Dojji

If it is, good for him. Expand your portfolio by any means necessary. The fame won't last forever, use it to get yourself set up for the long haul.

I've always been amused by this kind of rush to judgment. I mean even if you're right, what does it get you? Can you do anything about it? Settle down and enjoy the ride. The regular season matters now in a way it hasn't in awhile, that's no excuse to treat games 1, 2 and 3 of the regular season like they were games 1, 2 and 3 of the ALCS.

Swihart and Bradley may wind up outproducing what Beltre would have already given us, but even with Bradley's really first few games that's by no means a given. Throw in the fact that these were playoff seasons where we were frequently hurting at one or another corner infield position due to injury, and the fact that the Gonzalez trade (which trade, in the making, was probably the biggest reason we didn't extend Beltre) turned out horrendously for us in a number of respects, and what you have is, not quite a booby prize, but something I'd describe as a very nice silver lining.

Well we already have 2, Ells and Vic, so I suppose we could just suffer through having an outfield of 3 centerfielders.

Rask needed that very badly. Good show, even if it was "only" against the Devils.

Pedro Martinez needed to go to the National League when he did. Lowballing him was one of Theo's moves that he got right. Pedro would not have been his old self for us. His last year of vintage Pedro was 2003 and the writing, as they say, was clearly on the wall for a smallish pitcher who'd started to decline. The move to let Pedro move on only looked bad in 05 and we weren't going anywhere in 05 anyway.

If I had to center that line with one of Kelly and Peverley, I'd pick the guy who can handle the puck. Soderberg ain't a bad playmaker, but he can't be a line's primary playmaker until proven otherwise. Given the choice of who to sit, Kelly or Peverley, I choose Thornton. Also I don't separate Lucic and Krejci. I'd rather move Horton down, even though he's looked much better. Lucic is an underrated playmaker along with everything else he does right. He makes Krejci better at least as much as the other way round Lucic-Krejci-Jagr Marchand-Bergeron-Soderberg* Peverley-Seguin-Horton* Paille-Kellly-Campbell We turn into a softer, more finesse driven team, more of a pure checking team and less of a checking/bruising hybrid, but with these players I think we can pull that off. *I might catch some **** for this one, but I think it might be the best way to make sure Soderberg actually comes over, while giving Seguin a chance to center a real scoring line in a pretty low pressure environment. That would be 2 players we used on the first line last year, on our third so no one could complain we didn't let Seguin center some offensive talent. It could be argued to put Pevs with Marchy and Bergy and Soderberg with Seguin, but ultimately that's a good problem to have. The other way to accomplish the same thing may be to let Seguin center the Bromance and put Krejci between Soderberg and Jagr.

Kind of a surprise. Mentally I had Jagr on Krejci's line written in pen. I guess Claude figures that now that that top line is finally clicking, there's no way you mess with it, and the second line needs reinforcements at the moment. So MVP what do you do if Soderberg and Kelly join this merry band of fools? How do you line things up?

So Jaromir Jagr and Wade Redden are what Chia felt we need ed to compete, and we still have our top prospects. There's also confirmation that Chiarelli is gunning hard after Carl Soderberg and dangling an open starting spot for him if he comes right over from Sweden after his team is eliminated from the SEL playoffs. Combine that with Jagr, and that could represent a very serious upgrade in the talent level at forward. Redden isn't an awful idea either. I'd have liked a top guy who he isn't, but if the price was too high he'll do as a poor man's substitute. Lines if we get Soderberg could be very interesting. I can't see them not skating Jagr with Krejci and that creates an interesting three line situation going forward Lucic-Krejci-Jagr Marchand-Bergeron-Peverley Soderberg-Seguin-Horton That-Fourth-Line Kelly could easily be our 13th forward when he comes back If not, pick which of Kelly and Paille you'd rather have playing on Seguin's left and alternate between the other one and Shawn Thornton.

