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And I was never talking about every oldie, rather specifically Polanco who is even riskier because of his profile. Poor bat speed, and poor exit velocites. I want to add guys around Mayer, Casas, Campbell, and Anthony......I'd just be very dissapointed if it was Polanco.

What could possibly of happened over the last 6 years to give you any kind of bad feeling about the moves this team will make?

Really? what are you going to tell me next? that Dante Bichette is actually Bo????

This is a great point, and honestly if Pipeline is saying Mayer was the #1 prospect in the draft and Al Leiter is the #2 prospect in the draft.....who's to say Texas didn't legit see Leiter as the #1 or #2 player in the draft and that's why they took him #2?

5/125 would be more than fair for Bregman. Maybe add in some vesting options if he stays healthy.

If John Henry did this and posted another photo of himself smoking a cigar shutting up his naysayers that would be awesome. I'd put the odds of that happening at slightly greater than zero. Then again the odds of every atom in your body aligning perfectly with the wall and allowing you to walk thru the wall are theoretically greater than 0 percent. It's about .0000000000000000000000000000001% I think the Odds of John Henry growing some balls is higher than that but not by much.

People seemed pissed, understandly so. Not that I have much faith in them doing anything significant BUT... If the Sox open up the year having signed Bregman/Okamoto. Bregman/Bellinger. Bichette/Ohamoto. Bichette/Bellinger. Marte/Bellinger. or Marte/Okamoto How would we feel overall about the offseason? I'll just pick one. Lets say we ended up adding Sonny Gray/Alex Bregman/Cody Bellinger. This team has the options out there to have the offseason we mostly want. But they have lost off goodwill with most fans. Until they do something, given their recent track record, I think they deserve the grief they get.

I mean, "passed over by three teams" is an interesting way to describe a guy who was the #4 pick overall" By that logic every guy who isn't drafted #1 is "passed over" 1052 players played in 2025, 8 of them were former #1 overall picks. So 99.2395437% of all MLB players are "passed over" Only the White Sox are going to get a non passed over player next year. ADD: I know what you meant red, I'm just having a little fun with numbers while I sip my morning coffee.

Even college guys who breeze thru the minors typically need a full season of development, putting his ETA at 2027. But that's usually top of the draft elite ready talent. If he hits, he probably still needs 2-3 years to cook min. Lets also never forgot. You can trade guys. If you knew your outfield was set for the next 10 years, and you knew a prospect was going to be stud you'd still draft him 100% of the time because you can always trade guys. If you see something in a guy, you like him, and you think you can develop him you are NEVER looking at current needs of the big league team when making most trades.

I'm stealing the spirit of this comment from another commentor in another online forum. The Sox received Isaiah Jackson for Vaughn Grissom The Sox received Vaugn Grissom for Chris Sale The Sox received Chris sale for Michael Kopech Michael Kopech was drafted with compensation pick received from losing Jacoby Ellsbury Jacoby Ellsbury was drafted with the compensation pick received from losing Orlando Cabrera Orlanda Cabrera was received from trading away Nomar Garciaparra. The return from Nomar lives on!!!!!!!

Bichette, Alonso, Bregman, Schwarber are all guys that could make this team better. im not so certain on the Japanese guys. Okamoto maybe but Murakami scares the crap out of me.

But the under 23 guy likely comes with 6 years of team control. So shouldn’t we really be looking at value from 23-28?

The problem with this is two fold. A.) I’m not comparing Polanco to any 23 year old nor am I saying we have to go out and get a youngster instead of him. B.) comparing a 23 year old to a 33 year old isn’t the same thing as comparing 23-28 vs. 33-38

I never once said guys can’t be good past that age, only that the vast majority of guys fall off a cliff before then. the fact that you are literally going back to the 1940’s and have such a small list of a lot of HOFers actually proves my point. how big is the list of the guys who were good and fell off a cliff by 35? That list would be the size of a book, Think about how insanely enormous that list would be.

At the end of the day getting Alonso and Bregman was a pipe dream and 3B is a much much much bigger hole so this is kind of whatever. But the cards are starting to fall....will Breslow be left without a dance partner?

