Offseason So Far

Some very quick things to say about the offseason so far:

--Fans who spurt vitriol Ellsbury's way--and Johnny Damon's way before him--are simply ignorant of the fact that the Yankees offered much more money both times.  The Sox offered Ellsbury a three-year deal.  Even at $20 million per year, that would be "just" $60 million.  The Yankees offered him seven years for $153 million dollars, which by my simple math is four years and $93 million dollars more.  Bottom line: More security via a longer contract, and $93 million.  Plus whatever endorsements he can get in New York, which I'll bet will be incredible, especially after one or two very good seasons.  Would you turn down $93 million?

--Robinson Cano, don't ya know, going to Seattle is a shocker, though the 10-year, $240 million contract isn't a surprise.  It's just surprising that Seattle gave it to him and not New York.  Though the Yanks did spend roughly $280 million so far, it was on three full-time, high-impact players at three different positions, rather than just one high-impact player at one position.  And Cano won't win too many playoff games in his ten years in Seattle, though he will have a good pitching staff.  But he's now the only weapon offensively.

--I guess Jay-Z came through for his client--albeit a client who wants dollars more than he wants rings.

--Signing Napoli is a good move.  Though nobody can K like he can, it's also true that nobody around the team can field first base and motivate his team like he can.  And he likes Boston like college students do.

--Napoli will make more with this two-year deal, plus last year, than he would have with that three-year, $39 million contract that he lost because of the physical that found his deteriorating hip.  But he'd better rest more the next two years, or that hip will end his career.

--Signing the ex-Cardinals reliever Mujica is a good move, too.  He's a solid reliever who can pitch frequently, and for two innings at a time.  Two years for $9.5 million isn't bad for him.  Bailey's gone, and Hanrahan is just happy to be around.  Uehara will still close, and Tazawa and Breslow still have the eighth, and when one of them falters, either Mujica or Hanrahan can step in.  Relief still looks very good in Boston.

--As does their starting pitching.  Everyone's stayed.  They're a year older, but Lester and Buchholz are still young in baseball years (though Buchholz needs physical coddling and Lester needs emotional coddling), and Workman, Doubront, and other younger players in Pawtucket are ready to step in when needed.  The Sox are poised to get younger, and their farm system looks great.

--Which is why the Yankees had to spend $153 million for Ellsbury, $85 million for McCann, and $45 million for Beltran, for 7 years, 5 years and 3 years, respectively.  And the Sox?  Not a dime.  Because the Sox have a good farm system, and the Yanks don't.  And won't for quite awhile.

--Though, I would've liked to have seen Beltran in right, and Victorino in center.  But maybe Fenway's right field is too big for Beltran, though Beltran is a good athlete and a very good fielder, and he gives 100%--all of which we saw in the playoffs.  Plus, he's one of the best playoff hitters of all time.  (Which made the game-ending pickoff of that Cardinals rookie even more inexplicable--because Beltran was at the plate.)

--I still say that Choo would be a good fit in center or in right, as well.  He's an on-base machine, which the Sox covet, and he can run and steal, though not as prodigiously as Ellsbury.  Still, a very good fielder and a very good leadoff guy.

--Right now, the leadoff position is a little murky.  Victorino can, but you don't want him to, since he was great hitting second, plus he's getting older.  Pedroia can, but you don't want him to, since you want him at third.  Is Jackie Bradley fast enough?  Is he a good enough hitter?  If he is, he's your answer.  But I'm not sure that he is.

--I'll take Pierzynski over Saltalamacchia any day.  Fewer Ks, more walks, about the same batting average with better production and OB%, and a much better play-caller.  I like the Sox catching corps for 2014.

--They're both old, sure, but they can play the position very well, DH on rare occasion, learn first base, and get relieved by one of the Triple-A catching stalwarts every now and then.

--Salatalamacchia and Middlebrooks never played again after that horrible, game-ending play.

--And I'm not crazy about seeing Middlebrooks at third, so I hope the Sox re-sign Drew to play short, and put Bogaerts at third, and make Middlebrooks the first- / thirdbaseman to begin some games.  He's still great trade-bait, as he does have a great upside.  I just don't think he'll ever meet it.

--Though I'd hate to break up whatever he's got going on with Jenny Dell.  Did you notice how her before- or after-game interviews with him were a little sweeter than they were with anyone else on the team?

--Speaking of the off-field talent, I hope Jerry Remy is better and ready to go.  Sox fans will take him back, no problem.  Hopefully his lungs and head are well, and he wants to return.  If he's up for it, I think he will.

