Tag: John Henry

If the Red Sox Trade Xander Bogaerts, We Riot

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There have been more and more rumors circulating that the Red Sox are at least entertaining the idea of trading their best all around player. In the midst of their worst season in decades, the Sox are looking for any and all avenues to rebuild and reload. This ain’t it. 

If the Red Sox punt on this season I’m ok with that because I understand the legitimate need for a bridge year every now and then. It’s something Theo Epstein was adamant about in “Feeding the Monster.” You can’t be good every single year. Even the Yankees adopted this soft reset approach over the past few years to extraordinary (regular season) results. You need to take a step back and reload every once in a while otherwise you’re going to trade all your assets and overextend yourself on overpriced free agents and then you’ll have to do a hard reset. Kind of like what they’re staring at right now.

You saw the full value of the bridge year in 2006 when the Sox were less than two years removed from a World Series title but were coming off getting swept in the 2005 ALDS (thanks Tony Graffanino). Despite winning 95 games in ’05, the Sox recognized they were further away from winning a title than their record reflected. So rather than just double down on an aging core they took a step back and acquired some young talent like Coco Crisp and some veteran placeholders like Mark Loretta until the next wave of prospects like Dustin Pedroia (2007 Rookie of the Year), Kevin Youkilis, Jonathan Papelbon, Jacoby Ellsbury, and Clay Buchholz were ready to truly flourish and/or take over full time. It paid off. In 2007 the Sox recognized they were ready to compete again with a combination of their veteran core (Manny, Ortiz, Varitek, Schilling, Nixon), the aforementioned infusion of young (cheap) talent, and some new acquisitions. So they went all out ahead of the 2007 season and signed JD Drew to a (at the time) massive 5 year $70 million deal as well as Daisuke Matsuzaka to a 6 year $51 million deal (plus the $51 million posting fee). The result? The Sox were the wire to wire best team in baseball winning 96 games and the AL East en route to their second title in 4 years. Yes, the Sox did trade one of their top prospects in Hanley Ramirez for Josh Beckett and Mike Lowell before the 2006 season, but Beckett was only 26 at the time and was the anchor of their rotation when the team went for it all in 2007.

The Red Sox have the opportunity to do the same thing here, but if they elect to trade Xander Bogaerts they’re not just punting on a season; they’re removing the core of their rebuild. Why trade a 27-year-old shortstop who just re-signed on a team friendly deal (6 years, $120M) through 2025 and finished 5th in MVP voting last year?

Why trade a guy that you scouted, signed at the age of 16, developed into a player that is just now hitting his prime, is a 2x All-Star, is a 3x Silver Slugger, and became a vital piece of two World Series titles? Yes Bogaerts has a full no-trade clause kick in after the deadline this year, but these are typically the kind of guys you want to build around.  

This is not the same as Mookie Betts. Mookie Betts wanted a contract that quite literally was 3x the size of what Bogaerts re-signed for last spring. Mookie was in a walk year and was noncommital about even wanting to be in Boston, whereas Xander re-signed early. The irony is that despite Mookie’s career WAR doubling that of Bogaerts, you’d probably get a better return for Xander because he has 4+ seasons left on his contract. Doesn’t mean you should do it though. 

I am a full blown prospect fanatic so while it obviously paid off in 2018 I never loved Dave Dombrowski’s M.O. of ripping apart the farm system. So I understand the value of Bogaerts and the return the team could get, but if you trade him you basically are putting all your chips into the middle of the table and banking on TBD prospects, Rafael Devers, and Alex Verdugo. Not something I want to bet the next 5-10 years of the Red Sox on. 

Obviously Boston’s farm system is not ripe with future All-Stars like the ’06 team was, but thats the best part about currently being on pace for the worst winning percentage in team history; you are in play for the No. 1 overall pick. The Red Sox have never had the first overall pick in the history of the MLB draft. That’s value right there. Combine that with some smaller deals like you’re seeing with Workman and Hembree getting dealt and potentially trading guys like JD Martinez who I love, but is 33-years-old and may be the only valuable asset you have. There’s also Andrew Benintendi who I would have thought unthinkable to trade at the start of last season, but he has seemingly taken a plummet in his development the last two seasons. If the rumors are true and the Sox could get a young, promising starter like Mike Clevinger or Zach Plesac, I’d strongly consider it. 

