The Red Sox have outrighted infielder/outfielder Tzu-Wei Lin, right-handers Robinson Leyer, Zack Godley and Andrew Triggs, and lefty Mike Kickham, Jen McCaffrey of The Athletic tweets. Godley, Triggs and Kickham have elected free agency.
The most established major leaguer of the bunch is the 30-year-old Godley, who had some success with the Diamondbacks from 2015-19. But Godley struggled in the last of those seasons and had another down year with the Red Sox in 2020. He wound up tossing 28 2/3 innings of 8.16 ERA/7.10 FIP ball with 8.79 K/9 and 4.4 BB/9, all while averaging a career-worst 89.7 mph on his fastball.
Triggs, 31, also didn’t prove to be part of the solution for Boston’s pitching staff. He ended the year with 8 1/3 innings and seven earned runs allowed, owing in part to the three homers he surrendered. Neither Leyer nor Kickham helped the club’s cause, either, combining for a whopping 23 earned runs given up over 18 2/3 frames.
Lin, the lone position player in the group, was a promising prospect in his younger days, but he hasn’t performed at the MLB level so far. Since he debuted in 2017, the 26-year-old has hit .223/.298/.316 with one homer in 218 plate appearances. He took 57 trips to the plate this year and batted a mere .154/.182/.173 with no HRs and a paltry .019 ISO.
Zack Godley just can’t handle being outrighted. It’s probably been two or three times that he’s elected free agency already.
Why should he when he keeps getting big league chances?
And oh dear, didn’t expect to see that sort of performance from Robinson Leyer this season as well. A 21.21 ERA isn’t too much fun. Hope he gets better soon.
2021 is going to be another trying year for the Red Sox. Even with Sale & E-Rod back, this team is still missing 7-9 impact players (including BP pitchers) and there just aren’t enough of them in the minors or available via free agency or trade to make Boston true contenders in 2021. They should use 2021 to develop as many of their youngsters as they can (Houck, Mata, Groome, Dalbec, Downs & Duran) and then really see what they have to add to build their next championship club. As good as Houck was at the end of the year, Mata should really be better than him and don’t give up on Groome yet either. If Boston can develop 2 out of 3 of these guys into starters, they’ll be in really good shape. Seabold should be in the mix too, but most likely will be a bullpen piece. The Sox won’t be cellar dwellers next year but will probably be a .500 ball club with some interesting rookie building blocks.
I don’t understand this logic at all. Sale, E-Rod, Eovaldi, and Houck is a promising rotation if Sale is close to his usual form. Bullpens can be reconstructed from scratch, and the Rays brass were always good at it, The offense should still be one of the best in the AL. This is the usual Sox fan doomsaying.
Anybody planning on sale pitching in 2021 is kidding themselves
Sale will pitch in 2021 but it won’t be until July or August at best.
Sale has TJ on March 30th and is already throwing. We will see him by June 1st at the latest (barring any setbacks)
We may see him, but it won’t be anything significant. They will not be contending, so they will be super careful with him. Too much money on the table not to be cautious.
he is at least mid-season
The problem is we have no idea how sale will look once he gets back and he isn’t back until July at the earliest assuming everything goes well in his recovery. Eovaldi will surely find some new injury so I don’t think you can count on him to pitch all season and even if you can, he’s pretty average (expect about a 4 era). Erod had one good season and a few pretty mediocre seasons coming off of missing a whole year and cardiac issues so who knows what you get with him. The rotation might be fine if all these guys put it together but there are just too many question marks in my opinion. This rotation is also going to have to compete against a really good AL East which I think will be tough. On paper New York, Toronto, and Tampa look better so I don’t think it’s just Boston fans crying doomsday. The team should be better than they were this year but I wouldn’t expect a huge turnaround
They WILL finish ahead of the Orioles though 79-83
Seems like a very pragmatic viewpoint. I am optimistic on Sale due to his history of bouncing back and expect him no later than June 1. I wouldn’t be shocked if he pitched in May.
