Jayhawk Bill

Enlighten me. There were 25 on the roster: quotes from 13 would be conclusive. Thus far you've got zero, unless you've got YouTube or transcripts or links. You smug jerk. *** More to the point, no player is going to say, "We won, but we could've done it without the guys chosen by the media as ALCS MVP and WS MVP." That would be unacceptable in our professional sports community, regardless of the potential truth of the statement. I know that; you know that. If you disagree, say "Cheez, JHB, you make a good case but I've got to subjectively disagree as an informed fan." Were that it, I'd say "Cool:" in fact, we had a similar exchange this weekend. Your posts don't stop at that; they try to call me wrong without a shred of evidence except your opinion. *** Lay off. Put me on ignore--I won't bother you. You call my posts venomous; if that's within forum standards, I've got wide range to use in refuting every position you take if you persist in this flame war. ***************************************************************** Moderators: You didn't act when I reported the post where I was insulted as "venomous" by a700hitter. If there are dual standards here, if he can do that and I can't, ban me now and be done. If you want researched posts, I offer that. If you want flame wars, I really prefer that those be avoided through moderation, but I'll participate if provoked and if that's the accepted standard.

Isn't Carlos Guillen slated for first base with the acquisition of Renteria? :dunno:

Why not? :dunno: My positions are supported--can you support yours, or is it just your opinion?

Nah. You're veering from mere unfounded subjective disagreement to absurdity as the paragraph progresses. Anibal Sanchez pitched a no-hitter in 2006. While I concede differences between leagues and situations, claiming that a no-hitter caliber pitcher who was 10-3 with the hapless Marlins with a 2.83 ERA in 17 games started would be less than excellent with the Red Sox is ridiculous. I do! I celebrate that we can win a World Series despite the blunders that every MLB team makes: the Beckett-Lowell trade, the misuse of Wily Mo Pena, the squandering of Kelly Shoppach...I could go on. We can point instead to the decisions not to sign Johnny Damon or Pedro Martinez, or the gamble taken on David Ortiz, or the last-minute acquisition of Dave Roberts that resulted in one absolutely crucial stolen base that changed the karma of Red Sox Nation forever. I'm on record elsewhere in cyberspace as claiming that Theo Epstein appears to be on track to become the greatest GM in MLB history, with a record in his first few years that is unsurpassed. I still think that trading away Hanley Ramirez and Anibal Sanchez plus two other prospects for Josh Beckett and Mike Lowell was a mistake.

