News for ya. In a free market, worth is determined by what the buyer will pay.

Worth to Atlanta pretty clearly != worth to Boston.

So you don't consider any player to be "overpaid". ;)

I think Andrew Jones, for one, wasn't worth his contract ;).

Ah, but see, now we're quibbling over different semantics.

'overpaid' is different from 'worth.' An item is 'worth' what the buyer is willing to pay, but that doesn't necessarily mean the buyer was smart with his money. :)

It's still early, but I really think that Washington might finish above Atlanta in the NL East this year.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's incongruous to have a discussion of a player's worth while at the same time saying he was 'chasing the money' in relation to loyalty.

If somebody's willing to give him $10m, and you're not willing to go over $5m, why is your perception of his loyalty worth $5 million? How will that affect him, either way? You can wish he remained 'loyal,' but his acceptance of an offer you weren't willing to tender isn't a reflection of his worth, positive or negative.

Well, I mean worth in, you know, his intrinsic worth, and not his market value ;).

I don't think anyone said "chasing the money" is a bad thing. But to blame the Braves for not paying more than they considered his actual value to be is silly.

Ken Burns is making a 10th Inning to "Baseball", covering the period from 1993 to 2008... it's to come out in Spring 2010:

MLB.com/Entertainment: News | MLB.com: News

Oh, I totally misread what you were saying.

You were ripping on the guy ebaying his rooting interest, not on Smoltz.

My apologies.

Oh yeah... I don't blame Smoltz at all.

:redface:, sorry if that's what the impression it gave off!

Now I'm eating these words. Kansas City is charging hard and it's just ridiculously frustrating when that money, if properly invested in a market where Pat Burrell is getting $8M per year, Adam Dunn and Ben Sheets are still out there, and Brian Fuentes made about $1M more than your team just handed Kyle Farnsworth.

Dayton Moore has just signed his way into 2009 being a make or break year for him and, frankly, he doesn't have the team on the field to do that. In a couple of short months, he's gone from "above average and having the team on the right track" to "how could you do this to the team?"

It's one thing when you don't have the resources to compete- you just can't do anything about that until MLB fixes its problems. It's another when you do actually convince the owner to open up the checkbook and then you spend it badly.

SI

Looks like Atlanta has signed Kawakami from Japan (there's a you tube of some of the curves this guy throws, just sick. Even with the smaller ball it's impressive), and will sign Lowe to a 4 year 60 Million dollar contract.

(and I'm impressed. I thought that when Lowe rejected 3/36 from the Mets he wasn't going to see a better offer)

While I would have loved to see Lowe with the Mets, I'm glad the Mets didn't play into Boras' hands.

Fixed.

That preceding argument is really starting to get old. If Florida and Tampa Bay can compete in this market, then so can and should Kansas City and Pittsburgh.

This seems like a bad year to have turned down ARB. Veritek will be lucky to get half of what arb would have got him

At least SI is acknowledging that his owner sucks, which is problem #1. I give him credit for that.

And no way do I give Lowe 4/60. Glad the Mets passed.

MUCH better than signing AJ Burnett.

I think we've gone down this road before just a few times but if you're going to call me out my quote specifically, I'm going to take a chance to respond. Especially when it's made with such a mindlessly repeated meme with no real thought behind it on this board and in the media, in general.



Yeah, how is that Florida and Tampa dynasty going? Florida won a World Series with a huge payroll, dismantled their team, and crushed their fan base. Only to do it a second time and how's that attendance down there now with that good young team?* And Tampa? Let's wait until they keep building and see how they do the next few years. Remember how Colorado was the hot up an coming team last season who would be around for years. Or Milwaukee? How'd that go last year? Minnesota's new GM isn't half the GM Terry Ryan was and in the next couple of years, that's going to eliminate half of the tandem of every big market fan's "what about Minnesota and Oakland" excuse which ultimately was more a product of Oakland and Minnesota having two of the best front offices in all of baseball along with Boston.

In short, yes, it's still patently unfair. If you're a large team which isn't run piss poorly (re: Orioles, etc), you can compete every year and reload, like a large college program. The smaller teams basically have to hope everything comes together in their window of a couple of years before it's time to rebuild again, flatten the salary and save money for the next time up. You can break that cycle, but it's the exception rather than the rule.