E-Rod is the biggest concern due to the nature of his injury. If he can’t start conditioning until January he won’t compete in Spring Training and his arrival date will be after Sale. Also, that’s a best case scenario. Unlike TJ surgery that usually doesn’t have set-backs, the heart issue could have lots of set-backs so if by December 1 it’s clear he can’t start conditioning until January, I think you have to non-tender him since he won’t play more than half the year and that’s only if nothing goes wrong. If, on the other hand, he is successfully conditioning in December and looks to be ready to attend Spring Training with no limitations, then, without set-backs he could be back in April or May. Those are big ifs.
Eovaldi won’t face everyone’s #1 like in 2020 if Sale or E-Rod make it back in April. Otherwise, you are right, he’ll struggle against the #1s from other teams but if we hit he gives us a chance to win.
Perez needs to continue his 2020 performances. If so, he’ll be an excellent #4 when everyone is back and Houck is an excellent #5. Hopefully, Pivetta can fill in for Sale until he is ready and give us a chance in games and be depth for the rotation..
Will 2021 be a playoff year? Not likely but if things break the right way it’s a possibility if Bloom back-fills Mookie’s bat and find so solid role players to go along with a new closer and another starting pitcher.
Bloom’s decisions will determine if we are slightly competitive or fighting to stay ahead of Baltimore in 2021. I think 2022 is far more likely to be a competitive year.
Dare to dream.
Even if Sale does come back and pitches well, there will be a lot of growing pains with their young starters. I’d expect both Houck & Mata to make the team out of camp but wouldn’t be surprised if one got sent back down to AAA to work some things out (if they play a full 162 game season). We don’t know how Benny will rebound after 2 down years, don’t know what Boston will do in CF and don’t know how well Dalbec, Downs and Chavis will play in 2021 either. So a record of .500 seems pretty reasonable to me. If all rookies play well and Benny, JDM and others come back to form then a 90+ win season is possible but personally I’d be happy with an 82-82 record so long as they play and develop their key rookies. No more Godley’s, Triggs’, etc. Let’s see Pivetta, Seabold, Thad Ward battle for bullpen positions and let’s see Duran, Downs and Wong get a shot as starters or backups. I feel that Boston has much better farm depth than they are given credit for. 2021 will be the year to put that to the test.
82-82?
How come they get two extra games?
😉
They got under the CBT which was apparently a pretty Big Deal for them. I’m not convinced a decent spending spree – in a down market – wouldn’t give them a chance to get back in the thick of things.
I guess that’s not really on the table though. If it was they’d’ve just kept Dumbrowski & not hired Bloom.
Yes 82-82. MLB is probably going to play two extra games for the next 51 years to make up for the 102 games missed this year. Or something.
Sale won’t be available for half the year and once he is, who knows what version of him we’ll get. Crazy to depend on a bounce right back to form.
After starting 12-27, they played at a 98-win pace over their last 21 games, 12-9 plus an adjustment for a very tough schedule.
They need a CF, a mid-rotation starter, a closer, a couple of bench guys (RHH 4th OFer, LHH 1B) and two more quality bullpen arms. As the only one of the top 4 revenue clubs that wasn’t over the tax limit this year, they’re as well situated as anyone to grab the best FA’s possible, and they’ve got a smart ex-Ray running the team who may have already stolen Nick Pivetta from the Phils (that’s based on his numbers when they acquired him as much or more than his two starts). So they should be able to fill all of these needs adequately.
Eriemvan – totally agree!
ericmvan – If you want to live with 24 errors at 3B we can do that but I’d like to see Devers at DH and I’d like to see JD’s salary moved for the SP you are looking for. No salary eating just a new 3B who can field and a SP. If Bauer can be gotten with JD being gone that’s great otherwise we need to sift thru the garage released by other teams. I’d trade Downs since he is over-valued for young pitching. It’s a lot easier to find a CF than a quality 3B who can field. Justin Turner is older but could act as a bridge to Casas or Dalbec at 3B in the future. We need a bat like his either at 3B or CF. He’ll be a lot cheaper than Springer.
