2011-2012 Offseason Thread

[User Name]

You can't prove it isn't what they meant either.

 

That's exactly the point.

[jacksonianmarch]

Says the Yankees fan. How many times this decade have the Yankees and their massive payroll gone into the season with a shitload of questions? It happens.

 

One, 2008, and they bottomed out.

[jacksonianmarch]

Let me clarify that. How many times did we have enough holes and lack enough depth at the beginning of the season to be truly worried, one. 2008. There we go

[User Name]

Let me clarify that. How many times did we have enough holes and lack enough depth at the beginning of the season to be truly worried' date=' one. 2008. There we go[/quote']

 

2011.

 

Let's be real here: Bartolo, Hughes and Garcia inspired no confidence at all.

 

Sportswriter and fan alike were losing their s*** after they missed out on Lee.

[jung]

Well if Muggah was taking my comment verbatim and overlaying it on what he believes Sox management expectations to be I did identify it as my "minimum" expectation. The Sox did not bring V in here with the expectation that he would bring the Sox a ring this year. I don't even think they believe it likely that V will be here for very long. They brought him here with the expectation that at a minimum he would have a positive impact on the underlying issues that I believe were considered an embarrassment to the organization as a whole.

 

I don't know what the organization expects for performance for the team that they have so far built for 2012. However, I do think at a minimum they don't want to see this team touch any of last year's behavior with a ten foot pole.

 

Josh Beckett comments that fans should have the right to expect better behavior along the lines of meeting some expectations as a team. It seems to me that Josh believes that some players should still be entitled to their individual benies regardless of how well or poorly the team is doing. Further Josh contends that the real problem was that the behavior was leaked to the media not the behavior itself. He then went on to sight the now famous drinking sessions of the 2004 team as an example of his expectations for what fans and the media know and when they know it. To me, Josh misses the point here. The 2004 "team" won the world series. That is the biggest difference between the 2004 team and the 2011 team. Won the world series vs. biggest collapse in baseball history.

 

The other place where Josh misses the point in my view is that it is rare to have a team that is inherently united in a way that does not result in elements of the team being polarized off into the entitled vs those that are not entitled. It appears to me (obviously from the outside looking in) that in 2011 privileges and benies became a domain for an entitled few that insisted on maintaining those benies and privileges regardless of how the "team" was performing. You can't have guys acting as if they still deserve their benies because their ERA is XYZ or their batting average is ABC. It can never be "I am doing my job as an individual player" so don't talk to me about what else I should be doing to help the team win.

 

Lastly and I think here again Josh misses the point, in all likelihood certain behaviors of the 2011 team were leaked because it appeared to be behavior that was inherently flawed for that team in that circumstance. Don't condemn the messenger Josh. Be enough of a pro and a veteran to understand where the team you are playing for is and when your behavior has a negative impact.

 

I am glad Josh showed up early for camp but I worry about him particularly. His comments, only a few days old now, seem to suggest that he still does not get it and is still unwilling to yield to the needs of the team as a whole. Further his comments suggest that he is going to be looking for "rats" in a year when this team and individuals on it are going to be under a microscope because of what happened last year. Ya' got better things to do Josh than police the clubhouse for rats. That is not leadership. Ya' wanna' do something worthwhile? Police your own behavior and the behavior of any other player that appears to be putting himself above the team as a whole.

[Spitball]

It does' date=' but pro-rated.[/quote']

 

Are you sure it works that way? Look at this article by Verducci.

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. -- The Boston Red Sox aren't worried about getting first baseman Adrian Gonzalez signed to an extension after acquiring him in a trade from San Diego. Indeed, the parameters are in place for a seven-year deal for $154 million, according to one source familiar with the negotiations. But there are two reasons why the Red Sox are smart to wait.

 

First, Boston wants to make certain that Gonzalez comes through his shoulder surgery just fine. "Wouldn't you with that much money?" said one team source.

 

The procedure, which Padres GM Jed Hoyer described as a simple "clean up," is not a risky one, but could at least cause Gonzalez to get behind schedule and off to a slow start, which had concerned the Padres about reducing his trade value if he had remained with the club.

 

Mostly, though, waiting simply makes good business sense. It keeps $4.11 million in Boston's pockets, essentially helping to pay bonus money for draft picks to replace the three prospects the Red Sox traded to San Diego.

