Dojji

I could see Tek coaching young catchers -- we have a number of them that are theoretically 24 months away -- Ibarra, Lavarnway, Exposito -- and I imagine he'll do some work with Salty as well. This is a guy who wasn't the most talented catcher's catcher in the world and made it all the way to being a pillar of the franchise by being smart, well-prepared and good at handling the personalities of his pitchers. These are things that can be taught and learned.

Looks like we know who our starting catcher is for next year -- and probably for the next few. The franchise I don't think has formally committed to Salty, but he's probably going to be the guy who gets 400 at bats from the catcher's spot this year unless something goes seriously wrong. Honestly, I'm not that worried myself. Salty made a lot of progress last year and I wouldn't call him great, but he's a big league catcher if he can hold onto it. His arm improved, which used to be a huge problem for him. People still run on him too much, but he made it not cost effective for them to do so last year, throwing out 31% so I expect them to do it less next year He struggled blocking the plate, leading the league in passed balls, but he also caught Wake. With Wake out of the equation I expect that passed ball count to halve. And while he's not Tek level smart, he's not a stupid catcher either, his game calling is what I'd call a tick above average. I'll expect him to improve there with experience. Offensively, there isn't a lot not to like. Good offensive catchers are rare and wonderful things. Salty isn't good, but he is decent, .730 OPS and 16 HR's from the catcher's spot is not chopped liver. And he definitely has the raw offensive talent to do much better than that. We're counting on the kid to take strides to being a player who can really succeed where Tek left off, but even if he's pretty much the Salty of last year, that's still better than average among MLB starting catchers so I'll take it. And if he breaks out and becomes the .800 OPS 20-25 HR guy he has the ceiling to be? Look out.

I love Aceves in the role he's in. If he can reprise it he's incredible valuable. How many releivers in the game can consistently go out there and pitch 3 shutout innings when called upon? Not too freaking many. He was the ultimate long man and if he can recapture that, I don't move him to the rotation where he's maybe a 5-6 innings guy, I keep him where he is as the only truly dependable old-school throwback 3 inning releiver in baseball. With Bard transitioning from the bullpen, having an elite longman would be incredibly valuable. There's going to be times Bard barely goes 5 if that. Having Aceves pretty much piggyback Bard would make greater than zero sense for most of the early season. I give Doubront every chance to be the guy.

I think Prince Felix has a legit chance. Unfortunately he also has a chance of being Abe Alvarez, but there ya go, that's the chance you take.

The guys who were thrown under before now were sulking superstars like Manny and Nomar. This was Tito, and that's different because Tito is the exact opposite. I'm not surprised that having Tito get the treament would shake some guys who wouldn't care if Manny got what was coming to him.

Josh Beckett will be pitching for the Red Sox until his contract expires in 2014. Period. 110% chance. it would take a radically unprecedented change in the CBA to alter that. He might even be re-signed at some point. You heard it here first. People paid Roger Clemens. People paid David Wells. People paid Pedro. People paid Schill. Loud mouthed idiots who happen to be effective starting pitchers don't get moved for being loud mouthed idiots.

Agreed. This really doesn't affect Martin at all. In fact the Cards got a decent deal considering just how good Yadier is behind the plate.

Not convinced that's a big deal. When Girardi came to the Yankees there were still players there from his playing days -- Mo springs to mind almost immediately, and IIRC Jeter was in harness by the time he was done as well. Doesn't seem to have hurt them that badly.

Fact: Tek just retired Fact 2: Valentine is considered a short term solution as manager. Things that make you go "hmm.." I donno if I'd make him the manager right after Bobby V, but when Bobby V goes it'll open up a spot that could be used to make Tek the bench coach. He'd be one heck of a bench coach right now.

I'm very concerned. It's just that I'm not sure what could have been done that wasn't at least tried.

It didn't end pretty, but much respect for 'Tek.

So it looks like Zannon for Kampfer, a 7th D that Claude won't use in regular games for one he might works, although you hate to lose Kampfer's potential. Pretty much nothiung for Rolston and Mattau, which means that we gave up nothing for nothing. I doubt either of those guys factors in much for us.

Looks like Cherrington isn't the only one that goes round back and checks the dumpster now and again. Mattau, Rolston and Zannon are not Kelly and Peverley. What the heck Chia. Well I suppose Zannon's decent.

To break camp? There have been times when Plan A has failed and a rotation spot opened, like it did for Masterson when Schilling was never able to pitch in 2008, but unless Wakefield is a retread or a minor leaguer the last time they had a spot actually open for competition out of camp was 2007, and that was because of Lester's cancer. Even in 06 they had a solid plan, it just failed in every concievable way.

Well duh. There's a time and a place for PR moves.

They had Papi and VMart was done as a catcher. That was a big part of why I didn't like the trade.

I did, at the time. I saw him as a future starter -- maybe not top end, but a 3.9-4.2 200 innings guy, I saw that coming, and didn't want it traded for an aging catcher with maybe 1 good year in him. The problem being I was militantly indifferent to this offseason. I wasn't going to defend the FO, and if I posted here, I would have been roped into defending the FO. Besides, I saw going in that the odds were that this wouldn't be an active offseason to begin with. The only big shock was Papelbon not re-signing and they handled the aftermath too well for me to complain that much. I was also disillusioned for months after Tito's firing (thus the avatar) because he was one of the best managers this long and storied franchise has ever had. It's still going to take me awhile to get fully reinvested in the team. They broke my heart over and over again in the last few months.

Performance. Which isn't just stats. He was showing very good poise and intangibles too, and his stuff wasn't quite Lesterish, but was big league. Different kind of pitcher from Lester so a striaight up comparison is foolish anyway. So calling it just "stats" is a bit inaccurate. He didn't have the potential to improve that Lester obviously had, and ultimately his performance would always be limited by his command, but he was getting the job done and you saw an ability in him that suggests to me that he could have continued it at least to the point of being in the bottom of someone's rotation. Pauley never had that multiple start stretch that Gabbard managed twice where he was taking the ball, getting into or through the 6th, and getting wins. Comparing Gabbard to Pauley made sense before he started pitching in Boston, but end of 2006 and through the deadline in 07, Gabbard had Pauley beat by a fair margin. Seattle subsequently evened the score quite a bit, but that's Seattle, anyone and their fish can pitch in Seattle. No, nothing really wrong with it. It was the right move if you were sold on Lester and didn't think any Red Sox starter would ever get hurt again for as long as Gabbard had options left. So yeah, it was fine.

Masterson springs to mind pretty quickly. One of my all-time favorites. Boston kept trying to shoehorn him into a relief role. Definitely rather have him than Lackey right now.