I don’t think it’s a question of want. They can do an excellent job of making their pitch to both players but so will everyone else and it’s one person’s decision. It would be fantastic to get them both. I’m not sure it’s fair to judge their intent or their competence if they don’t. It’s a big ask.
Thank you and be prepared to copy and paste that response multiple times per page as the days go by.
Sure, but 90% of the time the decision comes down to "who offered the most money" , and that remaining 10% comes down to "who sold me the best on their ability/willingness to contend". So not signing the player does say something about their competence, provided they really wanted the guy. It's not as if there's a scenario in which the Red Sox put the best offer on the table and those players opt to sign elsewhere because they don't really love their uniforms.
For Yamamoto? No. Can’t go that high on a SP as much as I want him. If Dodgers kill the market on these guys, we simply have to pivot.
Unless they are sure that YY is going to be Gerrit Cole, no. For that AAV you could have both Jordan Montgomery and Seth Lugo, with a much smaller commitment in years.
So basically, if a team really wants a guy, they should just offer whatever it takes no matter what it is or they're incompetent at their jobs? That seems like an unreasonable standard.
This is where I am as well. Rather have solid pitching two days in a row than overpay one and hope for the best the next day. Yamamoto and one of Montgomery, Burnes, Snell, Lugo and I’m extremely happy.
Multiple teams have indicated that Yamamoto is their number one acquisition target of the off-season. The overwhelming majority of them will fail to sign him. Will it say something about the competence of every team he chooses not to go with?
I largely agree. To me, there still has to be some question mark (even if just a slight one) as to how Yamamoto makes the transition to MLB and with that I mind, how big of an offer should any team be pepared to make him? The tough thing here is that agents are likely willing to let YY set the market as that's going to benefit their clients. I'm sure that all of those listed have gotten offers already, some probably above what they might have otherwise gotten were it not for the Yamamoto posting, but they seem to be in a good position to sit tight.
There's a good chance multiple teams offer roughly the same terms (with any differences being a rounding error). If he wants to be in LA because of the celebrity lifestyle there, or elsewhere on the west coast because of the presence of large Asian communities there, it will say literally nothing about the competence of the Red Sox.
Well said.... people seem to think that because they did not get the player signed by topping a number they weren't comfortable with , that makes them incompetent.... Imagine if we had signed X to a deal richer than he got?
The board seems very split on Snell. As someone who admittedly doesn’t follow the rest of baseball nearly as closely as I do the Sox, I’d love to hear more opinions about whether we should go after him.
He has the two Cy Young seasons. Then he has six other years with a combined 8 WAR. Do you feel lucky?
Why not Yamamoto and Imanaga?...I'd be thrilled with that outcome. The lefty looked great in the WBC and maybe there would be a comfort level there in having the countrymen in the same rotation. I think he'll be cheaper than Montgomery, who i have a feeling will get ace money when his a borderline #2/3 SP
Yamamoto + basically anyone is a great outcome for us but I would definitely be good with both of them. Hasn’t been much noise on Imanaga so curious about who is interested. Feels like everyone continues to wait for Yamamoto to set the market.
3 things for Breslow to not like about Snell:
None of those really feel right to me with the exception of maybe Lugo to the Red Sox.
I have no idea how he is getting to that "feel".
Snell is an excellent pitcher. Two CYAs. Career era of 3.20, career whip of 1.23, career k/9 of 11.1. He walks more guys than I'd like, but makes up for it by not allowing many hits. He's just really good. The problem is that he's rarely healthy enough to pitch a full season. He's never pitched more than 181 innings, and only twice in his career has he pitched more than 130. So you're paying a lot of money for what is likely not a lot of innings. But WHEN he pitches, he's awesome.
FWIW, Snell is tied for 24th last season with 180 IP. In the same amount of games started (32) Jordan Montgomery is 17th on the list with 188.2 IP. and Corbin Burnes (also with 32 GS) is tied with Aaron Nola at #10 with 193.2.
That feels steep even for a crazed market. There are really legitimate questions about his HR rate iirc.
$350 million would be my max offer, but only Sox ownership can answer that. If it prevents them from handing out future contracts, than no.
You guys should absolutely go after him for the sole reason that the game threads will be must read every 5th day when your ace is at 98 pitches in the 4th inning after having walked the bases loaded for the 2nd inning in a row. He’s like if JD Drew and Jeff Spicoli had a kid and they sent him to the Dice-K pitching academy. Good luck!
5.27 IP/Start in 83 Padres starts.
He pitched a bit deeper into games in San Diego but I’m guessing his career IP per game is more skewed by his career 4.2 BB/9 than it is a Tampa philosophy.
But both times he did, he won the Cy Young Award.
Much of next year’s success hinges on whether or not they severely upgrade the rotation.
He's Nolan Ryan if Ryan were both injury prone and never allowed to throw more than 110 pitches. I don't know how valuable that is, but he's going to tax your bullpen in ways that a true ace like Cole won't.
Yeah, I have gotten more on board with this thinking. I still think he won't be as good as he was in Texas in front of the Sox defense (who would be?), but his innings would be such a huge addition to the rotation that it would all even out.
Sure, but I think some of that is probably going to have to come from within. If your team is just an ace and a #2 away from being successful…well, how good are you to begin with?
I'm very comfortable with how Snell pitches. I'm just worried that he won't be healthy very much, since only twice in his entire career has he pitched more than 130 innings. If you're going to pay him to be an ace (which he absolutely is when he's healthy), you need him to shoulder a full workload. (these days, 180 innings is a full workload...these guys make Pedro Martinez look like Cy Young in terms of innings)