There's that too. We know Drew can hit big league pitching over a full season, if he can get back to that level of health.

Yep. And if Drew produces, there's no reason Iggy can't wait. If we're pushing for the playoffs with Drew doing well at SS, I think hard about extending him too. Our options are wide open right now, and a shortstop of Drew's talent is hard to find. Let's not repeat the mistake we made with Adrian Beltre (even though I was all for it at the time) Still it's real, real nice to see Iggy make the adjustments he needs to make to make it a hard decision. Nice problem to have really. especially because Ciriaco would be a starter at either short or second on a lot of teams right now as well.

It's never all about play the money. That said, they're not going to sink $9M in Drew and not even find out what he is. When he's ready to go I expect him to start, but longer term the job is Iglesias' to earn.

I want to see him slump and then break out of it. That was the mistake we all made with Nava. He looked like the second coming, but once he fell into a slump he couldn't pull himself out. If he can break himself out of slumps and manage to readjust and start collecting hits again, then I'll believe in the new bat of Jose Iglesias.

LOB is something that happens when your team gets on base. I believe we had a very high raw numbers of LOB both 04 and 07. I'm not saying it's nothing to worry about, but it's as much a sign that the players did something right, as it is that they did something wrong. It comes with good and bad points. OBP is about giving yourself lots of chances to score. Not about putting everyone who gets on base across the plate. Since we're down on power compared to the usual, we're going to see some LOBs. It's just the way we're built. The hope is that we give enough chances to ourselves to score, that eventually something comes through by sheer law of probability.

But far from impossible. A lot of guys with similar skillsets managed to pull it off But it did take years, not months or weeks. If he does figure it out, it's going to take a lot of at bats in all likelihood. Thousands possibly. And that means he's going to have to figure out how to keep a very offensive-minded fanbase off his back long enough to get those at bats. That's a tall trick.

Two straight starts for Kudo, two Boston wins. Tuukka better watch his tailfeathers. As I mentioned earlier, I'm keeping a close eye on Kudo, mostly because of guys like Mike Smith and Brian Elliott (and a few years ago, Ilya Bryzgalov). In a defensive system, you don't need a superb highest caliber goalie, and there's an argument to be made that overpaying for one at the cost of forward or defense cap space is penny wise and pound foolish. Kudo is not as talented a goaltender as Tuukka, but he's shown some skill. If he can be 80% of Tuukka for 40% of the cap, you have to start pondering the cost benefit analysis in a serious kind of way.

True, but a lot of the best hand-eye guys figured it out eventually, at least to the point that they weren't total black holes anymore. Ozzie Smith started out as a complete waste of at bats. .573 OPS over his first four seasons. It took him a long time but he did eventually begin to put up some offensive capacity. No one would exactly mistake him for Joe DiMaggio, or even Dom DiMaggio, at the plate, but he got himself on base at least. Omar Vizquel had a similar trajectory. Heck, of the guys you cited, Mark Belanger by year 3 was working the count and taking his base. Couldn't hit for consistent average but he was at least making the pitcher work, which considering the team he played for and the fact that Earl Weaver was ahead of his time in that era, served him pretty well. As for Maxvill, he didn't figure it out if the numbers are any guide -- but his playing time seems to have eventually suffered so I wonder if there's something else going on there. I guess what I'm saying here is that I don't see any real reason not to expect Iggy to at least pick it up a bit and get himself consistently in to the .320/.330 OBP range. He does that, makes some solid plays, I'm fine with him

It's a win. A win in which both of the two biggest risks this franchise is taking at the moment had a real chance to shine. I was impressed by both Bradley and Iglesias, and the effort and hustle out of a lot of our players shows that the team was willing to come out swinging on Opening Day. Not something to take for granted, and a very good sign. Don't forget that Gomes doesn't score if Ellsbury doesn't bust it down the line before they can cover first. A lot of encouraging signs. That's all they are, but they're worth celebrating for what they are nonetheless.