Hope you are right that the needs are met this off season.
this team is still missing 7-9 impact players
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I think you need to describe what you mean by ‘impact players’. In 2019, there were only 86 hitters with a 2.0 fWAR, and only 51 pitchers. That means there are approximately 4.5 players with a 2.0+ WAR per team. So no one, maybe the LAD, will have 7-9 impact players.
(4) dependable bullpen arms, starting CF, quality 4th OF, 1-2 starting pitchers and a solid utility IF. They may have the utility IF in Arroyo or Munoz (only time will tell) but they need major improvements in the OF, the bullpen and in the starting staff. Let’s hope the rookies can fill at least 1/2 of these openings.
Our BP will be Hernandez, Barnes, Taylor, probably Brewer, 1-2 stragglers from last year, and one outside dependable RP, but no addition will be considered an impact player.
The rotation will be Sale, ERod, Eovaldi, Houck, Martin, and Pivetta, and maybe one inoact SP.
My guess is that they come to terms with JBJ, but he is not an impact player.
And we won’t signed anyone that’s been given a QO.
oh no what are they going to do after losing Godley!?! Haha… thank “God” no pun intended… they’re moving on From Godley… at the time he was worth taking a flier on but he clearly didn’t have anything left in the tank. So I’m glad that they’re moving on From him as opposed to hanging onto him and trying to Give him more time to turn things around. in general I’m not opposed to that when the pitcher has talent or potential to return to form… but from Godley’s performances in Boston, I’d say it’s pretty clear he (unfortunately for him) really doesn’t have much to offer. who knows though? he is still young enough that maybe he could reinvent himself so for his sake I wish him the best… just glad it’s not going to be with the Sox
You’re playing fast and loose with your use of capital letters, Jeff. You’re a renegade maverick, but damnit you get the job done!
For me it happens with voice to text. Not sure if that’s the case with Jeff.
The A’s should sign him and have the tandem of Jesus and Godley
Jesus IS God-ley. 🙂
We should have thought of that!
-Angels marketing team and pitching coaches, probably.
Just don’t bring Pontius Pilate onboard as a free agent reliever…too much clubhouse turmoil.
Pontius Pilate will beg out of the game every time. He’ll wash his hands and walk away and not even pitch !!
Then it’s all chill…until the Prince of Darkness (lefty closer) is recalled from the farm for the stretch run.
Oh yeah that guy. Well he will definitely bring the heat, that’s for sure.
Next Red Sox waiver, DFA, option…removal from 40-man roster post should also include:
Walden
Brewer
Peraza
Covey
Stock
Springs
Hart
Aybar
(Bradley will be removed as FA)
(Pedroia will get his $12,000,000, but will finally be removed as his spot on the 40-man is wasted during the Rule 5 draft until spring when he is put back on the DL/IL for the entire season)
Walden might still be of some use. Kind of typical short term memory Boston fans all forgot how both he and Taylor were 2 of the most dependable relievers they had in 2019, both had health issues in the shortened 2020 season.
Seeing how there is nothing, other than Barnes, Hernandez, huge question mark Brasier and no chance will repeat Valdez as of right now set for the 2021 BP, I’d no be in such a hurry to unload Walden and Taylor. Those are the 2 best bets to help, rather than the cast of discards still on the 40 man they still have not yet unloaded.
I agree John. As bad as Walden was last season, he led the bullpen in innings pitched in 2019 and had one of the best ERAs of the group as well. Provided that he costs under $1M, Walden certainly deserves another shot at righting the ship. Taylor is 100% part of their future. Between COVID & injuries, he barely pitched in 2020 so you really can’t look at his 2020 numbers at all. He’ll be an important part of that pen. The Sox do need to add a couple of big arms to the pen though. Guys that throw 98-100. It seems like every playoff team had 2 or 3 (or more) guys who could come out of the pen and hit 100mph with ease. Boston could use a couple of those guys for sure.
