Thanks to their unspeakably bad season, the Red Sox find themselves in a position to almost entirely reconstruct their roster for 2013 and beyond.
They will head into next year obligated to pay only manager Bobby Valentine and five of his players ? John Lackey, Dustin Pedroia, Jon Lester, Clay Buchholz and Jose Iglesias.
There?s not much Boston can do with Lackey except let him pitch and hope he does better than Daisuke Matsuzaka did in his return from Tommy John surgery, and who knows if the Sox will retain Valentine or not? Otherwise, Pedroia, Lester, Buchholz and Iglesias appear to be worth the money.
That leaves the Sox with lots of flexibility in who to keep and who to let go from the current crop, although players like Cody Ross and David Ortiz are free agents and can go their own ways if they wish. Some recommendations:
Keepers...
Ross, Andrew Miller, Ortiz, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Andrew Bailey, Franklin Morales, Scott Atchison, Chris Carpenter, Rich Hill, Ryan Kalish, Clayton Mortensen, Ryan Lavarnway, Felix Doubront, Junichi Tazawa, Will Middlebrooks, Pedro Ciriaco, Jacoby Ellsbury.
Ross is arguably Boston?s MVP this season and seems like a player who will have better numbers playing half his games at Fenway Park than he will with any other franchise. He knows that, too. Ortiz?s absence hurt the Sox this season, but it also probably reduced his value on the free-agent market, which should work in Boston?s favor. He should be given every chance to end his career in a Red Sox uniform.
They need two catchers and know that Saltalamacchia is acceptable, while Lavarnway is showing signs of being able to hit ? finally. Middlebrooks is a potential All-Star, Kalish deserves to be evaluated as a healthy player, and Ciriaco is worth keeping if only because the Sox play the Yankees 19 times next year.
Bullpen parts are generally interchangeable, but Miller and Hill are two proven lefties. Mortensen has shown enough to rate a spot for 2013. Atchison has been dependable and refused to take the easy way out and have Tommy John surgery. Carpenter is promising as a mid-innings guy.
Tazawa has been consistently good, but his ERA is a bit deceptive, since he has allowed too many inherited runners to score. In clean-inning situations, Tazawa has been terrific, which makes you wonder if he could close. Bailey is probably good enough to stay in that role, but his meltdown at Tampa Bay Thursday was disturbing.
Ellsbury has a year left before free agency in 2014, so chances are he will be very motivated to make 2013 a good year. Ability has never been an issue with Ellsbury, but consistency has. Maybe next year can be an MVP season for him.
Let ?em go...
Ryan Sweeney, Matsuzaka, James Loney, Scott Podsednik, Craig Breslow, Aaron Cook, Mark Melancon, Vicente Padilla, Daniel Nava, Alfredo Aceves.
Sweeney and Loney fall into the same category ? left-handed hitters who will never be that effective with Fenway Park as their home stadium. Matsuzaka ? there should be a ceremony when he makes his final appearance in a Boston uniform. Podsednik and Nava are fourth outfielders who filled holes this season, but look worse the more at-bats they get. There are a hundred Breslows in the world, and if both Miller and Hill are healthy, the Sox don?t need one.
Cook is 4-10, Melancon?s ERA is 6.64, and Padilla is superfluous. Aceves has worn out his welcome here, as he did in New York, and may have worn out his welcome in the major leagues, period. He did some good things in two years and was never on the DL, which is something in the Red Sox organization, but for all that, he is 2-10 with a 5.31 ERA and eight blown saves this season.
On the fence...
Mike Aviles, Daniel Bard, Mauro Gomez.
Aviles is such a likable and versatile player, it?s hard not to bring him back, but if you keep Ciriaco and Iglesias, where does he play? For all his fine qualities, Aviles is a .250 hitter and average defensive player.
It would seem that Bard needs a change of scenery, which would be dangerous for the Sox since he?s liable to come back with a new team and exorcise his mental demons. Still, his career record is 10-19, and it?s not all bad luck.
