Hugh2

This is my point exactly, there's so much we DON'T know. To be fair, filling in the holes with those unknowns is the difference between the Sox screwing this thing up and REALLY SCREWING this thing up.

fair, everyone has a leakage problem. So when something hits the news I always wonder who it makes look bad, then I think who must of leaked it, and then I think to myself WHY would that person leak such a thing? Boras is really really good at what he does.

God....I really wish we could insert GIFs in here.

But this is just my point. How do we even know about the offer? Because Boras leaked it. Sox don't leak anything. I also read Bogaerts said if the Sox offered the Story contract he would have accepted. At the very least, they misjudged his market. That I don't blame them for, who the heck would have guessed he got 280/11. I said he'd get $217 and was practically crucified for suggesting that (maybe a slight exaggeration). Still, why they wouldn't give their best offer with what they were comfortable with and re-evaluate matching in FA later is beyond me. I hope some good comes out of this. I hope the Sox take a deep deep look at their evaluation and negotiation process because of this and come out better on the other side.

Trae Turner at 300 million doesn't looks so bad right now.

There's two types of people. A.) Bloom haters B.) People who dislike a lot of Blooms moves, like some of them, are generally unhappy with the team but because they're not clamoring for Bloom to burn at the stake they're like....in love with him or something.

What we do know is he is widely viewed as having an elite hit tool. He's going to put the bat on the ball and not strike out a lot. You can do some research and read what everyone has written about him. That seems to be the one constant across the board for Yoshida.

I don't think the media is lying, but they only tell one side of the story. You can't really blame them, somebody leaks something and what is the media supposed to do? not their job? I blame people for sucking things up without taking it with a grain of salt. Imagine you're Scott Boras and you are offered 5/100 for said player, but you say NO we want 10/300. You know darn well that's not the other team's final offer but you leak their weak ass starting point offer to the press and they report it and everyone criticizes the team for lowballing said player. Now Boras has leverage. "See, everyone knows your offer is garbage, you better up the anti" You get the other team upping their offer without doing or saying much you're winning the negotiations. Also, the pressure gets put on the team with that level of negative press to get something done. It's a smart move by Boras, he certainly knows how to play Boston fans like a fiddle. In a way, people who swallow these stories up help inflate player salaries. I have zero doubt in my mind to some extent the Bogaerts situation was messed up, and they deserve a LOT of strife for it, maybe even some firings should be in order. but everything we know is what has come out from Boras's side. Using the Sox opening offer they brought on day one to the negotiating table to put them down is just stupid. I would like to apologize to everyone for not being a Boras stooge who likes to regurgitate what he leaks to the press.

Why does one of Hosmer/Dalbec have to be traded? I think one does at some point, but my guess is Dalbec could start the season in AAA.

SOX DON'T SIGN ANYONE AHHHHH sox sign someone YEAH BUT...LIKE....WHY DID THEY SPEND MONEY MORE THAN EVERYONE ELSE. Ummmm...because that's exactly how free agency works?

I mean to be fair, it's still too early to judge now. Betts is probably the guy who breaks that streak, but if he starts to seriously decline.......then not so.

The team who offers the most money is the team who gets the FA 95% of the time, isn't this what we want....the Sox to win a bid and get a guy who improves the team? If they signed any of the big free agents this year it would have been because they offered more than every other team. This is how it works.

I wanna see REDS scouting notes on Yoshida.

And you're a professional scout who knows so much about Yoshida? You're right on the first 1/2 of your statement. This team has done a s*** poor job of holding onto its talent. But you fall flat from having a coherent opinion in the second half. If Yoshida is as good as they hope he is, he's worth every penny. Maybe more.

It can both be true that the Sox FO has really messed some things up and the Sports media loves to live in a perpetual state of misleading the public and half-reporting every story out there with an agenda. It must get tiring having to be negative, heck look at why LOU stepped down from WEEI.

how can we simultaneously criticize the Sox for being too cheap and then spending too much on a guy at the same time? that's.....stupid.

No one suggested it because those guys declined 1/2 way into their team control years.