That was a spot start, in a double header. The FO didnt give him a starting role. Nice try though. A spot start is, by definition, a starting role. :harhar: FWIW, note the emoticon with the original answer. How many ROY-eligible AAA players have been given starting roles by this FO, if starting is defined as 1) Starting at least 10% of the team's games (16 games, rounding) as a starting pitcher or 2) Ranking first at one's position in games started as a position player? 2003: none 2004: none 2005: none 2006: none 2007: Dustin Pedroia No pitcher from MiLB has started more than 15 games for Boston these last five years, AFAIK. That 15-game starter was Jon Lester, 2006, called up as a stopgap in a season that featured 14 different Red Sox starting pitchers and allowed to keep pitching for a while when, after a rough no-decision first start (3 ER in 4.1 IP) he reeled off seven consecutive outstanding starts. He posted a 7.75 ERA in his last seven starts, probably due to weakness from his cancer. Excepting relief pitchers and bench players, Dustin Pedroia and, maybe, Jon Lester are the only two Red Sox players allowed to play as regular starters their rookie seasons. Five years--fourteen positions each year--seventy chances for rookies--only one or two rookies were played regularly. Neither one was a AA player. Of course, it's such a small sample that the point is moot. It's not that Boston doesn't give AA players starting roles: it's that Boston doesn't give rookies starting roles. Even closer Jonathan Papelbon only got that role because he'd proven himself in 2005 (after a mere four starts and three relief opportunities in AAA) and because the established closer, Keith Foulke, was stinking up the joint for the second consecutive year. The point is that Boston has regularly traded away its best rookies for years in return for high-priced veterans. If your point is that we can't criticize the FO for trading away the ROY because with Boston he'd be used, at best, as a bench player, I'd answer that perhaps the refusal to play rookies is an element of the mindset that I'm criticizing. The biggest part of how things were constructed was the Lowell-and-Beckett for Hanley Ramirez-and-Sanchez trade. Injuries? Yeah, they were an issue. Sure could've used Anibal Sanchez as another starting pitcher and a healthy Hanley Ramirez at shortstop. Perhaps asking if you blame Hanley's MVP-caliber play for the fact that his team couldn't compete? Check 2007 payrolls (source USA Today): New York Mets $115,231,663 Philadelphia Phillies $89,428,213 Atlanta Braves $87,290,833 Washington Nationals $37,347,500 Florida Marlins $30,507,000 Now check final standings: 89-73 Philadelphia Phillies 88-74 New York Mets 84-78 Atlanta Braves 73-89 Washington Nationals 71-91 Florida Marlins I applaud Josh Beckett's ability to win four games with only 34 runs in support of his efforts. I applaud Mike Lowell's getting six hits in the World Series sweep when his regular-season efforts suggested that he might only have gotten five and when an average MLB player might only have gotten four. I think, though, that average MLB players might've done OK and that Boston might still have won the Postseason without either Lowell or Beckett. How much is the benefit of "sole negotiating rights" worth in an environment where every player knows what every other player is making and where one's performance for the employer is known so precisely? You're citing $30 million vs. $100 million--do you really believe that sole negotiating rights yield a 70% discount? I'd suggest that there's probably no evidence of any such effect. I've been looking for a study that captured such an effect for years, and I haven't found one. Josh Beckett was struggling in July 2006 when he signed his extension, and the price for free agent pitching was 30% less than it would become just four months later. I think that Theo and the FO locked in Beckett to a great deal when his value was the lowest it had been since, maybe, his 6-7 4.10 ERA rookie year. Beckett thought it a good idea to extend at that moment--maybe he knew something about his health that we didn't and still don't. But I see the great deal from signing Beckett as being good timing, not a huge hometown discount. But if you know of any comprehensive study regarding the comparative value of free agent contracts and non-free agent contracts for players beyond their arb years, I'd be eager to see it--goodness knows that I read less than half of what's written on these things. I wouldn't call speculation that the FO disagrees with me as evidence that they're "deeper thinkers." Of course, YMMV. FWIW, though, a trade is an exchange of contracts and contract rights--anything beyond that isn't included. If the FO gets negotiation rights such as they did with Schilling, it's different; certainly it's possible that there are other discussions and handshake deals to which we're not privy. As a rule, though, expecting hometown discounts shouldn't be considered part of trades...unless there's evidence I'm not aware of that you could cite.

Sure it is--I'm criticizing my own statement regarding "lineup protection." Check the context of the quote you removed. Abe Alvarez, 2004. Sanchez did spend a big chunk of 2006 in MiLB: his fairly considerable value for Florida was earned in just a fraction of the season. Hanley Ramirez had been brought up for his "cup of coffee" in late 2005. He got little playing time because Boston was trying to earn an ALDS slot in a battle that lasted until the last game of the regular season, but he was brought up for a reason: the FO were tiring of Renteria and were thinking of trading him away. Perhaps. My detractors here are attesting that there is absolutely no way that Boston would ever have won anything without Beckett and Lowell. No support. No analysis. No consideration of alternatives. Certainly no consideration for 2008-2011 or the potential alternative talent available for Beckett and Lowell's salaries. I kinda think that my analysis is a little more rigorous. Adding and subtracting WARP at least puts one in the right area for projecting wins and losses. If you want to consider actual league factors and actual park factors, go right ahead: but they're not going to change anything by orders of magnitude, and Dolphin Stadium depressed hitting by a whopping five percent 2005-2007, so that would be a big factor increasing Hanley Ramirez's potential value elsewhere. :thumbsup: There's plenty of cause to be happy. The trade concentrated value in the year 2007. If that's the sole metric one chooses as critical, hey, support Theo if things get bad in the next four years. :dunno:

