Hugh2

I'm not going to make up an arbitrary number that I don't really know....who am I kidding of course I am but I wanna say like 90% of what we here is always being spilled from the player side and not the agent side.

You won’t? Is that you Craig?

He wasn’t, but if he goes into a serious decline you lose a lot more in value in the long run if you had signed him to 6-7 years prior instead. thats the point of overpaying for less years

I mean, I remember David Price. That was ten years ago, before that when was it? yes I love Jurassic park, but just because you should or shouldn’t do something does is not an argument for the Sox not spending more. you want to be the Kansas City Royals? That’s fine, but I think most Sox fans would like to see their team throw their weight around and punch in their weight class. Saying spending to win is not good is completely subjective and you’re entitled to that opinion. I’d argue you need some kind of lopsidedness. Yes, teams like LA and NY spend more and win more is that bad? They have the market to support and drive love towards the sport, do you think Tampa Bay would ever bring in the same kind of revenue to the sport if they had the same success as LA? I doubt it. evil empires are good, you either root for them or against them. One thing that made 2004 so special was the fact we beat NY to get there. People love to cheer against the LA Lakers, the New England Patriots and now the LA Dodgers. I’m not even asking to be those teams, I’m advocating to be runner up, or next in line behind that and I just pointed out the Boston has the market to support that if they chose to.

If you gave me Marte/Schwarber/Joe Ryan I'd be in heaven.

I think this is subjective. Both Marte and Bichette were 21 years old when they started their MLB careers. Bichette has 20 WAR, when Marte was Bo's age he had only put up 15.4 WAR. Bichette is in his prime where' Marte might be good for another few years.....or not. I'd still roll the dice on Marte for the right price. I feel like he can still be really good for a few more years.

I think we can expect some big moves in the trade market this offseason. But they're going to spend the money too, I think the writting is on the wall with that. But will it be a big name? or 4 $10 million dollar men?

Exactly, when you think about it, we should be somewhere around the 3rd to 4th highest spender yearly. No reason why you can't do that, dip under the LT every once in a while and occassionally even swing big and out bid LA and NY.

It was also a one year deal and we didn't have to give up any assets to get him, but yeah I get it. Some of the old timers can still get it. Aroldis is also a physical freak of a humn being.

BTV accepts Kyson Witherspoon and Vaughn Grissom for Chris Sale

I'm done with pitchers over 35 years old. I don't mind paying for a few years on the back end of a contract if I'm getting a guy in his prime but I don't want to add AARP guys to our staff.

Agreed, Garcia didn't come up because he was ready but rather because guys kept going down. He looks much better at the plate vs. LHP so I can see him being a roster replacement for Refsnyder when he's ready but I think he needs at least a few more months in WOO. WHICH MEANS! we either convince Refsynder to play one more year or we are going out and adding a guy to replace him.

One thing I've been considering lately is that the cash payroll is going to be lower than the LT payroll. I think this drastically increases the chances that we not only go over the first LT limit but that we can spend up until the 2nd and maybe even a little over under the right scenario.

If someone goes down or get hurt, we could go from a glut of outfield players to having it be an area of need. Still, in that scenario the outfield is still probably in better shape than the infield now. If the Sox brough in a legit infielder and a legit ace by packaging up Duran/Abreu separately with some value added the team is going to be better off. I'm also open to the scenario, where the Sox trade two outfielders not named Roman for a 2b/3b and an SP2 and go out and sign someone like Kyle Tucker. I'm not saying this is going to happen or these are the guys but imagine subtracting Abreu/Duran but adding Marte/Ryan/Tucker. I think the team becomes a better team and can win 90 games, maybe even more if they retained Bregman to but now I might really be hitting the pipe. One thing to consider is the cash payroll is much lower than the luxury tax payroll. If the Sox have a hard "cash budget" then they likley have more to spend than we are all guessing here because up until the draft pick penalties going above the LT threshold is just money, which they will spend up until a certain point. I think a more realistic situation is to expect one big signing (moderate to big) and one big trade and a few moves we didn't see coming in the mold of the Aroldis Chapmans of the world, which we saw from last year can work out sometimes. But I really do not like a Yoshida/Garcia platoon in LF. Garcia might be a nice platoon player one day but I think he still needs to cook a little bit more

I like the "hobbled and broken-down pitchers" as projects, I don't like it when that's all they do. I liked Buehler so much more last year because they ALSO went out and got Crochet. Unlike a few years ago when all we got for Christmas was Corey Kluber

I think it would be the most Red Sox thing ever to have Sale not be very good (injury related) for almost half a decade, go to another team and win a CY Young, and then come back here and either stink or get hurt again. And we'd see the same people who complained about him every day here, then complained about trading him, will complain about trading back for him. I like Sale, I wish we didn't trade him, but he is injury prone and will be 37 next year. That ship has sailed.

