The Red Sox are faced with a problem unique to big-market teams, John Tomase of the Boston Herald writes. That question is how to spend all their money. Baseball has clamped down on spending on amateur talent, and the Angels' recent example shows the problems inherent in free-agent spending sprees. The Red Sox will have plenty of money coming off the books next offseason, perhaps giving them $50MM with which to spend. The Red Sox haven't spent heavily on top free agents recently, letting Jacoby Ellsbury depart and not signing Brian McCann. But Tomase suggests they'll continue to spend to add depth and build a "strong middle class." They could also look to extend their own stars, perhaps including Jon Lester and/or David Ortiz. Here are more notes from the AL East.
- The Yankees have not made any recent attempts to trade for Padres third baseman Chase Headley, Andy Martino of the New York Daily News tweets. Yesterday's news confirmed that Alex Rodriguez will be out for the entire 2014 season, but the Yankees could well go with their existing options at third.
- Kelly Johnson and Eduardo Nunez could receive significant innings at third base this year, Yankees assistant GM Billy Eppler tells Martino. "We’ll look left, we’ll look right, we’ll look under rocks and see if something can work itself out and makes sense," says Eppler. "But with Kelly Johnson, who we spoke to earlier in the season … before we came to an agreement with him, we talked to him about playing third base … as well as second base and there’s outfield."
Pretty sure the Red Sox are close to 189 now. When Gomes, Papi Victorino and Napoli leave/decline they will need to spend money since the system does not have much in the way of Corner OF/1B types that are close to MLB ready.
Revenue wise, with the new national TV money, revenue sharing rebates, and post season revenues, not to mention hefty ticket price increases next year, and tax credits for the renovation due to the parks historical designation, they are sitting pretty.
Victorino still has 2, Papi 1, Napoli 3 anything I am missing.
Napoli’s deal is for 2 years, not 3.
2 @ 32 I think
Considering Napoli’s necrotic bone disease, 2 years might even be a little much.
Yanks would have to give up a good amount to get headley..
A good amount of talent that they don’t have in the minors. Sanchez? Williams? Really? These kids are top prospects? I think it’s written into some secret law to cover MLB you have to rank Yankee prospects in the top 50.
Considering Headley has only had one outstanding year (2012) during his 6 year career I’m not sure that the Padres aren’t overvaluing him in the market place.
It’s probably why they have not traded him yet since they may have a high asking price, Unless they really want to extend him as well which could be causing trade delays.
Point is, it will absolutely not take a lot to get Headley nor should it.
Whether it should or not is debatable, but it absolutely will.
Not if it’s a contract year when he’s coming off a good but not great season, and that is the case. Which is why I said the Yankees, nor any team, should give up a lot of talent for a 1 year player.
I think the lack of 3b on the market will make him worth more talent wise, even if he did have a pretty average 2013 season.
But Headley will be one of those on the FA market unless the Padres extend him. Hanley and Sandoval are also on the market, though I’d be surprised if Hanley left the Dodgers.
You’re missing the point; should =/= will. They have shown no interest in moving him, and they clearly value him highly, so if you want to pry him away it’s going to cost quite a bit. Whether the Yankees should (or even could) pay the price is totally irrelevant.
No interest? His name has came up literally hundreds of times in trade rumors with Byrnes mentioning he would want a good return for him
And? Stanton comes up in rumors all the time too, and King Felix did for years, it doesn’t mean anything that he gets mentioned in rumors.
No such rumors of Stanton and Felix ever being traded existed. That was from all of the crazy fans.
When did Byrnes every say there is no chance he is trading Headley?
The rumors about Headley are exactly the same as the rumors about Stanton and Felix; “this team wants ___” or “___ would be a good fit for this team” or even “this team called about ____, but it didn’t go anywhere.” And back in December Gammons reported that the earliest the Padres would consider trading Headley is at the deadline, and just a few days later Byrnes said that Headley is part of their plans for 2014.
Not many trade rumors in 2013 for him, but previously there was
mlbtraderumors.com/2012/07/padres-likely-to-trade-…
Never once have Stanton or King Felix have been mentioned in a trade by their GM’s or even listened in on offers. If you can show me wrong, I will be a gentlemen and will say I stand corrected.
Something that the Yankees shouldn’t even consider giving up for a free agent after next season. At least not Sanchez. I think they can part ways with Williams though. He’s not even in the top 100 anymore. Their only top 100 I believe since the rankings came out last October was Sanchez, so I don’t know where you get the silliness in the last sentence of your post.
But then you are selling low on Williams.
The long term solution to their problems are to keep their prospects instead of trading them for 1 year stopgaps.
As I expected Headley returned to his norms. He simply isn’t a big enough piece for me to break the bank for.
True. I think that’s the wisest move unless they plan another spending spree.
I think Sanchez, William and Austin are all rated in the top 50 of many lists. Perhaps that was pre-season 2013. MLB.com has Williams #2 for the Yankees and ranked #37 overall.
A good amount to get a guy with only 1 year left on his contract and coming off a year with a slash line of .250/.347/.400 ?
My feeling towards how Boston should build it’s team is how it always should have.. A very strong farm system that produces the majority of it’s own talent and acquires very few of the pieces it cannot produce on it’s own via trade and FA.
Yes.. That might be the old fashioned way, even small to mid market way, yet that is the way that is and was proven to work for decades by many teams, even power house teams of this current generation in Tampa Bay and St. Louis.
