moonslav59

When they open the season vs the Nats, there will be 14 players on the field making $10M+ a season- all will be Dodgers.

It's hard to find a match for Duran and a 2B/3Bman. I really like Paredes, and I think we are a better team with Paredes at 3B and Masa at DH than DHam/Romy at 2B and Duran at DH, but it's too much of an overpay to do it one-for-one. If the Astros gave us Brian King and catcher prospect Janek, I'd do it. (I might trade Duran for just Paredes & King.) The downside is heightened by 2 yrs of Paredes for 3 from Duran, but King has 5 years of control. I don't trade Duran for 2 years of Donovan. I'm not sure what STL could add to Donovan to get me to a yes. 4 yrs of Vientos or 1 year of Hoerner? Not for any of our OF'ers, except maybe Campbell. 1 yr of Gleyber Torres (NOPE) or pre-arb Matt Shaw? (not on for one) MN wont give us Keaschaal for Duran, but maybe a 3rd team can get us to yes. 3 years of Royce Lewis? (Maybe if they also give us 1 year of Jeffries, who is not good at C defense.)

Then, he's shocked, but rinse and repeat.

The top 50 MLB FAs list by MLBTR has dwindled down to just a few top 20 players and very few players of interest to the Sox. (I took out QO players who took the offer) Available: Tier 1 6. Framber (est $150M/6) NOPE for Sox! 8. Bellinger ($140M/5) NOPE 15. Gaallen ($80M/4) NOPE ____________________ Tier 2 17. E Suarez ($63M/3) Fits our power need and plays 3B, but poorly. ___________________ Tier 3 20. Bassitt ($38M/2) Was affordable, but we now have a logjam at SP 23. Giolito ($32M/2) same as Bassitt 27, H Bader ($26M/2) NOPE 28. N Martinez ($25M/2) Could use a pen arm like his. 29. Arraez ($24M/2) Not good enough at 2B 30. Littell ($24M/2) Okay as a pen arm. 32. Verlander $22M/1 NOPE 37. S Dominguez ($18M/2) Maybe??? 41. Scherzer $15M/1 NOPE Gone: Tier 1 1. Tucker $240/4 (est $400/11) Never on Sox radar 2. Bichette $126M/3 (est $208M/8) NOPE (too much $$$) 3. Cease $210M/7 (est $189M/7) NOPE 4. Murakami $34M/2 ($180M/8) NOPE 5. Bregman $175M/5 ($160M/6) $45M more than Ranger 7. Imai $54M/3 ($150M/6) Less AAV than Ranger, but better? (No) 9. Schwarber $150M/5 ($135M/5) $20M more than Ranger 10. Ranger $130M/5 ($115M/5) 11. Alonso $155M/5 ($110M/4) $25M more than Ranger ________________________ Tier 2 12. Naylor $93M/5 ($90M/5) 13. E Diaz $69M/3 ($82M/4) 14. M King $75M/3 ($80M/4) 15. D Williams $51M/3 ($68M/4) 16. Okamoto $60M/4 ($64M/5) Only one from tier 2 I'd consider. _______________________ Tier 3 18. R Suarez $45M/3 ($48M/3) NOPE 19. Polanco $40M/2 ($42M/3) Was affordable for BOS 21. M Kelly $40M/2 ($36M/2) Was affordable, but we filled SP need. 24. H-S Kim $20M/1 ($30M/2) Was affordable and can play 2B. 25. Realmuto $45M/3 ($30M/2) Not really a fit for BOS at $15M AAV ______________________ Tier 4 22. Brad Keller $22M/2 ($36M/3) 26. O'Hearn $29M/3 ($26M/2) 28. R Iglesias $16M/1 ($26M/2) 31. Helsley $28M/2 ($24M/2) 33. Ponce $30M/3 ($22M/2) 34. Finnegan $19M/2 ($20M/2)/ 35. Weaver $22M/2 ($18M/2)/36. T Rogers $37M/3 ($18M/2)/37. Fairbanks $13M/1 ($18M/2)/ 38. G Soto $8M/1 ($16M/2), 39. Pagan $20M/2 ($16M/2), 40. Mahle $10M/1 ($15M/1) 42. Caratini ($14M/2)/ 43. W Castro ($14M/2) Yaz $23M/2, Houser $22M/2, Matz $15M/2, DJansen $14M/2, K Jansen & Maton, $13M/1 D May, $11M/1, Kay $12M/2, $10M/1 Eflin & A Garcia, $8M/1 Lorenzen, $7M/1 J Bell & Mullins

BTV Accepts: Mayer, Tolle, Wong & DHam for Keaschall, Royce Lewis & Jeffries Would yo do this? We lose Tolle, which is huge, and perhaps Mayer busts out, soon, but we gain a great 2Bman, an injury-prone 3Bman with 30 HR power and one year of a catcher with a .777 OPS over the last 3 years and 22 HRs per 650, too! MN gets 3 years of Wong for 1 year of Jeffries and a damn good young pitcher, but if they don't like Mayer like BTV does, they would surely say no.

Certainly BTV has some questionable numbers. Maybe they have data that shows former #1s gain more than guys like K. I'd trade Mayer for Keaschall, but we'd still need a 3Bman. BTV has this: K 84 value- 42 pay= 41 value M 82 value-27 pay=55 value So, they do say K is better than M, but feel K will be paid more, perhaps due to reaching arb earlier than M.

He'll be 33, but point well taken.

