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Welcome Osiagledknarf, there's a few thread devoted to this kind of thing already, so perhaps we should move this discussion there (2010 offseason thread, Bay vs. Holliday)

I feel like the idea of this FO trading Ellsbury and Buchholz is insanity. There is no way they would do it. Yes, Ellsbury, Kelly, Anderson, Bowden and Reddick gets Adrian Gonzalez, that's WAY, WAY too much to pay. The Sox aren't just going to throw in other mlb-potential players for the hell of it. I think Hoyer could be tempted (with former scouting director McLeod by his side) to pick from the bottom parts of the Sox minor league system, where there is a shitload of talent available, particularly if they are willing to wait until the 2009 class becomes available. San Diego doesn't have the financial abilities to pay well above slot draft after draft, the Sox do. While it's only 1.5m here and 2m there, over a few drafts that adds up. These are also McLeod's players; what better way to start redefining a franchise than bringing a really talented pool of young players with you. Guys like Fuentes, Wilson, Renfroe and Younginer will be 2010's highly talked about prospects and they all will have value on the market. The Sox could move Ellsbury is because CF is one of the positions with the best depth in their system; Kalish, Reddick, Lin, Westmoreland, and Fuentes (among others) make it a strong position depth wise. However, I like Ellsbury a lot and I think there's reason to believe that he can put it together to be a true impact player very soon. If we combined his fielding numbers from 2008 and his hitting numbers from 2009 we're looking at one of the best players in the league, probably nearly a 5 WAR player. In 2008 he played a lot of LF and he excels there. I think they've got to be thinking that moving him to LF will maxamize his value and that his value could be pretty high in that position.

I would love it if they managed to sign Bay to a reasonable contract to have him take over DH after Ortiz leaves. It would be very much unlike this FO and wouldn't be a wise financial decision in terms of payroll, but I like Bay's bat, especially as a DH. I wouldn't have thought this was possible, but this is another offseason where most teams are hesitant to pay much at all and this seems to be driving down prices considerably.

They needed a pitcher and decided on Matsuzaka. As for Lugo supposedly crippling the franchise, I'm going to disagree. They won a WS, made it to an LCS and then made the playoffs this year despite paying to get rid of him. He clearly wasn't a success, but you can't say that moves they made (Dice, Lugo) crippled the franchise when that franchise went on to win a WS the next year. I advocated for they to get Andruw Jones after moving Manny. Not trading prospects to get him. Do you not see a pattern here? Even in the proposal you thought you got me on, (Bard, Crisp and Hansen for Andruw Jones or whatever) I feel like it was appropriately conservative and in the same thread I touted Ellsbury, Buchholz, etc., and mentioned that with patience the farm system would be paying off in a year or two. You lectured me on patience and talked about the Red Sox in the 70s to argue against having any expectations for highly touted prospects. You had seen it before and would move them when they could be sold high. I'm ready to drop this discussion as it is boring. I'm just pretty confident that we have both established patterns of evaluating players and prospects and advocating for particular directions by the FO.

Oh, but they absolutely do. What would have happened if they followed my advice? They would have been disappointed with WMP and Duncan and they would have shipped them off, or stopped paying them, or paid them to go away. They were both young, cost-controlled players who, in a pinch, would have been easy to get rid of. What would have happened if they followed your advice? They would be regretting having traded Youkilis or Lester and they would be wondering what they could do about the players they got in return. Getting Chris Duncan was a bad plan, but it wouldn't have crippled the franchise.

I'll do this all day if you want man. I'm very conscious of the fact that this is an open forum where we can see what we've posted.

You don't need to do any mind reading. Tito says time and time again that whenever he's asked by Theo what he thinks about how to improve the team, he asks for a pitcher. Run differential is real and is strongly predictive of success. You do realize that the FAs and available trade talent play different positions and have different skills and values, right? Does this bat come from 1B, 3B? LF? Why would you be happy with Jason Bay but not with Mike Cameron? Cameron has mached or outproduced Bay pretty consistently for the past 4 years and he plays a more valuable position. You seem to get an emotional release from the FO having to pay extra money for virtually no extra production.

