Paradisecity

Contracts are usually an optimist's "what have you done for me lately"in that if you had a great year the postseason doesn't matter that much, and if you had a great postseason, the year doesn't matter as much. With a s***** year and a s***** postseason, the HIGH end on tek will be 7. I am guessing 5 per.

I'm not expecting a discount. I'm expecting him to be in a sox uni next year, because it makes financial sense for both the team he plays for and for him.

And dont forget to eliminate every team unwilling to spend 4-8 per on a gamble/potential backup catcher. The list of suitors is....

Pedro and Lowe are pitchers, and fall into a completely different conversation since each team has 5 of them starting and droves of them waiting to pitch. How many teams need a catcher who provides great leadership and hits .220? Look around the league and notice that most teams have their guy already. Notice further that his value is much like that of an employee with retained knowledge. He's worth much less on the open market.

He's gonna wanna lot of money- That is great. But who on earth will find him valuable enough to give it to him? Are there suitors lining up for him?

Regardless of how we feel about his performance, Tek will be back in some capacity. His value, far and away, is highest to the sox.

I respectfully disagree. Lowell is getting old and he's on the decline, IMO. I know Ortiz is hurt, but I feel similarly about him. I also feel he is upset about the Manny thing and may not get over it with management- him wearing that shirt the other night speaks volumes. The decline of these two leaves us a very powerless lineup. We need another solid bat that can play 1st/3rd/DH, IMO. I feel thatnot upgrading the heart of our order will leave us pretty impotent.

162 game averages per ESPN: YEARS G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS 1.1 162 610 107 178 26 7 11 59 45 86 54 10 .293 .346 .413 .759 YEARS G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS 2.28 162 588 92 163 33 2 17 75 83 164 36 12 .277 .367 .426 .793 I wouldn't say miles and miles.

What does a manager do in innings 1-6? Mike and Tito are very different. Mike wouldnt do well in Boston, but does better than Tito would with the Angels. One manages games, one manages people. They each have their benefits and drawbacks.

I really don't think (until this year) that he was blessed with very much talent. One very good pitcher, One great hitter, one very good closer, and a decent pen. I mean, Garret Anderson was Vlad's protection. who else all those years. Erstad?

I ain't buying You COULD argue that Pedroia is more valuable because of the expected v received of a 3B and 2B ( what I mean is that Pedroia exceeds the 2B mold more than Longoria the 3B power mold). Still, I ain't buying

Don't forget that he also doesn't end relief pitching careers. I wonder what Joe Torre's legacy would be without Mariano Rivera?

It seems like a pretty stupid move by the Padres. This is an offseason deep in free agent pitching, and Peavy is signed for 5 more years. They'd be better off getting some innings out of him and waiting for a year (or midyear) that has a dearth of pitchers and multiple teams looking for a thrower.

The magnitude of this game makes it "greater", but I remember watching the tail end of Cleveland's 12 run comeback from the 7th on against that record setting Seattle team in 01.

Nice Haiku. To paraphrase one from a Neyer chat last year: Kotsay rounding third Here's Gross's throw to the plate Bounce bounce bounce bounce bounce

I'm going to change my screen name to Crow so Gom can eat me.

Mojo

I agree. The Ortiz/Lowell diminished time with Youk splitting 1st 3rd and Tex splitting 1st DH for a year seems like a pretty good (but unlikely) situation...