I don't think it's that simple. I think the equation looks like this, assuming Duran becomes the DH, because we don't trade any OF'ers and all stay healthy all season: DH: .790 Duran with some power and a lot of speed vs .770 Masa with little power and slow as hell. That is a gain, for sure. Now, weigh this with... 3B: .825 Paredes with power vs 2B .725 DHam vs R and Romy v L (I think we can get a RP added with that Duran trade, too.) Which one looks better? Duran + DHam/Romy or Paredes + Masa (and Romy could platoon w Masa)

Didn't you say, just recently, we are not signing any FAs to a big contract? Okay, you were shocked, but would signing E Suarez and then dumping a salary like Bello of Sandoval really be all that shocking? I'm not saying the odds favor this, but how many times must we be shocked before thinking it's at least possible? We were shocked when we signed Bregman, last winter. Some were shocked we extended Devers, Crochet, Anthony, Campbell, Bello and Rafaela. Some were shocked we spent over $40M AAV on FA pitchers, last winter (21 Buehler, 10 Chapman, 9 Sandoval and 2 Wilson) IMO, I'd be fine with a trade for a big bat infielder like Paredes. I would not be shocked, in the least. All I hear down here in HOU is that cannot trade Walker, Altuve, Pena or Correa, so Paredes will be traded. I'll be shocked if he's not traded somewhere. The Astros need an OF'er badly and every team needs pitching. We have logjams in both areas, so the odds seem to favor we can match up.

I'm not sure the reason why the union doesn't push for more balance. I think they believe when a player gets $400M, the rest of the players will naturally get more. I think I read somewhere that the avg MLB salary is about $5M, but the median is like $1.4M. That means over half the players in the union make less than $1.5M. If they were a forceful voting block, which they could be if they flexed a unified position, some sort of changes could be made to bring the median closer to the mean. I've thrown a few quick ideas out there without much prior thought, but doubling the min wage would be a big plus. Min wage is NOT just for rookies: it's for all pre-arb players to benefit. I'm not sure how many that is, but it is a pretty big percentage. Many Arb 1 and 2 players make near or less than that $1.4M, so add them to the percentage and maybe they could force the change. Owners could probably absorb paying the lower half of players a lot more, but they won't do it without getting something back, of course. Let's just say the bottom 13 paid players on each team get this raise, that's about 360 players (13 x 30 teams=360.) If they all get a $500K raise that goes up to $1M by the end of the new CBA, we're talking $180M year one to $360M year ??? Hell, maybe the top 10-15 players make more than that by themselves! The theory makes too much sense to just discard out of hand, but making it happen would be more complicated, and it would have to involve limiting the top pay, somehow, or the players giving something else back.

TOR offered Tucker $350M/10. He'll have to get $110M/6 when this deal is done. I guess that's possible, but very risky.

I dont think MN says yes.

Yes, it would, Mayer is 54 and K is 41. We'd still need a 3Bman by trading Mayer.

BTV says his value is about $10M ($5M x 2). I think we might be lucky to find anyone to pay $8M of the $36M owed him ($4M x 2.) We might get someone to pay $3-4M x 2 for Hicks.

BTV accepts Early & Campbell for Keaschall. (Also Early+Arias) Of course I had to go nutty: Tolle, Campbell. Phillips, Wong & DHam for Keaschall & Jeffers Here is a lesser one: Phillips, Sandlin, Wong & DHam for Jeffers and Kody Clemens.

Of course the Twins would want more. I'm not sure Aria and Tolle gets it done. BTV accepts Tolle & Campbell.

They think we'll trade Bello to save some money, and they see Early and Tolle as the guys who move up. One will replace Gray and the other replaces Sandoval. They felt anyone we trade for, other than KMarte will be an imperfect fit. They mentioned Otto Lopez as someone with upside and Royce Lewis, despite the injuries and recent lower O numbers. Their dream guy is Luke Keaschall, but they think we'd need to give up Tolle or Early.

Maybe they just assume inflation and MLB salaries going up and up and...

The soxprospects.com podcast was a real downer. They blasted the loss of Bregman and questioned the signing of Suarez after using so manya ssets to get Gray & Oviedo. They even likened the Suarez signing to a trade, as they will lose their 2nd round pick (61st), 5th round pick (159th) & about $2M in Int'l bonus money in 2027. An ouch listen... https://news.soxprospects.com/2026/01/podcast-ep-398-alex-bregman-is-cub-but.html

Here is a list of the top OPS players from 2024-2025 that could possibly be FA or trade targets for the Sox and I'm throwing in some names of players not mentioned as trade targets: .913 KMarte .861 Seager .806 Suarez .784 Chisholm .769 Vientos .768 Paredes .766 Donovan .762 Bohn (Bichette is at .755 & Masa is at .742) .724 Hoerner Kinda slim pickins.

He's been under .700 two years in a row, and he's 25. He is not the guy we need for offense. Of course, adding Yoshida or Hicks, or both to a deal for him gets me listening, but we need some sort of offensive boost to the line-up, IMO.

I thought about that, too, and for a 2 month catcher rental that the manager decides would be the back-up.

Apparently, PHI offered Bichette $200M/7, but he took $126M/3. Tucker took $240M/4 from LAD. I'm pretty sure he got longer term offers from others, but the trend seems to be moving towards these type deals. That's some high AAVs there!

The vast majority of MLB players make min wage or arb wages. I used to bargain as a union rep, and the company often exploited the fact that the majority of members had seniority, so they had tiered pay schedules, but one the company took off and hired a ton of new workers, they flipped the script and offered the majority newer members jumps in tiers much earlier, and a contract was accepted that gave no raises to the senior most members. It happens. I can happen. Yes, something would have to "give" to get owners to significantly play lower tiered players more money and to establish floor levels for teams' spending budgets, and maybe that would be some sort of limiting higher level contracts of limiting the spending by top teams. Perhaps there are other "gives" the union give to get a more balanced reward system for the majority of their members most likely at the expense of the higher paid players.

Realmuto took $15M x 3.