A bit of a pet peeve, but if it's an article like that that is just linking to a different article where the rumor actually originated, please click through and post the earlier piece. It's still generally people making stuff up to fill pages, but at least it's where it originated.
The host mentioned Duran (and others) by name, but in that clip Kennedy only agrees that locking up pre-arb players is important and doesn't name any specific player. Has anyone listened to the entire show to know if Sam named names?
Why stop at just signing Ohtani?
Yup, I may be off but Im pretty sure I first found out about this place and signed up as a lurker after the Curt S rumors, and Thanksgiving 2003 was like a family middle school dance - the males could legit only talk about the Red Sox.
He's quoted in the story as saying so:
https://www.masslive.com/redsox/2023/10/sam-kennedy-red-sox-plan-to-be-aggressive-on-extensions-for-young-core.html
He's going to be DH-only for one year. The expectation is he recovers and becomes DH-P going forward
I know... the expectations are also that Judge continues to play the OF. I said before last offseason that he has 3 at the most years out there before he's either told to start learning 1B at the best.
And if he can't pitch, or is ineffective to the point where it's not worth sending him out there, I don't believe he would remain a DH. I think that given his skill set, he would likely be able to play the outfield, and I could imagine him being pretty good.
I dunno. I think you take the generational talent 10 times out of 10 and figure out the rest later. I get the risk concerns but if I have a chance to land this unicorn, I’m doing it.
I get it, but I'm not sure about Snell or Bellinger as being good investments. Snell can easily run a double digit walk rate, and I worry about his ability to keep getting the swing and miss once he ages and his stuff declines. Bellinger had a bounce back year, but isn't far removed from being absolutely unplayable. He struggled against fastballs last year, and a lot of his value comes from his defense. I would hate to end up with Jason Heyward 2.0. I do like Montgomery and think he is pretty safe, and I can see him being a Chris Bassitt type FA.
It all hinges on how confident you are that he'll be able to pitch again at something resembling his previous level of performance. If you think he can give you 90% of 2022/2023 pitcher Ohtani for 2025/26/27, you give him 50 million a year and don't even blink. The surplus value alone in that could probably make up for him sucking for half that contract. And then even if he never pitches again you'll have at worst peak David Ortiz production at DH.
Isn't that what the Angels did? It's cool to have a great player to watch every day, but it kind of gets old when the team is under .500 at the end of the season no matter how great he was.
The Angels don’t have our farm system. They also signed Rendon to a $245M contract. The Sox are incredibly well-positioned to take this risk and I’m confident they wouldn’t Angels this.
But that's what the rumors thread is for...making fantasy trades and free agent wishcasting legitimate by attributing it to outside sources.
I mentioned those guys as an example of spreading that money around to multiple players to fill holes. You can sub in Yamamoto and another impact bat if you want. Red Sox Payroll on Twitter says they're at $192 million including everything. If you add Ohtani at $50 million, the payroll is already at $242. If you're telling me JWH is going to blow way past the luxury tax penalty thresholds, fine go for it. But if the limit is somewhere between $257 and $277 million , putting that much towards Ohtani is going to also limit any other impact additions they could make. They desperately need at least one if not two frontline starters plus an impact RHH bat which is going to cost a lot. Getting Ohtani is great for headlines and off the field revenue while also getting incredible production on it, but at the expense of significant FA upgrades to the rotation? I wouldn't be in favor of it. If JWH is turning into Steve Cohen all of a sudden, different ball game altogether.
Thank you. The inclusion of Duran is the most interesting to me then, as 1. he was on nobody's list of long-term signings in April, so yay, and 2. a lot of us were maybe thinking of him as trade bait. But maybe he is as valuable with a set price for the next few years. It is also interesting that Dugie isn't on that list.
I think Verdugo is not generally thought of as being part of the "young players to lock up long term." (Even though Duran isn't *that* young) They may be moving on from him, but I dont see this particular comment as reflecting that.
I think signing Ohtani would be done if the owners acknowledge that fan interest is waning and they need to commit to spend more. I'm not convinced ownership would actually do this given what we've seen recently but they clearly have the means. It would be similar to Wyc committing to pay a ton in luxury tax after the Jrue Holiday acquisition. Obviously, the Celtics and Red Sox are in different stages of their championship lifecycle but the Sox have a good enough foundation with more potential cheap high end guys coming soon that you can make an argument that the time is right for a major splash signing, even a semi-redundant one.
There is no reason not to talk up Duran and how valuable he is at this point.
Yup. You'd think we'd be used to this by now. Every free agent with good representation is going to want to be linked to the Sox as much as to the Yankees, Mets, Dodgers, Padres, Rangers, etc. Any team with a propensity to spend big or a consistently high payroll is going to be used for leverage (through media or otherwise) more often than they're going to be seriously in on a given player.
Right. Kennedy isn't saying they need to sign all of those guys long term. He's saying it's important baseball ops identifies the correct players that they should offer deals to.
Absolutely, last year at this time I think most people here would have gladly traded him for the proverbial bucket of balls.