Spending money on more and more knowledgeable scouts, worldwide and setting up more agreements in other countries like they just did with the Korean team for information to help with the new limited budgets is the way to go, not spending needless money on every AAAA FA, or just over paying for people like Santana, who wants to get paid 80m for 1 career season.
Look at how the teams that bought and traded their way out of farm systems are sitting right now. I don’t need to name them. Scouts are a lot cheaper. Dan Duquette isn’t bad either, I hope Angelos will allow him the freedom.
The Rays’ situation is not applicable to any team but the Astros. They’ve drafted well and had a lot of success with low risk high reward FAs, but they also had years of top 5 picks. Teams don’t want to lose their way to the playoffs.
Yes, Rays have to operate differently. They needed those top picks to get competitive, and they will need to trade their top players for prospects, something which shouldn’t go over in Boston.
If I were Ben Cherrington I would do everything I can to sign James Shields next season. The Red Sox could really use a strike out pitcher who can go deep into games. The bonus with shields is that he can handle the AL East division after being apart of the Rays for much of his career. He may cost the Red Sox first draft pick but if they qualify offer Lester and let him go due to his inconsistency, then what should it matter that the Sox are swapping draft picks with other teams? Only time will tell what the Red Sox will do next offseason.
Shields will be 33 by the time he hits free agency. I don’t think he’s worth the draft picks and he’ll be looking for a pay day after his team-friendly deal with Tampa and his trade.
It won’t make any sense for them to sign a pitcher next year unless it’s a true top of the rotation guy like Kershaw; they have half a dozen top pitching prospects who they can slot into the rotation and pay the league minimum.
The Sox already have six starters. Why do they need seven?
Makes sense, why go after Headley at this point when he is so close to free agency. He still has the option of signing long-term with the Padres, but I’d rather risk tackling him in free agency than trading any of (what little we have) the minor league talent. He is going to have to show he can stay healthy and produce better if he wants to cash in on a monster contract.
I’m not sure that some combination of Johnson/Nunez and now Sizemore aren’t just as good as anything currently available on the market. They may even be a better option then the other choices.
If the Yankees want to dig under rocks for their next 3B, Ruben Gotay, and Josh Fields are available. Kevin Kouzmanoff could back out of his minor league deal as well for an opportunity with the Yanks.
Drew Sutton, Jim Negrych, and Rusty Ryal may also offer some interesting bench help for the Yankees as well.
We’ll be happy to send them Dan Uggla for a few NY strip steaks and a couple good NY style pizzas
Sounds delicious! The food, not Uggla.
With a thin 2015 FA market and pretty much every position locked up, say for LF and catcher—what would the Sox needs be next year that they could spend their $$$ on? Backups and a couple of relievers?
Injuries. And their current expectation of turning cf and ss over to rookies, and middlebrooks at 3b could really implode.
It sounds like the Padres are wanting to make a go of it this season anyway, so it is not clear he would be available unless they stumble out of the gate.
Did they improve 16 games this offseason though>?
For the Red Sox, you have to think they will eventually – maybe next offseason – make a move for somebody like Giancarlo Stanton. They have the trade pieces, the salary space to pay him, and, after next year, will have an open spot in left field.
Yankee’s have a better chance trading for Sandovol from the Giants
NYY would be better off acquiring Sandoval but SF is not nearly as willing to trade Panda as SD is trade Headley.
Queue the Chase Headley hype. Is there a player more overhyped in trade rumor history. I looked at this guys numbers and outside of 2012, the guy has never hit more than 14 HRs and 65 RBI’s in a season. I mean Kelley Johnson whom the Yankees signed, hits 16 HR and 52 RBI’s last season in 154 less at bats than Headley who had 13 HR and 50 RBI’s. Dude is overhyped. Reading and hearing about Headley is like hearing another story about a washed up Alex Rodriguez suspended. Not like its the 2002 Arod here or something.
I agree. But many have been riding under the expectation that if you take him out of Petco that suddenly he will be a mvp canidate.
I think that’s the case too. He’s a career .818 OPS away from Petco and just over .700 at Petco. Last season was actually one of his worst seasons away from Petco, but I would bet it was a little bit of him pressing due to his 2012.
I’d love to see this guy in another uniform, even if it is the Yankees. Would just love to see if the hype is warranted.
But that still only puts him at a 121 wRC+ for his career. He is a perfectly fine 3B, and I would be happy if NYY had him, but that still puts fringy towards the outside of the top 10 3B offensively. And only marginally better than Arod has been for the past 3 years.( 118 wRC+ )
Petco has certainly stifled him, but I have seriously seen sports writers try and perpetuate the notion that outside of Petco he will be a .300/.375/.500 hitter. He is a fine player, but I really think that is nuts.
Eh, it’s not completely out of the realm of possibility. I know it seems more like an aberration, but he hit over that .875 Ops you’re displaying in 2012, away from Petco, and he hit damn near that at home that season.
He’s also had other seasons away from Petco where he’s hit close to that projection as well.
I’m not saying he will hit that but it’s hard to say I guy can’t do something when he’s already done it. Since he has, I’d really like to see what he can do where his home park isn’t Petco.
He is a very good defensive third baseman who has pop from the left side of the plate. Yes he is overhyped but it’s not like he is garbage either. If he was playing half of his games at Yankee Stadium then I could easily see him hitting 30 home runs again. Plus San Diego can put the QO on him & get the draft compensation if he walks. There is no reason for the Padres to give the guy away unless someone blows them away.
The Sox could invest some of that money in better hitting instructors for their minor leagues.