ORS

BSG hits the nail squarely on the head once again.

Why come to this site to discuss this team if you know absolutely nothing about it, or the game of baseball, as it seems you don't? Lowell won the NL GG at 3b last year, I think he'll be able to fill Mueller's shoes in the field. Look, we all know why you came. Your username and first post make that very evident. Now it is time for you to move on, because the longer you stay, the more you expose the fact that you are a serious window-licker.

That won't get it done now. A google search of: "Scott Boras" "Kevin Millwood", turns up stories of the M's offering 4/$44M before they signed Washburn, but Boras turned it down saying Millwood's a "5-year contract player". Of course, he's generally full of s*** concerning offers on the table. Who knows, that amount could get it done as ST approaches?

Apparently, Boras thinks the bidding should start at 5 yrs./ $55M, what AJ Burnett signed for. Stand up comedians should start feeling that their livelihood is being threatened by this guy; I know he makes me laugh out loud more often than they do.

He came back to the Yanks after the Clemens trade as a FA in 2002.

ATG13, why are those in favor of a cap guilty of a "hidden" agenda, while your desire to protect the rights of big market teams is completely virtuous? If you can accuse some of not giving two-shits about the small market teams, then they can accuse you not giving two-shits about the big market clubs and are only interested in prolonging a system that allows your team to stay on top. I've said it before, and I'll reiterate it in a modified form now. Competition in baseball exists both on and off the field. The current system provides for fair play on the field, but an unfair system in off the field management. It's only 50% fair. Reverse the roles and have it be fair off the field but unfair on. Now there is a cap but big market teams are allowed to take steroids and amphetamines, scuff and grease the ball, and the fences moved in when they were at the plate. Sound fair? That is essentially what the situation is off the field right now.

The CBA alots for the salary cap penalty funds to be distributed among the teams that have a payroll below league average. From what I can gather, this is distributed on a prorated system like I outlined in my previous post where the teams award will depend on what percentage their difference was of the total difference. The amounts that the smaller market teams will get is a pittance compared to the spending of the big market clubs. Maybe a cap isn't totally necessary, but they at least need to raise the penalty rate to 75% or so in order to make teams think long and hard about exceeding the cap.

You are kidding me, right? The Yanks and Sox combined for about $40M in cap penalties. This gets split up among the remaining teams depending on how much their payroll is below league average. Using data from usatoday.com (which I know isn't official, but is close enough to prove a point), 17 teams are below league average in payroll. The Devil Rays had the lowest payroll at $29M. The league average was $74M. The total difference from league average was $380M. The Devil Rays accounted for 11.8% of this difference, which would net them $4.74M of the penalty funds. How in the world does an extra $5M give them a chance to be more competitive?

So, it's OK for small market teams to be punished for where they play and make what they make? It's not like they have a choice about what city they call home. MLB has to approve any move, and they won't allow 8 NY teams, 3 Boston teams, 5 Chicago teams....you get the point.

I lurk over at SoSH (I think fees and applications are a little pompous), and one of the members, Eric Van, works in the Sox FO. He updates a draft compensation thread whenever signings that affect the draft occur. You can get a viewer membership for free, you just can't access certain parts of the board or post messages.

No, they don't. But scouting reports have Shoppach catching a good game, a quick throw to second, and a good athletic build for the position. I don't understand why you want either of the complete wastes at the plate instead of Kelly, nor why you say Shoppach won't "manage" based on his grand total of 29 innings caught.

They got the #28 pick, the Yankees original 1st round slot, for Damon. The Yankees got the #21 from Philadelphia. Both got sandwich picks.