Need Hall on that list, too.
I missed Hall, my bad!!!!!!!
Hall might not be DFA’d. As bad as he was last year, he was acquired via trade where the Sox actually gave up a decent minor leaguer (catcher Jonny Nunez) because they liked Hall’s spin rate. While he was pretty awful last season, he still only pitched 8 innings. He might get another shot. as long as he can maintain that spin rate.
Ketch – Spin rate has not helped Colton Brewer. That was the reason the Red Sox traded for him from San Diego.
Brewer
2019 – 1.70 whip – 4.12 era
2020 – 1.75 whip – 5.61 era
Hall
2019 – 1.84 whip – 7.71 era
2020 – 3.12 whip – 18.69 era
They both put WAY TOO MANY MEN ON BASE to be successful.
The Red Sox will keep them if they clear waivers, but the 40-man will be full after adding the six Rule 5 additions and the players from the DL/IL list (and 3 to 4 FA and non-tendered additions).
Brewer was fine out of the BP in 2019 and 2020. It was the starting that killed him. He is by no means any more than mediocre, but he is good enough to work out of the BP at minimum wage.
Whip is still too high to be anything other than mop up. He does not command his pitches (cutter or curveball) and gives up too much hard contact. Since he went from mlb to DL/IL to end of season, i think the shortness of the season avoided him from having his last option burned, so he can start the season in AAA without clearing waivers if he remains of the 40-man.
If the RS sign a starter and a couple of bullpen pitchers, i do not think Brewer is good enough for mlb and starts the year in AAA.
Process, process, process. The fake season was for information only. Nice surprises in the rotation at the end. We’ll see if it holds over. I wouldn’t pencil in 162 games in 2021, our fabulous nation is more than capable of blowing up the pandemic numbers. Who knows? Sale is totally a TBD situation as is ERod. If things fall right they could compete but I’m not expecting a lot next year.
He John – no short term fan or memory here! I followed Marcus Walden when he was signed to AAA Pawtucket and was one of his biggest supporters during and after his 10 win season at Pawtucket. I rooted for him to be brought up, and was excited to see how well he did in the mlb as with all the minor league players the RS bring up, but i do not think he is better than some of the other pictures they have. His WHIP was an eye popping 2.40, BA against .371, 5 HRs in 13 1/3 innings, and he has 0/zero remaining options.
I see the staff being:
Rodriguez
Eovaldi
Pérez
Pivetta
A FA starter
Houck starting the season in mlb for whoever is hurt coming out of spring training which happens ever single year
FA closer
Barnes
Brasier
Hernandez
Taylor
Weber (look at his numbers is relief era under 3.00 and multiple innings per game).
FA (controllable and under 30 – Bloom typical choice)
Non-tender Bloom pickup
Look at the pitchers the RS had that Bloom let go or waived:
Poynor
Velazquez
Brian Johnson
Hembree
Larkins
Shawaryn
Marcus Walden was great in 2019, but then again Velazquez and Johnson were great in 2018 and look where they ended up in 2020
The Sox could very well be the most interesting team of all to watch this winter. What does John Henry do? Eat the inevitable re-build, knowing that it will cut into his franchise value, as it go into the toilet? Or does he plunge, and look seriously at Springer, Bauer et all?
He’s taking the Fenway Sports Group public, starting with an entity that has a greater value than Amazon did when Bezos went public. And there’s a whole lot more baseball fans out there than people who read books.
M guess? He’ll go crazy after FAs, even if harms long term value. Excessively bright billionaires like Henry don’t worry about 2025, they worry about October 27, 2020. Then he’ll alter course as needed.
He knows the Rays are still going to be there, the Yanks will react (especially with an aggressive new Mets owner), the Blue Jays are coming. Even the O’s may only be a couple of years from being competitive. “Surrendering” 2021 is surrendering the next few years. Henry knows the myth of a rebuild; believing that your competition is going to stand still while you rebuild.