Red Sox 27-17 May 19, 2013

Been gone for a long time.  The job, and getting a lot of reading and writing done.  But I've been watching (or listening to) most of the games.  Missed maybe 3 or 4 all year so far, maybe.  Here's what's been going through my head about the Sox, and about baseball in general, lately:

--The new one-game Wild Card playoff format is unbelievably bad, I've realized, and here's why.  Imagine you're the Red Sox, for example, and you win the Wild Card over the next team, the Tigers, by, let's say, five games, which is a lot for a Wild Card lead.  Anyway, since the top-2 Wild Card teams play in the one-game playoff, the Sox, who won by five games, play the Tigers.  The Tigers, of course, pitch Justin Verlander, possibly the one best pitcher in the majors.  He strikes out 12 and wins a complete game shutout, and the Sox are out of the playoffs.  Is that fair?  The format exists this year not to make it more interesting for the top two teams, but to make it more interesting for the middle-level teams, three or four of which will finish between one to three games away from the second spot.  Soon it'll be like hockey or basketball, where almost every team is in, or close to, the playoffs.  This is better for the owners, of course, but not for the game itself.

--Pedro Ciriaco isn't doing it for me this year.  After today's game, he's committed six errors in extremely limited playing time, and is hitting below the Mendoza line.  This is a far cry from last year, when he hit (it seems) about .300 and played great defense.  Right now, he's a glorified pinch-runner.  What happened?

--John Lackey is 2-4 with a 3.30 ERA.  And he's slim.  And he's not complaining.  Finally.  Not bad for $15.25 million per year for the past three years, including this one.

--Speaking of money, David Ortiz has made over $112 million (mostly for the Sox) over his career to, essentially, swing a bat.  And for the Sox, and even for Boston itself, he's been worth every cent--if anyone can be worth that much to swing a bat and to represent sport in a major city.

--Lester and Buchholz are finally pitching like they should--at the same time.

--Hanrahan never did it for me, anyway.  But Bailey can't spend any more time on the DL, especially when you consider last year.  If he does any more, you can't consider him a good signing.

--Uehara is amusing.

--I've probably said it before, but I'll do so again: Minnesota should not have an open-air stadium.  Target Field looks beautiful (and its ground crew is run by the guy who used to do Pawtucket's McCoy Stadium for many years), especially with the tan limestone and cityscape in the distance, but it's a mistake for the Twins to have an open-air stadium.  And without a great team, the novelty of it will wear off, fast.

--Ellsbury has been in a long, very quiet, slump.  (Napoli has, too, but not for as long.)  Currently he's hitting about .250, with an on-base percentage around .300.  That's bad in general, but it's catastrophic for a lead-off hitter.  How about Victorino there, and Ellsbury 2nd, or whatever, to let him get himself on track again?  Bradley may not be the answer next year, but I'm not sure Ellsbury is, either.  I have his autograph, so I want to be wrong, but he's got a lot to prove, since he's a free agent at the end of this year.  If the year ended now, I wouldn't resign him, no matter how much Sox gear he sells for the ladies.  (Yes, the management would take it into consideration when considering his free agency.)

--Pedroia's having a great year.  He's a great hitter almost anywhere in the lineup.  He could hit productively, with a high average and on-base percentage, between the first and the fifth spots in the lineup.  When batting cleanup, which he has the last few years when Ortiz was out, he drove in a lot of runs, too.  An amazing hitter who should have a long and productive decline phase, which shouldn't start for quite awhile yet.

--Saw Cecil Fielder on Tim McCarver's show for a short time, so I looked him up on baseball-reference.com, which I use to look up all players' stats, and the salaries mentioned above.  Anyway, he ate himself out of the major leagues.  His last game was at age 34.  The site mentioned above kindly listed his weight at 230 pounds, which is way off, I assure you.  Even now, he takes up the entire lens of the camera.

--Who're the only two American League batters to lead the league in RBIs for three consecutive years?  Answer: Babe Ruth--and Cecil Fielder.

--Speaking of whom...His son, Prince Fielder, will be making $23 million per year, every year, for the Detroit Tigers, until the year 2020.  By that time, he would've made over $225 million playing baseball.  Prince Fielder is hitting below the Mendoza line in his playoff games.  His playoff batting stats are, to be kind, abysmal.  A-Rod has been much better in the playoffs, despite his reputation otherwise.  Ewwwww......

--Tim McCarver is a terrible broadcaster, by the way.  His enshrinement was a joke.

--Daniel Nava is quietly hitting close to .300, with close to a .400 on-base percentage and close to a .500 slugging percentage.  Unbelievable!  Happy for the guy who hit a grand slam on the first pitch he ever saw in the majors--and hadn't done much since.  He was bought from an independent league team for $1.  Literally.

