Palodios

I would imagine the Red Sox are looking for a relatively cheap #2 to finish off the rotation, or go all-in on a cost controlled #1. That means Gallardo, Garza, Fister, Shields. If Ben wants to overpay, it will someone from the Sale/Harvey/Kluber/Holland/Darvish group. The high end group is looking too costly, consisting mostly of guys like Cueto, Zimmerman, Scherzer, Hamels, Price. Those guys are costing franchise changing talent, and give no control -- that isn't happening.

It seems like they are trimming payroll, and getting ready to sell. There was an article recently about how they want to sell the team to an ownership group in Montreal.

Thanks! It has been a complex one to negotiate -- turnover in our office has pushed off my move date from January. Hopefully everything will work itself out.

Slaughtered is a bit extreme here. These guys all have relatively good career numbers. We can probably expect one or two to have a bad year, but they are bound to find someone in their pool of prospects eventually. Masterson's career ERA -- 4.24. Buchholz's career ERA -- 3.92. Miley's career ERA -- 3.79. Joe Kelly's career ERA -- 3.41. Rick Porcello's career ERA -- 4.30

The AL East is much weaker in 2015. The Rays have blown it up. The Yankees have been quiet so far this offseason, and have lost several key players. Baltimore has lost a pile of key players, including their 40 HR bat. Outside of the Jays, what team are you afraid of in 2015?

I should be around in April/May, but I may be moving to Seattle in June.

In all fairness, you could say the same thing about every reliever on this team in the last 15 years not named Papelbon or Uehara:p

Red Sox acquire Anthony Varvaro. Weird that the Braves DFAed him -- he seems relatively effective the last two years.

It'll take me a few years to get there. I was more interested in the other deal -- I won't disagree with you if you don't disagree with JH

I have been saying this for some time as well. I'm wondering if the Red Sox are looking to package Xander for a controllable ace, ie a Sale/Harvey type.

I would be very willing to make that deal.

When you make your first billion, lets revisit this.

The Dodgers looking to dump Brandon League. He's an extreme groundballer who has somewhat effective -- maybe he's available on the cheap.

The Rays! Wow. They've wrecked havoc on their team. First Price for spare parts, then Hellickson, Joyce, and now Will Myers is off his way. McGee is already hurt, Maddon left for the Cubs. There isn't much left, and Zobrist may be next.

Donald Trump's father was a millionaire. John Henry's father was a farmer.

Bookies are predicting the Red Sox to win the AL Pennant this year. http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/extras/extra_bases/2014/12/no_lester_no_problem_red_sox_odds-on_favorite_to_w.html

When you make your first billion, let's revisit this.

It sounds like he moved his attention to baseball and lost interest in the firm, and investors moved onto other firms. I wouldn't call that running it into the ground.

Fair enough. I would argue that there is a big difference between being able to run a business successfully, and excel at one for consistent periods of time. Sometimes you make mistakes, but even worse is when bad luck happens. Here's an example : How many people do you know have sizeable investments in oil? It seemed like an extremely safe and profitable bet, but not so much now. Oil might as well be Jackie Bradley Jr. or Carl Crawford.

Your new title is exceptional, by the way.

You are saying that all it takes is knowledge of the game, and business acumen to succeed as a MLB owner/manager. John Henry is a billionaire, far more successful than 99% of most people with MBA's. He hired people around him that he believes will help this team win games and make money. If a self-made billionaire has only had mixed success, why do you believe arm-chair GMs with MBAs are going to be any more successful?

Just to be clear, you do realize that John Henry is a self-made billionaire, right?

When a team is successful, there are usually good reasons why. You may not agree with the moves when they are made, but these guys know what they're doing. They have all sorts of experts involved -- mathematicians, scouts with great eyes, medical teams, PR masters. We also don't even notice these things until years later -- look at Brock Holt for example. You may not agree with this team's pitching acquisitions, but there are several reasons why they picked up these guys. These guys are between the ages of 26-28, right about the time pitchers hit their prime. Miley and Porcello haven't been on the DL in their entire careers and have been 200 IP guys every single year. Masterson was a 200 IP guy until this year. All three are groundball pitchers, and that is important for two reasons. Fenway eats up flyball pitchers. These guys also had terrible defenses behind them, and stand to improve with a solid defense. I would not be surprised to see a #2 and #3 emerge out of this group, with very little money and very few trade chips used here.

Honestly, when you guys badmouth this organization, it makes you seem extremely ungrateful. It frustrates many of us, but we let it go. This organization has done a great job. They've won championships. They've made boatloads of money for themselves. They've weathered the storm of a Yankee dynasty. You can say what you will about the teams from 30 years ago, but I firmly believe Ben has done everything he can to make the team competitive, whereas Loopy Larry has done everything he can to put fans in the seats (even if it isn't always about baseball). I'm pissed about Lester. Most of us are. But saying they screwed up is extremely short sighted, especially with these big contracts. We don't have the medical records. We can't see into the future. We don't have professional scouting reports on players and an idea of how their abilities will age.

As someone who has had his differences with almost every tenured poster on this board, I would say that it is almost never worth it. Because I'm still here, and they'll continue to still be here, so why not spend more time enjoying the time we spend with fellow Red Sox fans?