Blue Jays going to need to find some pitching
And the Sox don’t????
“there’s a whole lot more baseball fans out there than people who read books.”*
*citation needed.
No major losses here…but hopefully there is a plan for next season to start to see some improvement
If Bloom wants to make a mark for himself he has to do bold smart things this year. If we declare the incredibly dumb move with Mookie and Price on ownership then he needs to go bold again only this time we need to get the better end of the deal.
Making a big splash deal will be hard since we don’t have top players to deal. Devers is probably the most valuable and since he can’t play defense it makes sense to move him for pitching or a more well rounded young player. Trading Devers for a guy like Luis Robert of the White Sox makes sense because he is a great defender, steals bases and hits for power and should do well in Fenway. Or trade him for an Ian Anderson to immediately boost our starting staff and make it younger. The problem is Devers probably isn’t worth either of those two players.
Bogey could bring back some nice players but his value and cost make him much more difficult to move than Devers. If we think Verdugo’s back could be an issue going forward he looked good enough in 2020 to improve his value so he might get us pitching.
That’s about it for guys who could bring us something decent in return. A big market team needs to have more than 3 trade worthy players so nobody should be thinking about rings right now. We are embarrassingly weak. Our excellent DH just had his worst year. Our star #1 SP just had TJ. Our next best pitcher really only had one good year and even that wasn’t all that great except he got lots of wins thanks to excellent run support.
The 2018 Red Sox were feared because they had Sale, Price and Porcello as starters in the post season and Mookie, Devers, JD and Bogey at the top of the order producing runs. In 2021, we have 1/2 year or maybe 2/3 of a year of Sale, Price has not been replaced as the #2, our #3 is either a guy coming back from heart problems or an injury prone starter whose done average since we got him. Our hitting is Mookie-less but we still have Devers, Bogey and JD coming off his worst year. The minor players haven’t changed much in that Vazquez is still here and slightly better than the 2018 version, we have a young Dalbec rather than an experienced Moreland, we have a question mark in center field and we have Verdugo trying to fill Mookie’s shoes but will never be the #2 player in baseball. There needs to be upgrades in LF, CF, 3B, 2B and Devers needs to go to DH to fix the offense. We need a legit #2, more starting depth, another right handed set-up man to go with Valdez and a closer. It wouldn’t hurt to swap out all our mediocre middle innings guys for hard throwing guys like TB has. That’s a lot of fixes this off-season. Be prepared for .500 with a range of .100 on either side of that number if the off season goes well or poorly.
Addition and subtraction are polarities, right; you really don’t add by subtracting. So you can’t trade Devers, or X or Vasquez. The team is weak enough; no need just to move that weakness around.
Those three (maybe JD) and the health of the pitchers is crucial; all the others are warm bodies occupying a space. The promotions last year are at best marginal,, bottom of the order stuff. They need an impact bat, and of course, any pitching they can find.
They really can’t afford to trade anybody.
Your comment assumes Bloom wouldn’t get comparable value. I’m not sure why you think that but it’s a question on my mind too. Devers for Robert would make us better since he can field very well and hits better than Devers and would lead the team in SBs. Heck, I’d give the White Sox both Devers and JD and ask for Robert and a hard throwing young unproven arm. Tons of money saved and an opportunity to use the DH more like TB does.
I agree that it will be hard to take big steps forward through Free Agency since we have only about $30M if we cut the likely players in December or before. So without money to spend trading is the only alternative. Most of our trade-able players are in the minors since our major league roster is so weak or the players’ values are down from bad years. So moving a Devers for a Robert makes perfect sense. We have our CF for the next decade who will hit 3 in our order and lead the team in SBs and HRs. Our defense improves nearly 15 spots by losing Devers’ 24 errors. Or we trade him for the SP we need.