--To show the opposite, Julio Iglesias, who was hitting about .360 and playing Gold Glove defense for Boston when he was sent down to Pawtucket when Stephen Drew came off the DL, was benched for three games recently by the Pawsox manager due to his bad attitude.  His benching started in about the seventh inning of a game I attended.  He was his typical magician self in the field, but he wasn't running out ground balls, and he must've said the wrong thing at the wrong time to the manager.  This won't get him brought back up anytime soon.  He deserved the chance for his defense alone, but his attitude won't help hide how offensive he can be, if you catch what I'm sayin'.  But he has a major league career, even if he bats ninth for bad teams his whole career, just for his defense alone.  He'll give his teams a few wins a year just with his glove.

--Saw a Twins outfielder make a homerun out of a double for Pedroia when he went after a fly ball, and it bounced off of the heel of his glove and over the outfield wall.  (This should really be a 4-base error, rather than a homerun, but I don't know if the rules allow for such a thing.)  Anyway, I haven't seen that happen since Jose Canseco infamously let a fly ball bounce off his head and over the wall.

--A friend of mine imitates how Jenny Dell seems to point with her chest.  I mentioned that Dell does it better, which didn't help matters.  Jenny Dell seems to be having fun with a thankless job.  And she's definitely grown on me, since I said in the beginning of the year that she's no Heidi Watney. 

Boston 11-4; 2 GA of NY

Photo: Movie poster for Major League, from its Wikipedia page.

It's been awhile since the Sox played a game, and even longer since I posted about it.  Hopefully Boston will play today--Saturday, 4.20.13--as the city needs the distraction and celebration.  It'll be a soggy Fenway, unfortunately, if they play.  Speaking of rain, I got rained out of Fenway last Friday, and my next game, on the 23rd, looks like rain, too.  Thanks...

--It's odd and sad to see Terry Francona in a Cleveland Indians uniform.

--About 9,000 people, on average, watched each of the three games at Cleveland's Progressive Field, ex-Jacob's Field, ex-Municipal Stadium.  That's pathetic.  The Red Sox's AAA team, the Pawtucket Red Sox, draw more than that at its McCoy Stadium on a nice summer day.

--I don't miss Mike Aviles.  And didn't he go to Toronto in the deal for John Farrell, the Sox manager?

--Nick Swisher doesn't look right in a Cleveland Indians uniform, either.

--The Indians team right now--and its attendance at the park--is exactly like the Indians in the movie Major League.  Watching the series was like watching the movie.

--I wouldn't pay to watch the Indians play, either, but I would pay to see some of the Indians play, and some of the players on any visiting team.

--Mike Napoli can motor for a big, stocky guy.

--The Sox are playing Billy Beane ball: Don't swing for the fences; work the count; make the pitcher throw a lot of pitches; wear out the starting pitcher; get into the bullpen; hit singles and doubles; draw walks; keep the line moving.  Just like 2003, 2004 and 2007.  And not at all like last year.

--The Sox defense is the most steady I've seen it, at least since 2007, and maybe better than 2003 and 2004.  Maybe the best, day by day, since I've been watching.  And I've been watching since Ned Martin and Bob Montgomery, if you know what I'm sayin'.

--I'll say it again: Lester and Buchholz are pitching with rhythm, efficiency and confidence, and they're both 3-0 with ERAs hovering near 1.00.

--And Lester is keeping his fastball down and not trying to blow everyone away with high heat he doesn't have, a la Josh Beckett.  (Though, truth be told, Beckett's pitching very well, so far, for the Dodgers this year, with a 3.26 ERA and a 1.1 WHIP.  But he hasn't won a game yet, which leads me to say--)

--This year's team is a perfect example of addition by subtraction.  Yes, the guaranteed money to these guys is gone, too, but so are Bobby Valentine, Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford, Adrian Gonzalez, and all of the obnoxiousness and ridiculousness.  Any team without these guys is bound to get better.

--Couldn't the Sox management have done all that and kept Francona to begin with?  (Though I do like John Farrell.)

--I'm changing my tune.  (Get used to that.)  With Ortiz due back, it's right that the Sox send down Jackie Bradley, Jr. and keep Mike Carp, who's hitting well, especially considering his lack of playing time.  Bradley needs to get himself straightened out.  His time will come again.

--Speaking of that, I don't like that sometimes these things are called "demotions," as in "Bradley was demoted to Pawtucket."  Iglesias was hitting over .400 when he was "demoted." Can't we just report it as "sent," as in "To make room for Ortiz, Bradley was sent to Pawtucket?"  It's not just semantics; sometimes it's inaccurate, as in the Iglesias example.

--Jamie Erdahl and Jenny Dell are wonderful, but they're not Heidi Watney.  Who's sort of wasted in MLB Network's Quick Pitch, I might add.

--If you're interested, my thoughts about the marathon massacre and its aftermath will soon be on my regular blog, here.

--And my review of the movie 42 will be on that site, and on this one, as well.