Yes, this is exactly my point.

Personally I think you need balance. I did want Alonso though. Now I'm wondering if our best case scenario would be Bregman/Marte......which I'd be more than happy with.

I’ve seen a lot of the comments you’re liking that are in line with my thinking so I’m thinking something is getting lost in translation here. Trust me I don’t care as much as my unreasonable number of posts may suggest lol

Which is a weird because I’m not taking about any 23 year olds here, I was specifically and exclusively talking about Polanco

Ok I'm done with this because I feel like I'm poo pooing on Polanco as if he kicked my dog and called my mom a *** or something. I got nothing against the guy and hope I'm wrong. I just think he's a poor bet for the 2026 Boston Red Sox who can do much better.

You want to play semantics here and define what I said? ok, using the term "great" was probably a little far fetched, perhaps I should have said really really good consistent players. Also using the 34 and 23 is a little ridiculous as the average age of a rookie is 24.5 Most guys aren't even in the league yet and I'm not advocating building a team of 23 year olds. I'm advocating AGAINST signing Polanco because I think he is a huge risk and will be a bust.

I'm 43, and was semi professional athlete for a few years. I get it, but understand there is a big difference between us and them. I worked my ass off from 40-42, lost the 60 lbs I had gained, lost an addtional 20 and got down to 7% body fat and looked better than I ever had at any point in my entire life. But the fact of the matter is I had to put in twice the amount of work and I was playing sports against professionals anymore. If I put the same amount of work in at 27 I'd be even better and stronger then. None of us escape father time. Again I'm 43, and in many ways I feel 10X better than these 20 year old shmucks but at the end of the day I'm 43....not 23. It ain't the same. Doing something well, and then doing it at the pro level is an entirely different thing.

I'm not saying guys north of 35 aren't good. Many of them are, the point is most don't make it there to be good. Polanco could OPS .600 next year and look even worse coming into the following spring and not be on a team and he won't make it there. He might not make it to 34.

The vast majority of MLB players who play the game are out of the game at 35. The average retirement age is 29.5 the average length of a career is 5.6 years. Your memory is failing you because whenever you think of a player who is old you think of the good ones. No one remembers the guys who fall off and stop playing. You think Polanco is more likely to be a Beltre and less likely to be a Matt Kemp??? Based on what because on top of his age Polanco has the skill set that ages quicker. Look up his statcast page, he's in the bottom of the league in bat speed and exit velocity. That is verifiable data. Look up what the age curve is for guys with below average bat speed and exit velocities it's below average you can look that up too, it's verifiable. I'm not emotional about this, I could care less. I'm just stating that Polanco is a bad bet, if you want to make the argument that he is going to defy the odds that's fine...but why? you haven't provided any logical argument here. Your answer can be as simple as you like him and you believe in him and THAT'S FINE!!! You're allowed to like guys but there's not real reason to think he's not a bad bet compared to other guys. Because he just simply is.

Here is another way of looking at it, guys in the early 30's outperform guys in their early 20's because theres less of them. If you added in all the guys who stopped playing because they fell off the cliff the guys in their 20's would blow them away in value. Any year could be the year they go from a 3-4 WAR go to negative value real quick. Players physically peak at age 25 but often don't show signs of it for a few more years as they're still in their "prime" but when physical tools start to deteroiorate the decline accelerates. That accelaration drastically picks up speed at 30 and almost completely wipes out all guys careers at age 35. THat's the risk you take every time you sign a guy who is 30 to a multi year deal. You could get 5-6 more years of good production out of them or 1-2 or NONE. And it has been proven through many studies that poor bat speed and low exit velocity guys hit that wall sooner. Polanco is both, and he's likely not going to take a 1 year deal. No matter how you slice it, he's a massive risk. And I'm ok with risk, but not him.....he's not the guy. Yes younger is better, that's NOT ANAGOLOUS with having all youth. I agree with you, we need some adults in the room and you need to take some chances on some guys. Young guys can be sent back down and optioned......you can't do that with vets under contract.