All trading needs to assume we get at least an equally skilled player who plays a different position that we need more than a 3B. Our two biggest holes are SP and CF so Devers getting us one of those spots for the next decade makes perfect sense. We have plenty of depth at 3B and they can’t field worse than Devers.
So we do baby steps. Fix CF or SP first and back-fill where we have depth. We have no depth at SS so trading Bogey needs to be a strategic move if we feel he will opt out. If we can buy out his opt out then lets do it. Vazquez is a catcher and catchers don’t produce much. So if you have the 3rd best or 12 best you have roughly the same thing. Moving Vazquez for something we need for the future makes perfect sense and hurts less than almost any position on the field. Remember, we need a LF if Benny isn’t back to old Benny, we need to hope for an answer in Arroyo at 2B and we have the worst bottom half of a bullpen you can find in baseball. The bullpen might be replaced by sleepers that Bloom finds and 2B isn’t terribly critical. We must get a #2 SP and a good closer to compete in 2021.
Devers for Robert would make us better since he can field very well and hits better than Devers and would lead the team in SBs. Heck, I’d give the White Sox both Devers and JD and ask for Robert and a hard throwing young unproven arm.
—————————————————————————————
1-No way does Robert is hit as well as Devers, and it is not close.
2-The WS won’t trade Robert for Devers straight-up, so why would they add they add a hard-throwing arm for JD? JD has negative trade value. You also seem to think that Devers should be a DH. So would the WS add two DHs?
3-That said, I’d make that trade in a heartbeat, and I’d be willing to throw in a decent prospect. Robert is largely unproven, but his upside, and with a 5+2 contract, makes him, imho, more valuable than Devers. And the fit (Dalbec to 3B and Casas to 1B) is pretty compelling, albeit extremely risky.
Welcome to Year 3 of 10 of the Dombrowski Drought. Tis the price the Red Sox must pay for letting that idiot anywhere near the Red Sox. It is his M.O. to throw away a team’s future for about 10 years to buy a single year of success. The farm system is left ravaged and the team’s payroll bloated with horrible contracts. Detroit is still recovering. Mark the disaster he created right up there with the Molasses Flood and the Great Chelsea Fire.
“67” please get real. DD took over a team that finished last in 2014 & 2015 and won three AL East titles — one WS– in four years. No matter who wins in 2020, there will be seven different winners since the Red Sox won in 2013. So tell me who has done better?
67 – the DD rant is very tired since it’s so far from the truth. The farm system graduated 17 players from 2013 to 2020 and all but JD and our 2B came from our farm system if you count Verdugo as a swap for Mookie our best farm system product. We’ve had one of the most productive farm systems of the 2010’s. As far as contracts, again you have no clue. Hanley and Panda were prior mistakes. DD NEVER exceeded the luxury cap with in-year payroll. The excess was all on prior GMs.
It’s funny how you call contracts horrible during the down years but not great during the good years. Most players don’t have great years every year so you have to evaluate a contract from start to finish. Even Price wasn’t a terrible contract during the early years. It was during the late years which is expected when you sign someone. Sure, in 10 years Mookie could have an off year after 2 or 3 MVP seasons but would that make it a bad contract? No. Price recently was in the lesser value years of his contract. If he had Brock Holt’s personality, his contract would have been considered less bad by most fans but he didn’t. Will he have decent years in 2021 and 2022? I think he will with a fresh start in LAD where they score runs and play defense much better than Boston, specifically Devers.
DD made just one huge mistake, he hired Cora. Otherwise, he never spent too much, he never depleted the farm system and he picked up key players in our run to a championship in 2018. We can only hope Bloom figures out his job is more than swapping non impact minor league players, he needs to start impacting the on field players this off season. Since it appears his approach is bottom-up, I hope he is still around after three or four years of mediocrity using his approach. Based on the owners financial troubles, I guess it makes sense to have a frugal GM because as far as I can tell ownership has changed their competitive approach to a conservative approach to save money. If that’s true, then there was no reason to get under the cap since we’ll never go back over it. So all the decisions in the last year were a waste, except from a saving money stand point. That has to excite the fans after nearly 20 years of being aggressive with the spending. Let’s hope the ownership group turns it around and decides to spend money again since the Yankees out spent us in 2020 by the most in our history of competing with them. With the cap at $210M and a new CBA on the horizon, it will be devastating to see us spending $50M or more under the cap and that could happen by 2022. It gives ownership an additional profit margin of $50M while the fans get to watch a team struggle to win 81 games.
