moonslav59

It does seem that way. Even the Manny deal, which has to viewed as a win, ended pretty badly. (I know, that was over a decade ago.) Here are our biggest contracts from 2001> $217/7 Price $160/8 Manny $154/7 AGon $145/5 Sale $142/7 Crawford $120/8 Bogaerts (opt out) $110/8 Pedroia $110/5 JD Martinez $95M/5 Sandoval $88M/4 H Ramirez $83M/5 Lackey $82M/4 Porcello $73M/7 R Castillo $70M/5 JD Drew $68M/4 Eovaldi $68M/4 Beckett $52M/4 Ortiz $52M/6 Dice-K $42M/4 Kimbrel 2007> $41M/4 Youkilis $39M/3 Victorino $38M/3 Lowell $36M/4 Lugo $32M/2 Napoli $30M/3 Beckett $30M/4 Buchholz $30M/5 Lester $29M/2 Peavy $27M/1 Mookie $27M/2 Dempster (retired after 1) $20M/1 Betts $18M/2 Uehara (I might have missed a couple.)

I'd say, no. If he ends up doing well, it's a good "problem" to have. I'd hold some money in reserve for the summer, and give Arroyo, Munoz, Chavis, Arauz and Chatham a shot at proving they can be a net plus at 2B. If not, and we're in the race, then we trade for a 2Bman. Or, we sign a 2B/4th OF/CF type player for not too much dough.

18.2 H Bader 15.8 K Kiermaier (Trade?) 14.5 B Buxton 10.9 B Hamilton 10.6 L Cain 7.4 J Dyson 6.0 L Martin 4.7 M Margot 4.2 E Inciarte 3.9 JBJ 2.8 R Laureano 2.7 J Marisnik 2.6 S Deshields 2.1 M Taylor 19. G Springer 0.0 DRS /Innings 41/2401 L Cain 36/2142 Kiermaier 23/1842 Bader 23/1237 Buxton 20/2159 Hamilton 15. 8/1462 Springer 19. 2/2855 JBJ

For 2 years? I predict he gets $12M/2, but I would offer $8M/2 or $5M/1. If the market for a guy like Pillar is $8M/2, I might go $9-11M/2 for JBJ. $7.5M x 2 for someone who may very well be no help on offense and may also show age-related decline on defense is not what I think we need. I'd rather spend more on pitching and cheaper but better or equal CF defense. I do like the idea of a 1 or 2 year deal for CF.

He won't even get $8M x 2 or $7M x 3.

That was basically my point.

Honestly, what Beni makes does not affect what I think JBJ should make. Beni was signed to avoid arbs after a good year. That has nothing to do with JBJ. JBJ is getting older, and though his defensive metrics improved, this year, he is not as good as he used to be on D and is getting older. "Finally improved his hitting" is not a sure bet. We only played 60 games, and he is famous for having long extended slumps. He has not proven he can be a consistently good hitter, to me. I'd offer him $8M/2 or sign someone like Pillar or a very good defensive CF'er with a weak bat, so we can save money and get better pitching (and defense).

That, too.

Exactly, and is he drawing any fans?

Here are some big contract we could possibly take on in trade as a way to acquire another player or prospect or to offset some salary we may be trying to dump: Player Owed (Lux Tax) Team BAL SP Alex Cobb $15M/1 (14.25M/yr) TOR SP Hyun-Jin Ryu $60M/3 (20/yr) CF Randal Grichuk $31M/3 (10.4/yr) TBR CF Kiermaier $23.8M/2 (8.9/yr) C M Zunio $7M/1 (6.0/yr) LAA 1B Albert Pujols $30M/1 (24/yr) OF Justin Upton $52M/2 (21.2/yr) SEA SP Yusei Kikuchi $31M/2 (14/yr) TEX 2B Rougned Odor $24.7M/2 (8.25) NYM 2B Robinson Cano $72M/3 (24/yr) RP Jeury’s Familia $11.7M/1 (10/yr) ATL RP Will Smith $27M/2 (13.3) CF Ender Inciarte $9.7M/1 (6.1) PHI LF Andrew McCutchen $23M/1 (16.7/yr) Cubs RP Yu Darvish $59M/3 (21/yr) RF Jason Heyward $65M/3 (23/yr) RP Craig Kimbrel $16M/1 (14.3/yr) CIN 1B Joey Votto $75M/3 (22.5/yr) RF N. Castellanos $48M/3 (16/yr) 2B M Moustakas $52M/3 (16/yr) SP Raisel Iglesias $9.1M/1 (8/yr) SP Sonny Gray $21.8M/2 (10.9) MIL CF Lorenzo Cain $35M/2 (16/yr) RF Avisail Garcia $12.8M/1 (10/yr) PIT Gregory Polanco $11.6M/1 (7/yr) AZ SP M Bumgarner $79M/4 (17/yr) LF David Peralta $15M/2 (7.3/yr) RF Kole Calhoun $10M/1 (8/yr) COL CF/1B Ian Desmond $10M/1 (14/yr) SDP RF Wil Myers $46M/2 (13.8/yr) 1B Eric Hosmer $68M/4 (18/yr) SFG SP Johnny Cueto $26M/1 (21.7) 1B Brandon Belt $17.2M/1 (14.5) 3B Evan Longoria $43M/2 (11.2) LAD CF AJ POllock $31.5M/2 (12.0) RP Joe Kelly $8.8M/1 (8.3)

