop off in performance is not so great and they still have a chance to win games while they are resting guys. Some additional thought will have to go into those guys whether they come up or are brought in as more and more the Mike Cameron kind of move looks more like a lurch to pander to the fans and look like they are actually doing something. On an ongoing basis those guys riding your pine more and more actually have to contribute. It appears to me that they will no longer be some luxury that looks good filling out the uniform but can't do much more than that.

 

My biggest disappointment in the Ortiz thing is that signing him leaves the Sox with no viable plan to use Youk and AGons in such a way as to park them in the DH role as a means of resting them. I fail to understand why the Sox seemingly have chosen to ignore the fact that Youk is brittle with age and not capable of playing in the field for anything like the number of games he has played in years past and AGons by his own admission saw his performance drop off at the end of the year due to fatigue.

 

Maybe the Sox are surprised that they are paying a guy $21M per year that cannot take the grind of the 162 but again I think it makes the point. The combination of coast to coast travel compounded by the networks and their propensity to toss teams and games into favorable slots from a rating perspective has changed what is happening to players in a very fundamental way. I think it makes it more important that teams not trade away cost controlled players that have a chance to play in the big leagues even in support roles because those are the guys that should be coming into games when you are resting your top players....not the broken down Mike Cameron's of the world. In fact, the potential star minor leaguers maybe need to stay in the minor's so they get their at bats and don't languish on the bench with the big team. But the guys that don't have stardom written all over them in some cases should just come up.

 

The Cards last year had more guys making league mins than most major league teams. Who are those guys? Did we win a WS last year? Maybe that is a good model. A limited number of stars making really big money that are at the core of the team as opposed to having eight or nine or ten big contract guys. The Sox had Crawford, AGons, Youk, Ortiz, Drew, Beckett, Lackey, dice-K, Jenks all dragging down big money and some dragging down really big money relative to their contributions.

[redsoxfan3]

We acquired Bailey from the A's according to MLBTR. We are giving up Reddick in the deal. This is definitely good news.

[win red sox]

Red Sox Acquire Andrew Bailey

By Ben Nicholson-Smith [December 28 at 3:42pm CST]

The Red Sox have acquired Andrew Bailey from the Athletics in a deal that will send Josh Reddick to Oakland, according to ESPN.com's Buster Olney (Twitter links). The move provides the Red Sox with a closer and gives the Athletics some much-needed outfield depth.

 

 

 

excellent acquisition, good move Ben!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Bellhorn04]

A couple of other points about A-Gon's late-season fatigue.

 

-Coming off shoulder surgery.

-Home Run Derby. A-Gon consistently denied that it affected him, after the season Magadan said the opposite.

[RedSoxfanforlife305]

I personally think the HR derby f***ed up his shoulder. He had a power outage in HR. His swing is still perfection though. So smooth and so precise.