One other fact you misrepresented. The Detroit Tigers struggled since DD left because their new GM sucked and mismanaged a strong organization. He let go of JD and so many other key players it’s embarrassing. DD didn’t kill the TIgers he gave them a shot at winning, the post DD years are on the ineptitude of the people that followed in DD’s footsteps.
Seldom do I see comments with so much fundamentally wrong.
Clearly, you have no real clue. I guess DUMBrowski didn’t get fired and is still running the show since he did such a fabulous job and the Red Sox didn’t finish dead last in their Division and 27th out of 30 teams.
67 I ask you again: 3 AL East titles -one WS win — in 4 yrs; Who has done better?? Henry has a quick hook. Theo/Ben won three WS in 11yrs and both got fired. You should have been watching in the late 50’s early 60’s when a racist Yawkey/Higgins combo refused to sign any black players.
67redsox – it’s pathetic how guys like you try to distort facts with bs. The numbers don’t lie, but apparently that doesn’t stop you from doing it.
DD got fired because he wanted a fair in-season amount of money to compete with the Yankees and Houston. Not over the threshold just near the threshold to compete. In 2018 he spent $`167M on in-season talent. The overage came from bad contracts before him. Those are the facts you tool.
The Red Sox starting line-up would have bounced back in 2020 after a bad year in 2019 due to Cora’s huge Spring Training mistake and some key injuries. 10 games back by the end April wasn’t on DD except for hiring Cora but ownership stated publicly that they were going to fix their diversity issues before they hired Cora so maybe DD had no choice. Apparently when ownership wants something they take the responsibility out of the hands of the GM and they consistently make mistakes using that approach.
2019 wasn’t on DD it was on Cora and injuries. DD got axed when he refused to live with a reduced payroll that had nothing to do with him. Bloom didn’t have the experience to say no but DD did and got fired. He proved himself so many times in his career he earned the right to do it his way based on his successes. Bloom was hired to be a puppet. Let’s hope that changes because he has the potential to do a good job but until he takes ownership of player personnel decisions, we’ll never get the real Bloom.
JMI1950 is spot on with all that he said. The same with Joe. DD did not make many mistakes, especially trading. If you think about how money has a time value so do players. A player of equal value in year 1 and year 5 are not equal. DD used minor leaguers to fill spots on the major league roster to win now but he used over-rated players whose value would not be realized for many years. Ever Moncada, who was the #1 Prospect at one time, took 3 years to start achieving some of his potential and he’s still not performed like a #1 prospect. Anderson Espinoza has yet to impact the Padres. Kopech like Joe said still hasn’t contributed. Joe also mentioned Margot and at the time we had Betts who we thought we’d keep forever, Benny who looked like a long-term keeper and even JBJ seemed like he might hit someday but he didn’t. Margot leaving wasn’t a mistake because once again the time value of players has shown what we got was worth more.
Kiddy17 – Mr. 60 year fan you should run for president….because you know everything
@KD17 – Dombrowski signed David Price to the richest pitching contract in history at the time, JD Martinez to a 5 year, $110M contract, Eovaldi to a ridiculous 4 year deal and re-upped Sale to a huge contract while hurt. Those four deals alone put the Red Sox over the CBT so how can you say he didn’t spend much or put them in payroll jail? He also traded young, affordable talent for high priced veterans (Kimbrell is a great example) so his fingerprints are all over the Red Sox bloated payroll.
