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Agreed. And his $25-27mill AAV won't impede his ability to put food on the table...

The bulk of which came prior to 2016...

In fact, this off season is one where I am glad not to be GM. (Like that was a tough bullet for me to dodge.) The free agent the Sox need the most to really get back into contention quickly is Trevor Bauer. There might be a Perfect Storm brewing to make this possible with 1) per MLB Network talking heads on High Heat, there will be fewer teams actually spending money, a list that does not include the Red Sox, 2) the Sox are in desperate need of SP 3) the Sox have been very public about achieving their tax reset, which should be the green light to spend again, and 4) Bauer's personal hate-hate relationship with the Yankees' Gerrit Cole (which, at best, is a tie breaker in his decision-making process, if it enters at all.) But the problem is, Bauer is very likely looking for a deal in the neighborhood or what David Price had, if not more. His goal might even to be a bigger contract than Cole, just because. This is a major step to putting the Sox right back in this type of mess we have today, especially since, so far, Bauer has simply not been as good of a pitcher as even Price was at the same ages. Bauer is still certainly a very, very good pitcher. But even Price had a much, much better track record (31.1 fWAR, 1 Cy Young award) entering free agency than Bauer (19.3 fWAR and counting)...

If you were on that other website, I had numerous rants about the Sandoval contract. Now, granted, they guy I wanted them to get as a stopgap 3B (the late Luis Valbuena) did not turn into that much better of a player. But at least he stunk at a discount rate...

He might be looking, but he is not likely to be getting one from anyone. (Now, Ronald Acuna, he will be getting one of those.) Age aside, Devers simply is not as good as Betts. B-R lists his most similar batter by age as Ryan Zimmerman, but obviously he won't be looking for a Zimmerman deal (~8 years $114mill), as it was so long ago it's not fiscally relevant. But an 8 year $200-220mill contract does seem right if he signs it by age 27. He'll very likely go for more than Bogaerts...

Depends on what they get back. As Bloom has a tendency to take a bad contract in order to up the return, there could be a fit with Kevin Kiermaier (2 yrs $25.8mill) in order to get Trevor Richards and Shane Baz, or, more likely one of, Shane McClanahan or Joe Ryan or Brent Honeywell. This deal works for Boston as the get one MLB pitcher (Ricjards) who is clearly being underutilized in Tampa, one minor league pitcher (your choice - each has pros and cons) and a short term replacement for Bradley. Tampa also deals from two positions of depth in pitching and CF, where they still have Manny Margot and Randy Arozarena, and saves a bundle of money. It's a win-win. All of these deal result in a minor overpay on BTV. If it's Baz, Tampa is overpaying. Boston is slightly overpaying with any of the other....

I would guess Vazquez is not with the Sox next season. They're going to have to make a few trades to prevent repeating exactly what Dombrowski did, and they do not have much in the way of trade bait. But Vazquez was apparently a somewhat sought-after player last month, so there should still be sufficient interest. I suppose Downs is another potential trade piece, since he was clearly not Plan A in the Betts trade. Possible he as only acquired to be a potential deal piece to get an arm when the Sox (mistakenly?) decided against Graterol?

Verdugo?

But then Lewis did not do it in his first 9 hits...

He's very readable. Ask any hitter...

No. It's worse than I projected in that way. (If I did predict, I would have thought Sale never signs an extension here and tests the market.) But the Sox not being able to afford Mookie and having no pitching coming up through the minors (or very little talent all around) was really why so many people were talking about the inevitable "cliff" that you lampooned them for in your own avatar until recently. When, you know, we fell off it...

I think that's a good/hopeful comp. I know a lot of Sox fans hated hearing about Middlebrooks as a comp for Mark Reynolds - and Middlebrooks never even came close. But if Dalbec can even come close to Reynolds' 298 career HR with a .780 OPS, I'd be more than satisfied with him. Not sure why Reynolds gets so little respect from baseball fans. He had a good career...

On paper, I have to agree. But te fact that it is still a possibility puts to some faith in the Orioles for me. What really helps the Yankees is they have no games left against Tampa, whom they are 2-8 against this year...

No. It was a very predictable outcome that I have been talking about for 4 years. And I am no prophet...

Peraza is extremely likely to be non-tendered. Of the remaining 3, Arauz is most likely to be in Pawtucket. He's only in MLB now to clear his Rule 5 status. While I liked Lin as the starting 2b 6 months ago, he has done zero to prove me right. Chavis is not a full time player. And I think Chatham can play the position defensively, but he is a high strikeout/low BB slap hitter whose numbers have been dependent on insanely high BABIP in the minors. (Granted, he rarely hits the ball in the air, and his LD/GB approach should lead to a higher BABIP.) Can he maintain anything close to this type of success in MLB? I'd bet against it if he was getting 600 ABs per year. He's probably best used as a utility infielder who can adequately back up 2B, 3B and SS. Munoz strikes me as the best internal option, but even he has had limited success in the majors to date...

Hopefully they do not get placeholders for two years while betting solely on Downs. Get a real second baseman/starting player and worry about the logjam when it becomes an issue. If the Cardinals do not pick up the $12.5million option on Kolten Wong (which is not the given it looked like 8 months ago), hopefully the Sox show some interest...

It is great to have those players. I do hate to see those long term, payroll sucking contracts. But there were also 3 that I either liked or advocated fr the Red Sox to make. 1. Manny Ramirez. He was 27 at the time. A player who reaches free agency at 27 is certainly worth more consideration for a big deal than a 30-31yo free agent. And Manny was a productive hitter for the entire length of his deal, a rarity. 2. Jon Lester - It was looking like he probably would not live up to a 7 or 8 year deal (and he is struggling to do so), but I wanted the Sox to extend him. 3. Mookie Betts. My problem was never his contract, which certainly did not surprise me in terms of years and money. But I did not like the Price contract that (I felt) made it tougher to afford Mookie and (I felt) took us all but out of the Mookie bidding. Beyond that? Not really. Although I certainly liked JD Martinez' contract when compared to the original asking price. And Bogaerts contract was brilliant and one I never thought we'd see happen since he is a Boras client and those players rarely avoid free agency with extensions...

While I can certainly understand the point about preferring to see the Sox win when it’s more dependent on the baseball acumen of the front office as opposed to the wallet of the owner, we have reached a point (some time ago, actually) where if the Sox were NOT amongst the highest spending teams, it would be a statement to the fans that they were simply no longer worth it. But it should never come to the point where the team with the third highest payroll in MLB is nightly trotting our starting pitchers with the pedigree of the current Sox staff....

As you are asking, I'm going to go with Kyle Lewis...

Possibly also trade for a pitcher in the final year of his deal. Interestingly, the bulk of the Astros rotation fits that description, in Verlander, Greinke and McCullers...

Per Fangraphs, Eckersley was more valuable as a starter, earning 41 of his 61 fWAR in that role. The thing about closers is, they’re useless if you’re trailing. Not really true for a good SP...

Nope. Even she was bummed out. She wanted a pitcher...

“Yeah!! Dylan Covey!” said no one ever...

So if they sign him, he has to pay it back...

Sale’s contract was actually only one year longer, right?