example1

I think both teams got what they were looking for from the deal. We won't know how great a deal it is for the Sox until we see how good Marte is. The sox got a few needs addressed, adding a key bullpen arm and a leadoff/switch-hitting CF for the future. I don't think the sox will be disappointed with this trade at any point. Marte is more valuable to a team like Cleveland than Boston, at this point. Crisp is more valuable to a team like BOS than Cleveland given their needs. I'm very happy about this.

I think it is now obvious that the Sox FO has a really high opinion of Coco Crisp. I tend to trust their intuitions about young players and hope they will be right. Crisp could end up looking like a great acquisition in a few years (or this year, if they're a contender).

Its probably pretty rare that people quote and then refute themselves, but that's what I'm about to do. C'mon example1, this guy is a dog; he's scrappy with some good pop. He plays hard and, frankly, looks like Trot Nixon except a little smaller and righthanded. He seems exactly like the type of player the Sox FO picks up every year who turns into a nice acquisition. The guy had 17 HRs last year, made some nice defensive plays and his nickname is Dusty for crying out loud! He's perfect for Boston and his struggle to get playing time will be one of those nice little dramas that always play themselves out as the summer goes on (see Payton, Jay and Kaplar, Gabe). To clarify, I went back and watched some videos of him on mlb.com and like what I see. His numbers listed above are pretty bad, but he can certainly play Gabe Kaplar's role with a little bit of Doug Mirabelli's power to throw in as well. Nothing too special, but he doesn't look bad.

I'd say its not BAD, but it sure as hell isn't good. Let's hope he's competing for the 5th outfield spot; backing up the 4th outfielder and filling in as 4th outfielder upon injury.

Who are you talking about? Youkilis? He's about as professional a hitter as they come. He is the exact opposite of a hacker, someone who puts as much thought and patience into hitting as possible.

Don't forget, Loretta and Lowell are former all-stars because of their bats too.

I don't know why i keep checking this board, baseball.com and SoSH every ten minutes. Any trade that is going to happen will likely happen under the radar or not at all. Just keep Marte and start freaking stern or someone at this point. I don't care. At this point I'm all for just keeping Marte and watching him turn into a 30+ HR guy within th enext few years and a ROY candidate next year.

This topic seems to have digressed. Although, I'll join in too. There is nobody I want to throw 'near' A-Rod's head more than Josh Beckett. I've watched a lot of his highlights recently on redsox.com and the guy just throws hard and has a knee-buckling curve (not to mention a moving heater to seems to slide about two feet from one side to the other on command). Beckett is much larger than Arroyo too and could probably hold his own in a skirmish with A-Rod. Especially since Big Papi is always on the edge of the dugout ready to join in if necessary (as long as beckett could buy a minute or two to give Papi time to get out to the mound!)

I think if you compare your post with mine above you'll find why Youkilis is potentially so valuable. You claim that he has had only 250 AB's in his career. That's true. Of course, in my post I mention that he's had 343 plate appearances in his career. Also true. Last year he walked nearly 15% of the time he came to the plate. The year before that he walked almost 16% of his plate appearances. That's pretty phenomenal. This is a guy who is going to continue to tack on 100+ points onto his OBP above his AVG thanks to his patience at the plate. That's what this team (or any team, for that matter) would be looking for: a guy at the bottom of the order who gets on base 40% of the time? I'll take that.

I don't get the impression that the deal is dead. The deal is as it should be: quiet. So much gossip and speculation and leaking. The red sox are going to make some move for a CF. The question is whether they need to give up Marte to get one. I sure hope they don't have to. They have 7 starting pitchers for godssakes! I mean, don't teams have any interest in SPs + money? I would think so.

I would hate to see Youkilis playing at the age of 55. that would just be sad.

Its hard to have earned 6 gold gloves when you've been riding the pine the last few years, as Youk has. Its also hard to earn that many when you're only 26. When JT Snow was 26 he had a season that went like this: avg. 220, OBP .289, SLG. 345 in 61 games. I expect that Youkilis will do better than that. When Snow was 37 (last year) he had a season that went like this: AVG. 275 OBP .343 SLG .365 I think Youk can do better than that too. Youkilis is not about developing this year. He's about starting. He's been developing over the past two years. Now is his time to play, as the Sox have let him develop and like what they see. Francona has made this pretty clear and I think most of the Sox organization are looking forward to giving him the playing time. This question seems like a no-brainer to me, as snow is really only valuable as a late-inning defensive replacement. Have you guys watched Youkilis hit? He tends to have really good at bats. For instance, the MLB leader in pitches/plate appearance last season was Bobby Abreu who averaged 4.39. In his short time with the Red Sox (343 plate appearances) Youkilis has averaged 4.60 p/plate appearance. That's a small sample size, but its not THAT small of a sample size. (compare with Snows career 3.94 p/pa). If we want the sox to continue doing what they've done the last few years (draw walks, tire out starting pitchers by the 5th or 6th inning, score lots of runs) then we want Youkilis in the lineup, IMO.

