Barely Winter, No Discontent

The Red Sox have created flexibility this winter and a fair degree of media silliness. Let's examine some flexibility and silliness.

• Dan Shaughnessy accused management of parsimonious behavior suggesting that the Sox were trying to rebuild on the cheap. "Nothing easier than spending somebody else's money, eh?" Silliness.
  
• The Sox acquire outfielder Mike Cameron. Exit stage left, Jason Bay. As mentioned before, the "Winner's Curse" means overpaying, just because other people are bidding for merchandise. We all recognize that in an industry where the AVERAGE salary (not just AVERAGE player) gets around three million dollars, there's a lot of overpaying. Cameron has always been a terrific defender, has some pop, and strikes out a lot. It's what you're doing when you don't strike out that counts. Flexibility. Here's the top 20 career list in strikeouts...some pretty good players on the list.
  
• Casey Kelly is highly regarded throughout baseball for potential. Is he 'likely' to be contributing to the Sox in August or September? Some organizational people privately project that. Reminds me of the 'curse of unlimited potential' applied to Ken Brett, back in the day. Cool the jets, people. Silliness.
  
• The John Lackey Watch has begun. The number one for Lackey on the www.baseball-reference.com comparison list for John Lackey is Josh Beckett. Lackey is to Beckett what Luis Tiant is to Catfish Hunter. Look it up. Flexibility.
  
• Jeremy Hermida comes to the Red Sox. Platoon or puzzle piece in some future deal for Adrian Gonzalez. Flexibility.
• The Mike Lowell saga, is he coming, is he going, a medical love story. Everybody likes Mike Lowell*. Well, *that is, a healthy Mike Lowell. All the talk is about his thumb, and we seem to have forgotten that the poor guy (healthwise) can't run and has constricted range. Silliness.
  
• "I'm okay with Casey Kotchman at first base." Come on, Terry, that's the organizational guy speaking, but Red Sox Nation doesn't share your enthusiasm, absent Kotchman getting some Brady Anderson kickapoo joy juice. Silliness.
  

Red Sox plans have plenty of reasons for optimism, including a new shortstop, the additional of John Lackey, maturing players possibly in Daniel Bard, Clay Buchholz, and Jacoby Ellsbury, and a full season of Victor Martinez.

Concerns? Well, we have to see whether Daisuke Matsuzaka looks more like Godzilla or the Pillsbury Dough Boy, and whether Jonathan (one-pitch) Papelbon will throw something besides the fastball this season. Papelbon's 38 saves belied a dramatic fall in his strikeout-to-walk ratio and rise in the WHIP ratio. Clean inning just wasn't something we heard too much.

Sure, you say, if Papelbon is all you have to worry about, then the Sox are golden. Frankly, it's never that simple.

Seasons greetings to all, and to all a good night.

Baseball Meetings

As terrific as Roy Halladay is, does he merit something approaching 20 million dollars annually, and the loss of several top prospects, e.g. Buchholz and Kelly? If I'm ownership, I can't go in that direction.

Yes the Sox need a right-handed bat, and there are a few directions there, including Adrian Beltre. Whether Mike Lowell can handle the full load next year can't be known to Sox fans, and Beltre has considerable pop in his bat.

The Sox are rumored to want to lock up V-Mart heading into his contract year. Jason Bay? The news all seems negative, from money to location, and J-Bay looks like he's earned a Godfather contract, although the 5-6 week stretch of distress against breaking stuff away mid-season gives me concerns.

Among the possible pitchers, the best 'bargain' could be Justin Duchscherer, a former Sox farmhand, who has had health issues. Sure, you have the tantalizing Rich Harden, he of the DL, and Ben Sheets, ditto.

Reportedly, Brad Penny has found a new pitching home in St. Louis. Penny just never seemed comfortable in the AL, with great stuff and not so great results with selective hitters in the AL.

Market-Based Thinking; Caveat Emptor, Theo.

Whatever we might think about the Red Sox, they aren't cheap. But in the baseball landscape, you have two currencies, players and greenbacks.

The Sox have a variety of intriguing bargaining chips (relatively low-salaried players under extended obligation) including Clay Buchholz, Daniel Bard, Ryan Westmoreland, Casey Kelly, Ryan Kalish, and more. If we use the commodity business as a model, then the Sox have a certain 'book value', budgeted salary plus the "proven reserves" model used in mining.

Of course, the proven reserves aren't so proven, but if they are assigned a 'value', trading them for high-salaried players depletes your future in both salary obligation AND in projected value. In other words, mortgaging your farm system to acquire 'expensive' stars makes you pay twice. For the Yankees, the bottomless money pit, spending 29 percent of free agent dollars in the past couple of seasons (per an ESPN article), that's simply business as usual.

For the Red Sox, they need to work smarter not more expensively, and trading the combination of a Buchholz, Kelly, and change for a Roy Halladay isn't as efficient as spending on free agents and developing players.

Clearly, the Red Sox management didn't exactly fall of the turnip truck. You never know what disinformation campaign exists to drive up the price (Boras style) in the Winner's Curse. Everyone can point to the Beckett-Lowell trade as bringing the Sox one title, a gamble worth taking.

But we've gone through the six year productivity of some of the best pitchers in history during the Santana discussions a couple of years ago. Historically, over that timeframe, some of the best pitchers in history (from Clemens to Pedro) have averaged about 15 wins. In the past two seasons, Johan Santana has won 29 games for the Mets, and one of the players rumored to be on the block for him, Jon Lester has won 31 games...at a fraction of the cost. Caveat emptor.

Hot Stove or Ice Box?