And of those 4 how many are "sustainable winners"? they were all window teams, with the exception of Houston who did seem to extend their window, but they also started paying guys to do that. You've proven that you don't have to be the biggest spender to win, but I never denied that fact, but it's still ALSO a fact that there is a correlation between spending and winning. The Red Sox have the 3rd highest valuation of any mlb team. Last year they had the 5th highest revenue, but if you exlcude NY and LA the other teams were only $10 million more than them. They've been top 5 the past 10 years, and I'd argue that if you take the losing seasons recently out, given Bostons market size we should be the 3rd highest revenue generating team. There is ZERO reason why we can't spend. We can spend on players, player development, drafting, coaching, scouting etc etc. The point you're proving is that other things add value and create a winning atmosphere as well but when there is an undeniable link between spending and success a fan of the 3rd richest franchise in MLB should demand his club do both. Henry has spent in the past, he thinks he's the smartest guy in the room and tried to go cheap. I fully expect he has it in him to pivot back and try to do both. LA is the model to follow, of course we will never be LA, but we never had to be NY to beat NY but we acted pretty darn close to it to get there. I get there is risk, but to me, there is a difference between not spending heavily on free agent pitchers and then practically never spending. Crochet was a good move, but aside from trades when is the last time we signed a big time free agent pitcher? you can't keep trading 4 top prospects for elite pitching, eventually you will have a few good players and no one else on your roster. A Boston team, that returns to it's winning ways AND DOES not fall back into the 2020-2024 trap is one that does both, spends resources on drafting, trading and developing talent but also goes out and take a few big rips. You can convince in any given offseason that a certain set of guys "aren't the guys" but I refuse to accept year after year without any big free agent pitching aquisitions is the way to go.

So 3 in the past 20 years? and I mean, how many years did those teams suck to get top 3 picks to get there? the braves were horribly for like an entire decade. We are not a small market team. It IS possible to win, spend, and develop players. The Dodgers have a loaded farm system, and spend like crazy and yet still manage to dip below the luxury tax every few years. The Sox could easily do that with the revenue they have and enjoy sustained success. They just need the will and the demand for it.

Yeah look that's silly, you're right here. But at the end of the day if you don't pay the price of admission you don't get into the show. But go down the list of past world series winners, almost every single one of them has big name free agent pitchers on their roster. You get what you pay for, and yes that involves risk. But the boy who never asks a girl to dance never dances with a girl.

but like, that can work against you too. You sign a guy to 3 years and he's injured for 2 of them and then pitched great for another 3 afterwards. It's not the longevity that should scare you, it should be paying for a guy at 36 years of age and up.

This may be true, speed allows guys to make up for late jumps. But a defender who can jump quick will always cover more ground. Especially if they have better instincts and speed, which many CF do. More fly balls are hit to LF, because there are more RHH but over more balls go to CF. So having a guy who can cleanly make a play is very important.

I don't care enough to look up AGAIN what the exact number is but I thought it is something like 1/3 of all pitchers nowadays will have TJ surgery. So like.....if you sign guys you're going to get guys who have had the surgery or will at some point.

I don't think Durans value has dropped off as much as people think it has. He was still a 4 WAR player last year, That still makes him a fringe all star level player. The knock on him the year prior was he had a career year and he might not ever do that again, now a team might see a 3.5-4 war as more of a floor for him. I think by far the drop off in his value is mostly just having one less year of control.

The thing is Abreu never hit well against LHP even when he was exposed to them in the minors. What makes Abreu different than the other platoon LHB who can't hit LHP???

Detroit is never going to part with Skubal for just Duran no matter what math you use.