S5Dewey

...which may be one of the reasons I like this team. When you look at Beni, JBJ, Mookie, XBo, Pedey, and Vazquez (and maybe even Hanley) you find a bunch of home-grown players there. No, we don't fill every position with home-growners because we've traded/signed for our pitchers, but I see nothing wrong with that. Bill James said many years ago that the best way to use Free Agency is to fill as many positions as possible from within and then fill in the holes with FA's. In the case of the 2017 Red Sox we've filled the holes with home-grown players (in trades) and then filled the remaining holes with FA's. This has Bill Jame's long-term fingerprints all over it. It may not be practical to think that we can do this every three or four years but we should do it when we can.

I agree completely. I like to say that on any level "There's no substitute for having been there". Given the youth of our team that responsibility now falls onto Pedrioa - or David Price, which in itself is a bit of a scary thought.

The sooner we can get it out of our heads that we're going to replace Papi the better off we're going to be. We're not going to be able to replace him - at least with only one player. Instead of thinking about replacing HIM we need to think about replacing his offense - which is happening to as much of a degree as is possible. My two concerns about replacing the man are that IMO his clubhouse influence is possibly irreplaceable, as his ability to be 'clutch' - and some people question the validity of either of those. So we'll wait and see.

I hear what you're saying but at the same time I'm not one to go out and 'borrow trouble'. We have quality players locked up for three or more years so it's not imperative that we have ML ready players in AAA. We now have 3+ years to replenish our farm system, at which time we're looking at Groome, etc. being ready to make the jump to Fenway. There's a real chance that by 2022 the Red Sox won't be as good as they look right now but given the changes that MLB is making that may become a cycle in MLB - that the strong teams become weaker as the weaker teams get stronger and so ad infinitum. For now I'm willing to be on the leading edge of that cycle. It's more fun than being on the trailing edge. There's also always the argument to be considered also that the teams with money will always find a way to have an advantage and as long as JH is driving the bus I don't see the Red Sox as ever being a team without the money. So in a nushell, am I "concerned" Sure, a little. But let's see how things shake out before we start wringing our hands.

The amount of RS each team gets has to be in flux every year because the amount of revenue the teams take in every year varies. I haven't seen any numbers for previous years but I haven't looked either. I will later. But my guess is that it's significant. I haven't read the entire CBA - I haven't needed a sleeping pill that badly - but nothing I've read there says anything connecting exceeding the LT with draft picks or international signings. But didn't we lose our right to international signings for a couple of years due to some punitary penalty the Sox are paying for "mismanaging" the payouts to the signings?

I don't know about the international signings but I'm quite sure that starting in 2017 any team that goes over its LT limit forfeits all of it's Revenue Sharing. Actually it's a bit more complicated than that. As I understand it, each team pays 31% of their baseball related revenue into a fund and that money is then equally divided among the 30 teams. Consequently the teams with the lowest revenue pay in the least but because every team gets the same amount of revenue sharing they fare the best. At the other end of the spectrum is the teams with the most revenue sharing. They pay in the most and therefore get back less than they paid in. However, starting in 2017 any team that exceeds the LT level will not get any revenue sharing money for that year. It's pretty cut and dried in that if you exceed the LT level you don't get your share of the revenue sharing pie. It's on a year by year basis and since these teams get NO revenue sharing there is no escalation for exceeding the LT level in multiple years - they're getting nothing back the first year and it remains at nothing every year! At least that's my understanding after having read it and reread it and reread it. If someone got something different from that after reading it I'm more that willing to listen.

This raises the question with me of exactly when we have to be under the LT Limit. Is there a date certain when it's calculated? Is it an average daily salary over the entire year? Moon, you seem to know as much about the LT as anyone here. What's your thought?

Ok. Now let's look at the flip side of that. Buch is also a guy who can put up a dozen W's for a team in a half season, without accumulating a lot of L's. And when he goes down those 12 W's are still there. One of the good things about Buch is that when he goes down it's because he's injured and everyone knows it. It's not like he just loses his stuff and the team keeps running him out there hoping he'll suddenly get it back. The trick is knowing when to stop using him - and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know when to do it, based on his history. I agree that his value is limited. If it weren't for those horrendous stretches he's be making David Price money.... and deserving it. That's his limiting factor.

It could happen, but I'm always leery of letting a good player get out of our control. There was talk of that with Lester too and we all know how that worked out.

We'll agree to disagree on that then. IMO GM's are egocentric in that they're only interested in what will help their team. There'll be someone who'll be willing to take on the risk of Buch's fragility if it could mean the difference between playing baseball in October and playing golf then. I don't see DD giving him away for less than something of high value in return. It's not like he's a position player. Again, from nearly everyone's point of view, 'You can't have too much pitching". Even when it pertains to the Sox.