If one is not allowed to use actual historical performance marks as reasonable proxies for what might've been, it becomes difficult to discuss any comparison of any trade after the fact. Hey, I think that Hanley Ramirez would've done way better batting leadoff with Youkilis, Ortiz and Manny batting behind him, playing at home in Fenway Park instead of some atrocious pitcher-friendly mosquito breeding ground. Of course, unlike my previous analysis, it's speculation without benchmark...but that seems to be better accepted than actual statistics around here sometimes.

I hadn't considered the Bronson Arroyo angle. Arroyo was probably the fourth-best starting pitcher in the NL in 2006. If you consider the absence of the Beckett trade to erase the Arroyo trade, you're looking at adding an 8.9 WARP1 season to Boston's pitching in exchange for the loss of Wily Mo Pena...and there's still more than enough money left over to sign AJ Burnett. Wells, Clement, Sanchez and Lester share one spot; the others are Schilling, Arroyo, Wakefield and Burnett. OK, the 2006 Red Sox were an 86-win team. Losing Beckett, Lowell, Wily Mo Pena and Alex Gonzalez costs about 15 wins. Adding Burnett, Arroyo, Sanchez, Hanley Ramirez, and Jeff Bailey adds about 31 wins. (Mohr or Murphy or whomever playing RF/CF at zero WARP1 for zero extra wins.) The Boston Red Sox go 102-60 in 2006, making the ALDS. Removing Arroyo and leaving Wily Mo Pena still gives Boston around 96 wins. Last year Lowell and Beckett were roughly comparable to Ramirez and Sanchez. If the salary dollars that went to Lowell and Beckett go instead to Burnett, Boston's washout 2006 becomes, potentially, a World Series year. Should be great! Of course, if Beckett hadn't extended with Boston he'd be a free agent now, so we could instead be looking at Beckett Burnett Matsuzaka Schilling Wakefield (Lester and Buchholz and Sanchez down in AAA) and Hanley Ramirez at shortstop. That's an opinion. As an aside, the Red Sox scored 34 runs in Josh Beckett's four postseason starts this year, including 10 and 7 in his two ALCS wins: it's possible that a different pitcher might've somehow eked out a win in those games. The Red Sox do not win the 2006 World Series without Hanley Ramirez. Period. That's a fact. With him, they might well have contended for one more year this decade. ***************************************************************** The ability to call up one screen, change one number from 2007 to 2006 and call up the other, plus run-denomination. It's quicker with two starting pitchers to use VORP, whereas you've got to use WARP once defense is a major factor. Lowell would look worse and Hanley Ramirez would look better if defense weren't considered. Checking WARP1, though, the difference would be greater, because the DT cards give a little more credit for Beckett's extra IP each year and because WARP1 counts Beckett's very solid hitting in 2006 (even in tiny samples, .429/.429/.857 counts a bit in one's favor). It's single-digit runs each year, but it adds up to over a win across two years. Good catch; thanks for raising the point. ***************************************************************** My purpose in bumping this thread was to point out that trades need to be evaluated over several criteria: 1) Talent gained over replacement level; 2) Years (or months) and postseasons through which that talent would be available; and 3) Payroll impact. If one discounts the extra years that Florida will get from the players it received, or if one adds contract extensions purchased at free agency value to the value received via trade, and especially if one disregards the talent that could be acquired if payrolls were lessened, then trading prospects for veterans usually looks good. Once those factors are considered, it usually looks bad. If one can negotiate in advance with a player, as Boston did with Curt Schilling, then it's still possible to reach a fair deal. Barring that, one is left hoping that the player will extend, and more and more players are avoiding extensions because the free agent market has become so lucrative. Trading away top prospects for a single year of service is a crap shoot; success in extending Beckett when his value was lowest in mid-2006 doesn't offset the initial risk accepted in making the trade for just a couple of obligated service years.

