marklmw

Detroit was having some money issues and unloading the HUGE contract of Fielder helps them with a possible contract extension of Max Scherzer. They essential took $76M of liabilities off the books. They also have a stud prospect in Castellanos that they would put at 3B should Cabrera be moved to 1B. I hardly think that they will put out the money for Cano as he really is not a need. Cano makes every MLB team better (with the exception of Boston) but at what price.

I do not think as fans we give Koji enough credit for the 2013 Championship. Our top 2 closers go down and Koji steps in and sets records. I hope that he can do it again in 2014. To have a dependable closer is as important as any position on the team. The Yankees were fortunate to say the least to have Mariano for all those years.

Nice UN ... glad to see your exercise some humor!

Fred ... you need to relax. Nothing creates better team chemistry than winning. It also helps to have the leadership of Papi and Pedey and rid yourself of AGon and Beckett. Lackey imo is still somewhat of a problem child but he seems to be growing up a little. It is no surprise to me that the Sox are open to deals involving Lackey, Peavy and Dempster. Ben did a fabulous job putting the 2013 team together and he deserves the benefit of the doubt with respect to Napoli. Throughout the 2013 season Napoli had his ups and downs, same with Drew ... after we win a Championship and finish on a high note all of these issues have now been long forgotten by the fans but hopefully not by management. I am sure that the FO would love to put the exact same team on the field next season but unfortunately that would not be possible due to the 4 FA's and their own personal expectations. It is a fine art to put a team together that can address most of your needs and within a set amount of money. There are so many moving parts that the FO has to consider ... they have to look 3-4 years ahead where as the average fan is only looking at 2014. Do you really think that a platoon of Hart & Carp could not give you the same numbers as Napoli? Just an educated guess as there is no way to know for sure.

The Sox are in a really good place. I am having a feeling about Vasquez ... anyone else have a positive feeling about the lad?

Yeah I suppose, I wonder however how much weighting the most recent season has when contemplating a signing vs. that players career numbers. Do you agree with my order of preference? Option 2 might be the best value depending mainly upon the price for Hart.

True UN ... you shared your own ideas what Beltran will demand in a previous post. For 2014 the order should be: 1. Napoli 2. Hart 3. Beltran A Hart / Carp tandem would be very strong IMO. Beltran is really a left handed bat. His numbers are significantly less batting from the right side.

Yeah ... for the upper and middle tier players it makes sense to wait for Cano. Do you have any idea when most of the deals are typically made?

As I stated before ... is it really wise to add a 2nd Sr. Citizen to the roster? We had good luck with Papi last season but with Beltran we are just adding to the %'s that one will go down. 37 is just too old for the kind of money we are talking about.

Ellsbury is most valuable to the Sox for the next 2 years. If he were to sign with Boston at a reasonable price we can always deal him 3 years out. I am having a really hard time however thinking that we will pay someone big money when JBJ is projected to be a very good player. It is a catch 22 cause to a man who would not want to see Ells leading off next season.

I would be very surprised if they sign Beltran ... obviously the chances would be increased should Napoli sign with another team ahead of him, same with Hart. Fielding 1B is not as easy as people are suggesting.

LaBron James?

I am with you Palodios ... why would the Sox want to add a second senior citizen to the roster. We were lucky enough last season that Papi's heal did not act up. Makes zero sense whatsoever. But perhaps they are just kicking the tires and not all that series. Hart and Beltran at the same time makes even less sense.

Will Hart demand as much money at Napoli? From a health stand point Hart might be more appealing while at the same time Napoli plays one hell of a first base. Hart is tall though so he might have a reach advantage over Napoli.

I agree that Owens and Barnes are not ready today ... probably not leaving spring training but could very well be by mid season.

Come on Fred Bush was pretty bad ... but I do agree that Obama is a total disaster ... I should not say Obama ... the people behind Obama are a disaster. Obama just reads the teleprompter he dose not write the speeches he only reads them. Our country is going down fast ... much faster than anyone realizes actually.

Bellhorn .... please stop bringing up 2012 ... I have just managed to erase that season from my mind.

I can think of 4 or more players who are a lot cheaper who I would rather fill in when injuries occur. Owens, Webster, Workman, Barnes oh and my niece Peggy Sue. Can you pitch underhand under MLB rules?

Not sure if I am breaking any rules here bringing up the evil empire in a Sox Forum. But they are and always will be our arch enemy so I thought it was something we all can have some fun with. First off ... Is Cano delusional? Because it seems like he is delusional and that alone should hurt his value. Cano turned 31 in October and wants a 10 Year $310 Millllion contract. One would have to believe that he has 3-4 more years like his 2013 season in him. Over the last 4 season Cano has averaged a WAR of 7. I have read that each WAR of 1 = 5M. To Justify a 10 year $300+ contract he would need to average a WAR of 6. Ten years is a long time but in reality a WAR value of 1 should be worth more in 8-10 years then it is today. Am I right about this? One thing that Cano has going for him is his position and team. The Red Sox had no problem extending Pedey to age 38. Cano provides more power than Pedey and Yankee Stadium is made for him so he can easily transition to DH in ages 37+. The Yankees are on record today ... Randy Levine said that no way are the Yankees doing a 10 year deal. My prediction is that Cano will sign an 8 year deal with the Yankees at average annual value of 31M per for a total of $248M. In the end the Yankees will try not to bid against themselves but at the same time they need Cano to sell tickets and make the team competitive. It also hurts that the Sox won the World Championship in 2013. The Yankees are in bad shape to be forced into another ARod type of contract but I do not see anyway out for them.

I would imagine the more the Sox eat the better the prospect in return.