Red Sox banking on history repeating itself BOSTON -- Yes, the Red Sox have been in this situation before. Last year, they trailed Cleveland 3-1 in the ALCS before winning the final three games and then sweeping the World Series. In 2004, they trailed 3-0 before staging the comeback that will never be forgotten (in part because Boston fans will never stop talking about it). And if you can go back to 1986, the Red Sox trailed the Angels 3-1 before Dave Henderson entered New England folklore. But as your broker really should have pointed out more strenuously, past performance is no guarantee of future results. "That experience, I guess, can give you kind of a feel for what you're supposed to do," Coco Crisp said of last October's comeback. "And, I guess, at the same time, it was last year. We're not playing Cleveland now. This is a much different team we're playing." So, too, are the Red Sox a different team. David Ortiz wore a telling black T-shirt after Boston's 13-4 Game 4 spanking. In the same style of the "Got Milk?'' advertisements, the shirt asked: "Got Manny?" Boston most certainly does not got Manny this October, and while Kevin Youkilis and Jason Bay have hit well, his absence is as conspicuous from the lineup as it is from the clubhouse. In other words, no one was saying, "If we lose the next game, who cares -- it's not the end of the world" as Manny did before the Sox rallied against Cleveland in last year's ALCS. Instead, Ortiz was telling reporters: Hey, don't blame me for everything. A bunch of my teammates have sucked, too. "The problem is that everyone is focusing on Papi not hitting, and to tell you the truth, both of the series, with Anaheim and now with the Rays, Papi doesn't come to hit with men on base all the time," Ortiz said. "I may come to hit four or five times the whole series with men on. That's not going to change the game when they have a lead of nine, 10 runs, whatever it is. What we have to focus on right now is stopping their offense and make things happen like in the first game." Actually, Ortiz has batted seven times with runners on base this series and has failed to drive in any of them. He also was hitless in his previous 14 postseason at-bats before he broke the string with a meaningless triple in the seventh inning. But his point was well-taken, even if it was a slight slap at his teammates. Ortiz is struggling big-time -- he isn't denying anymore that his wrist is bothering him -- but the Red Sox are losing for a lot of other reasons as well. Aside from Daisuke Matsuzaka's Game 1 performance, the starting pitching has been atrocious. Josh Beckett allowed eight runs in Game 2, Jon Lester allowed five runs in Game 3 and Tim Wakefield, pitching on 16 days' rest, allowed five runs on three massive home runs in less than three innings in Game 4. The Red Sox found themselves trailing 5-1 after three innings and 11-1 after six. That kind of pitching would be difficult to overcome even if the Red Sox were hitting, which they aren't. Manager Terry Francona subbed Crisp for the hitless Jacoby Ellsbury and batted J.D. Drew at the top of the order, but it didn't do any good. Neither player had a hit -- Boston leadoff hitters are 0-for-19 this series -- and Crisp also grounded into an inning-ending double play in the second when the game was still relatively close. Boston rallied against Cleveland, but unlike last year, when Games 6 and 7 were at Fenway, the Red Sox will have to win two games in St. Petersburg, where the Rays had the best home record in baseball and have won nine of their 11 games with Boston this season. Ortiz said after Game 1 that when he looked in the Rays' eyes he could see they were feeling the pressure of the stakes. But the Rays aren't the ones who are bug-eyed now. "This thing is a surprise," Ortiz said. "Everyone is raking in their lineup. You watch the game and everybody is pretty much locked in. I've been in a lot of playoffs and you don't see that too often. You might see three or four guys, tops, but everybody there is hitting. It's crazy." Asked whether he was healthy, Ortiz said unconvincingly, "I'm all right. I'm dealing with my hands and stuff. But I'm in a situation where I don't want to put too many things in my head." Thanks to baseball's insane postseason scheduling, Boston gets a needed day off Wednesday to rest Ortiz and its tired bullpen. It also gives the Sox a chance to recover from having their heads beaten in the past two games. They will send Dice-K to the mound and hope he can begin another comeback. Asked what last year taught him about their current situation, reliever Mike Timlin replied, "Take tomorrow off and come back the next day -- and come back firing. These things aren't just handed to you; you have to earn them. This is where you earn your reputation. "History repeats itself -- that's what I've heard. So we'll go with that." WTF???

This could be the dumbest, most irrelevant point to make regarding fans not knowing their team. Wait, so I live 4 hours away and still go to games but I'm a bandwagon fan because I don't know the area codes in a city I've never lived in? I guess I need to get a Boston phone book so that I can study Red Sox history and be a real fan. I better hit up to post office for zip codes too so I can get the true Red Sox Nation experience. Moron

I am of the opposite opinion. I think the wheels of movaughnitis have been set in motion. I'd love to be wrong.

Tek and Cora back to back. This is a pitcher's dream. I can already tell- this game is going to frustrate the s*** out of me.

Sorry they don't play in a dome with cowbells...

Alex Cora, Mike Timlin. I feel like Francona is getting all Bill Belichick without the genius part. We should win today, but I also feel like it is more important to the sox to win today than it is for Tampa.

The National League has one of these championships? I thought they just voted a team into the World Series as the "people's choice"