SoxSport

It would be a mistake for the Yankees to sign Hunter. They need to get younger. Somebody is going to get Hamilton. He should be the target for the Red Sox. They can afford to pay him $30 mil ----more than the Yankees can--at this point. Signing Hamilton would bring some excitement to Boston.

With Ross going to FA, they need another RHd bat. Maybe it will be Sands. They should give him a shot at 1B. Watch for some bold action signing Hamilton. Either the Red Sox or the Yankees. The Sox really need Hamilton, and are positioned to offer him $30 million. Maybe more so than NY.

Asking Ben to swoop is like asking a turtle to fly.

They ought to bring Bogaerts into ST and give him a shot at SS. See what he can do. This team no longer has the luxury of letting prospects develop slowly. Middlebrooks had a partial year in AAA and was ready.

Papi gets his money. An easy deal for the FO. Now the real work starts. I hear Ross is going to free agency. Maybe that signals a run at Hamilton. You know damn well the Yankees will be in on Hamilton. It's a no brainer in Yankee Stadium.

I heard on twitter no deal with the Cubs.

Players get hot in the playoffs. Players get cold in the playoffs. Sometimes it rains in the playoffs. Scutaro got hot--just like he did last September in Boston. Trading him is still one of the better deals the FO made last year. They saved $5 million, and he wasn't really a SS anymore anyways. He played 2B for the Rockies and the Giants. Aviles played adequate SS last year, and cost much less. Scutaro was a better OB guy, but cost cutting was their priority at the time. The Sox collapse last year had nothing to do with SS. It was about management dysfunction, poor coaching, turf wars, and very bad pitching.

I agree Farrell should have his own people on the coaching staff. Lucchino-Henry have surely learned their lesson on that after last years' disaster. It's incredible they would pay a manager $5million for two years, and give him coaches with more loyalty to the FO which opposed him. That's the core of their dysfunction last year. Of course, it helps that Farrell is the FO choice, as well as Lucchino-Henry's. Peterson was probably the guy they needed last year. This year, it depends on whether he's Farrell's choice. Farrell was/is also a pitching coach, and his pitching coach will have to be on the same page.

What they need is an ace in that rotation. A stopper. I don't know if there are any available. Maybe Lincecum if Ellsbury is enough to get him. The most promising in the organization is Ruby DeLaRosa--but he's a year or two away from being an ace at best. Hopefully, he gets a chance to stick in ST. The days when prospects stagnated in AAA because of age and money on the roster are over.

We'll see what Cherington does. The ball is in his court--unless Henry wants to play GM again. He has a lot on his plate, and I expect a fair amount of money to spend. Let's see if he can do a better job than his former boss, Epstein.

You can bet Lovullo will do what the manager Farrell tells him to do--not what the GM Cherington tells him. Unlike the previous bench coach, Bogar.

http://espn.go.com/boston/mlb/story/_/id/8548128/tim-bogar-responds-bobby-valentine-criticism-boston-red-sox-coaches Bogar says in this Edes' article that, as bench manager, he did what "Ben told me to do." Not what the manager told him to do, mind you, but what the GM told him to do. Can you imagine LaRussa or Leyland having a bench coach that bypassed them? Even Farrell had his bench coach in Lovullo.A sign of organizational dysfunction, and a clue about the source of Valentine's obvious frustrations. Of course, Bobby's a damn fool for mouthing off to the media about his players (make that the FO's players).Maybe he really wanted to mouth off about his coaches and upper management, but that is taboo in any organization. You never criticize the people above you--only the ones below you. I guess the Red Sox way of dealing with the dysfunction is to hire an insider like Farrell, and have him bring in his own coaches. Makes sense in lieu of firing everybody south of Lucchino.Farrell will do OK because he has the ear of the front office. Life is simple.

Lovullo is a guy who worked for Farrell in Toronto, and managed in Pawtucket. Looks like a good fit. The coaches have to be the manager's choices. Hopefully, Lucchino & co have learned their lesson on that. Maybe Valentine's big mouth was just a reflection of his frustration at having to work in a vacuum. Everybody's villifying this guy right now, but I think he is showing some underlying bitterness in his criticism of Ortiz, and there may be more to follow. This guy was thrown under a bus by Lucchino. Papi got his money, which I suspect was his original motivation to sit. He's got plantar fascitis, and that can linger for 6-12 months. I know--have it myself right now--and run on it with orthotics. Papi might still have some soreness next spring, but this time he'll play with it.

So Papi gets his money--and his two years. Looks like his strategy worked. Don't risk further injury. Sit, and collect paychecks. The question is whether he'll stay in shape and hit next year. Are there safeguards in the contract? Right now, the media is livid for Valentine suggesting Ortiz "quit". He didn't say that in the interview. He said he thought he decided the season wasn't worth playing after the Dodger deal. I say he was thinking about next years' contract, and the risk of further injury. Valentine is an experienced manager with some success--more than Farrell--before he came to Boston. What he encountered in spring training goes to the heart, maybe, of the real problems on the Red Sox--too many years of laissez faire softness with a soft manager and bench coach--after Mills. The players were running the show. That's not Bobby. The guy was doomed to failure on this team. But it was worth it for him--he's $5 million richer.

I don't know much about the Jays, or how Farrell managed up there last year. I do know he mentioned the word aggressive, when asked to characterize his style of play. That would be a welcome change on this team. They haven't been aggressive since the dirt dog days. My guess is Farrell will get what he wants this year from the FO. Why? Because, this year, it's the FO that's on the hot seat. At least with the media. Ben & Co got a free ride last year with Bobby's mouth being a convenient deflector. I see Ben has a new addition to his GM title: "executive VP". Looks like a promotion from daddy Henry. I hope he can live up to it. Henry's future as owner may depend on it.