 

Here's how it works. For exceeding the Completitive Balance Tax for a second straight year in 2011, Boston will pay a 30 percent tax on every dollar it spends above $178 million. That means Gonzalez's 2011 salary of $6.3 million carries a tax of $1.89 million.

 

But if Boston officially signed him to that $154 million extension prior to Opening Day, Gonzalez would go in the books as a $20 million a year player -- for multi-year deals, the average annual value of the contract is used -- and carry a $6 million CBT bill. So the Red Sox are likely to make the deal official after Opening Day -- after the salaries are established for 2011 CBT bookkeeping purposes.

 

"It makes sense whether or not" there is a health issue, one team source said.

 

Said another baseball executive, "Look, it's smart baseball. The Red Sox did it with [Josh] Beckett and they did it with Coco Crisp. You see it a lot and you'll see more of it: extensions announced right after Opening Day. The Tigers made a mistake with [Miguel] Cabrera a couple of years ago and got burned."

 

After Detroit traded for Cabrera from Florida, they settled on a 2008 contract of $11.3 million. The Tigers then replaced that contract on March 24, 2008 with an eight-year, $152.3 million contract that instantly turned Cabrera into a $19.0375 million player for luxury tax purposes.

 

The CBT threshold that year was $155 million. If Detroit waited until Opening Day to finalize the Cabrera deal, its payroll would have come in under the threshold at $153.1 million. But the extension pushed its payroll to $160.8 million, and because of that the Tigers were hit with a tax bill of $1.3 million.

 

Opening Day was seven days away. Those seven days cost Detroit $1.3 million.

[Bellhorn04]

It's two different things, Spitball-the rules pertaining to mid-season trades and the rules pertaining to the timing of signing contract extensions.

[User Name]

Yup. An extension that starts next season cannot retroactively impact that season's cap.

[Spitball]

But the wording says, "...after Opening Day -- after the salaries are established for 2011 CBT bookkeeping purposes."

 

Do either of you have a link to clarify your contentions? I can't find one to contradict Verducci.

[User Name]

( Assignment of Contract

If a Uniform Player’s Contract is assigned by any means to

another Major League Club, the assignor Club shall be allocated

Salary through the date of the assignment and Salary shall begin

being allocated to the assignee Club on the following day, regardless

of the Player’s reporting date. An assignor Club that pays

cash consideration to defray all or part of the salary obligation of

the assignee Club for an assigned Player shall include such cash

consideration in its Actual Club Payroll in the Contract Year in

which the cash consideration is paid; provided, however, that any

such cash consideration included as part of a Player assignment

made during the 2011 Contract Year but not payable until the

2012 Contract Year shall be included in the assignor Club’s 2011

Actual Club Payroll to the extent that the assignee Club does not

have equivalent salary obligations under Player contracts

obtained in the assignment in the 2012 championship season or

beyond. Any cash consideration that is, pursuant to the preceding

sentence, included in the Actual Club Payroll of the payor Club

shall be subtracted from the Actual Club Payroll of the payee

Club in the same Contract Year in which it is added to the payor

Club’s Actual Club Payroll.

©

 

Straight from the CBA. The remaining portion of the player's salary is allocated to the player's new club from the day after the trade on.

[Bellhorn04]

Spitball, here are 2 examples, and I'm very confident I'm right on this:

 

1) A-Gon extension. When the Sox acquired him he had one year remaining on his contract for $6 million. They signed him to a 7 year extension for $154 million after Opening Day of 2011. Therefore his salary for 2011 for LT purposes was $6 million. For 2012-2018 it will be $22 million per year, the average value. If he had signed the extension before Opening Day, it would have become in effect an 8 year deal for $160 million, or $20 million per year from 2011-2018.

 

2) Billy Wagner trade. Wagner's salary that year with the Mets was about $10 million. The Red Sox traded for him in August. The amount of his salary that they carried for LT purposes was their pro-rated portion of the $10 million-about $3 million.

[seabeachfred]

I have become more pessimistic regarding Oswalt upon learning that his back problem is actually degenerative discs. Making all of his starts in August is hardly a recommendation under the circumstances. This is not something that gets better over time. It is something that you manage over time and the fact that he has been using cortisone so early in his life and extensively to boot is not at all encouraging. I would suspect that every year he has pitched with this particular malady is another year that he has bashed away at those discs.

