Tuesday, December 4, 2012

How Many Catchers Does One Team Need?


I’ve been waiting. I’ve been wondering. I’ve been patient.

Now, I’m confused.

What’s the plan? What are the Red Sox trying to do? What do they hope to become? Are they rebuilding? Are they going for it? Are they waiting?

The Red Sox traded away a ton of money last season. It was to gain this mystical financial flexibility people talked about. I’ve wondered all along what they planned to do with all this flexibility. Especially given that this year’s free agent class was terribly weak. There was no Carl Crawford out there that teams needed to clear budget room for. There was no Cliff Lee that clearly would demand nine figures. Where was the money going to go?

Were they even interested in spending it? Was 2013 supposed to be a wash year. Lose another 100 games, and be ready when all the kids evolve together in 2014. They’d have to, of course, ignore the fact that this plan never works. But, at least it would be a plan. The overpaying of Papi seemed to support this plan. Sure, it was a lot of money. Sure they paid for past performance. But, it was something for the fans to hold onto during the down times. At least Papi would still be there to enjoy.

Then came the Napoli deal. Talk about overpaying. And, what’s the point? Is Napoli going to bring fans to Fenway during a bad season? Not likely. Is he a stud first baseman that the Sox couldn’t wait on? Not even close. He’s probably the best first baseman out there, at the moment. But, that’s not important unless you’re trying to win now. However, if you’re trying to win now, why not just keep the first baseman you already had who is much better than Napoli?

I’ve been waiting on a plan. I didn’t get a plan.

I got scared.

Maybe this front office really is clueless? Maybe they don’t know what they’re doing from one day to another. Are they just trying to pay the team enough money that fans can’t yell at them when they lose? If they have one of the highest payrolls, we’ll assume they were actually trying?

There better be a big shoe that drops because of this. Hopefully we’ll find out that Josh Hamilton adores Mike Napoli, and will follow him wherever he goes, no questions asked. Or, we’ll find out that Jarrod Saltalamacchia was the apple of Washington’s eye and the key piece to trading for Gio Gonzalez. Because without that, I don’t know what to think.

Other than the fact that I’m terrified.

2 comments:

  1. It's totally my own conspiracy theory, but I think Salty is out. I think Lavarnway was always the guy we were waiting to be ready, but Theo brought back Salty because he had wanted him in the past. We trade Salty, maybe even include a prospect, for a top-end pitcher. Napoli backs up Lavarnway when he needs the rest, but plays 90% at first, where we had a hole.

    I agree, we overpaid for him, but I really do think Ben's goal for the winter meetings is a pitcher.

    If I'm wrong, yeah, 2013 is probably a wash, just to get to 2014, in which case, we REALLY overpaid.

    Fingers crossed!

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  2. Salty or Lavarnay is gone.

    This year there will be more interleague games. The interleague games will not be in two stretches anymore either; they will be spaced randomly through out the year. I figure Napoli will catch the interleague games with Ortiz at first and somewhere during the game Ross will take over defensivly for Napoli.

    ReplyDelete

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