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This is not good news on several fronts. I hope DD does not do something really stupid now trying to take advantage of Ortiz last year. We have had about five years worth of stupid mistakes in two. Just no wiggle room for dice rolls.

Given the immense fortune Price is going to get, He might even give the Cubs a bit of a break to get back with Maddon. Cubs would be a nice place for Price to land even if Maddon were not there. Considering Maddon, signing Price here might be more than just difficult.

Once you climb off that tier of pitchers like Sale, Grey, Harvey, deGrum et al, I think I would prefer DD spend JH's money and not his prospects. Granted there is not a great deal of depth to this year's FA pitchers. But DD should be able to get one of them I would think. It would be interesting to know just what it would take for a Quintana. He's locked up till 2020 which makes him attractive in that regard. It probably adds a bit to his cost though.

"Not liking the package that we gave up for Kimbrel has nothing to do with thinking that he will blow up in our faces. I am not concerned with how he will perform." But if Kimbrel gets injured ....mark it down....that will light the match and there will be people just waiting to pounce on DD. So when I pose the possibility that it "blows up in our faces" and its consequences I am including the possibility that Kimbrel gets injured and saying I would take that outcome over waiting as well. It was still worth the risk IMO even if that happens.

The pen was roundly criticized last year and rightfully so. It was a horse and buggy version of a bullpen. We are not "somewhat strong" in anything that has anything to do with pitching and don't even have adequate assets in the farm system to build up and develop for the ML club. We have hardly a power arm ANYWHERE in the system, not a real power arm save maybe ONE. Might Kimbrel blow up in our faces???? Yup he might. Is that possibility a rationalization for just sitting here and waiting for what!!!! a next generation of pitchers to be drafted and work their way up to the system in an effort to finally bring our pen assets up to contemporary standards? Yes it was an overpay. We are not dealing from anything that remotely resembles strength as it relates to pitching just as pitching is growing more and more dominant again...apparently a dynamic that Larry and BC did not see coming. it was plain as the noses on their faces but they just kept stumbling along in the same old way....bats bats bats...its Boston, gotta' have bats....does not matter if they are old bats....fat bats......deceitful bats, bats without power ....who cares..... just so long as they are bats. So now we are stuck with two bad options....do nothing but....draft, develop and wait....or try to kick start the process using assets that are somewhat duplicated elsewhere in the organization. And We can stop with the BS about being able to use those assets to secure a Sale or a Gray or any of the Mets young arms because we would be stacking assets like cord wood to bring any one of those guys here and it start with guys none of us want to trade...I don't mean JBJ either. We would get laughed out of the room trying to make JBJ the centerpiece of a deal for any of those guys. Two things would make me howl from here: 1) Using assets to rent a pitcher for 2016 2) A similar overpay either in fact or in scale at this point which I don't see happening. The asking price for top starters in trade would be too great. I don't believe for a minute that DD will stop trying the trade route regardless of what he says publicly but it hardly matters. I am OK with this overpay at this time for this player. If it is repeated anytime soon I might howl along with others that are already howling. The wait option is not appealing to me as I will be pushing up daisies before that option yields anything worth talking about.

Well if that were the case they would have swallowed the one year rental on Chapman. I think they are all in to get back to contending and probably all in to be seriously contending by as early as 2017. I think they just want to be lots better in 2016 but will not sacrifice the future past 2016 FOR 2016.

It is a slight overpay and that is rubbing some the wrong way. But what do we expect....We are not dealing from strength. A slight overpay should be expected and we have a great pitcher that is signed for the next three years. This is the right path for this team to be on. I can't get excited about Chapman because he would be a rental...not interested....sign him out of FA for 2017 if you still want him then.

There is nothing wrong with the QO as a device and teams should not be reluctant to use it for the right player. Not everybody is a fit. Neither is it a bad thing for the teams in all cases. The agents are the guys that don't like them lead by our favorite agent target for criticism, Boras. He wants everybody to go to full FA and frankly he does not care whether it is in the best interests of the player he represents or not. He wants to generate the most revenue he can out of each player he represents. He wants to take a shot at the brass ring for every one of them and he can afford to have some failures. But those players that fail to come up aces may not have been able to afford it.

Are you guys trying to figure out where BC is going to land? If that is it, IMO he will most likely land either a GM job for a team that has a President of Baseball Ops for him to work under or he will land a President of Baseball Ops job for a small market team. He has to be smart enough to know that the power is sliding away from the GM positions around baseball. But for the right money and the right team, he would likely go that way. That kind of position actually suits him in my opinion. He might get an offer from a team looking for a President of Baseball Ops but it won't be one of the major big market teams...no way. Nobody is going to hand him the keys to the family sedan unless the family sedan is a used Yugo limping along and leaking oil. But he WILL find a spot in baseball. He has contacts....and there is really no substitute for having something of a working relationship with everybody and reputation of a sort. Somebody will give him a job. Nobody is going to give him any real authority...not for awhile anyway. BC still has a lot to learn.

I did not want Salty back either. I was just commenting on the total rejection to this point of the QO by players. There was a chance that the Sox would offer one to Salty and I do think Salty would have been the first player to have taken it if offered.