Nice post, King. And BTW, it's great to see you back out of "retirement".

I'm more optimistic than you are as to what we can get for Buch. This team is realllly dealing from a position of strength in any negotiations involving Buch in that there's nothing we NEED.... ok.. other than a 3Bman. I can see a GM who feels that he's one solid starter away from the PS holding his nose and paying dearly for Buch, maybe with a solid 3B or maybe with two solid minor leaguers with a future to help rebuild what we've traded away. And if not.... we keep him. At the risk of being redundant, "You can't have too much pitching".

Let me add to that, if I may. IMO our 'up the middle' defense is probably as good as anyone's in the league. Pedey & JBJ are GG caliber, our catching duo is very good defensively, and while Bogaerts isn't GG material he's steady and dependable. When adding Sale to our roster and thinking about the rest of the staff I like our chances very much. This team probably won't score as many runs as last year but with out pitching and defense we won't have to.

Yeha.... that's probably a god idea, and one that occured to me too. Or my daughter for that matter. Some things are just between us guys, OK? :D

Wait a minute here. Please don't go putting words in to my mouth. It's not sanitary! You have NEVER seen me root against Bogaerts. Ya...I've said that he's not a GG defender but that's just stating a fact. I want for him to do better and better. Ya, I wanted him at 3B but only because (IMO) it would have helped THE TEAM.

Oh, NO! You're not going to drag me into another debate on Iglesias I have no problem with admitting when I'm wrong. I was one of Hanley's biggest critics in 2015 but I was on his bandwagon BIG TIME by July of 2016. And as critical as I've been of Sandoval (a/k/a The Fat man) I'd like nothing better than to be proven wrong about him, too.

Oh, pulleeze. Craig Kimblel in 2016 was the definition of reputation over substance. He had the reputation of being able to throw strikes so the hitters were swinging at pitches they should have been laying off from. The guy couldn't find the strike zone with both hands and a flashlight. Did you even see how many 3 (and 4) balls counts he had? At one time he was so wild that Farrell had to go out and get him. There was even a segment of the posters here who were begging for Koji to be the closer again. I know there are a lot of excuses for why he pitched the way he did, and I don't buy many of them. I tend to fall back to Bill Parcell's statement of "Don't tell me about the pain, just show me the baby". I truly hope that he is significantly better next year because if he isn't we're going to lose several games while Farrell figures out that he can't leave a player out there just because he used to be good and because he makes a lot of money.

Not all of us. Only the ones with a sense of humor.

I don't get all this love for trading Pom. If we're going to be making a move it should be one that first, improves the team, and second, helps us on the Luxury Tax. Pom is scheduled to make $1.35M in 2017, almost exactly 1/10 of what Buch will make. I'm not in favor of trading any of our pitchers because "you can't have too much pitching", but if one is traded it should be Buch. He's more likely to bring back players that can help the team (now or in the future) and he gets us below the LT threshold.

I'm in. Literally LOL about the line of dirt thing.

IMO the FO has put most of their eggs in Pablo's basket. In a worst-case scenario where he's unable to play at even a decent level there may be enough talent around him to carry the team, or if not there's always Brock Holt. Holt's not THE answer at 3B but given the people around him he should be AN answer while either Devers develops or we find a mediocre 3B at a reasonable price to take his place. Whatever happens, we shouldn't be any worse at 3B in 2017 than we were at 2016.

OK. But it's going to be that way whether we made these trades this year or not. At some point a few years down the road our core of players is going to become eligible for free agency. I have no problem with trading the players behind them in the depth chart to win now because the same issues are going to exist in 3-4 years regardless of what we do today. DD's trades give us a window when our team should be very, very good with the potential for a WS Championship (or two). I'll take that over continued (comparative) mediocrity for now and beyond.

Agreed. If this team doesn't win next year it shouldn't be the fault of the offense.

I don't think there's any doubt that we're going to have to be around it every year, but we have to be under occasionally to because the tax rate escalates every consecutive year that we're over. IIRC it maxes out after 3 years @ 50%. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong in that. Also, starting in 2017, each year a team exceeds the LT limit they are penalized by not receiving Revenue Sharing that year.

I had the feeling we were becoming a young team from eyeballing the roster but I didn't realize the extent. Thanks, Moon. With the Sale trade DD was able to set the team up for the next few years. DD has done his job. Now it's incumbent on the scouting group to draft the right people to allow us to replenish the team when/if our current players opt for Free Agency. If the scouting group comes through we could be in for a long run of success.