Sometimes Profanity is a Good Thing

When I first heard the news of the Red Sox trade with the Mariners yesterday, I did what any reasonable blogger would do. I tweeted Mariners fans to gauge their reactions.

I first asked Megan Sheer, the wonderful author of the Mariners blog Section 331. (love the name!) I wondered if I was going to like having Carson Smith on the Red Sox. She had, apparently, not heard the deal yet. Her response was full of profanities. I took that to be a very good sign. When you make a trade, you don’t want the other team to be dancing on the rooftops.

The second person I tweeted was the well-known Mariners fan Kailee Dunn. She confirmed that Smith was “a boss” and she was sad to see him leave. Again, much better when the team you trade with is sorry to lose the player. Much better than if she had responded, “Heh heh. We sure fooled you guys!”

Does that mean it was a great deal? On its own, of course not. But it’s nice that people familiar with his work are at least pleased with his performance.

It’s an interesting trade, because the Sox traded from a position of strength for a position of weakness. So, it’s the rare case where breaking even on a trade is just fine. It’s also interesting because Wade Miley was actually one of the reasons I was OK with not having a reliever like Smith.

Last season, the starting rotation had a rough stretch. For whatever reason, after starting strong they went through a collective slump. The bullpen was used over and over as starters went about a month without getting into the sixth inning. The bullpen never really recovered. The addition of Kimbrel would certainly be expected to help with that. One more key arm would obviously reduce the workload of everyone else. The addition of Price also helped with that since hopefully we can assume he’ll be going at least six innings every time out.

So, with Price going deep into games, and Miley always going deep into games, you had the feeling that the bullpen could handle potentially shorter outings by the other three starters. By losing Miley, the Sox lose that guaranteed long outing. So, they’re down to just one long start for every turn through the rotation. But, they add another bullpen arm to compensate. So, maybe it’s a wash.

It does make things MUCH better if you assume that the rest of the rotation doesn’t suck it up every start. If instead of five innings per start, if Kelly and Porcello can go at least six, things are now much more encouraging. Now your A-team of relievers only needs to cover three innings between the four of them.

So, I think this trade shows some confidence in the rotation. The Red Sox aren’t expecting to need another long man or two to compensate for below average starters. Instead they’re looking for a solid bullpen they can use to lock down wins. That’s a great sign. It's a sign that there isn;t a big fix needed in order to make big strides.

It also means that all those other pitchers the Sox have been stock piling, the Owens and Johnsons, of the world, can help fill out the pen if they don't crack the rotation themselves. 

Even though the deal hurt the rotation directly, it certainly helps it secondarily. It's a much better job of following the Kansas City model that has worked so well the past couple seasons. Although, the Royals never had David Price. 

Price
Porcello
Buchholz
Kelly
Rodriguez

Smith
Tazawa
Uehara
Kimbrel

I like the looks of that.

This could be fun.

What’s the Plan?

People don’t like thinking. 

It’s not just baseball fans. It’s everyone. They want things to be black or white, with no grey area allowed for interpretation. If they need to lose weight, they don’t want to follow a balanced diet requiring careful consideration of fats, and calories, and grains, and proteins. They want one where they just eat nothing but grapefruit every day for a month. That’s black and white. No wondering if their piece of chicken is three ounces or four. Just avoid the chicken. 

Baseball fans do it too. Moneyball was never about collecting players with high OBP.  It was always about acquiring players with skills that are undervalued in the market, whichever skills those might be. But, that requires thinking. So, people just said teams need to acquire high OBP’s.

Now people have turned their attention to the Red Sox. What’s the plan? Are the Red Sox going to win with prospects? Are they trying to outspend the world on veterans? Which is it?

Of course the answer is, as it should be, both.

I’ve said it before. There’s only one good plan. To get the best players when you can get them. It doesn’t matter how. It doesn’t matter where they come from. If they’re the best, go get them. Sometimes, the best shortstop is already in your organization. You can see him develop, and know he’s a guy to keep. So, you leave Xander’s name out of any trade discussions (unless they get really silly). Sometimes, the best closer is on another team. So, it’s a time to use your stash of prospects to make a trade. You give up some of the youngsters to get Kimbrel, if that’s what it takes. Sometimes the best is a free agent starter. If that’s the case, you open up the wallet and give David Price all your money.