Josh Beckett's contract extension was for an AAV of $10 million a year. AJ Burnett's contract was for an AAV of $11 million a year. Now let's check VORP: Beckett: 2006 19.9 2007 58.6 Total 78.5 Burnett 2006 25.3 2007 37.5 Total 62.8 Certainly Beckett was better--sixteen runs better over two years. But Burnett came, essentially, for free (nothing but a draft pick), whereas Beckett came at a price of four prospects including cost-controlled superstar Hanley Ramirez. Burnett has been an excellent pitcher for two years, better than Beckett in 2006. "Massively overpay?" "Much less money?" Hyperbole. For a few more dollars, Boston could've had a pitcher almost as good without surrendering a young HOF candidate. You're counting not only the extension to Beckett's contract but also the chance of signing Hanley Ramirez as a free agent. Neither was part of the trade--and Boston's chance of getting Hanley Ramirez back someday is very, very slim. But regarding the last point, "Anyways, ask any GM if they would pull off a deal that would give them a pitcher that could be ace of any staff... the trigger would be pulled," we both know that it's a cost-benefit issue. One great pitcher without a remaining ballclub is useless: look at Johan Santana this year or, my favorite, Steve Carlton 1972. Look at the discussion here regarding a potential trade for Johan Santana--what is one year of the probable best pitcher in MLB worth? The future of both Jacoby Ellsbury and Clay Buchholz? No way. Thank goodness that our supply of minor league talent is limitless. :thumbdown And thank goodness that Julio Lugo was such an effective shortstop at such low cost--upon reflection, I guess that I can see why nobody misses Hanley Ramirez.

Last things first. My suspicion is that they wouldn't reveal their internal metrics, but that they already know that they lost the trade. I bet that they had no idea that Hanley Ramirez would become an MVP-level talent the very next year, and that they'd have undone the trade in a heartbeat had they known that. Yes, it is. It would be more accurate if I included discount rates for future salary obligations and considered tax ramifications, but what I'm showing you is what better Front Offices almost certainly do when considering player trades. It definitely happens. Most MLB teams don't have the resources to compete every year, and they should be working on 4-6 year cycles to bring their talent to a maximum and reach the postseason. The Twins and, especially, the Florida Marlins have done this well. If you look back I've posted that the trade could be defended through "concentration of talent." That's what I'm getting at--we're not disagreeing there. And here's where we disagree. What years are you willing to concede to the Yankees as a Red Sox fan? 2008? 2008 and 2009? See, the Red Sox are one of the few teams whose strategy is to contend every year. Some years, such as 2006, go less well than anticipated. But the goal every year is to contend for the AL East and the Wild Card. Look at all of the veteran players brought in for bit roles in 2006--had the organization been rebuilding, minor league players would have gotten all of that playing time. Boston aims to contend every year. Giving away low-priced, durable talent isn't a hallmark of this FO: despite inheriting a farm system almost bereft of talent, it looks as if Youkilis, Papelbon, Pedroia, Ellsbury and Lester will all be playing big roles for the 2008 Red Sox. That's essential for such a strategy: the core of a successful perennial contender is almost always players in their primes, and players' primes usually come before their free agency. Boston gave away more talent than it received in the trade under discussion, and it accepted a much higher annual salary obligation in doing so. For a team that wants to contend perennially, that's not a win. Even if the 2007 World Championship Trophy makes it clear that the results weren't catastrophic by any stretch (as I alluded in my first post in this thread), the trade still wasn't a win.