 

Plus you end up adding up what has been happening with Oswalt looking for a rational. Does it make sense that Jackson gets $10M from the Nationals and Oswalt, a pitcher with his record of accomplishment cannot get either the Cards or Rangers to even consider moving somebody aside so that he can have a #5 spot in the rotation? Does it make sense that he apparently cannot get anybody to offer him more than $5M and that he has attracted so few teams to offer him anything to date?

 

Many of us have been saying that something does not smell right for weeks now. For my part I just did not have anything that I could put my finger on other than thinking that teams were concerned about his back's health all be it somewhat nebulously. Once I found out that the heath problem was degenerative discs at least to me a good deal of what has been reported about offers that have been put before him finally made some sense. While I only just found out it was degenerative discs, teams obviously would have known this and it appears to me that they are taking it into consideration. In fact if I am not mistaken was it not reported that what offer the Sox had made to Oswalt had been withdrawn?

 

The Sox do not need a guy that can bend over the wrong way one morning and be on the shelf for a month or longer. I certainly could not pencil him in as a #4 anywhere under the circumstances and the chances are pretty good that he could not even give you the 150 innings or so that you would expect from a #5.

 

Before this I have contended that I thought some NL team would come out of the woodworks late and sign him for something around the $5M that has been tossed about for weeks now. Now, knowing this I am more inclined to think he will not get an offer till teams see what they have in ST. If the #5 somebody has been planning on does not seem to be able to fill the bill and that team does not have somebody that can move into that spot then I think he will get an offer, probably lower even than the $5M that has been thrown around up until now. In my view it will take that sort of event for some team to take a shot at giving him a rotation spot. That puts him about one step on the ladder over Wakefield if that provides some perspective and that might be generous.

 

Degenerative Discs????? Plural?????? Hey if that isn't a red flag I don't know what is. It is also why almost all teams have shied away from this guy. A healthy Oswalt would garner a lot more interest than he has but as soon as someone here mentioned DD Plural, it starts making a lot of sense why he may be a risk. However, let's not get carried to far to say Wakefield is step above him. Wakefield is one step up on nobody, a nowhere nothing who will infuriate a lot of fans if he has the nerve to show his face down at Fort Myers.

[User Name]

The CBA clears up the issue, as per my above post.

[seabeachfred]

Here's to hoping you all blow money on Oswalt rather than us.

 

Can of Corn---you have much more money to blow than we do since your team really screwed themselves up as well as the Cardinals fans by blowing the caper on Albert Pujols and still have a lot of cash around that your refused to use to resign the best player in baseball. I don't know how it will all turn out for us but the Cardinals are now deal men walking.

[Spitball]

Okay, I see you guys are right. I appreciate each of your prompt responses. I guess I was just hopeful Cherington had a strategy we had not yet realized. Apparently not. <_>

[User Name]

Remember that if you get a pitcher at the TDL, you get him for roughly a quarter of his value.

 

A $10 million pitcher at the TDL represents a 2.5 million cap hit.

[jung]

But if Boston officially signed him to that $154 million extension prior to Opening Day, Gonzalez would go in the books as a $20 million a year player -- for multi-year deals, the average annual value of the contract is used -- and carry a $6 million CBT bill. So the Red Sox are likely to make the deal official after Opening Day -- after the salaries are established for 2011 CBT bookkeeping purposes.

 

Actually I think the wording in the piece you are quoting is confusing. Probably just poorly written. Notice how at the top of the piece the author talks about what would have happened if the Sox had made the contract official "prior to opening day".

 

At the bottom of the same paragraph the author talks about the result for having made the contract official "after opening day".

 

I actually think the author has it right at the bottom of the paragraph but almost right at the top of the paragraph. I think the Sox had to wait till the day after opening day baseball but did not have to wait any longer than that to accomplish what they wanted to accomplish. I am not sure if you can cut it finer than the day after opening day and still accomplish what you intend. It is my recollection that every time the Sox have done this with an extension, they have waited till the day after opening day to make the extension official and have not cut it any finer than that. I am not sure if you could actually cut it any finer than that.

[jung]

Seabeachfred,

 

notice I wrote that it put Oswalt "about one step on the ladder above Wakefield".

 

I think you believe that I wrote that it put Oswalt one step on the ladder below Wakefield.

