Hugh2

I'm sure a good relief pitcher is what would have put this team over the top last year.

Oh, that's well established. The good news is, that is a fixable problem.

Strider was also drafted in the 4th round. Proof that Boston can still draft high school short stops from California with their first pick and still get more pitching talent in the system in any given draft.

I won't argue against that, I do wonder if they would have let him walk or would have traded him if they were able to resign Bogaerts.

If this is all Breslow can do because of constraints, I'm optimistic that he can, but that is going to make me pretty bearish on this team the next couple years. They will need good health, and good luck to really compete. Which has happened, and can happen, but as I said earlier, 2022 seasons happen more often than 2021 when you go diving in the bin.

I'm going to stand outside Fenway this year and hand out paper bags for people to wear over their heads.

If the Sox trade for a front line starter, what good is that if they're unwilling to sign that guy to an extension? In an age where guys don't sign extensions unless you give them what they think they can get in FA that just doesn't seem to make much sense. It makes sense if you're a 90 win team and view that guy as the extra pieces to put you in world series championship mode for the next 3 years. Unless you think a guy would give you a team friendly deal, but why would any pitcher on earth do that in Boston right now? The allocation of resources at this point to try to build a better team today and have a brighter future, is to either draft and develop better pitchers OR go out and spend some freaking money on some pitchers AND draft and develop better pitchers.

The thing about SNell is he was two Cy Youngs, not one but two. He was the best pitcher of baseball then fell off, then came back. That makes him very risky, but it also means that if there's something in him that is fixable, he could be the biggest steal in free agency. If someone can get more of the 2023 version out of them they will be rewarded handsomely. That team is probably not the Sox, if that permutation of Snells future even exists.

For the sake of brevity let me just say yes, I completely agree with that.

You wouldn't think so, there's no smoke, and he doesn't fit the type of pitcher they like. Which isn't hard these days.

That's fair, I don't want them to spend just to spend. I want them to spend on the right guys. Maybe they see something in a guy that they think they can improve in him or get more out of him in an 8 year window. Of course to do that you have to trust your internal pitching apparatus. I wonder what Breslow and company think about Montgomery/SNell. If they don't like those guys then I wonder if they think they could get a guy like Giolito right?

I don't think it was an accident, they just made horrible decisions at building a better roster. They just came off a season in which they were 2 games away from a WS. They thought they were going to compete in 2022. They were wrong. They also could have easily shed payroll at the deadline to get under if they really wanted too.

And the year before they were 6th, a position they'd be pretty close to again in 2023 if they signed a premier guy like Judge e.g. (not that they should have). I think it's more telling to look at how much a team spends over a several year window. It's obvious the Sox are allergic to long term deals, particularly pitchers. Which is an interesting strategy to have when you don't want to draft and develop them.

No, they wait until the 4th round to take guys throwing 90 MPH.

I don't think so either, given the market, teams will compete for his services, and seeing how this may be his only real chance at a big pay day he would take the years over the higher AAV. I think someone going to 176/8 - 170/7 is the team that gets Montg. I want the Sox to grow some balls if they believe in a guy. But I think at this point they're very far into "put up or shut up" territory.

I always say, trust actions not words. They did go over the LT as recently as 2022 after resetting. The Sox are spenders, what has changed is their spending habits. They'd rather go out and pay more in AAV to sign middling guys to short term deals. They spend the money, what they do not do, is go out and sign premier free agents to long term deals. They struck gold with that strategy before. 2013, and came close in 2021. The problem with it is you're 3X more likely to have a 2022 season than you are a 2021.

The only two premier pitchers to sign so far have been OHTANI and YAMAMOTO. One is coming off a surgery and wont' pitch, and we never had a chance anyways. The other maybe things would be different if we were winners, Yama wanted to go to a winner and obviously now was using other teams as leverage to go to LA. The Sox level of interest in Snell/Montgomery will be the real tellers of how serious they are to improve this team. I'm not terribly optimistic.

He did, and it didn't involve any pitching. Had a few good drafts, but no pitchers in there. Maybe Matt Duffy looks good this year with his 88-92 MPH fastball from the right side.

Who do you trade for though? many of the top pitchers on the trading market are only 1 year away from FA. Guys go to free agency now a days, it's very rare they sign an extention and some of those names have even said they are not going to sign an extension. So why trade top prospects (that you will have to replace in free agency) just to go out and get a good pitcher for one year, that you will have to pay $200 million to keep? when you can just go spend that money this year. It's like. Do you want Mayer/Teel/Montgomery??? Or do you want Burnes/FA1/FA2???? Given the teams history and budgetary constraints, I wouldn't have confidence in FA1 and FA2 being very good. You're astronomically better with option 1. You have to spend the money trading for an ACE if you want to keep him around, so why not just spend the money now. Depleting your system when you suck is like throwing in all your chips to try and be a .500 team. I don't want to be a .500 team, I want to compete for World Series Championships.

I mean, it would be better to be able to draft and develop your own. The problem with that is we don't. Breslow seems to be putting together the structure, but that takes years, and I can only imagine the carnage in the streets if the next several years looks like the last several. Even if Breslow does an amazing job at building up the future of this organzaiton, without help from ownership allowing him to spend he is either going to need time.....or he will have to get lucky and be a better dumpster diver than Bloom was.

From what we know now, I think it was the Dodgers all along. Reportedly the Mets offered more money, and he still didn't go back and give them or anyone else a chance to up their offer. Sox might of never been in on it regardless, but at this point, I think it's obvious Yama just wanted to go to LA and used other teams to get the best reported deal. I think we all kind of sensed this possibility when Ohtani signed that siginificantly AAV friendly deal.

Depending on the years, Montgomery probably gets somewhere in the $22-$27 million aav range. That's my guess. 5/$135 - $176/8. I can live with that.

Exactly, I'd love to get some good pitching in here. People will complain that we paid too much, people will complain about the contract not being worth it, etc etc etc. But I'd be much happier having that debate in here, than any of the other ones we've had the past few years.

They've been under on pretty much everyone so far. But tha's fine, so is everyone, including fans. It just feels that we always complain about them not signing free agents and then when they do we complain that they pay them too much. Of course, to be fair, when is the last time we signed a top teir free agent pitcher? Id much rather have that argument in here (that a guy is overpaid) than pretty much any other one we've had.

I won't be surprised if he gets at least 6 years.