jung

While I still have not found a complete new CBA I have found something pretty close. This offseason at least the compensation rules will be a combination of the old and the new...that should be enough of a mess. However the new tax rates will go into effect. I was wrong about the top (4th year rate). The first thing I read had the 4th year rate at 40%. Actually the new 4th year rate is 50%. That might actually be enough to even make the Yanks blink. The new 1st year rate is now 17.5% and there is no change to the 2nd and 3rd year rates. The whole inter-league thing seems to need some work as there are no guarantees that a team that is competing for a playoff spot won't end up with inter-league games in September. Imagine the Sox being in a race for the playoff suddenly having to cart themselves off to Philladephia in September to play the Phils without a DH and have those games count! One possible solution would be to have the DH in place for all inter-league games regardless of where they are played but that won't fly. Another would be to say there is no longer a diff between the two leagues and just finally fight the whole damn thing out and have the DH everywhere or nowhere. Another place that looks ticklish with no idea how it will work is the compensation as it relates to guys traded at the mid-season deadline. If the team that gets such a player does not sign that player for the next season they will no longer get any compensation for losing him. Can't figure out if that means teams will really shy away from making deals for players at that mid-season trade deadline or not. Finally the competitive draft lottery seems something of a joke. Half of the teams that made the playoffs last year would be able to pick up draft picks in that lottery. Unfortunately what that says is that being smart about how you spend your money for the most part bests throwing tons of money out there and trying to buy a World Series. It is a complicated mess. One commenter mentioned that it would make more sense to just take the 6 smallest market teams and just give them each one extra draft pick. While that does not seem fair either it is at least as fair as the mess they will be working with while being 90% less complicated.

I heard and saw BC making that statement and I have never seen a more strident appeal to be believed. Just did not smell right. Everybody is making to much of an effort to "sell" this story. It is all to forced. That is not the equivalent of a lie detector test but a pretty good indicator that something is wrong. The truth rarely sounds either forced or strident. It would be so easy for the Sox to make this whole stupid mess go away but no...not happy unless it is a complicated mess. With any luck the front office will start to function more competently which will go a long way to just burying this manager hunt thing. If that happens we won't have people trying continually to review all the FO screw ups starting with this manager mess. Then once the season starts hopefully the baseball itself will keep everybody occupied.

Did not realize that Magadan was definitely staying. That is a good sign but I do think it suggests the Sox should really consider getting somebody to come in specifically to work with Crawford. Dave has already been here and whatever problem Crawford is having Dave has not been able to help him figure it out.

Well there are so many people talking for the Red Sox, all of them saying different things to different people. One of the things that has been said has been that Bard would get his shot at closing this year. Maybe that is the one thing that is being said about closers by some Sox FO guys that is accurate. Maybe it is Bard after all. Then again one strategy that has been floated has been that the Sox would let the first few closers go by and then get one that was left closer to the bottom figuring that after Paps and then to some extent Bell the remainder are kinda' interchangeable. However that is the one strategy that I thought would lead them back to Bard because that sounds like they would just pay more money for somebody that would not do the job any better than Bard would.

I think the emotion he showed today was genuine and I also think that the reasons he gave were also truthful. I do think he was sitting there looking out at all those faces and it hit him that he was sitting at Fenway Park in a press conference announcing him as manager with a bright brand new home jersey folded in front of him. The sudden recognition that this was Fenway and the Red Sox and that was his jersey hit him all at once. I am sure that will be replayed several times this evening on NESN and I am sure to look at it again. It is rare to have an instance when a guy gets hit like that. You would have thought a building had fallen on his head.

What a shame. That would have been a neat rook card to have especially if V invites Buck.

I was trying to see what jersey that was that he had. I think it was a 5 but I guess it could have been a 25.

Just an aside for kicks cause not sure how many people might be watching. Donovan McNabb is being interviewed on the NFL Network and asked about his mind set as he goes through the release (at his request) and waiver process. Donovan responds "Well I am well rested". You are that for sure Donovan.

Phillips has a note attached to the roster for the 2001 team saying that the 2001 team "lead the league in quality starts" for some period of time but could not score any runs either. Not sure if that is a left handed jab at V or not.

I definitely like the bring him in and see where he goes approach. Would not want to give up to much for a guy from a team in move the contract mode. To me the biggest sin in moving prospects is moving guys that have made it in your system all the way up to AAA and have shown success there....guys that are maybe one year or just over a year away from actually moving up to the show. Even though they are still prospects I really hate the idea of giving up those guys. If we don't have to go nuts with stuff like that it could be OK.

Looked back at that 2002 Mets roster. Not something I had done lately. I know the expectations were high for that team but looking at the roster I am not sure they should have been as high as they were. Not much of a murderers row on the offensive side. Pretty good pitching but I think I remember they went through stretches where they could not score at all! Lost I tremendous number of low scoring games as I recall.

Low pitches tailing away went from being a bit of a weakness to a glaring flaw that killed just about every at bat for Crawford last season. I have got to believe there is something going on there. Maybe he is just not seeing those pitches as good as he once did. It got to the point last year where you were just waiting for the pitcher to throw either a change, sinker or slider depending on whether lefty or righty and sometimes it looked liked a pitcher was just probing for a pitch in that spot where Crawford was a sure out and have him hitting that weak ground ball to shortstop. I wonder how many 6-4-3's he had last year. I really hope they bring somebody in for him as it might also help him feel like the Sox are committed to helping him figure it out, not just frustrated and regretting having signed him.