[Bellhorn04]

I actually think the author has it right at the bottom of the paragraph but almost right at the top of the paragraph. I think the Sox had to wait till the day after opening day baseball but did not have to wait any longer than that to accomplish what they wanted to accomplish. I am not sure if you can cut it finer than the day after opening day and still accomplish what you intend. It is my recollection that every time the Sox have done this with an extension' date=' they have waited till the day after opening day to make the extension official and have not cut it any finer than that. I am not sure if you could actually cut it any finer than that.[/quote']

 

Announcing the extension the day after opening day would be a little too obvious. A-Gon's extension was announced 11 games into the season. Remember the Sox were catching a lot of flak for manipulating the rules to save LT.

[SoxSport]

Is this the same as traction?

 

Don't think so. I think traction is where you get put into a harness and can't move.

 

In decompression, they put you on a split table and pull the halves of the table apart--stretching your spine. You are in a harness strapped around your waist, and they can localize the stretching down to the lower lumbar area if desired. They apply a load of about half your body weight for a minute, reduce the load in half, then reapply the original load for a minute, etc. repeating this several times over a 30 minute period. You do this 3 times a week, up to 20 visits, and they increase the load every other time. The final load should be 10-25% above half your body weight. I just completed 20 treatments. There is definitely an improvement in my lower back--I don't get the nerve sensitivity down my leg I had before, which means the disks are less inflamed. The disks are supposed to thicken from the treatment--refilling with disk fluid regenerated by the stretching. I have a couple of flattened

disks--no herniation. It also helps in herniated cases--sucking the herniated stuff back into the disk.

[jung]

Announcing the extension the day after opening day would be a little too obvious. A-Gon's extension was announced 11 games into the season. Remember the Sox were catching a lot of flak for manipulating the rules to save LT.

 

I think they did Beckett the day after opening day. I did not remember the exact date they did Gonzalez.

 

It is transparent anyway. Nobody is really fooling anybody waiting till the eleventh game. The problem for anybody wanting to contest doing it this way is that there is no binding agreement to extend until it becomes official. Somebody wanting to contest doing it this way, would have to point to some stipulation in the preliminary agreement that binds one party or the other or both parties. So for example, in the case of Gonzalez (again I can not remember exactly how long after opening day the extension was made formal) if Adrian concluded that he was really worth Ryan Howard money ($25M per just before the Gonzalez extension had been formalized) he could have thrown a monkey wrench into the deal and asked that the Sox meet the $25M that Howard was getting. There was nothing that actually prevented Gonzalez from pointing to that contract and saying I want that and nothing in writing demanding that the Sox give it to him. But it would have been a sticky situation because Adrian could probably have made a good case for getting Howard money. So the team actually accepts some risk in all of this as well. Both parties accept some risk because there is nothing formally binding them to the extension.

[jung]

I don't get the nerve sensitivity down my leg I had before

 

I get this every once and awhile but not to often....thank God! Will get it in other places if it happens to be C4 or C5 that are acting up on me at a particular time.

[Bellhorn04]

Okay, I'm going to take a shot at clarifying the 2012 payroll for luxury tax purposes, based on Alex Speier's numbers. Here we go:

 

1 Gonzalez 22.00

2 Crawford 20.29

3 Beckett 17.00

4 Lackey 16.50

5 Ortiz 14.58

6 Youkilis 10.31

7 Matsuzaka 8.67

8 Ellsbury 8.05

9 Buchholz 7.38

10 Pedroia 6.80

11 Lester 6.00

12 Jenks 6.00

13 Bailey 3.90

14 Ross 3.00

15 Salty 2.50

16 Iglesias 2.06

17 Sweeney 1.75

18 Bard 1.61

19 Punto 1.50

20 Shoppach 1.35

21 Aceves 1.28

22 Aviles 1.20

23 Albers 1.05

24 Miller 1.04

25 Morales 0.85

25 man total 166.67

26-40 man total 8.00

Benefits 10.50

Bonuses 2.00

Total 187.17

 

The 26-40 number represents players like Tazawa, Melancon, McDonald, Doubrant etc. who complete the 40 man roster. Some of their salaries are not finalized yet, but none of them will be much more than 500K.

 

According to Speier, we are not getting any relief in 2012 from the club option for a 6th year in Lackey's contract.

 

Any questions?

[redsoxfan3]

Is anyone doing the Fenway All-Time Roster voting?

