moonslav59

Let's say Betts wants $30M x 10. If we sign him now, we can make it $29M x 12 and save $1M on the luxury tax for 10 years, starting in 2021. He gains by starting to get money more in the front end- better for him, and he gets security from an injury before he reaches free agency. We take a bigger risk, but save on the back-end- long run.

I considered him, too as well as Tim Naehring.

Yes, but we will mostly need the cost relief after Rusney & Pedey's deal expire. (Bigtime) If we can get Diaz in the deal, then the financial help could be lessened, since we have no great prospects to get Diaz without taking on more of Cano's contractual costs. Taking Cano just doesn't seem right to me, even by moving him to 1B in 2020.

I still think only Mo and Edgar deserve to go this year. Others may make it later.

It's certainly not an exact science, and even if it was, I'm not expert on it, but it just feels like Betts will age well. He's in great shape, and his "twitch reflexes" are off the charts great.

I'd want SEA to kick in a chunk of money to offset much of the Pedey-Can differential to make the deal.

I thought about Nixon, but I thought he got the cred he deserved.

I don't see what combination of long-shot prospects could land us Diaz. We could offer our top 5 and it still might not be enough.

Carlos Quintana started coming into his own at ages 24 -25 with the Sox. He didn't show much power for a 1Bman, but he did his .291 with a .364 OBP from 1990-1991. (18 HRs in 990 ABs) In February 1992, Quintana was involved in an automobile accident in town of Tacarigua de Mamporal, Venezuela while rushing his two brothers to a hospital after they were shot at a party. In the accident, Quintana broke his left arm and his right big toe and his wife Solys broke both of her legs. The injuries caused Quintana to miss the entire 1992 season. He tried a comeback but never made it back. I almost listed Jeff Gray. He came to us from Cincy and pitched great for the 1991 season. 0.795 WHIP in 61.2 IP (one of the best in Sox history) 2.34 ERA On July 30, 1991, Gray was preparing to go out onto the field for his daily routine. He never made it, as his right side went numb, and he suffered what was diagnosed as a kind of stroke (CVA), ending what had been a brilliant season. One of the best middle relievers of the league at this time, he allowed only 39 hits in 61 ⅔ innings as he had a 2.34 ERA. On the other hand, opposing batters hit a .181 average against him (LH .200, RH .161), the best of any reliever, outside of Bryan Harvey. He also went down in July and still finished third in the league with 19 holds. Gray missed the rest of the 1991 and 1992 seasons while recuperating from the stroke. He attempted to return to baseball over the following two seasons,[1] but had lost a lot of velocity on his fastball[2] and was never able to return to the majors.

I get your point with both Evans and Youk, but I just think too many people recognized their great talent and they got credit for it. True, they were often overshadowed by more glitzy or short term WOW players, but they were praised a lot. Evans player fantastic defense for decades, and hit better and better as he aged. Youk had 6 straight seasons over .373 OBP and 7 straight over an .800 OPS. He fell fast and hard. That sucked.

And we didn't even include his last 4 playoff series, where he had a WHIP above 1.70 in 3 of them. 12.2 IP 9 BB 3 HBP 9 Hits (2 HRs) 8 ERs If you added this to his 3 regular season numbers, he barely top 5.

If you give Betts 10 years now by buying out his arb years, maybe he takes it. Even if you wait until age 29, I think you can pretty much count on 5-6 very good to excellent years, 2-3 good ones and maybe 2-3 decent ones. He seems to have the kind of swing and quick reflexes that age well.

I think he got a lot of cred when he played, so I left the Greek God of Walks off my list.

Roger Moret had tremendous talent. He went 13-2 and 14-3 in 2 of his 6 seasons with the Sox. He ended up going into a catatonic state sitting in front of his locker one day. https://www.lavidabaseball.com/remembering-rogelio-moret/ Nick Esasky exploded in one season with the Sox: 30 HRs and 108 RBIs in 1989. He became a FA and signed with the Braves, but he only played in nine games for the Braves, as his career was cut short by an ear infection which caused vertigo.