If you're New York, you can wallpaper over stupid ass moves like Carl Pavano with hundred dollar bills and overpay to keep your declining players like Bernie Williams so you don't have to roll the dice with marginal or young players. For smaller franchises, one move like that is crippling so you have to roll the dice a lot more and it's a lot harder to be lucky.

SI

*I don't really have time for this little dissertation today but baseball is going to get further and further behind the NFL, and not just because of the sport. Focusing just on a few stars or a few markets is what the NBA tried after Jordan and it's just now starting to recover from that mistake. Only emphasizing New York, Boston, LA, and Chicago makes for short term gain but is going to cost the sport in the long run as prolonged losing does irreparable long term damage to fan bases. In particular, just having hope for your team can sustain a fan base- but so many more teams start a baseball season with no realistic hope for the postseason than any other sport that it's a whole season of fandom lost for a lot of cities.

And that's the big problem right there in a nutshell. Big teams can take risks freely, because they can spend to cover that mistake. Small teams can't do so, as a result, they tend to be far, far more cautious about things (or they are aggressive only to realize it will last for one season, or even less - ie, the Brewers last season) and can't make the big moves that are needed to compete consistently because regardless if you can trade for a big guy that will cause your team to be successful this season, when Free Agency rolls around, you can't compete with the Yankees or Red Sox or Mets or Dodgers, etc in that market. And I say that as a Mets fan.

I won't get into a whole thing with you now sterlingice, but I'm curious, would you be in favor of a salary floor? Say $90 million. The union has come out against that, but I imagine they'd accept it before a cap. Increase the luxury tax if need be.

Oh look, you're over here too.

I'm glad we have the definitive opinion settled now, so we can see who the morons are.

Cap and floor, both, yes, in a heartbeat.

They have to be part of a combo, I would imagine, as I can't see why owners would agree to a floor as it gains them nothing.

SI

Am I missing some backstory or is this just being troll-ish?

SI

The problem with a floor is... look at the Rays last season. Would you have made them grab a few overpriced veterans so they could get to the "floor"?

Basically I think his Hall of Fame criteria is idiotic.

I just wanted to pop in and say that with the combination of Willy Tavares and Jerry Hairston Jr. in the lineup, the Reds aren't just going to beat people this year, they are going to fuck people up.

I just wish I could believe that the small market owners aren't just content to pocket the luxury tax and other revenue and just trick the fans into putting the blame elsewhere. It's a good business model.

The Royals have bumped their payroll an additional $20M over last year's club record payroll to $70M and are spending $250M on renovations to Kauffman Stadium to dramatically increase their revenue potential. There's some teams you can say might be stashing away revenue sharing income, but using KC as an example is a lousy choice.

Small market teams' fans have such short man's syndrome ;)

Disclaimer: The above statement was a joke.

You mean like when Florida spent less in payroll than their luxury tax share?

I watched some of those Kawakami highlights on youtube, he'll be better than Jo-Jo Reyes at least.

disagree all you want with the guy, but this nugget in here is absolutely true, and there's not really a way i can see anyone trying to argue with a straight-face that it is not.

Definitely agree.

They made the playoffs and lost in the first round to the eventual World Series champions. Nothing to sneeze at.

People will probably bury the Brewers because of Sabathia going to the Yankees and it certainly won't help. Ben Sheets possibly going elsewhere will hurt too (he could still come back if nobody ponies up more than a one year deal). But the offense remains intact for the most part with another exciting hitter in Mat Gamel close to ready to fill the hole at third base.

As it stands, the Cubs are certainly still the class of the division. The Brewers still project as probably an 84 win team. With a little good luck and good health that could easily turn into 90 again. A little bad luck and bad health and it could just as well be 78 wins.

I'm not denying small market teams are at a disadvantage, but leveling the playing field in terms of a salary cap will not help teams that pay $24 million to Jose Guillen, Kyle Farnsworth, Horacio Ramirez, Willie Bloomquist and Mike Jacobs. You could give them a $200 million dollar payroll and they'd still suck so long as you have yahoos like that doling out the cash.

A better leveler would be a more equitable revenue sharing, but, of course, the owners would have to be able to agree on that, and that's a tough order.

The problem is that the league doesn't have anything like the NFL as far as a National TV contract goes and taxing local revenue would likely slow the game's growth.

The game is making quite a bit of money, no? What with record attendances and the such?