[Muggah]

RED SOX BLOG

Adrian Gonzalez on fried chicken in the clubhouse: 'People have to eat'

 

February 15, 2012 10:55 am By Mike McDermott

 

Red Sox first baseman Adrian Gonzalez appeared this morning on ESPN's SportsCenter, where he took questions from Hannah Storm about several topics, including the team's late-season collapse. At one point, Storm made reference to the fact that a handful of Boston pitchers had on occasion enjoyed fried chicken and beer in the clubhouse.

 

"We just didn't play good baseball," Gonzalez said. "People have to eat, whether it's chicken or [whatever]."

 

Gonzalez said that he met his new manager, Bobby Valentine, last week in Boston, and noted the differences in personality between Valentine and Terry Francona. He described Valentine as someone who would stress the details, and also said that it was important for the Red Sox to play every game like it matters.

 

In conclusion, Storm asked Gonzalez the inevitable question about Jeremy Lin. The first baseman said that he sensed the buzz about Lin, a Harvard graduate, during his recent time in Boston.

 

"It was a weird feeling," Gonzalez said, "seeing Boston embrace a guy who plays for a New York team."

[jung]

You can find the whole interview on the internet.

 

While Adrian downplayed the chicken thing with his comment that "people have to eat" he goes on to say that the team needs to remember what happened in 2011 and "play hard" for every run scored and every run scored against. Adrian commented that "we did not play good baseball" and "did not get our pitchers enough runs and did not prevent enough runs". Adrian appears to be talking about effort here, not talent. I could tell that Storm believed that was the gist of his response as well and she did not pursue it farther.

 

As for his condition he reiterated his comment from last year that his shoulder is 100% but that he did "fatigue" at the end of last season. It is "a long season" and "something you have to play through" where his last comments in this interview on his 2011.

 

AGain the whole interview is not hard to find so please do feel free to watch/listen to the whole thing.

[seabeachfred]

Seabeachfred,

 

notice I wrote that it put Oswalt "about one step on the ladder above Wakefield".

 

I think you believe that I wrote that it put Oswalt one step on the ladder below Wakefield.

 

Sorry Jung, but I apparently had a senior moment. Of course, every time I hear the name Wakefield or Varitek the hair starts to stand up on my neck and my teeth start to grind. Thanks for setting me straight. As for Oswalt, something just doesn't sound right why he is still out there. I thought he would be signed by now. Those discs in his back are no laughing matter. That's serious stuff he is dealing with, and I wonder if we did eventually sign him how long he would survive before he had another attack?:dunno::dunno::dunno::dunno:

[iortiz]

12:59pm: The Blue Jays watched Soler and others Wednesday at the team's complex in the Dominican Republic, writes MLB.com's Jesse Sanchez. *The Orioles will be in the D.R. to watch him Sunday. *Sanchez lists the Yankees, Red Sox, White Sox, Phillies, and Cubs as other interested parties.

[seabeachfred]

You can find the whole interview on the internet.

 

While Adrian downplayed the chicken thing with his comment that "people have to eat" he goes on to say that the team needs to remember what happened in 2011 and "play hard" for every run scored and every run scored against. Adrian commented that "we did not play good baseball" and "did not get our pitchers enough runs and did not prevent enough runs". Adrian appears to be talking about effort here, not talent. I could tell that Storm believed that was the gist of his response as well and she did not pursue it farther.

 

As for his condition he reiterated his comment from last year that his shoulder is 100% but that he did "fatigue" at the end of last season. It is "a long season" and "something you have to play through" where his last comments in this interview on his 2011.

 

AGain the whole interview is not hard to find so please do feel free to watch/listen to the whole thing.

 

I caught Adrian Gonzales on Baseball Tonight---which aired this afternoon (go figure), and he made it plain that he expects a more solid effort during ST this year, that Valentune will be be more demanding and demand more from the players. That is in start contrast to what went down last Spring if you could read between the lines.

[Muggah]

I caught Adrian Gonzales on Baseball Tonight---which aired this afternoon (go figure)' date=' and he made it plain that he expects a more solid effort during ST this year, that Valentune will be be more demanding and demand more from the players. That is in start contrast to what went down last Spring if you could read between the lines.[/quote']

 

 

From the sound of things ST might well be a 180 degree swing from what Fetch used to run. But we'll see.