...and many felt Ben would never trade prospects.

I don't see Chavis as the 2B first slot, right now. Arroyo is. With Munoz, Chavis and maybe Chatham is reserve with Down farther away, maybe they skip trying to add here. 1. Solid 2nd tier SP 2. Closer 3. Solid RP'er 4. Solid RP'er 5. CF (I would not bring JBJ back at more than $4M a year.)

You read my mind. I was thinking of compiling a list of these type players, soon. Remember least year, some of us wanted to get Wil Myers as the "offset" to Price or Eovaldi, and look what Myers did this short season! .959 OPS 15 HRs & 31 XBHs in under 200 ABs

I agree 100%. Could we use all of the $60+M on 2-3 solid starters? Probably, but we won't. We might try to get two very good tier 2 starters and a RP'er or two, but we also need a CF'er. We could go cheap on all positions not starting pitchers.

Here's the highlights to the whole game:

Huge. I loved Dave Henderson's HR trots- one flap down. The hop & twirl after this HR was classic...

This year was. I never said I expected the cliff to last years, in fact I argued it should only be 1-2 years. I also said I did not think we'd ever be the worst team, as long as we stayed near the tax limit. I never thought we'd finish 4th worst, so in that sense, it got worse than I expected, but injuries to Sale and ERod were factors.

He was about to be the goat of that game after a fly ball that was not going to be a HR popped out of his glove and went over the fence for a HR that gave the Angels the lead. What an amazing story that game was.

Be in the run for a playoff slot in September is "competing," to me. I expect we might compete for a ring by 2022-2023, which means making the playoffs is the minimum expectation. (I don't expect us to come close to winning a ring in 2021.)

Agreed, and maybe even JD, Beni and Vaz.

Yes, along with JD's rebound or not. If we become sellers, next July, it might not be such a bad thing for the longer term outlook, but sucking for 3 straight years will be worse than the 3 bad years under Ben, since those weren't consecutive, and they were interrupted by a ring year.

They can't afford to. Bloom will likely be given a $60-80M spending budget for this winter and next summer. If we can't improve enough to compete for a playoff slot with that sort of spending budget, then my thought on Bloom were wrong.

ERod is not going to be traded, unless he comes back, and we suck next summer. Then, he might go- along with Barnes and maybe JD, Eovaldi and Vaz.

If the plan was a complete overhaul, we'd have done it already. It makes no sense to gut everything over a 2-3 year period. They'd have pulled the band aid already. We are going to try to compete for a playoff slot next year, while strengthening the longer term outlook, at the same time. If that involves trading a key player or two, so be it, but I doubt we see any deals like Bogey for prospects. Even the Betts deal brought back an immediate impact player in Verdugo.

Plus, it will very difficult to "lop off" dead or not-quite-dead-yet branches like Eovaldi, JD and Sale. He's not going to offer Bogey like he did Betts with Price. He may end up trading a few pieces,some next summer, if we are sputtering, but I don't see a gut. It's more likely he deals Beni, Vaz and or Barnes, but even they are questionable trade offers. He's got enough spending room to make several serious additions. My guess is he makes one major trade and keeps the rest until summer.