Following Former Red Sox 2016
- Thread starter Lose Remerswaal
- Start date
Somehow I missed this attempted comeback, now apparently over:
http://www.rotoworld.com/player/mlb/4865/hideki-okajima
http://www.rotoworld.com/player/mlb/4865/hideki-okajima
Royals: Former first-round draft pick (of Boston) Rey Fuentes hit his way onto the roster – and likely the left-handed hitting part of a platoon – with a huge spring, batting .389/.459/.648 and tied for a team-high in HR (3) and SB (3) and leading the team with 14 RBI.
A lucky dude that could most likely have made a lot more and still be in the majors if he had worn contacts/gotten lasik.
(And no way he's got a couple million bucks. B-ref has his career earnings at $1.6M before everything that gets stripped out of that.)
Shane and all the others re-signed right away to minor league deals. Knowing Shane, this isn't over for him yet, he'll be at Wrigley sooner or later.
So he made over a million dollars playing baseball. But you're right, he's had a Dickensian life of toil and struggle on par with late 19th century orphan factory workers.
Yes, because that's the point i was trying to make. Thanks for emphasizing it.
My point - which I'm sure you knew - was that he could have made a lot more money and not be in the minors now if he had simply done a couple things differently, most notably making more of an effort o correct this vision and worrying more about his career than his honeymoon.
Quick summary of last couple days transactions:
Tigers put Alex Wilson on 15 day DL
Tampa released James Loney
Blue Jays signed Franklin Morales
Marlins added Craig Breslow to the roster
Brewers added Chris Capuano to their roster
Padres added Matt Thornton to their roster
Tigers put Alex Wilson on 15 day DL
Tampa released James Loney
Blue Jays signed Franklin Morales
Marlins added Craig Breslow to the roster
Brewers added Chris Capuano to their roster
Padres added Matt Thornton to their roster
So the A's scratched Sonny Gray from his Opening Day start due to illness, and have replaced him with Rich Hill.
Rich Hill. Opening-Day Starter.
Rich Hill. Opening-Day Starter.
Hill lasted 2.2 innings, throwing 66 pitches. Not an auspicious beginning for the A's, with both of their recycled Boston lefties on the fritz.
Chris Capuano makes a relief appearance for the Brewers today, proof positive lefty relievers can pitch a loooong time. But, he has a ways to go before he catches Tony Fossas.
Dominant start for Rich Hill today. That will be one of the greatest comeback stories ever if he can stay remotely healthy this year. Great for the A's too, nice to see Beane find another nugget.
This is one of the more compelling former-Sox story lines I can recall. Obviously we all love the guy because of a single base he stole in a Sox uniform, but in the 11+ years since then, everything else I've seen and heard about Roberts has made him more interesting and impressive. If he can manage the Dodgers into realizing their vast potential, he will pretty quickly vault to the upper echelon of managers, right?
So far, I see two encouraging data points: Puig's good behavior and great performance, and Roberts's decision to pull the rookie 7 1/3rd innings into a no-hitter.
tl;dr: Everyone loves Dave Roberts.
Speaking of former Sox everyone loves, Coco Crisp hit his first HR today since August 27, 2014, winning the game in the 10th against the Mariners, spoiling a Felix Hernandez start, and securing a sweep of the series for Oakland: http://m.mlb.com/news/article/171573564/crisps-hr-in-10th-lifts-as-over-mariners?game_pk=446950
The Felix start was actually spoiled by the prior HR that tied the score at 1-1, but if there's any lineup that will make an Oakland rotation of "who are these guys?" into Cy Youngs, it's the M's. My charter seat license contract runs through 2018 and I haven't seen a playoff game in the last 15 years, but I'm not bitter.
And he's doing fantastic for the first 7 games. In 23 PAs, five singles, two doubles, a triple, two home runs, two sac flies, two stolen bases.
Stephen Drew, playing third base and hitting in the two hole for the Nats, went yard today.
There are four things I am surprised about in that sentence.
There are four things I am surprised about in that sentence.