Yep. That's the problem. A salary cap (and salary floor) are poor solutions, and the problem with the better solution (more equitable revenue sharing) is that it's difficult to sort out the actual, true revenue numbers since most of the revenue comes in the form of local contracts. And that's a problem when the local broadcast rights are owned by the same people that own the team in question - it makes it extremely difficult to verify the actual value of those contracts when the people in charge can shift numbers around to suit their purpose.

It's certainly unfair, though I disagree that it's damaging the game.

Part of that is that the MLB has more parity in terms of championships than any other sport. (Ripping this off from Gammons)

Different Champions in the Last 30 Years:
Baseball: 20
NFL: 14
NHL 13
NBA: 9

I know that's not a perfect stat and there's all kinds of different ways to look at parity. But it's not like the Yankees are winning every year.

I still don't see how baseball wouldn't be better off contracting 4-8 teams. Maybe those 8 teams could start their own independent minor league. That'd be cool, I'd follow it. I know that would suck for Royals fans, but it would make the league better. Teams in bigger markets generate more revenue.

Someone here once said that MLB would be as popular as lacrosse if they got rid of a handful of the small market teams - that's the sentiment I disagree with this. The recent era of "unfairness" has been great business for MLB - we actually have near-dynasties and great teams staying together again. That's not really possible with a billion teams and a salary cap. (The NFL had the Patriots run, which was great for business, but that was really a staff-driven run, not a player-driven one).

OBVIOUSLY shit is unfair.....but it's not going to change. We're NOT going to have a salary cap. EVER (short of a 2+ year game stoppage, and even then, we might see a new MLBPA league first). Increased revenue sharing, contraction, and a 3rd team in NYC (and perhaps a 2nd team in Boston) would do a ton to help competitive balance.

Oh, I definitely agree, it'd be very difficult, but I'm not seeing a slowing of the game's growth.

Lemme guess, before this season one of those teams would have been the Rays?

Agreed. Revenue keeps going up.

If it was 8, definitely, if it was 4, they'd be on the bubble.

Same with Minnesota, who was about to be contracted. They went on a run right after. I don't think that's the point. Any team is capable of putting together a run. But the Pittsburghs and Minnesotas (or whoever survived contraction) have more of a chance if they're getting a higher % of the Yankees luxury tax.

Aside from that, I just think smaller leagues are better - more teams have the chance of success. If everything were equal in MLB, and your team was average, you could expect a championship every 30 years - even the Royals already have that

If you tax local revenue it would run the risk of slowing the game's growth as it would lower the incentive to maximize that local revenue.

I am in favor of limited contraction for both the MLB and NBA. Or maybe they could give Portland, Las Vegas, San Antionio, Indianapolis, Charlotte, Vancouver and some other cities a team, plus a third NYC team, taking the total to 40. Then split the league in half and add a promotion and relegation system. It's the best way to ensure the Pirates' season lasts past August.

Is this the same type of argument that rich people would stop trying to make money if you tax their incomes? :D

I don't think that a 60/40 split, with the 40% being pooled and equally distributed would cause all that much problems with growth of the game. I mean did the luxury tax slow the game's growth in New York City?

You don't think that if a team went from making 100 cents on the dollar for each dollar gained in local revenue to 60 cents it wouldn't dampen the desire to pull each and every dollar you can out of local revenue?

The NFL doesn't touch local revenue. Neither does the NBA. Its a bad business model.

I'm definitely in favor of contracting but it's a tough choice. 30 years ago, it would have been the A's. 20 years, it would have been the Braves and Indians. 5 years ago, the Expos->Nats and Rays. Owners, GMs and players come and go, potentially changing the fortunes of the teams.

Perhaps a better solution would be maximize the fan base for X amount of teams. In other words, if the NYC area can easily support 3-4 teams, then let's have that - at the expense of small market/revenue areas. Both Florida and possible Arizona, should be in areas of large, solid fan bases - not struggling to make it year after year despite on-field successes. It also means that we could lose some historical teams like Pittsburgh or Cincinnati, definitely Kansas City. But that's been done in the past as population, demographics and fan interest changes.

Not really. They'd probably try to hide it more, of course.

And it isn't 100 cents to 60 cents. It's 60 cents + a 1/30th share of the pooled amount which their local money contributes.

And one of the reason that the NFL doesn't go after local broadcast revenue isn't necessarily because its bad business, but because its difficult to account for. Changing from local broadcasts to a national one (in 1960 for the AFL and 1962 for the NFL) really is a way of going after local revenue by transferring who had the rights to broadcasting games.

edit: Oh, and the NFL DOES go after local ticketing revenue. It's split.