It’s time for Chaim Bloom to make the smart, unheralded moves that the team brought him here to do. Blowing it up and trading a player that is essentially your captain is not the way to go. Don’t forget, the Sox also have Eduardo Rodriguez and Chris Sale returning to the mound next year. So use the Theo blueprint; take the bridge year, but don’t blow up the damn bridge.

Mookie Betts Close to MASSIVE Deal With Dodgers. Here’s 5 Reasons Why I’m Still OK With It

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  1. I am kind of shocked of the size of this deal if the reports saying it’ll be $350-$400 million are true. That number, while absurd, sounded completely likely 6 months ago, but then when COVID cancelled sports for half the year a lot of people like baseball Hall of Famer Peter Gammons speculated this could tank the Free Agent market. A lot of teams are eating a lot of money and with no fans in attendance for the foreseeable future they will be eating a lot more. So a $400m deal seemed unlikely even for a free agent of Mookie’s stature. But then again it’s the Dodgers so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. The Dodgers don’t know the meaning of fiscal responsibility. They are the Yankees of the mid 2000s without the actual success.
  2. I am still OK with the Mookie trade. I saw a ton of sad Sox fans on Twitter this morning as the rumors of the deal spread like wildfire, going so far as to compare it to losing Jon Lester. The Lester comparison is lazy and not even close to the same thing. Lester was an excellent, home grown, fan favorite and a reasonable guy by all accounts yet the Sox still lowballed the shit out of him with a $70m contract offer. He would rightfully so be insulted by the offer, get traded to Oakland, and then sign a 6-year $155 million deal with the Cubs. Thats the definition of misreading the market. With Mookie he is looking to reset the market and become the top 2 or 3 highest paid player of all-time. And the Sox have been offering him deals north of $200m for years, but the former MVP doesn’t want to take a penny less than top dollar. And thats fine! Get your money dude, but that doesn’t mean it makes sense for the Sox to just give Mookie a blank check.
  3. I seem to be in the minority around here, but I don’t think there is a shot in hell a $400m Mookie deal ages well. I love Mookie, I own a Mookie shirt, and he’s arguably the best homegrown prospect the Sox have produced since Roger Clemens. But, he’s also a 5’9″ 180 pound guy with massive up and down seasons on his resume. Over the last four seasons Mookie’s batting avg has been .318, .264, .346, .295. I know batting avg is an old guard stat, but even his WAR has been all over the place (9.5, 6.3, 10.6, 6.9). Those are still great numbers (Betts finished No. 8 in WAR for position players in 2019), but those variances would give me concern if I’m writing the check.
  4. For $400m you need to produce power consistently and to be honest you need to be built like a linebacker so I won’t worry about your body breaking down. Obviously you can never predict injuries and big guys are just as likely to break down (Mo Vaughn, A-Rod), but I have more faith in a big guy continuing to hit for power than I do in a 180 pounder hitting 30+ home runs a year into his late 30s. Mookie’s true value is in being a five tool player. He hits for average, power, steals bases, throws well, and plays elite defense, but 5 tool players rarely age well so while I love Mookie I’m not banking $400m on him being the same player in 2032 (!) that he is today.
  5. I’m not going to give John Henry and the Sox credit for this because they fell ass backwards into it, but with a 60 game season this year the Mookie trade looks even better. You’re essentially trading 2 months of a guy who was not going to resign here for promising big leaguer Alex Verdugo and a top prospect in Jeter Downs.

    I know Big Z accuses me of being a prospect hoarder, but I’m playing the odds here and with arguably the worst pitching staff of my lifetime I don’t think the Sox were a threat to win it all this year anyways. Theo Epstein stepped on a hornets nest when he coined the term “bridge year,” but its true you can’t just pay everyone all the time without taking a step back every one in a while to retool and reload.

I’m So Starved for Red Sox Content That I Watched Fever Pitch Last Night

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The movie we’ve all mocked for the past 15 years and cringe whenever it comes on TV is actually surprisingly delightful right now. This movie just hits different when sports are banned.

