What this team is struggling with, is getting guys home. The Red Sox are 8th in on-base percentage and 24th in runs scored. Most of the runs the Red Sox are getting are home-runs (8th in the league) and that's going to go down if our home-run leader, Hanley, is down for a while. It seems insane that they've spend all of this money in the offseason, around 170 million, and they're still having the same problem that we did last year.
I think, although I love Panda, they should have just gotten Hanley. They could have used the Panda money to help bring Lester back to where he belongs, Boston. Hanley could have done a fine job at thirdbase, where he is comfortable playing.