I had Bernie & Buckner in my top 10. Here's my rankings: 1. Bernie Carbo 2. Roger Moret 3. Bill Buckner 4. Oil Can Boyd 5, Daniel Nava 6.. Nick Esasky 7. Carlos Quintana 8. Orlando Cabrera 9. DMac 10. Kevin Millar Others: Tom Brunansky, Bill Hall, Koji Uehara (did get some acclaim), Nathan Eovaldi

I usually avoid the game treads for all the reasons you mentioned, but I did get caught up in the Kimbrel rage a bit. The guy has had a WHIP over 1.70 in 3 of his last 4 playoff series. Too scary for my liking, but I know it is a small sample size, and I would not expect him to continue like that going forward.

Thanks. I think we may be close to as good next year, even without Kimbrel. We will need to go almost totally injury-free, which is not likely, but maybe some of the injuries we have this year might be offset by these players playing more than 2018: Pedroia Sale Devers ERod Wright Moreland Vazquez Pearce & Brasier for a full year Even Bogey, Betts and others missed time or played hurt. Vaz and Leon almost have to get better. I see Devers getting better. Maybe JBJ has a full consistent year. Hardly anybody is so old, you can expect age regression.

His 2016 and 2018 seasons were unlike 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2017. He had his highest WHIP in 2016. It's understandable that one could view that year as not "very good" when compared to his other years. (I think he was the highest paid closer in 2016- that changed quickly afterwards.) His highest BB/9 before 2016 was 3.8 in 2014. In 4 of his last 7 years it has been under 3.3. It was 5.1 in 2016 and 4.7 in 2018. In no way is that even close to "very good." Now, I get that's not all that closing is about but walking half a better per inning is an issue for any closer, no matter how well you do with the others. Like I have said, he was a top 5 closer for us. He helped us a lot. He was a "very good" closer every year, but he wasn't as great as he was prior to coming to Boston, except for 2017. He declined and likely will continue to do so. Replacing him will not be easy, and we may very well lose a few games by not finding someone as good, but we may lose more by not replacing Eovaldi and Kelly.

Good points, and there's a good chance replacing Kimbrel with Kimbrel will end up not being close to what we had for the last 3 years.

Exactly. The guy was very good, too. The Sox had a pretty long history of letting big stars do what they want but shut down lesser players on lesser wants and needs.

If we didn't have Price's contract on the books, it might be a lot easier to commit $300M to Betts, but it is what it is. It's a tough call, and I think we can try to get a little creative on ways to lessen the AVV for tax purposes, but to me, he's worth the big contract.

Exactly. Just because Kimbrel has arguably been the best MLB closer for the last 5-6 years combined, doesn't mean he will continue to be even a top 5 closer in just the first year of his expected 4-5 year deal, let alone years 2 to 5. Kimbrel did some great things for us, and it will hurt losing him, but he had already shown signs of decline over recent years, particularly 2016 and 2018. His main area of concern is control. He's still been striking out batters as much as ever, but look at these BB/9 numbers... 3.4 with ATL (5 yrs) 3.3 with SD (1 yr) 5.1 in 2016 1.8 in 2017 4.5 in 2018 Thankfully, his hits per 9 went down, but his HR/9 has inched up steadily for 2 straight seasons. I'd love to have Kimbrel back, but paying him top closer money for 4-5 years, when he's not the top closer anymore and will likely only get worse does not seem like a good choice. Kimbrel 2011-2015: #1 in RP'er WAR at 12.5 T#4 in ERA- at 46 #3 in WHIP at 0.91 (behind Uehara & W Davis) 2016-2018 T#4 in WAR 6.0 (with Betances) #11 in ERA- at 55 T#6 in WHIP at 0.91 Don't get me wrong, those numbers with the Sox are fantastic! However, he was barely a top 5 closer as compared to being the best before.

That is what happened. Plus, I literally busted my gut over the guy. (I have a laparoscopic hernia operation scheduled Dec 18th.)

Yes, some changed quite a bit. All in all, the totals are not that far apart.

Maybe something like $250M for the first 10 and $1M a year for the next 50 years. Henry won't be the owner by then, so it's not his money.