Here's why. I think part of the beauty of the game is that it isn't just competitive on the field. There is competition among the FOs to scout better, develop better, coach better, and manage their rosters better. Without a cap, certain teams can cover a weakness they may have in one of these categories by merely offering a little more money. With a cap, the process of valuing players will become much more important for teams that need to do this. If there is ceiling on spending, then I think it must be accompanied by a floor as well. I'd have to look really hard at the numbers to give a very confident answer as to what these numbers would be for the 40-man roster. But a quick estimate would be a floor around $60M and a ceiling around $100M. I think that leaves enough room for some of the smaller market teams to stay at reasonable spending levels while giving the bigger market teams enough flexibility to field a good team for their larger fan bases. Of course, these numbers would go up with inflation, or COLA.

Whose AAA number's look better? Age.....AB.....HR.....OPS Player #1 24.......399......22......781 25.......371......26......859 Player #2 24.......278......1.......758 25.......286......3.......695 Player #3 24.......104......0.......463 25.......365......6.......700

You recently asked the same question in another thread, and I posted a link to a Boston Globe article with the details. I don't remember the thread.

Interesting you say this. The folks over at Baseball Prospectus did indeed write a book about this called "Mind Game". They pretty clearly state that the 2004 Red Sox were perfectly engineered to win one championship, but that the team wasn't composed of the right combination of young, veteran, and superstar talent necessary to go on an extended run. The problem lay in the fact that all the major contributors were close to free-agency and that it would be close to impossible for the Sox to match every offer they got on the market. I'm of the opinion that they probably know more about the subject than a star-gazer on a rant.

Good point, he hasn't spent much time on the DL in his career. My concern centers more around his go-for-broke style of play, combined with advancing age. Yes, Beckett is an injury risk. But, the Sox have two years at arbitration prices to find out if the risk is enough to cause serious concern, while the Yankees have four years at $13M ($18.2M with cap penalty) to see if Damon's body and level of performance can hold up.

This signing makes absolutely no sense, IMO. I think Shoppach deserves a shot and is worth more to the team on the roster than in the trade market. Huckaby signed to a MiLB contract made sense because he could be injury insurance in case either of the 25-man Cs got hurt. At least it isn't going to cost much.

Try watching the Royals at the D-Rays next year. Yes, it can be done inexpensively, but you have to scout and develop better than other teams, and it has a high attrition rate when all the good players depart for big-money contracts. You claim that you aren't in favor of a cap just because you are a Yankee fan, yet your first complaint was that it would weaken your team. Not very convincing if you ask me.

I love how you, without fail, put words into my mouth..... link link I think my opinion pre-Damon signing is fairly consistent. Looking that up took me all of 10 minutes, which wouldn't have been a terribly large investment of your time in order to avoid looking like an idiot. Here's my advice, why don't you try actually researching something instead of pulling something out of your ass when you don't really know the answer.

I suppose this is an attempt at tongue-in-cheek humor, and a pretty bad one at that. FWIW, the Sox get two draft picks from this, and more importantly, they aren't saddled with a 34+ year old declining CF, which is very likely to happen, in two years. Also, the Sox are the first team to pick 4 times in June's draft, and after the Sox make their 5th pick in the 2nd round, the Yankees will be making their 3rd.

Now this is truly funny. Do you honestly think that Toronto's 9/10 home games against the Yankees each year will fill more seats than if the Jays were a competitive team for all 81 games? The case becomes even more unlikely when considering non-division opponents, since there are only 3/6 home games against each of the big-market clubs. This is a time tested truth, winners fill the seats.

Amazingly, there is always a bigger offer from an undisclosed team for Boras's clients. Strangely, they never get signed by this "mystery" team. Wonder why that is?

You would. I'm sure that any age-based statistical analysis that suggests the tail-end of Damon's contract may be burdensome for the Yanks doesn't sit well with you. But at least there is some analysis to support our claims, unlike the reporter's comment that is easily discarded by taking 2 minutes to actually look up the data relevant to his claim.

Reed lead all MLB CFs in Zone Rating, converting 94.3% of all balls hit into his zone into outs. This sounds like spin to me. When a player is rumored to be leaving, some media types feel they need to justify the deal to the fans.