Not really.

And the comparison to the NFL doesn't hold up. In the NFL, TV contracts are strictly national, there is no local TV revenue available to share. I'm less certain about the NBA, but I think the national TV contracts are the primary revenue for that league.

In baseball, revenue from local TV and radio deals outstrips revenue from the national TV contracts.

I'm not trying to dump on the Brewers here. They had a nice year- a year that KC would kill for. However, losing 2 aces is going to hurt any team and for a team that barely made the playoffs, things don't look that good. But, again, it's baseball and a lot can happen.

SI

I also don't see anybody within the division that has done squat to pass them either. The benefits of a weak division could propel them into the Wild Card hunt if they are lucky and healthy, like I said.

I can't defend all of the moves the team has made. Not in the least- in fact, that's the original post that started this never-ending firestorm that I grow weary of as much as you guys get tired of hearing me talk about it.

1) I'm sure if Dayton Moore knew how badly the market would implode this season, he wouldn't have traded for the guys he did or signed Jose Guillen last year. I think this market caught a lot of teams off guard.

2) I've mentioned this before, but I don't believe in the myth of the replacement level player. It's great that we have a scale and measurement for a mythical replacement player. However, on a team which has been laid bare by the last 15 years, there aren't too many AAAA guys and, once again, baseball is not an exact science. It's a game of averages and percentages- "replacement level" guys can be competent one year but they cannot maintain it and that's why they're replacement level.

Even worse is that sometimes your replacement level guys completely fail and are such a detriment to the team. Perrenial sabermetric favorite Wily Mo Pena ate it again last year with a -16 VORP. Wasn't he going to be the next great thing as soon as he got out of that OF in Cincy and went to a better situation- Boston took a shot at him and dropped him like a hot potato. I remember the Royals dabblings with PECOTA-loved Calvin Pickering. He was positively awful and overmatched to the point where they got rid of him after a month because he wasn't just bad- he was a black hole in that lineup, costing outs and wins. That's the kind of performance you risk and are fairly likely to get from a "replacement level" player. (That said, I'm not sure how Bloomquist is anything but a replacement-level player)

3) And this really goes back to the heart of the matter and the post I made earlier. How would the Royals look this year if they had signed Torii Hunter, who they were in the running for, and then not had to reach for Jose Guillen. Then they also don't make the move for Coco Crisp. Then, how about they had gotten Furcal, who they were one of the last couple of teams in on this year. No Willie Bloomquist. Then, GMDM looks at his lineup and doesn't really see a need for power and make an imbecilic move for Mike Jacobs. So, then you still have Leo Nunez and Ramon Ramirez in the back of the pen and there's no way you make a move for Farnsworthless or Horacio Ramirez.

Suddenly- this team looks a lot like a contender or at least a good starting pitcher away (DeJesus/Furcal/Hunter/Gordon/Butler/Shealy/Teahen/Aviles/Buck with a nice bullpen like last year and Greinke/Meche at the top of the rotation). However, that takes $30M per year for long term commitments- not a bunch of little rinky dink 1 and 2 year deals. And, the part that really gets lost on larger teams who can afford dead money- the ability to eat a bunch of that money when Torii is barely a $10M guy and Furcal is always hurt towards the end of their contracts.

This also presumes foresight for the bottom falling out of the market- anyone who had Burrell for 2/$16M, raise their hand. Hell, anyone who had him making double that at 4/$32M would have been laughed out of this forum 2 months ago.

But they didn't have that cash so they have to make due with much lesser pieces and minimize risk. And that all goes back to what I said before- that small team can put all the pieces together for one run like when a small college gets a great class recruiting and makes a tourney run when they are seniors. However, they just can't reload year after year and the ability for some teams to do that and not others is what is patently unfair.

SI

Oh, and I do appreciate everyone who can enumerate any bad or even marginal contract the Royals make. 20/20 hindsight is a wonderful gift that even the blind have and if we wanted to rake each team over the coals for the plethora of overpayments and bad moves, we could do it for each and every one of your teams like every one of your a-hole posts does. But, of course, that misses the big picture that smaller markets can ill afford to make one major bad move or a few smaller ones whereas larger ones can afford to make many large Lugo/Sheffield/Sexton/Park/Zito/Hampton/{Insert_Any_Number_of_Yankees}-esque moves and not even feel them.