Also, what do you make of the fact that Bay and Cameron have been worth roughly the same amount the past few years according to people that measure these things? I mean that seriously, not in a confrontational way. Do you not believe it? Do you believe a run prevented is as valuable as a run scored?

Remember when you said that people shouldn't tell you what you think? I think perhaps you should stop telling us what Theo Epstein thinks. He said in recent press conferences that signing John Lackey gives them the flexibility to move pieces for a big bat if they need to. He didn't say "we don't need a big bat". The point is that people have spent days and pages and pages on this site alone arguing the merits of Matt Holliday vs. Jason Bay, or just Matt Holliday alone (can he hit in the AL). Although I come down on the side of "yes, he can" there nonetheless exists doubt about his real value moving forward. There is no doubt about the value that a player like Adrian Gonzalez would bring to this team. Not only is he a better offensive player at a position the Sox can stand to improve on, he's also younger and cheaper and not represented by Scott Boras. For all of these reasons it makes sense to most reasonable people to hold out and trade for a player like this instead of buying the most expensive FA, or a guy who won't be able to stay in LF moving forward. The question at that point isn't one about whether or not the FO is willing to make the move, the question is what will they have to give up in return. Most reasonable baseball people would acknowledge that if the current asking price is, say, Jacoby Ellsbury and Clay Buchholz, and in a few months it would be Casey Kelly and Ryan Westmoreland, it makes a lot more sense to just wait, especially given that it likely won't impact their ability to make the playoffs.

Lowell needs to go. Pay his salary, ship him to someone who wants a free player. I don't want to spend the entire rest of the offseason debating whether Lowell can still play 3B or if he can move to 1B, people read ulterior motives into the FO's choices, etc., He's not useful for this club as long as Ortiz is the DH and there's no use in having a disgruntled Lowell around.

It's pretty easy to start throwing ideas around when a good portion of the offseason is already over. Where were these predictions a month ago? Look into acquiring Adrian Gonzalez if the price is too high (Buchholz or Ellsbury is too high, IMO) then wait. Sign Aroldis Chapman Sign more good relievers Sign a backup 1B if Kotchman is the only option to start there.

Also, a700, re: the ticket prices... I think it is time for this argument to go away. If you don't like the ticket prices stop going to the games. I go to rougly 1 game a year. I don't live in the area and don't really have the chance. When I get to go it is great but you need to realize that a huge portion of Sox $$ comes from TV revenue, and that for every night that there are 38,000 people in the stands there are millions watching at home. If you don't like the prices do what many other people do. If you like going to games and have the money to spend, go for it, but realize that the return is a chance to watch a good team play in person.... not a guaranteed WS win. You are grossly overrating the importance of whatever degree of investment you make in this team. Your money could disappear from the face of the Earth tomorrow and the Red Sox would not notice. You are not investing in a local non-profit, you're investing in a huge company that has millions of loyal fans--of which you are one. As ORS said earlier, there are lots of people who don't have the resources to be able to complain about having to pay more money to be able to go to spring training or to the games. Perhaps some perspective is in order. Likewise, there are 25+ other MLB teams that would LOVE to have the Red Sox resources and current roster. Again, perhaps some perspective is in order.