The fact that he's still possibly worth $18M per year reminds me once again how letting Beltre go to upgrade to AGon, hastening Youkilis' decline by moving him back to 3B and losing Rizzo in the process was one of the underrated lousy deals of the Theo era.
Cafardo with some updates today:
Burke Badenhop is with Texas in AAA
Ryan Kalish is in AAA with the Cubs
Lars Anderson is still kicking around, in AAA for the Dodgers
George Kottaras is on SFs AAA team
Ryan Lavarnway is on Atlantas AAA team
David Aardsma is on Buffalo (Toronto AAA) with Bob Stanley as pitching coach and Mugsy Allenson as manager
Burke Badenhop is with Texas in AAA
Ryan Kalish is in AAA with the Cubs
Lars Anderson is still kicking around, in AAA for the Dodgers
George Kottaras is on SFs AAA team
Ryan Lavarnway is on Atlantas AAA team
David Aardsma is on Buffalo (Toronto AAA) with Bob Stanley as pitching coach and Mugsy Allenson as manager
Sure – but at the time, Beltre was coming off his first >900 OPS season in seven seasons and only his second >800 OPS season in that span. In the five seasons since, he's been under 800 once.
Should Theo have predicted that Beltre would return to the 2004 version of himself? Hard to say – but he let a guy walk away 1) who was pretty much the best player on that 2010 team, 2) who proved he could play in Boston, 3) who wanted to stay, 4) who ended up signing for completely reasonable dollars, and 5) who has probably been the best player in the league since – oh, and 6) at a position that has been an absolute stink hole for this team for the last half decade.
So yeah, fair or not, every time I see Beltre drop to his knee and crush another ball to left for a team that isn't the Red Sox I get a little pissed at Theo all over again.
Well I'm sure somebody will come along to mention the compensation picks we got for letting him go
There are also his "intangible" entertainment qualities. Here are a couple just from the last few days.
I'll do it myself. According to BRef they were Swihart and JBJ. Which is pretty damned good actually.
I'd have rather traded Youk, resigned Beltre and traded for AGon anyway. Of course I never really liked Youkilis and even if maybe not on record here, I told many a folk that I thought he was a mirage that they should have sold high on, but that is what it is.
Bottom line is I'd have rather had the last five years of Beltre than the potential of JBJ and Swihart, at least when factoring in the suck at 3B since and the money spent on it.
Bottom line is I'd have rather had the last five years of Beltre than the potential of JBJ and Swihart, at least when factoring in the suck at 3B since and the money spent on it.
There was a decent sized minority that thought, very early on, that Beltre + Youk was the way to go - GG defense in the corners and a good L/R/L combo with Ortiz.
AGon was coming of shoulder surgery and never quite displayed the same power he had before. Beltre had been predicted as a breakout candidate moving from Safeco to Fenway, but his late 20s weren't elite in terms of offensive production. He was going to be 31 if he was resigned by the Sox to an extension (Youk was the same age). AGon would have been 29 when he started playing for the Sox in 2011.
Theo didn't make a horrible choice, balancing whether Beltre was a quasi-mirage, Youk would or wouldn't get hurt and or could move back to third, and if AGon would recover. Assuming all were equal, he essentially swapped three prospects for 2 extra years of borderline MVP production. Rizzo turned out to be a kind of worst case scenario, but he needed a season and a half of ABs in the majors before becoming an above average player in his 2014 campaign. (So who knows what his path with the Sox would have looked like.)
In retrospect though, 2013 is a big leveler. Maybe Beltre makes a difference in 2011 or 2012, but it's hard to say. The Sox probably would have still signed Crawford and extended Becket. And without AGon there certainly is no Punto Trade, and no 2013 retooling.
The next part of that sequence though is trading for Gonzalez. So you have to compare the compensation picks to thebprospects that were in that deal. I'd trade Swihart for Rizzo, and Fuentes looks like he's a keeper now too.
Yes. Lost in the shuffle is Rizzo, who was a replacement for Youk at 1B. The funny thing is the Padres traded him too and he's now a star with the Cubs.
Also, whatever happened to Casey Kelly?