I know it's a pretty minor part of your post, but Pickering had all of 27 AB his last year in KC - how many wins can you cost a team in 27 AB? The previous season, he had a 113 OPS+ in 122 AB. His career OPS+ was 96 ... pretty much the definition of a replacement-level player.

Nothing, short of a salary cap, would bring down the NYC teams or the Red Sox more than putting additional teams in their cities, it makes perfect sense to look at the 2009 instead of 1950 geographic population situations. I don't know all the roadblocks to that. Obviously those big market teams wouldn't like it, but I don't know if there's anything contractual that prevents it.

With contraction, I think it would come down to what owners WANTED out. Carl Pohlad wanted a payout, and he wanted out. The Expos and the Marlins had transitional ownership situations. Nobody could be taken out against their will, which means the Royals might actually have been safe (I don't think they were even in the discussion last time). Basically they'd take the 4 lowest bidders for a payout to contract.

Heh, I was just watching Hot Stove or whatever it's called on the MLB Network (damn not being able to fall asleep tonight) and they had Andruw on for a telephone interview. He said that he would like to come back to Atlanta.

Hey, the only post I made about this was how shitty the moves the Royals JUST MADE are. I don't think its 20/20 hindsight to say that what they're doing now is moronic. Although, I suppose I am using their history of terrible moves to color my opinion on their current moves.

No more than 4 I'd say, since the Royals were 3-4 in the seven games in which he appeared in 2005, leaving them 53-102 the rest of the season. And if you want to just look at the time he was on the roster, they were 2-8 without him in the lineup.

Or that they were 13-22 in the 35 games he appeared in during 2004, a .371 winning percentage. They were 45-82 in games he did not play in, a .354 winning percentage, 2-5 isolating games he missed after he first appeared.

Combined 04-05, the Royals went 16-26 with Pickering in the lineup, a .381 clip. In games without him in the lineup while he was on the roster they were 4-13 for a .235 percentage.

Yeah, he was a real drain apparently.

Seemed like this would go well with all the whine.

I can't speak for Boston, but I really don't see what sort of impact it would have on the NYC market. This isn't 5 years after the Dodgers split town; I don't see Mets or Yankees fans abandoning the teams that they have been rooting for their whole lives. I really don't know a single person who isn't already a fan of either team, so it's not like there's a huge untapped resource. Maybe you have some casual fans who will go to games here or there, and there will probably be enough general baseball interest to sell a couple million seats.

But how does that bring down the Mets or Yankees? They'll still go on to sell 3-4 million tickets, and most importantly, the addition of another team isn't going to make their TV network money go away. It's not like they're going to start dividing up the local Fox Sports affiliate money. Just don't see it so please explain.

I've always wondered about this idea. Maybe Brooklyn would support a third team in New York due to historical ties, but I just figured any third or even fourth team would be some bastard step child that would draw some fans but wouldn't put a significant dent on the Yankees, for instance.

Just look at the White Sox- Chicago isn't New York, but the Chicago MSA has over 9M people, whereas there are a lot of MLB market MSA's in the 2-3M person range so it should easily be able to support 2, right? Well, they've had problems drawing in the past even with such a wealth of people to draw from, mainly because the Cubs are still the dominant presence there. And that's a franchise which is over 100 years old- the White Sox aren't a new thing on the block.

Similarly, if you plop a third team in New York, say in Brooklyn, you might get some Brooklyn fans but unless they started winning soon, they would have problems drawing- even in such a large metropolitan area because of the established teams there. And while you would draw away some token support from the Yankees, I would think it would actually hurt the Mets more.

Maybe in the long term, as people die and allegiances change, it would work- but in the near and mid term (and I mean for the next 50 years)- I would think it would be dropping a team into a smaller market because, realistically, a lot of New York City is already spoken for with people either fans of the existing teams or not baseball fans.

SI

Or what he said in less words that I did :)

SI

Yours was solid too! I think you make a good point in that, if anyone, it will hurt the Mets, as the front-running Yankee fans will stick.

One thing though is that allegiances carry very well from generation to generation in this area, so I don't even know if people dying and being born will shift the fan structure.

:eek:

Wow. Nice analysis!

Yeah, that's the rub. Adding teams to the NY market is (in theory) the best way to cut down on their huge resource advantages, but in reality, new teams in that market aren't likely to carve out a huge chunk of fans.

Probably the best way to go about it would be to put a team in New Jersey - get the pride of Jersey going, try to pull away as many of those fans as possible.

