jd98

That would help, but you still seem way too optimistic overall. You've got the worst ERA of any SP as 4.10. It's a very long shot that nobody will be a bust. The only way I see them being better than average is if Buchholz pitches like he did in 2013 and does it for the whole season. The 2014 Sox SP were below average in ERA, even before the trade deadline. The avg AL SP ERA in 2014 was 3.92. The Sox were 4.36, and 4.09 before August. I like the rest of your projections, except for Pedroia 20 SB. He seems done as a base stealer. Why are you expecting a big comeback there? You're predicting Castillo in AAA until Vic gets hurt, but you also say Nava/Craig platoon when Vic gets hurt. So are you saying Castillo is a bench player when called up, basically not being a regular starter until 2016?

Post more stuff like this and less of the immature insults. I'd be comfortable betting a large sum of money (for me, I'm poor) that the SP ERA will be worse than league average.

If it was a job where the salary was negotiable, I would tell them I think I'm worth 80k, and continue to negotiate. I'll get bashed for this, but I'll be contrarian here and put most of the blame on Lester. The initial offer was low, but that's often how negotiations work. The team makes a low offer, the player makes a high demand, they negotiate and end up in the middle somewhere. That's why they're called negotiations. It was not so low that Lester needed to act like an insulted 4 year old girl and take his ball and go home. 2014 season must be ignored because it hadn't happened yet and was much better than anything he had done before. He had a 3.75 and 4.82 ERA the previous 2 seasons with an excellent 2013 postseason. He then said he didn't want to talk contract during the season so as not to be a distraction. You know what would do an even better job of not being a distraction? Signing a contract. I think he was like Scherzer and thought he could have a good season and wanted to test the market all along and go for the money, and he saw the 'insulting' offer as his out. That's fine, but would mean it's not all the FO's fault, and of course it's just my opinion.

Maybe he was talking about Pawtucket. PawSox rotation does look good.

It was just McCarver talking about how terrible it was, and everybody knows McCarver is an idiot. The other announcer (Joe Buck?) defended it. I'm not even sure Pedro really threw him down. I think Zimmer may have toppled over even without Pedro's help. He was an old fat man trying to run too fast for his body and throw a punch at the same time. He looked like he was already off-balance. Didn't take much help from Pedro to pull him down.

He even got a vote. But there's way worse than that. Jacque Jones also got a vote. Aaron Sele got a vote in 2012. The worst I saw in the 10 or so years I looked at was Walt Weiss getting a vote. These voters are either insane or joking around with their ballot, and either way they should not be allowed to vote.

Yay for Pedro. I love Pedro (in a non-homosexual way, not that there's anything wrong with that). He's my favorite player of all time. I was even a big fan of his when he was a reliever for the Dodgers. I'm not even sure why, I guess he just a had a presence on the mound and I could tell he was going to be great. Obviously as a Red Sox fan, I was thrilled when he was traded to the Sox. In my opinion, the best pitcher of all time in his prime, he just didn't have the longevity of some of the other greats. A few highlights, which people here will probably already know. A 7 year stretch where he went 118-36 with a 2.20 ERA, 11.3 K/9, and ERA+ of 213!! In 2000, a 1.74 ERA when the second best in the league was 3.70. The 9 inning perfect game in Montreal that wasn't a perfect game because Montreal didn't score until the 10th. The 1-hit, 17 strikeout game against the Yankees where there was only 1 ball hit fair after the 4th inning (12 K, 2 foul outs, 1 line out). Congrats to Pedro, the best on the mound (IMO), and seems like a great guy off the mound too.

Who's the opening day starter? Porcello is the only one worth a crap last year, but that's his only good year and he was the #4 for the Tigers. They want Buchholz to be an ace and he's been with the team the longest by far, but he was terrible last year. Masterson was the opening day starter last year but ended up one of the worst SP in all of baseball. Miley started the first game in Australia or wherever it was, and was the #2 when they started the normal season, but he also got worse last year. Kelly's probably not an option. So who's it gonna be?

I wouldn't bet on anyone in this rotation to have an ERA under 4. In fact, Porcello would be the only one I'd bet on to have an ERA under 4.50, and I wouldn't bet much on that. To be fair, I wouldn't bet on the others to be over 4.50 either, except Masterson, and maybe a small wager on Kelly.

I think it's the finished product. Ben will be happy masturbating to all the ground balls while wearing his panda head. I'm not quite that happy. The rotation may be good. They have all had a good season before, except Kelly who's never pitched a full season. They could also compete with the Rockies for worst ERA in MLB. Every starter is a question mark. For the 3rd highest payroll in baseball with lots of flexibility coming into the offseason, I expected a lot more certainty in the rotation.