Using information gleaned from a web site to build a case for revealing an underperforming employee or using information gleaned from a web site in building a legal argument is not the same thing as making fan opinion gleaned from anywhere part of your personnel hiring process. They just aren't.

I think you would use marketing trends to determine something like having a red bill on your blue cap or an all blue cap. If you are using the fan base as a barometer for "cleaning house" or hiring a new manager or any personnel decision for that matter you are headed for trouble. I would be very disappointed if they actually used any information that they might glean from this site or any other fan forum as a viable input to personnel decisions. I guess I would not mind if they looked at fan response to a personnel decision just to know what the response was after the fact but would not want them using fans as a viable input in the actual decision making process.

Like I said before 700 I was really surprised. V I think was also totally shocked by how emotional he got. It really took an effort for him to pull it back together.

Maybe he can...but for the kind of money he could come to Boston and fit somewhere in the BP. If it turns out he is the best set up man we end up with...that is fine also....especially if for the WS the main issue is just moving the contract. Even rebuilding though he would seem to be a worthy guy to have around a year but maybe not. WS have gone though so much lately, maybe the want a clean slate. Just saw your post 700. Thanks...even $5.5 is fine I think. I don't know where I saw $3M...obviously wrong.

Boy that press conference was way more strange than I expected it to be. Surprised by how emotional V was and In his interview after, he it sounded like he was saying that he was surprised by how emotional he got as well. In his opening comments, he said that he thanked JH and LL for supporting Ben in HIS decision to hire him. I don't know if his new bosses asked him to say that but expect they have asked him to characterize it that way. I would not have asked V to start his life with the Boston media that way. Whatever they want to do or don't want to do about how this process was handled, don't bring V into it for crying out loud. I have to think they asked him to characterize it that way because it would have been more natural and so easy to have just thanked the "Red Sox" for giving him this opportunity. Actually I think the media cut him a break in not focusing on that characterization of his hiring since he opened that door. Honestly I am glad that they did not go down that road but I just wish the Sox brass would learn from the past and not throw every carcass out there in a way that gives the media a chance to carve it up. Reminds me of that press conference where they forced Tito onto the stage with Theo. That was the one where Tito said he questioned whether he had the support of management or not.

If the money he is making with the WS is $3M per, I don't think he would have to be in one of the key roles here. He could however be a solid BP arm that has experience and can help some of the younger guys along. Even paying him a bit more than $3M per would be fine I think. Heck the Sox need so many arms that he might well fit nicely into one of the slots here.

Does anybody know where or how V commented about thinking Crawford should change his stance by closing it? Is that another comment that he made as a TV analyst or is this a more recent comment?

No...Tito either said that he offered to give the guy the name of his doctor and would refer the call so that the Dr. would talk to him about this particular subject or Tito said that is what he would have done. Sorry I did not listen closely enough to tell if he had offered to give him the name or would have had he known what the guy was gong to print. Obviously The Doc would have had to have Tito's permission. Not sure if a Doc would have talked to the reporter even with Tito's permission.

Boy I hope they cleaned house because the house was a mess not because of us in the fan base. As for hiring Bobby V being a consequence of comments from the fan base, the first I heard of Bobby V as an option people were saying that JH favored him and to some extent LL and that is why he was a candidate. This is a pretty good board for having knowledgable people even when they don't agree with each other and I did not see anybody forward V until those reports that JH and LL were interested in him. At that point there were at least as many people holding their noses over V as people thinking it might be a good move.....I think.

+11111111 I would count them as completely hopeless if they paid any attention to us. Good Grief!

Tito is on EEI now. Asked about Bard he says he thinks Bard can close and that in fact Bard can also start. He does go on to say that Bard covers many of the weaknesses in your bullpen because he can come in the 7th or 8th inning and bail you out of a jam. The interesting thing about that may be that it suggests that he can at least stand up to pressure. Other interesting bit was that Tito says he talked to the Globe columnist that broke the prescription drug use problem story the night before the article was in the Globe and it was Tito's impression that the guy was not going to use that item in the piece. Tito says he would have provided the guy with the things he would have needed to debunk that whole deal if he thought the item was actually going to appear in the piece. That does sound like something of a slimy media deal. Normally a reporter will tell you right up front if he is going to print something and is asking you for your comment before he prints it.

I realize that the are not going to announce their intensions but I was hoping that there might be some scuttlebutt about offers already on the table that had made their way to the public domain one way or the other. Maybe there is something out there in the public domain that gives us some feel for that qualifier "is shopping desperately". You just wonder what shape that desperation is taking. Shopping him desperately certainly sounds different than shopping him in earnest for example. I am asking more about that description of "shopping desperately" than anything.

Are the WS shopping Thornton in the sense that they are not looking for much for him or are they shopping him in the sense that they are willing to give a team the opportunity to trade for him if they are willing to send off a painful amount of talent to get him?