That describes the issue though. Mets dangle Harvey and will end up very likely insisting on either XB or Betts in a deal for Harvey if the deal is going to be with us and I would not even consider either of those guys for anything less than deGrum and I don't really want to go there either. If you can get Harvey for a basket of offerings that maybe include two top prospects, possible one major league talent...fine. But any insistence by the Mets on either Betts or XB for Harvey IMO should be rejected out of hand. Harvey improves the pitching assets here. So Harvey is a fine target. I just think everybody in baseball knows our Achilles Heel and is going to make resolving our issues very painful. Mets infield is so laughably bad that I could believe they would be interested in a package that included Merrero maybe JBJ who is more of an NL fit anyway, Owens because you have to load a pitcher into any deal that is going to get you a pitcher back. Still would take more guys than that. How damaged is Wright? He really has battled injury for a couple of years now. Are the Mets about to have a hole at 3rd and would they consider Panda as part of that package if we paid a bunch of salary? Panda is probably another guy that would welcome a return to the NL. The Mets may laugh any bunch of players that did not include either XB or Betts right off the table for all I know. The vulnerability for the Mets is that they MIGHT think they are good enough to possibly get all the way back next year and are thus interested in guys that they think yield short term AND long term benefit. I actually don't think they are as that team has more holes than a 5 lb swiss cheese.

One of them maybe might (and I do mean might) be a consideration for deGrum. Harvey...no way. But this is a real world example of the problem. Even if we were interested, the Mets are not going to let us just reach into their pitching assets and choose who we want. They want to move Harvey.....Big Whoops!!! I frankly don't think we would be interested in Harvey but the Mets are not even going to make that move unless we toss at least XB or Betts their way. Nobody, even the Mets with all their young pitching talent is just going to help us out of this mess.

I think that if the Sox had made Salty a QO (and Salty actually expected it at the time) he would have jumped at it and would have become the first player to have broken ranks with the PA and signed the QO. As I recall baseball media was split about 50-50 on the subject. So it would not have been a total surprise if the Sox had offered it. Myself I would have been pretty surprised if it was offered and then refused by Salty.

The problem with Cueto is the way the Reds used/overused/abused him the last few seasons. It must have been clear to them that they were not going to try to resign him and they just piled the innings on. There is a very good chance that the next team that signs him pays the price for that in DL time and possible surgical repairs. But our pitching assets are so much of an issue at this point that we really can't afford to be that picky. If we can sign a guy like Cueto and simply overpay without getting raped, he improves our overall pitching asset and we are at a point now where we have to improve there period. If it moves the rock farther down the road without being totally unreasonable, make the deal...,,move on, make the next one.

What an abysmally poor showing by the Bruins all series long. I expect Marchand is gone...little ball of hate my ass. Bartkowski never should have been out there at all. Almost lost the series all by himself. Bruins poorly prepared as well. Claude out-coached and the Bruins did not appear to respond to him in this series. Really really disappointed to have lost to these turkeys and to have looked so bad doing it.

Love the Bruins but they are looking like a team that deserves to lose. Krecji has been terrible. Marchand has been worse than terrible and is probably playing in his last game in an Bruins uni if the Bruins lose. Bartkowski has been a joke the entire series. No idea why Claude keeps throwing him out there.

Bartkowskie again...mistake center ice...mistake right at the crease...goal Montreal.. I have said it for days...Bartkowski is going to cost them this series if he stays on the ice. Bruins should never have wasted a spot on him for this game. Sit him down and DO NOT let him on the ice again tonight. Empty f***ing uniform!

Bruins getting outplayed tonight. They are controlling a good deal of the action but it is useless control. They aren't really getting anything done. Eventually make a bone-headed play and the puck ends up behind Rask. Game 7 in Boston to decide it.

This is ridiculous. Hamilton takes a stupid penalty at the end of the 1st period. The can't afford this BS. If you are going to take somebody on take him on so that you both go off the ice. Don't be rabbit punching a guy that is just standing there not fighting back....idiot!

All Marchand has to do is drop the puck for Bergeron. He does not even have to make a great pass. Bergeron keeps positioning himself perfectly when Marchand makes these rushes up ice. All Marchand has to do is leave the puck Bergeron and Bergeron has a shot through a screen at Price. But Marchand just won't pass the puck.

One other problem is the way Marchand is playing. He is taking Bergeron, one of the best of the Bruins out of the game offensively. Marchand has got to stop these end to end rushes. They do nothing. All that happens is that he ends up stuck in a corner behind the Montreal goal with nothing he can do with the puck at that point. Nobody is going to let him go end to end and score a goal....not going to happen!

If the Bruins lose this series, they can point at bringing Bartkowski back as a real problem. He is just too soft. Tons of penalties because he just cannot play without hauling guys down or grabbing them somehow. Hopefully the Bruins can with this game. If they do I would prefer not seeing Bartlowski for the rest of the series.

Finally something didn't work for the Rangers. That steal really had me worried. That would have been all we needed. A base hit with two opponents in scoring position - two runs.

I have to agree about Felix and the next level. If that means making it to something like #2 in the rotation, I don't see it.

Has no choice on JBJ and Sizemore. Farrell only has three guys that can legitimately play CF or RF, Sizemore, Vic and JBJ and one of them is missing. As for AJ, maybe Farrell wants to encourage him after finally having a game where he did not look awful. At least we have learned the secret to AJ. The pitch has to be out of the strike zone for him to hit it solidly.