People don’t like that. They can’t pass on Lester, but sign Price! That wasn’t their plan. They need to stick to their plan! Do they even have a plan anymore! Disarray everywhere!

In actuality, it’s commitment to a plan that’s often the problem. Cherington loved his prospects. Treated them like they were made of gold. His plan was to build the team from within. Cheap young talent. That was his plan. Then, the Sox ended up with 36 young outfielders, and no pitching. But, he stuck to a plan.

So, I’m actually glad the Sox veered from their stated plan. I’m glad they decided that adding a true ace was too rare an opportunity to let slip by. After all, I’m guessing “grab former Cy Young Award Winner” is probably too obscure to actually be written into anyone’s plan. Sometimes you just have to go off page. 

They may keep doing that. Or, they may revert back to a more conservative approach. As long as they continue to keep all their options open, I’m happy with either.

The best plan may be many plans.

I Scored!

April 13, 2012

Without even looking closely at this card, I can already tell it’s going to be a good day. Just look at all those black diamonds!

But, let’s explore a little bit more before we dive into the scoring. The notes section had a couple tidbits. As might have been guessed from the early April date, this was the 2012 home opener! That always makes for a fantastic day. The notes also mention that this was the 713^th consecutive home sellout for the Sox. Pretty big day indeed.

To help out with the specialness of the day, Josh Beckett took the mound, and he sure pitched a gem. Eight innings of four-hit ball. Not sure what more you could ask for there. Maybe more than a single strikeout? But, that’s splitting hairs. Melancon came it to mop up once things got really crazy.

Beckett’s performance is even more impressing when you see what happened to the Rays starter. He was only three innings on the day, giving up three runs. The Rays starter that day? Some guy named David Price. No idea why he left after only three innings. Sure, he had some trouble in the third…but he wasn’t exactly lit up. The fact that he finished the inning suggests it wasn’t an injury. Maybe it was an early season pitch count. 

But, the Sox certainly took advantage of his absence. They batted around in the eighth inning, and just about everyone scored. Wow.

Who do I give the player of the game to? With so much offense, it’s tough to choose. But, look at Kelly Shoppach. 3-4, 2 2B, 3R and 2 RBI. That’s having yourself a day from the nine-spot in the order.

The goat? Well, I’d say David Ortiz since he was the only batter not to score. But, he did drive in two runs. I think I have to go with David Ross. Sure, he scored a run. But, he was the only guy who couldn’t get a hit. This was definitely a game where there wasn’t really a goat, but I have to name someone.

So, obviously, the Red Sox were able to overcome both the David Price start, and the David Ross hitless day. The bats exploded from almost start to finish, on a day when three runs would have been more than enough.

And the scorecard shows you how it happened.

I Don’t Think the Sox Have Changed Their Philosophy

I think they still think they’re right. I think they still think it’s a stupid move to sign a pitcher to a long term deal when they’re over 30. I think if John Henry gave another presentation on the topic, he’d still pull up the same report showing the same data. He’d still show the sharp decline, and go on and on about what a waste of money those later years end up being.

I don’t think he’s a hypocrite.

I do think that, as I alluded to earlier, the Sox realized they have to make exceptions. Either the Lester contract opened their eyes to it, or Lester wasn’t the exception they were willing to make. But, here’s the one problem with their philosophy.

If you stick to your guns, and only sign reasonable contracts, there won’t be any talented players left to sign. 

Let’s say the Sox stuck to their guns, and didn’t sign any stupid contracts. Who would they be signing? No Price. No Greinke. They’d go to the teams paying out the crazy contracts. No Zimmerman. No Cueto. They’d get stupid deals elsewhere too. Who’s left?

Exactly.

So, the Sox realized that they have to go out on a limb every once in a while. They’re probably swearing up and down at themselves after this deal. Well, actually, they’re probably swearing at the rest of the league for forcing them to make this deal. They know it’s stupid.

It reminds me of drafting high schoolers. It’s stupid. You can’t waste a high draft pick on a kid who’s been playing against 15-year olds. It doesn’t work in baseball. It doesn’t work in basketball. But, it’s almost reached the point where the smart teams are forced to. If you don’t take a stab every once in a while, the stupid teams will have gobbled up all the talent by the time it gets to you. All the college graduates will be the players so bad they weren’t even gambled on by stupid teams.