Ben seems to have a fetish for ground balls, which isn't a bad thing. I hope he doesn't sign Masterson as the final SP. Need at least 1 guy who you can expect to be good, and not a bunch of guys you hope might be good. Porcello's career numbers are not at all impressive but at least he is trending in the right direction. Miley had a very good rookie season but has gotten worse since. His walk rate is especially concerning, 1.7 to 2.9 to 3.4. That's completely atypical of a young pitcher. Don't know what to make of that. Edit: As I typed this, I see Sox have signed Masterson. smdh. With all these ground ball pitchers, I fully expect Ben's next move is to sign Stephen Drew and move Bogaerts to the OF.

Gabe Speier was the 3rd player in the Porcello trade. Long way from the majors but shows promise. Had tommy john surgery in 2013 and in 2014 had a 26:1 K:BB ratio in 29 IP which is pretty impressive, even if it was just Rookie league

I hope that's true. I was expecting a panic move. Masterson's ERA the last 5 years is 4.70, 3.21, 4.93, 3.45, 5.88, so I'm not seeing the consistency you speak of. Masterson and Porcello's career ERA and WHIP are almost the same. I wouldn't want either, but if forced by gunpoint to choose, I'd pick the one that wasn't horrendous in the most recent season. Latos is good, but elbow surgery after 2013 and shut down with elbow problems in 2014 would make me pass on him too. Read this blurb and see if you want to depend on him as a top of the rotation guy next season--- " Latos said Tuesday (Nov 4th) that he recently underwent a procedure to insert stem cells into his elbow to help with the missing ligament from previous bone spur surgery, Jim Bowden of ESPN.com reports. Apparently, the procedure was needed to help regrow some of the missing tissue in the elbow. Latos underwent arthroscopic surgery to remove the bone spurs from the region in October of 2013, and the elbow presented issues on and off in 2014, but manager Bryan Price has already said that he expects Latos to be fine for spring training."--- It does say he's supposed to be ready, but I'd have to see him pitch before I would acquire him. Same for Masterson, but I don't think they can wait that long.

Sale's not available. It's not happening. It would take an overwhelming ridiculous offer for the White Sox to even begin to listen.

fwiw, baseball-reference's computer ratings (WAR) has Cespedes at 4.1 and Cueto at 6.4, which seems a better estimation to me.

They should just let Sandoval be the backup catcher too, since they paid so much for him. It would make his contract look better since Sox wouldn't have to spend on a backup C, and it frees up a roster spot for the 17 OFs on the team.

Latos would be a solid #2 if he still had an elbow. He's not someone you want to depend on for next year.

I could argue that only 1 of those 3 things is true.

We were talking about Sandoval's contract. You're talking about Hanley. I don't mind the Hanley deal because he's got more upside and has done it more recently. He likely would have been MVP in 2013 if he had played a full season. Of course that's one downside, he's had his share of injuries.

I agree. That was my ideal scenario, not what I expect to happen.

Betts CF Castillo LF/RF Ortiz DH Hanley 3B Napoli 1B Vic/Nava RF/LF Pedroia 2B Xander SS Vazquez C Panda fails physical and contract is voided and money used for pitching. If Pedroia hits or Castillo doesn't then switch those two.

And how was AGon a worthless piece of garbage? His power wasn't what was expected, but he was still pretty good. In his one full season, he finished 7th in MVP voting, had a .957 OPS, led the league in hits, and won a gold glove. His partial season wasn't as good, but still hit .300 with .812 OPS

It's still $19.5m AAV for next 5 years. I'd give him something like 4/$60 at most, and after signing Hanley, I'd offer 0/$0. If he can revert to 4-7 years ago, then it's not bad at all, but it seems more likely for someone to be closer to their last 3 years performance than 4-7 years ago

I've seen several other people say this too, but Sandoval has actually hit much better at home over his career. The last 3 years he's got a .731 OPS on the road and .789 at home. And while his NL West road parks include the most extreme pitchers park (SD) and another pitchers park (LA), they also include the most extreme hitters park (COL) and another hitters park (ARI), so overall that's neutral.

Cafardo is way off, unless some guys have been traded already http://www.weei.com/sports/boston/baseball/red-sox/alex-speier/2014/10/01/ready-go-market-look-red-sox-2015-payroll-and- Speier had estimated $52 mil before Koji, Panda, Hanley, but he also was saving $10 mil for in-season moves. Adding in that $10 mil would leave about $11 mil left.