Among all those dissing the Red Sox's chances entering 2013, one optimist stood out: Bill James. We don’t know what he was telling the Sox privately, in his role as senior adviser of baseball operations. Proprietary information and all that, although we can tell you that his influence on the Sox roster extended all the way down to Mike Carp, a complementary piece that James lobbied the Sox to sign. He wasn’t the only one -- the Sox had liked Carp for a while -- but his voice was heard. [+] EnlargeWill Middlebrooks Kelley L Cox/USA TODAY SportsAlthough Will Middlebrooks struggled in 2013, Bill James still is a believer, projecting Middlebrooks will hit 32 home runs in 2014. Fortunately for fans -- and the fantasy baseball players in their midst -- James annually graces us with the publication of his handbook, in which he offers player projections for the coming season. He is very self-effacing about the process, and the newly published 2014 Bill James Handbook is no different. “We are always right, except when we are wrong,’’ he writes. “We are always on target except when we’re off. We are always on time, except when we are early, or when we are late. We do the best we can.’’ But when it came to projecting Sox players last season, James had a very good year. He was too high on Will Middlebrooks and too low on Daniel Nava, but close on many of the team’s other key components. He predicted that nine Sox players would hit 10 or more home runs. Eight did, while three (Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia and Carp) finished with nine apiece. He predicted that the Sox would have five starting pitchers with an ERA under the league average (3.99). Three did, while a fourth (Jake Peavy, who didn’t join the team until midseason) just missed. Looking at individual players, some of his projections were spooky. Ellsbury, for example. James projected a .781 OPS for Ellsbury; he finished at .782, with fewer home runs (15 to 9) and more stolen bases (52 to 37) than forecast. David Ortiz was projected to hit 32 home runs with 103 RBIs. He finished with 30 and 103. The projected OPS was .919, the actual .959. Mike Napoli was projected to have an .847 OPS with 29 home runs and 75 RBIs. The actual OPS was .842, with 23 home runs and 92 RBIs. Jonny Gomes was pegged for 16 home runs and a .778 OPS. Gomes hit 13 home runs with a .770 OPS. James said Shane Victorino would hit 14 home runs and steal 29 bases. He hit 15 and stole 21, despite season-long hamstring issues, and outperformed James’s projection for OPS, .804 to .752. He said Stephen Drew would hit 11 home runs; Drew hit 13, and like Napoli had a higher OPS than projected, .776 to .736. James missed on Pedroia, predicting 17 home runs and an .825 OPS, compared to the nine home runs and .787 OPS actually posted by the Sox second baseman, James’s computer models failing to anticipate that Pedroia would tear a thumb ligament in the first game of the season. While many questioned whether Jon Lester could rebound from a 9-14, 4.82 ERA in 2012, James was not in their midst, predicting a dozen wins and a 3.71 ERA. Lester won 15 with a 3.75 ERA. Clay Buchholz’s 1.74 ERA was well below the 3.64 projected by James, but he also missed more than three months. John Lackey had a club record-worst ERA of 6.41 in 2011, the last year he pitched before undergoing Tommy John surgery. James predicted a dozen wins and a 4.05 ERA in a bounce-back year for Lackey, who won 10 with a 3.52 ERA. So what is James projecting for 2014? He remains bullish on Middlebrooks (32 home runs in ’14) and projects strong rookie seasons for Jackie Bradley Jr. and Xander Bogaerts, which if his opinion is shared widely on 4 Yawkey Way points to all-but-certain departures for Ellsbury and Drew. Here’s our clip and save list: BILL JAMES' 2014 PREDICTIONS -- HITTERS Player OBP OPS HRs Jacoby Ellsbury .348 .774 12 David Ortiz .384 .914 30 Shane Victorino .336 .751 14 Jonny Gomes .336 .769 16 Stephen Drew .332 .730 12 Dustin Pedroia .371 .814 14 Mike Napoli .348 .819 26 Jarrod Saltalamacchia .313 .750 19 Daniel Nava .377 .812 11 Will Middlebrooks .310 .800 32 Jackie Bradley Jr. .329 .749 15 Xander Bogaerts .357 .807 19 BILL JAMES' 2014 PREDICTIONS -- PITCHERS Player W-L ERA Clay Buchholz 12-9 3.46 Felix Doubront 8-10 4.39 Ryan Dempster 9-10 4.02 Jon Lester 14-9 3.67 Jake Peavy 11-7 3.31 John Lackey 11-11 3.93 Koji Uehara 23 saves 1.80

What you are basically saying is how long into ones career can a player be an effective center fielder. Is there an age. You have to take a year off of Ellsbury's legs due to injuries ... so he is really 29 in baseball years. I actually think that the Sox have a chance to repeat. But what is a good chance .... make the playoffs and you have a chance ... win your division or have the best record in the AL and win the All Star Game and your chances improve. The Sox chances of a repeat are further increased if they sign Ells. From a long term vision it probably makes more sense to let JBJ take over at 500K in 2014. I think the one thing that everyone agrees on is that Dempster and his 14M contract need to go.

If I were to call you an ******* it would be unkind to the *******s of the world

What is with the LOL UN ... what are you 12 years old? Since you felt compelled to chime in (I know you can't help yourself) how about you with your infinite wisdom tell me your conclusion to MVP's comment about Harvard then. Words and comments have consequences. Or maybe MVP himself would like to further explain his comment.

My educated conclusion is that MVP hates George Bush and so he hates Harvard because Bush went there. My other educated guess is the MVP hates Harvard because it is an elite University and he has issues with anything elite and he still hates George Bush not because G. W. snorted coke but because he does not like him because he has been conditioned not to like him. btw. I am not a fan of George W. Bush either but the fact that he snorted coke and attended Harvard has nothing to do with the reasons I dislike the man. Good enough for you UN?