I openly admit that this is a sign of Quarantine SZN starting to take its toll on my sanity more so than this movie actually aging gracefully. But when nobody has been able to drink a beer on Jersey Street in nearly eight months you take what you can get.

Watching this last night I legitimately started to feel like I had moved out of Boston and hadn’t seen Fenway, Cask n Flagon, Landsdowne Street etc. in YEARS.

You do start to notice little things though when you rewatch old movies, especially ones filmed in your backyard. Lets forget for a second that Jimmy Fallon is supposed to be some broke ass school teacher that has a sweet apartment in the North End and season tickets to the Red Sox. The thing that really stuck out to me was the bar that Jason Varitek, Johnny Damon, and Trot Nixon are having dinner at after the game just a few feet away from Fallon and his buddies.

Really? Had anyone involved in the writing, filming, or production of this movie ever actually been on Landsdowne Street?

Hey don’t get me wrong it’s a fine establishment to knock back a few Bud Lattes, but it’s not exactly the lap of luxury that the players would be having dinner at. But, I digress.

Fever Pitch is loosely based on an old Nick Hornby story about his obsession with an English soccer team. Rejiggered to focus on the Red Sox, the original script just kind of assumed the Sox would lose yet again in some brutal fashion, which really sticks out like a sore thumb when the movie peaks just before Dave Roberts’ steal in Game 4 of the 04 ALCS. Then they slap on a 30 second ending explaining the greatest comeback in baseball history and the Sox actually winning the World Series capped off with the most cringeworthy memory of the entire thing; Fallon and Drew Barrymore celebrating on the field with the players.

But hey I’ll take whatever Red Sox content I can get at this point, which is why one of the principals of marketing is that nostalgia is a powerful weapon. I haven’t been to a Sox game in slightly longer than usual and my body is already starting to go through withdrawals. And the team wasn’t even going to be good this year!

John Henry has us by the balls and he knows it. Now I’m not going to be the first guy there when the quarantine is lifted, but when the dust settles on all this I will be more than happy to buy a few a dozen $11 beers at 4 Jersey Street.

Man, do I miss sports.

Chris Sale is Getting an MRI On His Elbow. COOL!

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ESPN – Boston Red Sox left-hander Chris Sale is having an MRI on Tuesday after experiencing soreness in his elbow following his first live batting practice session.

Manager Ron Roenicke acknowledged concern as the team awaits the results, which will be sent to Dr. James Andrews for evaluation.

It was pretty absurd for the Red Sox to tell everybody that Chris Sale was getting pushed back to start the season because he had pneumonia, not because his elbow is apparently a train wreck. Then again thats par for the course with this ownership group who seem to think we’re all stupid. Tell me you don’t like my firm. Tell me don’t like my idea. Tell me don’t like my fucking necktie. But don’t tell me that Chris Sale is going to miss Opening Day because he had a bad cold.

It was his first time throwing to live batters since last August and after throwing just 15 pitches he felt soreness in his elbow the next day. Now he’s going to see Dr. James Andrews who hands out Tommy John surgery recommendations like they’re candy so prepare for the worst, Sox fans. In fairness he did go see Andrews last year and avoided surgery after opting for a PRP injection…but he didn’t pitch again until this week. Not good.

So this obviously begs the question of was the Chris Sale extension a good idea or an unmitigated disaster? Well considering the 5 year extension didn’t even kick in until this season and Sale missed huge chunks of time last year and won’t be ready to start the 2020 season….then yes this is problematic. In the interest of transparency, I was all for this extension when Sale signed it because it offered a steep discount for an ace at $30 million per year. The cost of pitching only continues to go up as Sale’s 2020 salary is still behind Gerrit Cole, Max Scherzer, Zack Greinke, Stephen Strasburg, Justin Verlander, David Price, and Clayton Kershaw. However, my enthusiasm for the extension was based on the Red Sox medical staff being pretty confident that whatever injuries Sale had before didn’t pose long term issues. Well, it would seem that was a swing and a miss because he’s had nothing but health concerns since the ink was dry on that deal.