Fantastic first day. Almost Alex Cora like.

For a backup, why is it that Kudo seems to be the guy who's in net half the time for these turnaround games?

With the OD roster released, this would be as good a time as any to close the thread. That's it for spring training folks. Be interesting to compare the OD roster to the roster on the last day of the season. With so many short to medium term contracts and some young players knocking on the door, I wouldn't be totally surprised to see less than 15 of these people still here. Personally I like this roster. I'd like a lot more top line strength in the rotation but the men we have should be able to give us innings at the last. Buchholz and Doubront are going to have a huge say in where this season goes. I count on Lester to be solid, or at least durable, but if those two can keep us in games and go 6 or 7 then this could be a very good year. They have the talent, but neither has really shown they can take that next step yet and show that talent consistently for 200 innings. If they can, that'll be huge for us. They'll have better defense behind them than we've had in years so that ought to really help. I'd give up a lot for a starting catcher who can get it done on the defensive side. Even if Salty improves all the way to somewhat adequate defensively, I'd rather have a guy who can help this pitching staff and still hit his weight in the lineup while playing every day and Ross isn't that guy. Has the skill, but not the durability. Here's hoping Christian Vazquez hits his stride in AA and starts to make himself a real option. Oh, and I do still suspect that Pedro Ciriaco is going to finish the season somewhere else. Jose Iglesias is either going to prove that he's a starting SS, or that he isn't, this year, and either way he's probably going to be on the big league roster for extended periods, either as the starter or as a no-bat-all-glove backup, which can be seriously useful in their own right.. With the money sunk into Drew, and some prospects available to handle UT duties down the road such as Holt, Ciriaco is the least necessary piece of the infield puzzle.

Ehhhh. The numbers Nava put up are decent enough that I always thought he was going to be given a long look for a reserve role. A "favorite?" Maybe not, but a guy who can get his scrawny little keister on base and play decent corner OF has his uses. I wouldn't be surprised if Napoli needs to wind up DHing a bit this year. First base is a definite issue.

If he isn't, it won't be because of Mauro Gomez. We need to worry about the 1B position going forward. There just isn't much out there inside or outside the org over the next few years. Someone's pipe dream of Middlebrooks at 1B and Bogaerts at third is starting to look reasonable.

Mauro Gomez is a wiser cut than Nava. While Nava isn't great, he has a 2 year track record in the big leagues of hitting at least well enough to be useful as a reserve, which is what you want deep in the 40-man. Or to put it another way, of the two, Nava and Gomez, Nava is the one I can see making someone else's big league roster a few months from now if we cut him. He's not the archetypal COF, but the archetypal COF has been so hard to find lately that there's room for a guy like him in some bottom feeder's lineup. If we're talking trade though, we could be talking Ciriaco. Unlike Nava or Gomez or the other schlubs we could cut, Ciriaco could fetch us a return, and I suspect we have the depth to part with him. If they want Iglesias in the big leagues at all costs, Ciriaco is expandable. If they plan on sending Iglesias down when Drew comes back, then we might see Nava or Gomez be the casualty. I must say, it's not a bad problem to have, having guys with at least some big league utility at the bottom of the 40 man.

There is no rule. A player will sign a 1 year deal if it looks to be in their best interest, they'll sign a multiyear deal on the same terms. A short term deal for a player in his early 30's is a gamble that the player sometimes wins, if it sets them up to make the big money until near retirement age. Beltre's deal is an archetype of this. It sometimes backfires, but if a player is confident he can put up a great year it frequently doesn't. The gamble works if the 1 year deal is fairly remunerative, and fetches the player an extension worth more at the end years than the contract he would have signed this offseason would make him over the same years. Beltre's situation is a classic example of this. I suspect Shaun Marcum is thinking along similar lines this year. Heck, CC Sabathia's opt out years served a similar role, wrenching an renegotiated out of NYY halfway into the extension he signed.