But you have to get a 2nd team too, so that there's both an AL and NL competitor to the Yankees and Mets.

I'm not sure Brooklyn would pull enough fans away - you might have to go up into Connecticut and try to pull away some of those commuter fans. But is there enough of a fan base to carve out there?

Thankfully he didn't appear in that many games, nor miss that many when he was on their roster. Otherwise skimming over his game logs would have been a much bigger bitch to do. He was to the Royals what a leaky faucet was to H.M.S. Titanic.

Ha!


Don't think so. The lower areas of Connecticut along 95 are transplanted New Yorkers, most of whom still work in NYC. Higher up and you hit Sox fans.

I'm pretty much staying out of this iteration because it's the same argument I've had with you several times, but this is disingenous. Like Ronnie Dobbs, I'm quite certain I've first-guessed many of the moves. Nobody is saying Mike Sweeney was overpaid and is killing the Royals. We're saying Mike Jacobs is trash that isn't worth more than the MLB minimum, Kyle Farnsworth sucks and why is Willie Bloomquist still on an MLB roster.

I'd also say your characterization of AAAA/replacement-level players is wrong. You can win 60-70 games playing basically a AAA-team - Florida showed that for a couple years. Boston had like 10 of these guys in Pawtucket alone last year - Joe Thurston/Chris Carter in the IF, Bailey/Van Every/Bobby Kielty in the OF, Pauley/Hansack/Zink/Chris Smith/Hunter Jones that aren't prospects and could be had for a song. Go add a hitter ($10-12m for Adam Dunn perhaps?), 2 decent league-average starters and you're only 2-3 homegrown stars away from having a shot at the postseason. Since any team, let alone one consistently drafting top 10, should be developing a star every couple years, that's not hard or out of the question. Especially if you take the $8 million being spent on shit like Kyle Farnsworth and Mike Jacobs and spend it on some more signability picks in the draft or player development.

Willie Bloomquist deserves to be on an MLB roster as the 25th guy super-sub/pinch-runner who gets no more than 150PA in a year. What he doesn't deserve is a 2-year contract, and for $1.5M per.

Isn't that about what the ML minimum is these days?
(yeah, I'm kidding, but not by all that much)

So, I'm watching the MLB Network's Prime 9 show last night, which in this episode was a list of the greatest centerfielders of all time.

#2 is Ty Cobb which is fine. But during the piece, they mention that Ty Cobb had 4,189 hits, which is 2nd all time.

How did he get 2 hits taken away? When Pete Rose was chasing the hits record, he beat Cobb when he got to 4,192 hits, which means that in 1986 or whenever it was, Cobb was considered to have 4,191 hits. Did some stat geeks actually go over some game film and take hits away from him? Anyone with insight on this? Or did they just make a mistake?

good question

Offical Ty Cobb Career Batting Average.... - Baseball Fever

This thread talks about it a little. It seems that some believe that a 2 for 3 day in 1910 was entered into the record twice.

Yep, that's case. Records in the early days of the game were a bit spotty, so some folks went through the box scores and found double counting.

Sources: Boston Red Sox, Kevin Youkilis agree to $40M deal - ESPN

Youkilis signs extension 4/40 with a fifth year option.

Makes losing out on Teixeira much more palatable.

I don't know why any player would sign a hometown deal at this moment as they will be way below market value. Kudos to the Red Sox for getting a nice deal done- buys out 2 FA years and possibly a 3rd with the option, if I'm reading right.

SI

Why, because you kept a player on your team? ;)

I realize the price is great, but it's the Red Sox, they have the money regardless.

No, but signing a guy who arguably was the better player last year for a quarter of the money makes me happy. Not sure what you mean by they have the money regardless; I'm sure that any monies saved will go to Lester, Papelbon, or a trade.

What I mean is that I don't understand how it makes losing out on Tex more palatable. I mean it wasn't like Youk was gone if Tex came in.

Good deal, but I don't see that it has anything to do with losing out on Tex. In a good or bad way.

A good thing balances out a disappointing thing. That is what I am trying to say.

Ah... ok.

I thought you were saying that it makes up for it (on-the-field). Nevermind me.

Reports here in Boston all season/winter were that Youkilis and Papelbon were not going to sign team-friendly extensions. In my mind, I had pretty much come to grips with losing Youkilis in two seasons. And there was no hint that this was coming to a head at all. It was a pleasant surprise.

But you're definitely right, it doesn't change the equation for this upcoming season.