Ortiz behavior during the season was not exactly team-first--to put it mildly. He gets a lot of stroking because Henry likes him--and he has had some memorable seasons in Boston. But he also had a couple of bummer years recently before he got in shape and bounced back. But let's give him two years, because at the moment their hitting looks thin and they need him--assuming he stays in shape. But he's fragile, and they should tie his pay to games played at his age. As to what Valentine said, it's impossible to tell what was on Papi's mind when he took the rest of the season off. From his prima donna me-first inclinations, I suspect he was thinking more about next year's contract than this year's team. He wanted no part of endangering his contract situation with a serious injury. Considering the money involved, you can't blame him. But you have to wonder just how serious a threat of an achilles blowout was. I read the doctors said not serious. But to Valentine, who was still trying to win, Papi was waving the white flag. So V didn't like it. I also read V got no scouting reports, etc fom the FO during the season. No help in stats of opposing teams, etc. If true, it suggests a dysfunctional, badly run organization divided in factions working against each other. It's no wonder the team collapsed--BEFORE Valentine. I emphasize before, because V seems to be the object of vilification right now in the media, chat groups, etc. V's big mouth has given people a scapegoat for the Red Sox problems. But he wasn't the problem. He just didn't solve the problem. No manager could have solved their problems without the full cooperation of the organization--which V didn't have. Probably the source of V's bitterness at individuals.

Henry gave up Scutaro because he figured he had pretty much the same SS in Aviles for half the money. It was a cost cutting move, and Henry was in a cost cutting mode last year. And I think he performed brilliantly--considering he also engineered the Dodger deal. Scutaro moved to 2B when he went to Colorado. The guy showed last September he could get hot with the bat --and he has gotten hot in SF. But he's playing 2B--not SS. He has played only 27 games at SS this year. Most of the rest at 2B. At 36, he's no longer a SS, and didn't figure in the Sox plans there. Good deal for them--and him.

Losing Aviles was no big deal--he is a known commodity and was expendable. He did not figure at SS--not when they are paying a 22yo kid $2.5million who may already be the best defensive SS in baseball. Plus he showed enough offensive development in AAA last year to be given a good shot this year in Boston. What would have been worse was giving up a prospect for Farrell. A prospect is an unknown--he could be very good, or not so good. They are already taking a risk with Farrell. Why take two risks? Henry should declare himself GM. From what I've read, he engineered the deal with Beeston, according to the Jays' GM. Including the compensation. He also engineered the Dodger deal--with Kasten. Maybe that was after watching Cherington muck up a couple of deals during the season. Henry shows every sign of being a promising GM. Maybe he should become more involved in the rebuilding effort--if he isn't already.

It appears Youks has slipped as a hitter the past couple years. His OPS is way down--especially on the road. He isn't worth $12 million anymore, but he could be a decent hitter and first baseman in Fenway for half that.

69 wins this year. It would take a miracle to turn this around to 69 losses. That won't happen in one year. Those season ticket holders will be gettting lousy value at Lucchino prices for several years--at least.

Iggy needs to hit better than .140 to be a regular SS. Not much better, mind you, but .240-.250 might do it. He's probably capable of that given the opportunity--which he has not been given at the major league level yet. There has been too much "he can't hit" going around, and not enough "he can field". That reflects the one-dimensional hitting mentality that has taken over the Sox lately. It's reminiscent of the old Yawkey teams: good hit, no field, no pitch. Clearly not the formula for winning. That will have to change for them to get back on track. Think pitching and defense balanced with hitting.

Cherington was probably split between Ausmus and Farrell. You figure Ben being an Amherst grad and Ausmus from Dartmouth there would be a connect there. But Farrell's been in the organization before, so either were acceptable. I wouldn't be surprised if Ausmus will be asked to be one of the coaches. I agree the Farrell deal is like the Dodger deal--hammered out at the top, with the front office coming up with the players or prospects coming to Boston. They are expected to know the personnel in the major and minor leagues.

My first reaction was they got what they wanted and only had to give up Aviles--and are a getting player back--maybe Lind. That leaves SS open to Iggy and Ciriaco. They know Farrell-the pitchers like him-so maybe it will work out. He'll get the cooperation of the rest of the organization Valentine never had. Bobby had to manage in a vacuum. Farrell will have none of those constraints.Plus he doesn't have a big mouth with the media. One of his big jobs will be to get Bard back on track. He's bound to have complete control over the pitching staff. We'll see who the coaches are, but you're looking at a manager here who will have a much greater say on personnel and field strategy than Valentine had.

If they want Farrell, they should wait--he's going to get fired. He's in hot water up there, and they should just wait. They are making a big mistake going after him now. Giving up a good prospect to get him will have fan repercussions. They like this guy because he hit it off with the front office and the owners when he was here. It's a personality thing. I don't think a lot of people were thrilled with his performance as pitching coach. Nobody made an effort to keep him at the time. Now they want him again. The real problem with this team is the upper management. Lucchino and above. They let the front office go to pot, losing a couple of senior people, and laying off the consultants. Then the team collapses after bad trades and signings, and they blame the manager. Lucchino has made enough mistakes lately to be fired himself. But he's too high to be fired. The organization sucks. And it will still suck with Farrell as manager. A lot of people in this organization feel entitled--right up the line. It isn't just some players.That was evident when Valentine found he was managing in a vacuum.

I think they're trying to deal Ells right now--for a pitcher. There are rumors about Holland from Texas, but that may be just speculation. They have enough depth in the OF to deal him. That assumes they re-sign Ross.