So, yes. The Sox are right. It’s a boneheaded move to sign a pitcher over 30 to a long term deal. They know it. You probably know it. Every once in a while, though, you have to suck it up and make a dumb decision.

Which is why they went so crazy after Price. If you’re going to make a dumb move, at least be smart about it. They didn’t dump $100 million on Zimmerman coming over from the NL. They didn’t offer the moon to Greinke and his history of never pitching in baseball towns. They didn’t throw all the money they had at someone just because he’s the best available. They saw a guy who has pitched almost his entire career in the AL East. They saw a guy who finished a close second in the Cy Young race this year, and already has the award under his belt. They saw a guy who is great with younger pitchers, and is well known as an amazing teammate. They saw a true ace. And, they saw a guy that wouldn’t cost them a draft pick. Price was the best that’s come up in quite some time. Better than Lester. Better than Scherzer. They saw that. So, they decided if they were going to go for it, they needed to go for it. Because as much as they were holding Greinke as a back-up plan, it was a Plan Z, not a Plan B. They knew it. So, they went really stupid. The contract will be terrible either way. At least with Price, they knew the good parts would be better.

So, the Sox aren’t wishy washy. They didn’t panic. They haven’t been lying to us. They’re not hypocrites. They just knew that every once in a while you had to break from your mold. For every five Bill Mueller contracts, you need one Manny Ramirez. In a rotation full of Derek Lowe money, you need a Pedro Martinez. Every smart plan needs a stupid exception.

And David Price was the smartest stupid exception out there.

Red Sox Get Their Man, For a Price

Yup. Let the era of using the player's name as a noun in the headline begin!

I know I don't usually do these posts until someone makes it official. But, if EVERYONE else is acting like it's true, I might as well go along with it.

First of all, the contract is huge. HUGE. 7 years and 210 million huge. It's too much. It's way too much. It's not even close to not being too much. And, let's stop focusing on the 3-year opt out like it's a good thing. Those are never good things for the team. If the player pitches well, you need to overpay to keep him. If he doesn't, you're on the hook for a dead weight contract.

But, It's not my money. I always say that John Henry is free to spend as much of his money as he'd like. As long as he doesn't cut it off. Ever. In four years, a 27 year old Xander Bogaerts becomes a free agent. The following year, a 28 year old Mookie Betts does the same. Don't you dare say they have to walk because the Sox are paying David Price's corpse $33 million. Beyond that, back up the truck and pay the man his money.

Because the Sox are better next year thanks to this deal. The Sox are better for the next three or four years. I wrote the other day that maybe the impeding free agency of XB and MB gave the Sox a "go for it now" deadline. It looks like that's exactly what they thought. 

They went for it in a big way.

The beauty of adding someone at the top of the rotation is that it allows everyone to slide down, and make their slot look so much better. It happened with Kimbrel. Sure, he wasn't an enormous improvement over Koji at closer. But, Koji as set-up is huge. And Tazawa moving to the seventh makes that an enormous upgrade. So, three innings were improved with just one guy. That's what Price does. He gives the Sox an obvious ace. But, it's so much more. Suddenly Porcello as the #2 guy looks a lot more appealing. Miley gets to sit at #3. Clay gets to be the #4 pitcher with the most upside in the league. Rodriguez gets to dominate the fifth spot. Even ignoring wherever they stick Kelly, all five spots in the rotation were just vastly improved. By adding one guy. Suddenly a severe weakness of last year's team becomes a strength. One more guy that you can count on going deep into a game, and an improved bullpen to help out the ones that can't. 

Betts

Pedroia

Bogaerts

Ortiz

Ramirez

Sandoval

Castillo

Swihart

Bradley

Price

Porcello

Miley

Buchholz

Rodriguez

Tazawa

Koji

Kimbrel

And, the Sox probably aren't even done. Remember those prospects I thought the Sox should use as a Godfather offer for an ace (or, whatever)? They got their ace, and still have all the prospects. They even got to keep their super-high draft pick since Price was signed without compensation. What are the Sox going to do to improve even more?

The sky's the limit.

This could be a lot of fun!