Your math skills need sharpening. The Cy Young winner Price received a record contract because he was one of the best pitchers in baseball when he signed it. That makes perfect sense. His contract of $32M per year added to JD’s $22M added to Eovaldi’s $17M and Sale’s $25.6M is $96.6M per year. The CBT is $210M per year. That’s a pretty big math mistake you just made.
The trick to a successful balance of cheap and expensive players is what any GM wants to achieve that is committed to winning. You have a 40 player roster and 25 players will cost less than $1M. So, $210 minus $20M for benefits and minor league contracts leaves $190M less the 25 guys for $25M puts you at $165M for 15 players. The trick is to have at least 5 and hopefully as many as 10 guys who will also be controllable through arbitration. The Red Sox have Sale, JD, Bogaerts and dead contracts all costing over $20M a year. In addition, they have Eovaldi at $17M so 4 players and dead contracts make up $92.35M of the $165M available leaving $72.65M for the other 11 players. Since our arbitration players are Devers, E-Rod, Barnes, Brazier, Plawecki and Brice they comprise 6 of the remaining 11 spots leaving 5 spots to fill with veteran contracts. The estimated arbitration costs for the 6 players totals $21.6M leaving $51.05M for the remaining 5 spots. We need a SP, CF and Closer and less expensive depth from the other 2 spots.
DD’s contracts made the Red Sox better and they won a ring. The NYY have averaged nearly $40M a year more spending than we did and have no ring so DD must have done something right compared to Cashman. Can the Red Sox afford to spend $210M a year? Yes, they have some of the largest profits in the industry. So why not spend money to win until the game gets fixed to add equity to the competition? DD understood that concept and yet stayed under the luxury tax level with his in season spending.
The goal is to win rings so trading young, affordable talent for high priced talent isn’t wrong if you are staying under the luxury tax and winning rings. DD was exceptional at trading over-valued players like Anderson Espinoza to get a key piece to the puzzle in Pomerantz. Getting Sale for great young prospects could have back-fired but it didn’t. He gave up the #1 Prospect and that player took years to develop. The stud pitcher he gave up has yet to make a name for himself other than he throws around 100 and has arm problems. Sale helped us win. Moncada and others haven’t helped anyone win and the deal was made four years ago. We won 2 years after the deal. The other team hasn’t come close. If you think that’s a bad trade then your goal is something other than winning rings.
DD’s fingerprints are all over their bloated payroll? If you are a TB fan I could understand the bloated comment but Boston is a big market team that needs to spend near the luxury tax to compete with the Yankees, Astros and Dodgers for rings. There is no bloated payroll. There is a roster full of players who have historical value, expected value and costs. A smart GM finds players with an expected value higher than their cost. Sale fits that description. Bogaerts fits that description. Devers, Vazquez, Verdugo, Perez and many others fit that description. Mookie fit that description and got thrown away. That’s the travesty of our situation not the bloated payroll as you described it.
Kiddy17 – more diarrhea…..flush buddy
The world according to KiDdy. Get over yourself
The trades were not a disaster. I hear this a lot, but who are the guys we are really missing? Margot would be our CF next year, but so far, he is hardly high-end. I hated that he included Allen in the trade, but so far he’s done very little. Two good years out of Shaw, but I think we got to the point where he was never going to play for us.
Moncada is really good, and I still like Kopech, but such is the price for a guy like Sale.
I think his weakness was less the farm, and more that he paid too much for Price and Eovaldi. I think he was bidding against himself in both cases.
It is a little surprising how few of Red Sox fans follow AAA and AA. Most I find barely know WHO the players are (most actually do not know), and they definitely do not know much ABOUT the players.
I guess most are too busy debating who the manager should be and whether the game has lost its morality. I am not saying that is good or bad just not my interest.
Five down, and at least 8 more to go. They need to open at least 13 spots on the 40-man roster just to protect their Rule 5 players and to add back the 7? players currently on the 60 day DL. I’d expect another 10-12 players to be released or traded off the current 40 man roster. Lots more work to do here! It might be time to finally cut the cord with Pedroia too.