Well, the performance of the players involved in a trade should, IMO, be considered distinct from the performance of the GM following the trade. The Expos won the trade; Boston made an excellent potential free agent signing when they inked Pedro to a then-record deal. *** Back on topic, it took less to sign Beckett than it did to sign Pedro. Same concept applies. Had Hanley disappointed, it would have gone differently; had Lowell continued to struggle or Sanchez not struggled in 2007, fewer would disagree with my position. It's still a trade of contracts of limited duration and differing salaries. Those periods of obligation and dollars matter, as does performance.

Would you say that if Pedro had refused the extension? The extension that was the richest contract ever offered an MLB pitcher to that date? The extension was separate from the trade. You're combining the two. I agree: same exact thing. The contract extension is still separate from the trade.

Actually, FRAA is a comprehensive defensive metric, so yes. Zone rating-based stats are far less kind to Manny. I'll say it more clearly, if they intend to extend Manny, they will not pursue Miggy, thus, making the argument regarding whether Ellsbury/Bucholz should be included in the trade a moot point. Does that mean that Manny 2009 > than Miggy 2009? No, Miggy will be in his prime. It just means that we will not have them both in 2009. No dodge. Your exact previous words were, "That being said, I hope they keep Manny for a couple of more years '09 and '10. That would make the debate over Miggy Cabrera moot, so please don't bother to track down this post two years from now... " You presume that Manny is worth having in 2009. I don't. While I don't dispute that Boston can't find a role easily for Miguel Cabrera in 2009 if Manny is still with the team, I regard it as moot: Manny isn't worth having in 2009. That factors into the calculus regarding Miggy. Manny is not a positive factor from 2009 and beyond...he wasn't a big positive factor in 2007, and he's steadily declining. I'm not a big fan of Miggy, given his rapidly increasing weight, but I'm accepting that he's got future value because Manny's bat is going to be gone.

Interesting. IIRC, Pavano wasn't a free agent until after 2004, and Armas wasn't until 2005. If the retention of Pedro Martinez a month later had been kinda automatic--with nothing special regarding salary--you might have a point. But here's an article describing the contract Dan Duquette gave Pedro: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E01E7DC133CF932A25751C1A961958260&n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/People/M/Martinez,%20Pedro I agree: the trade was a loss. Pedro signed the richest contract of any MLB pitcher to that date, and the willingness to pay Pedro made the trade seem like a winner.

How much of an acceptance of lost value should we place on our trades, ORS? I understand the concept of "win-win," which could be explained through concentration of value: Boston got more talent in 2006-2007, while Florida got more talent if 2008-2011 were considered. Still, Boston lost value: if we overlook that, we're failing to assess our trades objectively. ORS, I think that 700's entry into this thread was an assertion that AJ Burnett's address was the DL, implying that I was stupid to mention him as equivalent value to Josh Beckett. If 700 were to choose his attacks more carefully, he might not be made to look so stupid himself when the facts regarding Burnett's and Beckett's two-year ERAs are posted. Willis? Dunno. Don't care. My point is that the trade for Lowell and Beckett resulted in a long-term loss of talent for Boston.

Possibly, although 50 points is a lot and a fracture is a significant factor.

We SHOULD be extremely pleased that Boston won the World Series in 2007. We shouldn't begin to believe that every trade we made leading up to the World Series was a winning trade just because we won the World Series, though.

You'll take Beckett over Burnett AND Hanley Ramirez any day of the week?

Only five fewer starts than Beckett this year...and he posted his second consecutive sub-4.00 ERA, whereas Beckett's ERA was over 5.00 last season.

False dilemma. Quoting you: "My posting style is provacative, if you hadn't already noticed. I do it to generate a lively debate, but please don't be personally insulted." You're just being yourself. My points are clear. You ventured that Boston wouldn't need Miggy if Manny were extended. I consider that a poor argument, and I consider you to be trying to dodge the fact that you tried to make such a point. See, Manny isn't a great ballplayer come 2009. Miggy might be a great hitter; Ellsbury might be a great ballplayer. All of these bear upon the Miggy-to-Boston issue...thus the relevance.

No free agent talent? AJ Burnett says "Hi."