I'm trying to imagine what the Sox budget would look like right now IF they resigned guys like Benintendi/Betts/Bogaerts (no opt out). A lot of assumptions have to be made here because everything is about timing. Maybe Benintendi signs for 15 per after his downward trend, but he might have been less likely to do so if he wanted to bank on himself bouncing back (because he did after they traded him). I'm going to figure penciling him in around $20 per is fair. Betts at $35 million per and Bogaerts at $25 and Devers at $35 (Devers I'm assuming we sign now, could have been less if he signed an extension earlier). Under this scenario who knows who we end up signing and who we don't. I'm going to take the liberty of believing Kike Hernandez is your starting day 2nd in 2023 and Trevory Story was never signed. This puts the payroll at $279 million. with the pitching just as horrible last year maybe worse. That team probably competes, but also probably hasn't reset in years. We probably don't have Mayer/Bleis in the system either. The system as a whole wouldn't have a lot of other guys in it too but that rabbit hole is not worth going down for example e.g. probably won't end up with Roman Anthony last year, but for all, we know they hit on someone else, etc etc. and it's too early to judge. But the system would be pretty thin. and we'd be looking at having lost draft picks and almost no room to sign guys in the international market year in and year out. I understand that's not most fans' concern, but who is starting? because they don't have the money to add to this rotation and Henry would be looking at zero ability to reset the luxury tax in coming years. Even LAD reset several years ago and it's looking HIGHLY likely the go under this year. You may not believe the NY Mets will reset next year (which I do) but they at least have the money coming off the books to do so). Maybe the Sox don't go hard after the bullpen, in which case they have an elite lineup but zero pitching. This is not the argument for not signing all these guys, everything is relative. I'm a big fan of resigning guys earlier, and It's something I hope the Sox start doing because this AIN'T working. Maybe someone from the Devers/Betts/Bogaerts camp takes less money if you're signing them at an earlier age because they see the value in holding out to FA. But here is some food for thought. Everything is about timing, at a certain point in time, JBJ looked like a perennial all-star. After the 2016 season, JBJ looked like a lock to be a .800 OPS guy with GG in CF. That was his age-26 season, and as a 26-year-old he put up more WAR that year than Devers did this year at 26. If we had JBJ on our team RIGHT now in his age 26 seasons with 4 years of team control left and the Sox signed him to a $300/14-year deal it would look like a good deal right now. No one would hate it. Imagine having to pay JBJ for 14 years. There's risk in extending guys too. Just some food for thought.

You can't keep all of them, some guys chose to bet on themselves and go to free agency, and some can be had for their ridiculous "buy now" price. But it does raise ones eyebrow when they seemingly let them all walk. Benintendi/Betts/Bogaerts/ Devers? To be fair Bogaerts did sign an extension, and maybe it could have been done without an opt-out if the Sox opened up their pocket books just a little bit more, or maybe not if they tacked on a few more years. The time to extend guys and save substantial amounts of money is going to be earlier in their careers. That ship sailed with Bogaerts, Betts, and Benintendi years ago. They should have been locked up in the DD era. Devers could have been under Blooms watch and is entirely on him.

Yankees showing interest in Eovaldi. per report. Hmmmm, I wonder if this means he's about to sign somewhere (NOT NY) any hour now.

I do not care to look it up rigth now but I remember researching this back in 2016. The success rates of pitchers post TJ. It's not a guarantee guys come back.....but it's actually pretty high. Sometimes guys come back as good or even better. Verlander isn't just a freak of nature for what he's doing, but because of how long he has done it. Most of these guys getting 10-14 year contracts are going to suck for 1/2 1/3 of it.

I've made this argument time and time again on this board. Going after a premier free agent doesn't guarantee success. Winning the offseason doesn't win the regular season. I used this argument more recently to point out that trading away all our prospect talent for a pitcher or outfielder now when you were in last place is just stupid. Still, you'd expect a big market team like Boston to at least be able to compete for a wildcard by augmenting their team via FA.

The Sox have said they're 100% committed to Whitlock as a starter, and have said time and time again that Houck has been asked to be ready to start. More recently they've said that the stronger the bullpen gets the more likely it's that Houck will start. As of right now Sale Paxton Bello Pivetaa Whitlock Houck. So at least two guys have to go down before you dip into that depth, and there's still a good chance they grab a starter, making that number 3. Also, the Sox aren't going to promote guys based on future talent but rather who may better help the MLB club immediately. Mata may be the best talent they have in the upper minors, and he may be the guy to get the call first mid-season but on opening day they' probably go with Winc/Crawford over him. Mata is on the depth chart, and I expect him to move UP that depth chart, and I expect him to make his MLB debut some time in 2023. But penciling him into the starting day rotation is just bonkers.

I haven't looked it up, but it can take 3 months to heal from a grade 2 lat tear, which means he wouldn't start rehabbing until around right now. That's plenty of time to be ready by opening day even if he hasn't started throwing yet, which he probably wouldn't until sometime soon anyways.

And how good of a job have they done signing homegrown talent early on lately? This also doesn't answer the question of how you find room on the roster for Cutter and Mata who are both slated to start the season in AAA. If Paxton and Sale start the season healthy, then there's zero chance of that happening. And if they're healthy they can compete....don't we WANT to compete? Also, have we not learned our lessons of players development being stunted by being rushed to the majors? we see it time and time again. These are two guys who still need time in the minors, Cutter probably needs to start transitioning to a bullpen role. Mata could be very good, but if he's not ready why rush him? there's also a new incentive to NOT rush guys. The Mariners have an extra FIRST ROUND draft pick this year because Julio Rodriguez won rookie of the year. You only have to finish in the top 5 and be on 2 of the 3 majors top 100 prospect lists. Mata isn't that, but he might be by next year. This just feels like giving up on the 2023 season before we even have to and in the process possibly making us worse in the long run.