Don't you think its a little early to be judging him as an average player? He certainly wasn't average in the minors or in college. He may end up being average, if average is a .395 OBP (which its not). He's also young enough where he can improve in many ways over the next few years.

Yeah, but this is one of those times where you're actually evaluating someone's "prospectness". That's like the least relavent thing: how highly they're regarded at the upper echalon of prospects. I'm down with differentiating between prospects on the level of Moss and Marte. That makes sense. But at the level of the 10 ten prospects it really will only matter when they step on the field. Who knows whether Marte will be better than Brandon Wood, or Stephen Drew? In any case, all of them will get MASSIVE amounts of playing time for some big league club, as opposed to guys like Moss who may or may not.

Don't you think Aaron Boone is a better option than Adam Stern though? I would much rather go into a season with Aaron Boone as my 3B than with Stern as my CF. Otherwise, though, I can see why CLE would be a little desperate too. I wouldn't want EITHER in my potent/high-powered offense to be quite honest. I think initially CLE was in a position of power, and now they may have shot themselves in the foot. I'm not mad about utilizing someone not named Crisp in CF. I'm not willing to watch the sox get hosed on a deal including much more than Marte and Mota for Crisp +.

I would rather trade 3 Manny Delcarmen's to get Crisp and keep Marte. If there is any way to ship out Clement, MDC, Shoppach and another player to get back Crisp then I'm fine with it. If the sox could look to the future with players like Crisp, Beckett, Papelbon, Lester, Marte, Pedroia, and Hansen they would be in great shape. I like Crisp a lot. I think the Sox fans would attach to him in a similar way as they attached to Orlando Cabrera. He'll hustle, he'll make good plays, he'll be speedy on the bases and he'll probably be a little bit of a sparkplug. That being said, if they can make it happen without losing Marte then I'm all for it. Probably not likely, but I would put in 2 decent players to keep Marte. Even if it falls short and Marte isn't what he could be, losing MDC and Shoppach isn't the equivalent of giving up Sandy Koufax and Yogi Berra.

Of course, but given that the main part of the deal is Marte for Coco your proposal is nowhere near realistic.

Very levelheaded post. But I think this kind of proves the point that a lot of us have been trying to make. Like it or not, Crisp, Bard and Riske makes SENSE. It may be unpopular, but at least people are able to say (as they should) "Gee, I hate to see Marte go, but Riske is a good guy to get in return, and Crisp won't be BAD". The Red Sox FO has really not made one move in the past few years that I can think of that didn't get them back SOMETHING that at least seemed sensible and intreuging. I remember after they traded Nomar for Cabrera, Roberts and Mientkez, I had to run the trade over and over again in my mind. They didn't get better at any one position, but they sure as hell bolstered themselves in a lot of other positions. They can not get too much relief pitching. That's what has been so good about the Angels the past few years; its not K-Rod necessarily but the depth of very good pitchers they have out there. confident, mature, veteran (but not over the hill) pitchers who can pitch in many different situations. Anyway, my original point is that we just need to wait to see what the final deal is. Nobody felt that Marte/Mota/Shoppach for Crisp/Bard/Riske was extraordinarly lopsided to one side or the other. one depends on potential, the other on ceiling (i.e., how good can Crisp be?). If we just have some faith that the FO will not sell away a good player for nothing then we'll be fine. Ultimately, we don't NEED a leadoff hitter/CF next year. We could get by, if Marte truly is going to be a 40 HR threat (although in this day of post steroid usage I hope 40 HR is rare) in the future. In that case then of course we shouldn't trade Marte. The FO will do their best to get a deal that is either even, understandable, or favors the sox IMO.

Fair enough plump. I understand being apprehensive about it, but its hardly the worst trade that has ever been made. Like I said earlier, if Marte is really that good the Sox can overspend on him when they're ready to be done with Manny in 3-4 years. I just don't think its that big a deal that they're choosing to get a player who is entering his prime rather than babysitting a 22 year old player who likely won't reach his potential for another 5 years.

I'm pretty sure there is a health issue. I mean, Wade Miller a few years ago would be worth Andy Marte, but this year he's not worth Kevin Millar. Injuries, time, steroids, etc., take their toll on people.