You should never be in a hurry to make a poor choice. And currently, baseball's labor pool lives in the world of Buyer's Remorse, where generally ownership overpays for mediocrity.

Example: Marco Scutaro, a player whose price is at its peak, but what of value. Scutaro scored 100 runs and had twelve homers last season. He had NEVER hit double digit homers and never scored more than 52 runs in a season until the previous year (76). At best, I suspect the Sox view him as a placeholder until the anointed one, Jose Iglesias comes on scene. Meanwhile, shortstop remains the black hole of productivity and cost. Scutaro's career OPS is .721. Chrissakes, we are not talking about a great player. Lou Merloni had a career OPS of .716. Scutaro is Lou Merloni coming off an excellent season, a one-year wonder. Period.

Of course, we have entered the Tug Hulett era. Does that make you feel any better? I want to throw up in my mouth over both of the above.

White Hot, the Hot Stove League Leaves Sox Fans Blue

The New York Yankees got their 27th championship, a magical combination of glory and greenbacks, and the Red Sox have Jeremy Hermida. So, we're all feeling a lot better.

The Sox seem destined for the poorhouse it seems, with Josh Beckett only a year away from free agency, Jason Bay suddenly the defensive talent of say, Mike Greenwell, and John Henry doing a chopshop job on his investment company. Maybe they can reclaim the Dunkin Dugout seats.

We'll find out soon whether it was really Brad Mills who broke the curse, or whether the Sox can fill the role of bench coach with some combination of Stephen Hawking and Dr. Tom Hanson. Theo, you really ought to think about it.

What we've learned in the offseason is how great J.D. Drew really is (I thought his season more than passable, although the Win Shares/dollar might be less so). If Win Shares mean something, then we should acknowledge that Drew was an estimated SIXTH in the AL at his position. We found out that Rocco Baldelli will seek employment elsewhere, and of course that four Red Sox have also won World Series with both the Red Sox and the Yankees, Babe Ruth, Johnny Damon, Eric Hinske, and Ramiro Mendoza. Holy carp!

2009 taught us that money can't buy happiness, but it can buy a title. That's alright with me, because the Sox are New York light, with the big market payroll albeit small market swagger.

The issues for the Sox headed in 2010:

• Left-field. Bye-bye, Bay-be, good-bye?
• Can we get more mileage from the Japanese import, Daisuke Matsuzaka?
• Will the financial black hole/revolving door at shortstop ever close?
• Is Theo Epstein's expectation of Jacoby Ellsbury hitting for power a steroid era fantasy?
• If there's money to be paid out, who's going to claim it, Jonathan "more mouths to feed" Papelbon, Beckett, Bay, V-Mart, all or none of the above?
• Is Daniel Bard the closer-in-waiting? Does Jonathan Papelbon intend to throw more than fastballs?
• Is My Captain, My Captain going the way of "Nevermore"?
• Does Mike Lowell have gas in the tank, or specifically the femur/acetabulum?
  
• Will the real David Ortiz, please step up to the plate?

Mike Lowell's hip means a lot to the Red Sox.

How much would it take to get Justin Morneau from the Twins, because they're generally payroll parsimonious, and going to have to pay Joe Mauer? Heck, maybe they'll pay him less, because after all he didn't win the Hank Aaron Award, given to the best hitter from New York, excluding Mark Teixeira?

Captions?

2009 Post-Mortem

What post-mortem examination do the 2009 Red Sox deserve? The simplest and most deserving explanation follows that the Red Sox simply went as far as they deserved.

A team created to be balanced failed to show balance...underachieving on the road, including a dismal road show in Anaheim.

Overall the team went 95-67, but let's look inside the numbers.

• They won 16 of 18 games against the Orioles, the worst team in MLB
• They won 7 of 9 games from the next worse Indians
  
• Therefore of their 28 games over .500, 19 came from just two teams
• 7 teams other than Boston had winning records, New York, Tampa, Minnesota, Detroit, Los Angeles, Texas, and Seattle
• The Sox split with the Yankees and Rays, and had a winning record against only two teams with winning records (Detroit and Minnesota).
  
• In other words, the Sox couldn't beat good teams consistently
• All of which brings us to why they're working on their handicap instead of freezing to death playing baseball.
  

Why can't the team perform on the road? If there were a simple answer, you'd expect ownership and management to know it. The Sox had an OPS of .753 on the road, and only one AL team, the Yankees had an OPS over .800 on the road. Six AL teams had OPS exceeding .800 at home, including the Red Sox, leading at .862. For all the sturm and drang about Yankee Stadium, the Yankee OPS only increased .036 at home, compared to the Sox' .109.

The tale of the tape for pitching is a bit surprising, with a .736 OPS against at home and .779 away. In other words, the Sox not only hit better at Friendly Fenway, but also pitched better.

Upset? Not really, as perhaps Red Sox Nation's "need to win" has lessened in the wake of a pair of World Series crowns. In other words, the sense of urgency isn't so great. "We haven't won a title in two years."

Maybe worse than the early playoff exit is the reality that the Sox, for the most part, don't generate much excitement. It wasn't as though everyone had a career 'down' year. V-Mart, Youkilis, Gonzalez, Bay, Ellsbury, and Drew all performed at least to most people's expectations. Pedroia and Lowell were at least adequate, and David Ortiz had half a season after struggling mightily.

But overall, the lineup inexplicably struggles to 'create' and 'prevent' runs on the road. With a largely 'mature' team, the Sox can't lack the knowledge on how to get it done on the road. Yes, we've heard of Sox past burning the candles from both ends, but again, that dog don't hunt. At least let's hope not.