We’ll wait to see what comes out of Sale’s MRI, but this does not seem like it’s going to end well. Welp, the 2020 Red Sox continue to be the biggest shit show in town and they don’t even play a game at Fenway for another month.

Red Sox Ownership Defiant in the Face of Fan Backlash

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Boston.com – Red Sox fans are not at all happy, and the team knows it.

Well before the Red Sox traded away one of the best players in Major League Baseball, fans had begun to tune out, either by turning off NESN or not filling the seats at Fenway Park toward the end of last year’s 84-win, playoff-whiff of a season...Kennedy said last fall that attendance over 79 games at Fenway Park last season was down 0.7 percent, while NESN ratings dropped 23 percent.

The day after the Betts trade, Kennedy said overall ticket sales were behind last year’s pace by more than 15 percent, and that the renewal rate of season-ticket holders was down from the usual percentage in the high 80s to the low 80s.

Ticket sales are down. Season ticket renewals are down. Ratings were *significantly* down already last year. THEN the Red Sox traded Mookie Betts and David Price. I wrote extensively about the trade and how I’m not losing any sleep over it, but Betts was a fan favorite and arguably the best player in the game so a little fan backlash was to be expected. Yet, Red Sox ownership somehow still looked wildly unprepared for the heat. John Henry, Tom Werner, and Sam Kennedy had their annual picnic table presser down in Fort Myers this morning and it went about as well as a Jeb Bush pep rally.

Henry then released a statement on the team’s twitter account that compared trading a former MVP to the time they traded a burnt out, broken down player in Nomar. Not exactly the same, John.

“I know many of you – particularly our youngest fans – are angry or disbelieving or sad about it. I know it’s difficult and disappointing. Some of you no doubt felt the same way when we traded Nomar in 2004.”

I am amazed at how poorly the Red Sox handle the media year after year. Few organizations in America would benefit as much as the Red Sox from a complete PR overhaul. Henry was not only glib to the reception of the Mookie trade, but he openly scoffed at legitimate criticisms.

Kennedy said nobody has asked for a refund – “I think you underestimate our fans,” said Henry at the suggestion – and that the team will not roll back the ticket price increase, another idea that amused Henry.

“As a result of making trades?” he asked.

Red Sox fans don’t complain about paying one of the highest ticket prices in the league, but thats only because they expect the team to compete and spend, every year. It may not be fair to expect the Sox to have the top payroll in the league every year, but it is fair for fans to be upset when the team raises prices (again) and subsequently dumps two of their best players to shed payroll.

Henry can continue to spin tall tales every time he denies this trade was a salary dump, but thats exactly what this was. As I said in my blog about the trade last week, I am an adult and I understand there are budgets in business so while fans may not be happy about it, I get it. But when Henry continues to outright deny it after saying it *himself* just a few months ago is a bad look for the team.

Both Henry and Kennedy wanted to alter, by almost 180 degrees, the prevailing and understandable perception that the Betts trade was made for purely financial reasons. It’s a line of reasoning that was launched last September by Henry himself when he told reporters “This year we need to be under the [competitive balance tax].”

Henry downplayed the notion that financial tailwinds steered the trade.

“…It’s surprising that anyone would think we would outspend every other team in baseball every single year. To me, that’s a little surprising…it has nothing to do with CBT.”

To be fair, this could still be a very good Red Sox team heading into the 2020 season. With young studs like Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, Eduardo Rodriguez and veterans like JD Martinez and Chris Sale (if healthy) – it would not shock me to see this team in the mix for a playoff spot. Boston fans aren’t stupid though. This team could be pretty good, but this trade was still a way to shed payroll while recouping assets. Both can be true.

Henry and co. tried to stump on their track record of spending, which includes leading the league the last two years, and never being outside of the Top 5 in terms of payroll since they took over.

Guys, thats what you’re supposed to do.

The Red Sox and Fenway Sports Group as a whole are one of the most valuable franchises on the entire planet. You don’t get credit for acting accordingly.

Not to mention, A LOT of that spending that Henry and Kennedy are fond of pointing to is littered with horrific contracts that nearly sunk the team for years at a time. Carl Crawford, Pablo Sandoval, Rusney Castillo, David Price, Nathan Eovaldi etc. etc.

