mvp 78

Why do you believe he'd take less? His wife is starting a job in St Louis. Wouldn't he take less from St Louis if anywhere?

They didn't want to have to hand out dictionaries to fans.

When baseball insiders are saying "they are out on the top FA's and need to cut payroll to bring guys in" what are we supposed to believe? Just wait until ST for the roster to round into form? Some magical pot of money is going to appear? Henry's cold heart will melt with the snow in springtime?

My wife asked me today if I wanted to go to Ft Myers. I said no. The vibes are bad. I'll go see them at an away game that is 2 hours closer instead.

Throwing the baby out with the bath water would be dumping the entire farm to make a run at a short window. I don't think they are going that direction. There's still a long term focus.

We are in the stage of the movie where the groundhog is driving the truck.

If Dermody was good at baseball, he might have been given a pass.

Credit to Bloom, last year he basically said (paraphrased) "if you want to get the ovations on the stage at winter weekend after a World Series, you need to receive the boos when you aren't going a good job too. It's holding yourself accountable to the fans." Right now, the owners are not accountable.

Sox haven't cleared enough payroll to be buyers!

He gone.

Got it.

Suspended. Suspended. Not suspended.

Those are his boys. He would never. Raquel is the team mom. Can't let her go!

He wasn't suspended. Urias was suspended for 20 days the first time it came up with him.

Snell only pitching in the 7th inning 3 times last season. He's just really overrated IMO.

He's not a top of the rotation guy, but Clevinger pushes Houck to the bullpen for sure. He had 10 QS last year and a 3.40 ERA if you ignore his very last start. Aside from 3 bad starts, he had a strong 2023.

2/37

The problem is that frustration is so high right now, building up around the park won’t matter if no one is coming to games anymore. I think Henry firmly believes spending around $225 million for payroll should be enough to field a competitive team. It sounds more and more like he didn’t think Bloom made the right moves with the money he was allotted to spend. Whether that’s fair or not is another discussion. Breslow seems to be entering a similar paradox of finding the best talent for a set payroll. There are successful teams with lower payrolls, but the best players require top money and the best players help win games more often than not. I’m sure Henry looks at the likes of the Mets and Padres of last year as spending exorbitantly and not winning, so that likely further validates his view trying to win within a set payroll window. This coupled with his love affair with Billy Beane's early 2000 A's is why the Sox are where they are right now. Without a strong voice like Larry pushing Henry to spend, he's just going to say "oh, we should be winning on less money. Look at how my hedge funds did. Look at how Billy Beane did with no name undervalued guys." The problem with his logic is that Beane never won a WS and the most recent WS champion just went full throttle the past two years. Henry is obsessed with the undervalued asset gimmick and that is very hard to pull off when half of the league is trying to do the exact same thing.

This team typically went over the CBT or used up as much as it could. Under Bloom, it left extra money on the table in '23 for no reason. In '22, it went over the CBT because Bloom dithered at the deadline and couldn't get back under causing their QO rewards to be diminished. This has been widely recognized. They mismanage the "cap" and they are further under it than in recent history and will be going forward according to reports.

@GlenielGarcia2 On a Spanish interview Jorge Soler smiled and confirmed that the Red Sox have been in contact and that Miami has not reached out to him.

Terrible post, moon! Get it together man!

Anyone good with money doesn't own a boat.

@kileymcd IF Michael Chavis has agreed to a minor league deal with the Mariners, per source.

Winning a WS on a shoestring budget is Henry's Rosebud.

Agreed. Dumping one salary isn't going to affect the value of the Sox measurably. Destroying attendance though?