Odds & Ends: Buchholz, Nats, O's, Rays

Boston fans, Yunel Escobar and Kenshin Kawakami for Clay Bucholz and Jed Lowrie. Would ya'll be interested?

"Yunel Escobar and Kenshin Kawakami for Clay Bucholz and Jed Lowrie."

i think the sox can do alittle bit better then this personally, but you certainly have something to build on here.

" Yunel Escobar and Kenshin Kawakami for Clay Bucholz and Jed Lowrie. Would ya'll be interested?"

No Thanks. Bucholz will get to Fenway, just a bit of a pitching glut at the moment and where would Kawakami fit anyway? He certainly wouldn't start and Boston has the best BP in baseball and Kawakami's salary at 6.7M until 2011 is atrocious.

"Buchholz and Bard for Escobar and Flowers, id do that. thats better value for the sox atleast"

Tyler Flowers was traded to Chicago for Javier Vasquez.

Would you like that trade if Flowers was swapped with Gonzalez and Brandon Jones? Ya'lls pen is the best in baseball i know but Okajima is the only lefty you have.

im wondering if the braves would even part with escobar to begin with, hes pretty solid. i think desperation would draw that trade more then rebuilding. starting isnt really even the braves issue anyway

I know starting pitching isn't really our issue but i'm thinking long term with all this. If the Braves fall out of this I'd like them to be able to trade someone like vasquez and kawakami(if there's anyone who'd take his contract) or maybe even both and have a real good rotation next year and free up money so they could pursue a holliday and valverde this off season. I think the Braves may be willing to part with Escobar just because his personality doesn't fit the team and the players don't like him either for various reasons.

Sox bullpen is better than the Mets by a decent amount..

"Mets bullpen is the best in baseballRed sox are a close second"

Hahaha! I have been awake since 4:00 this morning, and could blow an 0.12 right now and even I don't believe that.

Every single one of the Red Sox current relief pitchers is good enough to be a setup man for a championship caliber team (with the possible exception of Bard who has as high of an upside as anyone in the pen).

If you only consider the pitchers in the bullpen as it's currently constructed (as hunter jones, javier lopez and michael bowden won't be back up barring injury or trade), the pitchers have a combined ERA of 2.36 over 168 innings. The Mets do have a good bullpen, but realistically it doesn't hold a candle to Bostons.

The Mets have a good bullpen. The thing is Jerry just uses the same 3-4 guys (K-Rod, Feliciano, Parnell, and Green). Stokes is underused and haven't had much luck with a 2nd LOOGY (Takahashi was more of a longman and didnt have good numbers against lefties. Switzer hasn't been great but very small sample size).

Red Sox pen is better because of its depth but the Mets' pen is right behind them.

Note to Stan Kasten: Jim Riggleman is NOT the answer.

Tomahawk368 agreed that the Sox have the best BP over the Mets midtown, I get confused sometimes on posts also and yeah, the Sox BP is really nice with 7 guys (counting Masterson) that Francona has -0- problems bringing in in the 8th, or 9th inning to shut down any rally by the opposition.

It's also worth pointing out that other than Oki-J, every one of those guys can "bring it" with FB's in the mid to upper 90's and not limited to just 1 off speed pitch as well, but multiple pitches that they can throw for strikes at any given time.

Jays have the best pen in baseball when everyone is healthy. Things have been off a bit lately because Tallet basically one of the jays better long relievers is currently our #2 starter -_-, or well #1 while Docs hurt.

"Umm, I am sure Theo would give him up for Jason Heyward, and I am sure braves fans would kill Wren if he traded him."

Not hardly. Not even the Braves Poster prospect Hansen has put up numbers even this year at AAA like Bucholz, much yet thrown a No No in the bigs..

"Not hardly. Not even the Braves Poster prospect Hansen has put up numbers even this year at AAA like Bucholz, much yet thrown a No No in the bigs.."

He's been in the majors for 2 starts for far so i'm not complaining about the lack of a no-hitter, albeit he did have a perfect game through 3 2/3 in his debut. As for there stats at AAA Hanson's were

1.49era, 0.86whip and 12.27Kp9

Bucholz

1.75era, 0.82whip and 7.93Kp9

also Hanson is 22 and Bucholz is 25 in a month

So now you understand why the Sox have pretty much -0- intention of trading him away. Boston, before the season when they didn't even have a catcher refused to trade Bucholz for Saltamach, Teagarden, or Montera and they desperately needed a catcher and Bucholz was coming off of a very shaky season in 2008. Now Bucholz has rebounded strongly, so why would they give him away for something they don't even need as an upgrade?

On the Hansen vs Bucholz. Gotcha.. I saw some graphs a couple weeks ago and it was pretty close, didn't realize that Hansen's K rate was that high. He's doing pretty nifty :-)

How about Jason Donald and Lou Marson for Buchholz?

icedrake523:

Did you just compare the Mets team with the Nats? Mets were suppose to be winning.

"If I'm not mistaken, the Red Sox offered Bard for Marson a few months ago, and Amaro countered by asking for Buchholz.
Posted by: baxter | June 17, 2009 at 12:41 PM"

It was actually the other way around. The Red Sox not surprisingly quickly turned that down.

"Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe reports the Phillies and Red Sox are discussing trade options concerning catcher Lou Marson.
According to Cafardo, the Phils want either Clay Buchholz or Daniel Bard, but the Sox “aren’t going there. 3/23/09”

The problem with Buchholz is that he is too good for the minors but not ready for the majors yet. He has shown flashes of greatness while being up with the Sox, but has also stunk up the place as well. The perfect scenario for him would be to go to a club who is rebuilding and let him take the ball every 5th day in a major league rotation where there is not this pressure to perform or be demoted. He is going to have is ups and downs like 99% of pitchers do but there is still an ace there. I just don't know if we will ever see what he can become with the way the Sox are handling him though. I understand the Sox thinking though, they are the best team in baseball and are in the toughest division in baseball and really can't afford to let him work out his kinks while they are trying to win a world series.