So we are now just 38 days away from Opening Day, but it seems like the noise surrounding the team is only rising. This is before we even get into Alex Verdugo’s stress fracture in his back and the troubling allegations against him, injuries to Sale and Eovaldi, the term “Opener” being thrown around a bit too much for my liking, and the fact this team still doesn’t have a real closer.

It seems like 2020 could be quite the rocky ride for the Red Sox as they prepare to cross what ownership doesn’t want to admit this is; a bridge year.

It’s Official: Spring Training Arrived Before the Red Sox Hired a Manager

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Pitchers and catchers reported today and the Red Sox have still yet to officially name a manager. This is like when you showed up to class as a kid and the teacher was sick, but the school forgot to assign a substitute. Real Lord of the Flies type stuff going on down in Fort Myers right now.

All the rumors point to the Sox promoting last year’s bench coach Ron Roenicke to the manager role, but the team made a point to come out and deny that was official last week soo who the hell knows.

This is exactly what you want to get the 2020 season started right after you just traded your best player and the guy you signed to the biggest pitching contract ever. Nobody in charge. Confusion. Chaos. This team could win 95 games or miss the playoffs entirely and neither would surprise me. Too negative? Well, if you believe my old friend Petyr Baelish, all this chaos could actually be an opportunity for the Sox.

Red Sox Reportedly Hire Ron Roenicke as Manager, Team Says Search is Ongoing!

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So it was reported earlier today that the Red Sox had ended their expansive search for a new manager and hired…the guy that sat next to Alex Cora all last season. At this point I do not care who they hire as the next lameduck manager, but at least by promoting last year’s bench coach in Ron Roenicke it confirms the Sox don’t believe any further suspensions are coming from the MLB sign stealing investigation. So that would be a positive.

Then later on came the conflicting reports and we were back to square one.

John Gibbons would be a terrible hire, essentially John Farrell 2.0, but he would make for great content since he’s a dead ringer for No. 2 in Austin Powers.

So who the hell knows what the Red Sox will ultimately do in their managerial search, but is any of this a surprise to fans? Something I thought of today as I cackled amidst all the chaos; do other fan bases find the same entertainment in watching their team implode or are we just fucked in the head? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the Patriots could win 10 Super Bowls and the Red Sox would still be the most entertaining team in town because they are a reality show. They’re either flying high and winning titles or failing in a spectacular ball of fire. The Francona smear campaign, Bobby Valentine, Pablo Sandoval, David Price vs Eck, the Mookie trade; it’s. always. something.

Welp, we still have four days until pitchers and catchers report so theres PLENTY of time to figure it all out.

With the Red Sox Dumping $59 Million in 2020 Salaries, is This the Year of Rusney Castillo?

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Rusney Castillo is one of the few mega-millionaires I actually kind of felt bad for over the years. The Red Sox signed him to a gigantic contract based off of a And1 Mixtape workout video (which seems to have been scrubbed from the internet) and he shockingly never really lived up to the hype. Well because of their seemingly never ending luxury tax issues, the Sox stashed Castillo in Pawtucket for the last 4 years. The reason John Henry is fine paying Castillo $11 million a year to play in the Ocean State? Because AAA player salaries don’t count against the major league payroll of course! So rather than maybe work his way into a 4th outfielder role, Castillo has been stuck in Pawtucket so the Sox can hide his money like it’s an offshore bank account. He’s been pretty good too with a minor league career batting avg of .293 in 467 games and he even hit 17 dingers in 2019.

And if you enjoy players sticking it to owners, it’s impossible not to laugh at Castillo forgoing free agency and the opportunity to play in the majors somewhere. Nope, he had a player option for $13.5 million in 2020 that he happily opted into knowing he’ll most certainly remain in AAA.

After slashing $59 million off the 2020 payroll with the salary dumps of Mookie Betts and David Price, there’s suddenly some breathing room under the luxury tax. So maybe 2020 is the year we finally see Rusney Castillo for a full season? Why the hell not.

Red Sox Trade Former MVP Mookie Betts to the Dodgers. Lets Break It Down

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ESPN – The Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers have agreed to a blockbuster deal that will send former MVP Mookie Betts and left-hander David Price to Los Angeles for a package that includes outfielder Alex Verdugo, sources tell ESPN.