Wow, really? So there is a decent threat (still) that Papelbon may be gone when he comes up for resigning?

I feel that unless he decides to sign a friendly extension, he will be gone in three seasons. He has always let it be known that he wants to get paid, big-time. I don't think the Sox will do it for any closer, let alone one that has injury concerns.

Papelbon agreed to remain the closer his 2nd? season in spring training, but made it clear he then expected to be paid equal to a top-flight starter when he was eligible for free agency. I don't expect him to go anywhere, but with his injury concerns I expect the Red Sox to agree to pay him very high $$ amounts but keep the years down when he hits free agency.

Lester, on the other hand, is the type of pitcher we should try to lock up, although it wouldn't be the worst thing to wait out this year and see if his arm holds up after the large jump in innings (some think he has the big frame to do so, but his innings jumped much more than the Sox like from young pitchers, partly due to the cancer throwing off his normal yearly progression.)

Happy to see Youks stick around. And lil-Petey too.

I honestly don't think a lot of people realize how good Youks is. Between being a relatively under the radar 30-hr guy, to being a guy who sees a large number of P/PA, he does a lot of things that really keep the offense humming steadily.

As far as the discussion re: Paps - at this point, given that he's become almost a one-pitch pitcher, I'm not sure that he warrants the type of deal that he will be looking for. Dude has a nasty split, he needs to throw it more!! On the plus side with that, on the occasions that people other than Varitek were catching Paps, he did throw more splits. So I'm HOPING that to some % it was 'Tek falling in love with Paps FB and that Paps is still willing to throw the split. If he'd throw 2-3 pitches then he'd be worth a larger-$, longer-term deal. Not sure with him too to what extent the fact that his lil-brother is in the Sox minor-league system too might play a role in things if at all...

I like the nice low-risk signing the White Sox made with Bartolo Colon. One year, $1 mill. base with performance incentives that could push it to $2 mill.

Even if he only lasts half the year until Contreras is back from rehab, he's still a nice end-rotation insurance for that price and can push the young guys and/or give the kids more development time out of the bullpen or in the minors.

Just don't let him bat.

Quicker than you thought:

http://www.fannation.com/si_blogs/ho...01?eref=fromSI


Wasn't willing to go long term it seems.

No, and he's on record saying as much last year when Sizemore and some other guys signed deals that bought out their arbitration years.

There was basically no question he'd be going on 1-year deals until his arb years are finished. I'm of the opinion that even then, the Red Sox won't go long-term, and if anything will try to overpay by 3-5m/y to sign him to a 1-2 year deal rather than pay what he wants for as long as he will want.

And Jeff Kent officially hangs 'em up today after 17 seasons. Next stop, Cooperstown.

Courtesy MLB trade rumors, here's who's left in the FA market as of yesterday:

Catchers
Paul Bako (37)
Gary Bennett (37)
Johnny Estrada (33)
Sal Fasano (37)
Paul Lo Duca (37) - Type B, not offered arb
Ivan Rodriguez (37) - Type B, not offered arb
Javier Valentin (33)
Jason Varitek (37) - Type A, offered arb
First basemen
Rich Aurilia (37)
Miguel Cairo (35)
Sean Casey (34)
Nomar Garciaparra (35)
Eric Hinske (31)
Doug Mientkiewicz (35)
Kevin Millar (37)
Richie Sexson (34)
Mark Sweeney (39)
Daryle Ward (34)
Second basemen
Craig Counsell (38)
Ray Durham (37)
Damion Easley (39)
Mark Grudzielanek (39) - Type B, offered arb
Orlando Hudson (31) - Type A, offered arb
Ramon Martinez (36)
Shortstops
Orlando Cabrera (34) - Type A, offered arb
Alex Cintron (30)
Craig Counsell (38)
Nomar Garciaparra (35)
Tomohiro Nioka (33)
Juan Uribe (30) - Type B, not offered arb
Third basemen
Rich Aurilia (37)
Craig Counsell (38)
Joe Crede (31)
Nomar Garciaparra (35)
Ramon Martinez (36)
Juan Uribe (30) - Type B, not offered arb
Ty Wigginton (31)
Left fielders
Moises Alou (42) - Type B, not offered arb
Garret Anderson (37) - Type B, not offered arb
Emil Brown (34)
Adam Dunn (29) - Type A, not offered arb
Cliff Floyd (36)
Luis Gonzalez (41) - Type B, not offered arb
Jay Payton (36)
Manny Ramirez (37) - Type A, offered arb
Center fielders
Jim Edmonds (39)
Andruw Jones (32)
Right fielders
Bobby Abreu (35) - Type A, not offered arb
Emil Brown (34)
Cliff Floyd (36)
Ken Griffey Jr. (39) - Type B, not offered arb
Eric Hinske (31)
Brad Wilkerson (32)
DHs
Cliff Floyd (36)
Mike Sweeney (35)
Frank Thomas (41) - Type B, not offered arb
Jose Vidro (34)
Starting pitchers
Kris Benson (33)
Paul Byrd (38) - Type B, offered arb
Roger Clemens (46)
Josh Fogg (32)
Freddy Garcia (33)
Jon Garland (29) - Type B, offered arb
Tom Glavine (43)
Charlie Haeger (25)
Livan Hernandez (34)
Orlando Hernandez (43)
Chuck James (27)
Jason Jennings (30)
Jon Lieber (39)
Braden Looper (34) - Type B, not offered arb
Rodrigo Lopez (33)
Pedro Martinez (37)
Mark Mulder (31)
John Parrish (31)
Odalis Perez (32)
Oliver Perez (27) - Type A, offered arb
Andy Pettitte (37) - Type A, not offered arb
Sidney Ponson (32)
Kenny Rogers (44)
Curt Schilling (42)
Ben Sheets (30) - Type A, offered arb
Kip Wells (32)
Randy Wolf (32) - Type B, not offered arb
Closers
Brandon Lyon (29) - Type B, offered arb
Middle relievers
Luis Ayala (31) - Type B, not offered arb
Joe Beimel (32) - Type B, not offered arb
Joe Borowski (38)
Shawn Chacon (31)
Chad Cordero (27)
Juan Cruz (30) - Type A, offered arb
Elmer Dessens (37)
Brendan Donnelly (37)
Scott Elarton (33)
Randy Flores (33)
Keith Foulke (35)
Eric Gagne (33) - Type B, not offered arb
Tom Gordon (41)
Eddie Guardado (38)
Jason Isringhausen (36) - Type B, not offered arb
Tyler Johnson (27)
Jon Lieber (39)
Aquilino Lopez (34)
Will Ohman (31)
Al Reyes (38)
Dennys Reyes (32) - Type B, offered arb
Ricardo Rincon (39)
Rudy Seanez (40) - Type B, not offered arb
Brian Shouse (40) - Type B, offered arb
Russ Springer (40) - Type A, not offered arb
Ken Takahashi (41)
Julian Tavarez (36)
Mike Timlin (43)
Ron Villone (39)
Kip Wells (32)
Matt Wise (33)
Jamey Wright (34)

That's quite a list 20 days away from Spring Training. Using the ESPN Free agent ranker, half of the top 40 free agents are still unsigned.

Either we're about to have a ton of activity or there will be a lot of people sitting out.

Kind of an interesting note on Varitek from ESPN Insider:

"According to NESN, Varitek was not aware that teams would have to surrender a No. 1 Draft pick to sign him, and he takes full responsibility for his decision. NESN also said that Varitek's meeting was mainly to "clear the air," because the team had not been returning Boras' phone calls."

Also, it's very weird to picture Pedro Martinez pitching for the Marlins or Pirates next year - the only two teams that apparently have any interest.

LOL..poor Varitek..well not really, but you know what I mean.

The Yankees should sign Cruz and Sheets and maybe even Manny. Basically their cost to acquire would only be 4th 5th and 6th round picks.

Yeah, they're in real need of some quality players...

Ah, but it's not necessarily that easy. Depends on how many Type A/B free agents they lost to other teams, and possibly how large the pool of Type A/B free agents was in the first place.

There are limits to how many such free agents a team can sign, which can only be exceeded if they've lost more than that number off their own roster, and I believe those limits cap at three such players, if the total class of such players exceeds 61.

It is that easy. The pool is not Type A/B free agents, it's the total pool. Teams can sign up to nine free agents or however many A/Bs they lost, whichever is greater.

Question re: Type A Free Agents - Sons of Sam Horn

Yeah. Some analyst was suggesting they sign these guys basically cause it's that easy. Cruz, for instance, is not worth losing a first, but a 4th? It's just money at this point.

And I really wish the pirates would spend some money now cause they could sign these A types and only lose a second. And they already get the 3rd pick in the 2nd since their guy from last year didn't sign.