Gomez could be better than Loney offensively, although certainly not defensively. The Sox can always use right-handed pop, and as good as Adrian Gonzalez was with the glove, it was good riddance when he was traded.
Baseball Jeopardy
Answers:
1. The last pitcher to beat the Red Sox six times in the same year.
2. The two major league managers active today who also were managing in 1985.
3. The last season the Red Sox had two teenagers on the team at the same time.
Questions below.
Honorable, but complicated
Melky Cabrera?s request to have any potential National League batting title vacated seems like an honorable thing, but it?s also a complicated thing.
Conceding that the batting championship would be tainted is also a concession that any games the Giants won with Cabrera playing are tainted.
Should San Francisco vacate those victories, too? And should any player with a positive PED test vacate any awards he won during the time frame of his usage?
Yes or no ? the policy should be consistent.
Maybe Cabrera will turn into the Rosa Parks of baseball statistics, changing the way things are done by what seems like a single, solitary, isolated act. What would be next ? players calling themselves out on strikes on a close pitch the plate umpire thinks missed the strike zone?
Catching up with?
The Red Sox unloaded 13 players during the course of the season. How all did, or are doing, since being traded or released:
Kevin Youkilis has turned into Jarrod Saltalamacchia with the White Sox, who like his contributions to their playoff drive very much. He is hitting just .226 in 70 games for Chicago, but that includes 15 homers and 45 RBIs. Youkilis has only four home runs since Aug. 22, though.
Lars Anderson played in 18 games for Triple-A Columbus and hit .196 with no homers before being beaned and sitting out the rest of the year. Marlon Byrd was suspended for 50 games for using PEDs and almost certainly will never play again. The popular Darnell McDonald played 31 games for the Yankees? Triple-A team, Wilkes-Barre, and hit just .194 with three home runs.
The Dodgers Trio ? Josh Beckett, Adrian Gonzalez and Nick Punto ? have not done much. In fact, it may be that L.A. made that deal to get Punto, who is hitting .263. Gonzalez is hitting a mere .243 with one home run, and Beckett is 1-2 with a 3.45 ERA; the Dodgers are 2-3 in his five starts.
Matt Albers has done very well for the Diamondbacks, essentially continuing the first half he put together in Boston. That?s a big change from last year when he flopped in the final two months. Albers is 0-1 with a 2.70 ERA in 18 games for Arizona.
Kelly Shoppach is the same player with the Mets that he was with the Sox. He is hitting .230 with three homers and 23 strikeouts in 59 at-bats. Justin Thomas ? remember him? ? spent most of the year with McDonald at Wilkes-Barre and got a September call-up to the Yankees. Thomas was serviceable at Triple A, going 2-1 with a 3.45 ERA in 57-1/3 innings.
Michael Bowden has had a good season with the Cubs, both in Triple A and the majors. Since being called up to Chicago in the middle of last month, Bowden has a 1.71 ERA in 21 innings.
Bowden?s teammate, Justin Germano, who left the Sox after one outing that went 5-2/3 shutout innings, has not done so well with the Cubs. He is 2-10 with a 6.17 ERA in 11 appearances. Brent Lillibridge is hitting .217 with three homers and eight RBIs for the Indians, but was .333 with one homer and two RBIs in a three-game series against the Sox.
Jeopardy questions
1. Who is Dave Stewart? The Oakland right-hander beat Boston six times in 1990 ? four times in the regular season and twice in the ALCS.
2. Who are Davey Johnson and Bobby Valentine? Johnson was the Mets manager in ?85, while Valentine took over the Rangers from Doug Rader early in that season.
3. What is 1964? When that season ended, Boston had Tony Conigliaro and Tony Horton ? both 19 years old ? on the roster.
Bill Ballou can be contacted at wballou@telegram.com
Source: http://www.telegram.com/article/20120923/COLUMN35/109239894/1118/RSS01&source=rss
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