The trade includes a third team, the Minnesota Twins, with the Dodgers sending starter Kenta Maeda to Minnesota, which in turn will ship hard-throwing pitching prospect Brusdar Graterol to Boston, sources said, confirming a report by The Athletic.

Verdugo, 23, hit .294/.342/.475 with a 2.2 WAR in 377 plate appearances for the Dodgers last season. He took over in center field when A.J. Pollock was out. Verdugo didn’t play after Aug. 4 because of a back injury he re-aggravated while on a rehab assignment in September.

He is excellent against left-handed pitching and is under team control through the 2024 season. He will make the MLB minimum of $563,500 in 2020. He’s also a member of the Mexican national team.

Graterol, a hard-throwing, 21-year-old right-hander, pitched 9⅔ innings last season in the majors, going 1-1 with a 4.66 ERA. In the minors last season, the Venezuelan was 7-0 with a 1.92 ERA across three levels. He was rated the No. 83 overall prospect for 2020 by MLB pipeline.

In the words of Red Sox owner John Henry, “It’s not ideal.”

It is an absolute bummer to trade a dynamic, homegrown, and MVP level talent. Theres no other way to put it. A gross mismanagement of assets if you will, but a situation the Red Sox put themselves in. Mookie Betts seemed like a great teammate, a good dude off the field, and was fun as hell to watch, but he is a businessman. Thats not meant to be a knock because everyone should look to get paid what they think they’re worth, but that meant the Sox were never going to get a hometown discount, let alone sign him before he hit Free Agency. Lou Merloni told a story on NBC Sports last night about how Mookie’s been very consistent over the years on how he approaches these situations. Merloni brought up how the Sox offered Mookie a signing bonus of $300K out of high school, but he counter offered with $750K and threatened to go to college if the Sox didn’t meet his number, which of course they did to sign their 5th round pick. My point is the Red Sox saw the writing on the wall, had a value in their minds of what Mookie was worth and realized it probably wasn’t going to be what he figured to make on the open market next season so they chose to (barely) get ahead of it and recoup some assets.

Maybe if the Sox managed their assets a little better they could have not worried about paying top dollar to re-sign Mookie Betts next offseason. Drunken sailor deals given out to David Price, Nathan Eovaldi, and Chris Sale over the years put them in a tight spot financially. You can’t pay everybody. Or the team could have traded him last year to get a bigger return. However, Mookie was never going to sign before hitting free agency unless the Sox offered him $500 million so lets not pretend otherwise.

Oh, and let us never forget *when* the news of this trade actually broke.

The Return

Not great! This is where I do have a problem with the deal. I am an unabashed “Prospects Guy,” much to the chagrin of Big Z. My stance has always been I am OK trading Mookie Betts if it meant restocking the depleted farm system, which the Red Sox did not do here. They got one young major league outfielder and one pitching prospect. Not exactly a haul for arguably the second best player in the game.

The main piece of the deal is Alex Verdugo, who had a 3.1 WAR in 106 games at 23-years-old and will be under team control for the next five seasons. Not terrible. To be fair, prior to last season Verdugo was the Dodgers’ top prospect.

“One of the best pure hitting prospects in baseball, Verdugo recognizes pitches and controls the strike zone better than most players his age. He uses the whole field, repeatedly barreling balls with a quick left-handed stroke geared for line drives. Though he homered just seven times in 132 games last season, his hitting ability, bat speed and strength should translate into average power if he adds some loft to his swing.

As good as he is in the batter’s box, Verdugo’s best tool actually is his plus-plus arm. Despite average speed, he has spent much of his pro career in center field, where his instincts help him get the job done. Scouts are split on whether he can handle center on a daily basis in the Majors, but no one doubts that his arm would play in right.”

Then there’s also this, which I would like to chalk up to just a young guy being a young guy, but Boston fans will have zero patience for that as the centerpiece of a Mookie Betts deal.

The Red Sox also received the No. 83 ranked prospect in baseball from Minesota with pitching prospect Brusdar Graterol, who’s *ceiling* is a No. 2-3 starter according to baseball guys like Sean McAdam.