I know this post was a page or two ago, but c'mon! One Red Seat, I expect more out of you than to fall into this absurdity. I expect more out of EVERYONE on this page who truly believes that Jason Michaels can be had for a mediocre middle reliever. Give me a break. I don't need to see Michaels' stats. He's a good player. He puts up some good numbers. Everyone that is advocating the Crisp trade has looked at Michaels' numbers, and looked at them again, then Crisps' numbers, then Damon's numbers, then we've discussed Ellsbury, looked at Reed, compared Reed to Michaels, compared Michaels to Crisp, then looked at Crisp again, before looking back at Michaels and then Bobby Abreu. Everyone knows that Michaels is a good player. He's a little older, and has never started for an entire season, but he's cheap too and apparently can be had for a piece of Johnny damon's hair and Manny's spittle (plus a David Ortiz used apple core). People here need to start thinking like a GM (perhaps multiple teams' GMs) rather than as pure stat-heads. Why would people believe every rumor out there? Why would people assume that a report that says "the sox get crisp plus 2 minor leaguers" is substantially different from "the sox get crisp plus riske and bard"? yeah, they're different players but its the same basic deal. I understand people criticizing the Sox for getting rid of Andy Marte. That's fine. No big deal, I understand being frustrated with that. What I don't understand is people assuming that "we could have had Jason michaels and KEPT Andy Marte". Really? I didn't see that trade rumor anywhere. I didn't see that the Phillies were interested in clement, or Arroyo, or anyone else we have. Why not trade Tony G for Michaels and just keep the top prospect in baseball? Because other teams are not stupid, that's why. ORS, I'm not picking on you in particular. I just get frustrated reading you falling into this perspective. Have some faith that the Sox are aware of whether or not they NEED to trade the top prospect in baseball. Perhaps they know of a Marte injury. Perhaps he's overrated. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps... we just don't know. But I know of some people who do, they're called the respective teams' GMs. EDIT: Johnny damon also had a Rate under 100 until he was Crisp's age. crisp was one of the best defensive LF last year and only didn't play CF because of Sizemore. EDIT 2: If Olney is correct then I can see why the Phillies would do Michaels for Rhodes. Rhodes was CLEARLY better than Mota last year. He had a really good season. I don't like him, but I can see why they would do that. Would anyone here trade Mike Timlin for Jason Michaels? Perhaps, but I wouldn't.

Here's the deal, according to the Globe: http://www.boston.com/sports/articles/2006/01/23/source_sox_agree_to_crisp_deal/ Sox lose: Marte ( 3B ), Mota (RP) and Shoppach © Sox get: Crisp (CF), David Riske (RP), and Josh Bard © I will now go to bed happy.

That's funny stuff ksushi. I think the sox are concerned about their future. At the same time, though, they have some players who are not going to be a part of that future and who can still contribute significantly to a WS run. The papelbon, Lester, hansen, Pedroia, Ellsbury era (Marte too) would not be until probably 2 to 3 years from now. Currently we are in the Varitek, Nixon, Schilling, Wakefield, Foulke, Manny, Ortiz era. Add crisp to that list. We have a solid lineup for the next 2-3 years, and will have CONSIDERABLE financial flexibility when we get into the Paps, Lester, hansen, pedroia, Ellsbury era to buy a guy like, say, Andy Marte if our heart is set on it. We can offer Marte 12 million a year in a few years if we need to. We could buy Miguel Cabrera, or Willis or whomever we want. In either case, the sox will be good this year. They will be good next year. They still have a great future and will be flexible when that future is here. They will be able to sign Ortiz to a long term deal, and find the players necessary to build another competitive team when it is needed.

Are these guys low-level prospects? Low-level to me means either AA or below, probably below. there are a few guys I would happily take from AA or below from the Sox team, that's for sure. If the sox get an Ellsbury or Bowden equivalent then I'm happy.

Yeah, except he did it twice and had 20 more doubles the second season. If anything ESPN will say that Crisp is bound to remain a good outfielder for years to come, given that he had 2 nearly .800 OPS seasons in his early/mid 20's. That's about what Johnny Damon did in his seasons between the ages of 24 and 25. One season he was below .800, the next above it. If the Sox could trade Marte for 3 seasons of mid 20's Johnny damon at a VERY reasonable price I'd do it. Not if this team were starting from scratch, but if that player is being added to an already solid team. Coco Crisp in CF has a better Rate than Damon did at his age in CF. Give Crisp some time to play CF. Give him some time to practice and get better. Damon was an average to below average CFer until he was 26 in 2000. He was an above average RF and LF until then. Much like Crisp. Look folks, Crisp isn't the second coming of Mantle here. However, I feel a whole lot better about the 2006 and 2007 Sox than I did a few days ago.