What does it mean to "beat the Yankees"? To beat them in individual games? To beat them in a playoffs series? To win the division? What? We have 3 players who slugged over .500 last year. You named them. There are 4 players who had more than 20 HR (Youk, Drew, Ortiz and V-Mart's combined seasons). They just added another 20+ HR guy in Cameron. Glass half-empty today, huh? OR, Drew was among the leaders in outfield OPS, Ellsbury is an emerging offensive force, Pedroia hits really well for a 2B and Scutaro is coming off a career year and sees more pitches per PA than most hitters in baseball and is extremely difficult to strike out. Oh yeah, they also added the best FA pitcher on the market to the best Sox rotation in my lifetime and they have a legitimate bullpen and improved defense. Please list for me the teams that have "realistic prospects of beating the Yankees and winning a world championship". As far as I can tell, the Red Sox and Phillies are very probably the immediate second-tier of teams. Yankees then Phillies/Sox. I admit that they can't beat the Yankees on paper, but nobody can. While beating them on paper would be great, so would some other team knocking the Yankees out and having the Sox role (remember 2007?). How can you both argue that you have been a fan for decades of this team, and then claim that--when they are the envy of all of baseball (minus the Yankees)--you are wasting your time if they can't beat the Yankees on paper? Yes it is. Scutaro is a legitimate MLB SS and is an improvement over what they had last year. Yes it will. They will improve on their run differential from last year and will be a much better road team because of their defensive improvements and the upgrade from Green/Gonzalez to Scutaro. I know it is hard to realize if you don't trust the various metrics, but Cameron has been consistently more valuable than Bay when defense is taken into account, and Ellsbury has the chance to be an elite LF if his defense from 2008 is any indication. Scutaro is a WAR upgrade to AGon, and Lackey is much, much better than Penny. This team has improved and they are really set up well for the future... but we can talk about that in 2013 when you and I are still here talking about the Red Sox (god willing) and they are still one of the very best teams in baseball.

Lackey and Cameron were both pretty good moves for this FO. Obviously there's more to like in Lackey than Cameron, as Cameron is older and has less impact. At the same time, I think there's quite a bit to the idea that it is all about run differential and that the Sox may have prevented as many runs as they lost via-Bay. In an interview the other day on WEEI Francona said that he hadn't decided yet who would be playing CF. That's not a ringing endorsement of Ellsbury, which must be disappointing to him. However, when Ellsbury played LF in the past he was well above average according to the numbers... bordering on elite. I think a good argument could be made that Ellsbury is a lot like Carl Crawford in LF. Their per-162 g numbers are similar, with crawford having more power, but Ellsbury having better OBP skills (Ellsbury's .355 matched Crawford's career high and I think we all believe Ellsbury can do better than .355). They both have elite speed. The Lackey and Cameron moves also screw over Boras and I can't even say how happy I am that this is the case. Unnecessary preoccupation? Perhaps, but the past few years the equation for the Sox ability to sign FAs has been built around Yankee interest (inevitable, a part of life) and whether Boras was the agent or not (a self-important agent). Ellsbury is a Boras client and Boras probably doesn't love that not only have the Sox passed over the guy he thought they would be forced to sign after Teixeira went off the market (Holliday) but they've replaced him with cost-controlled Ellsbury who now looks more like a LF than an elite CF. Great. :thumbsup: The Red Sox will get their elite bat. I imagine they have their sights on anyone from the group of Adrian Gonzalez, Hanley Ramrez, Prince Fielder, Albert Pujols and Joe Mauer. Depending on which player they pursue, it may take a longer time, perhaps even beyond 2010's deadline. That's okay. I think they should wait it out.

I actually like the Lackey signing a lot, especially compared to Holliday. *Holliday would have cost more *Holliday would have been signed for longer than 5 years *Boras can f*** himself *Cameron is a better option than many give him credit for--especially when he is in CF (which he will be) *Jacoby Ellsbur could be a really good LF, especially on the road.

With Cameron there really isn't a spot to play Bay this year. Their payroll is already pushing the payroll tax limit. They will have more room next year, but this year they would be paying a lot to add much more than they have already.

I just don 't see where he wants obscene amounts of money. The Cards offer is very good in years, but AAV it isn't huge. If he has reservations about playing in St. Louis for 8 years and would rather play in NY I can see them offering him 5-6 yrs x 18m/yr. He goes to the best team in baseball, they get a new LF. I don't remember the Yankees passing on most luxaries in the past.

Gom do you think there's no way the Yankees sign Holliday at this point? The Cardinals made a big offer to him and as far as I know he hasn't accepted yet. I can't help but wonder if the Yankees will see 19-20m for Holliday as a relative bargain.

You should interpret that the Sox FO sat his ass down in extended spring training because he showed up out of shape despite their training requests. He was bad, his pitches were flat and lacked bite. When he came back his stuff looked noticably better and so did he. He should be motivaed to prove he's better than he's been. Fortunately the Red Sox were a deep enough team to be able to absorb the loss without it hurting their ability to get to the post-season.