The realistic hope is that Graterol turns into a young, cheap closer for the Sox. Boston absolutely needs a young flamethrower in the pen, but it seems like a player of that caliber could have come much cheaper. Graterol will be under team control until 2026.

Oh and the Sox will also be paying HALF of David Price’s remaining contract for him to play elsewhere for the next three years! Good grief.

The Red Sox screwed this up by not having a long term plan, which they haven’t had since Theo Epstein left town. They change organizational philosophies at the drop of a hat, which leaves you with these gigantic problems down the line.

Also, can someone make sure John Henry never gets in front of a microphone again? He hamstrung Chaim Bloom from Day 1 by announcing to the rest of the league that the Sox were looking to get under the luxury tax so every team in baseball knew the Sox HAD to trade Mookie. Add in the fact they were trying to shed Price’s contract too and the Dodgers were one of the only teams in the league that could make a deal work, and the Dodgers knew it.

Get your “It’s Not Ideal” shirts now!

The Contract

I don’t feel comfortable giving any player in the league a 12 year $400+ million contract, let alone a 5’9″ guy. If his power slips at all, that contract will be an absolute albatross, making Jacoby Ellsbury look like a bargain. Granted on those mega contracts you’re paying for the front half and hoping for the best in the second half, but tell that to the teams paying Ellsbury, Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera, and Robinson Cano just to name a few recent examples.

“Stop Rooting for Rich Guys to Save Money.”

Okay, this is one I need to address because I could not care less what John Henry’s ROI is on the Red Sox so I’m not rooting for one of the most valuable franchises in the world to save money. However, I am also an adult and realize the situation the team was in. Every business has a budget and yes the Sox could absolutely “afford” Mookie Betts, but by doing so they would blow through their budget, not to mention the landfall of luxury tax penalties they would have to bear for being a repeat offender. I’m talking fines, lost draft picks, international signing money etc. etc. You would be strapping your team by overreaching on one contract. Not an efficient way to run a business. And thats if Mookie plays at an MVP level for the next 5-12 years, which he won’t.

Looking Ahead

So by making the impossible decision to trade a home grown superstar player the Sox have freed up a ton of money AND gotten ride of that pill David Price. This is what Theo and his disciples fetishized as a “bridge year.” Take a step back in order to take two steps forward rather than dumping more money into the problem, which is exactly what got them into this situation in the first place.

You could say I’m a bit more optimistic, or at least pragmatic, than most of what I’m seeing on Twitter today, but make no mistake: the Red Sox just punted on the 2020 season. Ownership could have kept Mookie and made one last run at it this year even if they knew he wasn’t going to resign, but maybe they saw the writing on the wall. Eovaldi, Sale, and Price are always hurt, the Yankees are loaded, and this team’s chances of winning a World Series were precarious. So they figured to punt on 2020, and dump Mookie and Price rather than pay through the nose to field a Wild Card team.

Here’s hoping they now put together an actual organizational plan for the first time in a decade and get after it next year. At least we’ll have the XFL to watch this spring!

It’s Official: Truck Day Got Here Before the New Red Sox Manager Did

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It’s official! Truck Day has come and gone and we are now eight days away from pitchers and catchers reporting to Spring Training without anyone in charge. The Red Sox were in a tough spot with the sign stealing hysteria when they decided they needed to fire Alex Cora. That was nearly three weeks ago and we still are no closer to learning if the Sox are going to get hammered by MLB or escape with a slap on the wrist. It seems like John Henry and co. are wary of promoting from within in case MLB does throw the book at the Sox and suspend more coaches than just Cora. Firing more than one manager in a single offseason would be an unmitigated PR disaster.

The team has been pretty tight lipped about who they’re looking at to take over, but it did come out the other day they were interviewing Luis Urueta, who’s been a coach in the Diamondbacks system for the past 10+ years. Oakland A’s “quality control coach” and former Sox first baseman Mark Kotsay has also been a rumored candidate. At this point I don’t even care who they hire, but you absolutely cannot show up to Fort Myers in a week without anyone in charge.

I feel like Alec Baldwin in Glengarry Glen Ross. Have you made your decision?