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QUOTE (iamshack @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 03:36 PM) I thought the entire idea of the Red Sox acquiring a 1b was ridiculous? I didn't say that. I said the Red Sox trading their best hitter for Paul Konerko made no sense. If they're dealing Ramirez for Matt Kemp then sending a few prospects to Atlanta for Mark Teixeira then yeah, I might be able to get behind that. If I didn't think it made any sense then I wouldn't have suggested it 2 days ago.

QUOTE (Texsox @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 03:50 PM) Doesn't matter. A team that doesn't want to even talk with Boras is not even going to look over his list to see if there is a good fit. The truth about Scott Boras is that he has a few high profile clients that will make a s***-ton of money and the rest are relatively unimpressive unless you like the Lohses, Weavers and Millwoods of the world. There's nothing wrong with avoiding Boras clients, there's always cheaper alternatives available. If you can acquire them some time in the first 5 years of their career before they hit free agency, that's fine but there's really no reason to even bother with Boras clients on the open market. More often than not it's not worth it.

http://blogs.nypost.com/sports/st/archives...deadline_1.html This is almost the exact scenario that I laid out a few days ago. The Red Sox pay Manny's salary, trade him to a contender for major league ready talent then swing a deal for Teixeira.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 01:58 PM) If they keep kicking our ass, this is a bad sign. The Twins are not THAT good. If they sweep us or win 3-4 it does say something negative about our team. That it's f***ing hard to win in Minnesota? What does it say about the Twins that we swept them in a 4 game series back in June? In New York which is not located in Minnesota and where the Yankees hadn't lost in 10 games coming into last night.

Entourage is just awful. Awful. I'd say Weeds just because I believe Mary-Louise Parker is a terrible actress, the show is funny but she definitely brings it down. Also, House is f***ing great and the first like 4.5 or 5 seasons Scrubs was about as good as it gets. It does suck now though.

QUOTE (Texsox @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 12:28 PM) If there ever was a guy that Sox fans should get behind and hope he improves it's Kong. He's been a decent, stand up guy, plays hard, has never in my memory embarassed the team. I'd rather be cheering for someone like that to get healthy and regain his form, then some of the other guys that have wore a Sox jersey. Do you seriously believe people are cheering against Konerko? That the fans on here don't want him to regain his form? Or could it be that he's been so bad for so long this season that they're sick of watching it and think getting him off the field will do nothing but help the team? You can only hope for him to turn it around for so long, cheer him on despite the fact that he's been garbage, keep sending him out there in hopes that he'll just come out of it. It's almost August, eventually something is going to have to be done because he's giving this team nothing at the plate and just as little in the field. I'm sure most everyone hopes that he turns it around but you can only watch that shoulder shrug so many times.

QUOTE (joeynach @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 03:34 AM) Hudson will not be traded. He was placed on the DL and u cant trade a player on the DL...and the deadline is thursday. I'm not so sure that's the case but it doesn't really matter seeing as how he might be looking at Tommy John Surgery.

QUOTE (joesaiditstrue @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 12:04 PM) i'm not sure how it's possible to say Swisher has been a bigger disappointment than a guy he's currently outperforming (albeit, not all that much, but the numbers are there), that makes about 6 times as much money per year something doesn't add up here. I had higher expectations for Swisher than Konerko this season. It's all about your personally expectations.

This season: as 1B: .220/.341/.394/.735 in 133 PA as CF: .243/.368/.416/.784 in 223 PA 2007: as 1B: .261/.415/.455/.870 in 171 PA as CF: .261/.370/.479/.849 in 255 PA as RF: .254/.368/.393/.761 in 209 PA 2006: as 1B: .238/.340/.416/.756 in 335 PA as LF: .271/.401/.579/.980 in 331 PA Where's the correlation? The numbers say it's bulls***, he played more games in CF than anywhere else last year and it didn't seem to f*** him up at the plate. His numbers are also better when playing CF than 1B this season and he was AWFUL as a 1B in 2006. I'm not buying the "out of position" argument one bit.

Swisher has easily been the biggest disappointment on this team in my mind. He's been garbage for 3/4 of the year and when he has hit well it's really only been at home. He needs to get his f***ing ass out of his head because his crazy, loose, zany clubhouse guy routine is just annoying when he's not producing.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 10:07 AM) Contreras... Garcia came like a week before the deadline, does that count? Robbie Alomar... Try a month.

QUOTE (Texsox @ Jul 29, 2008 -> 10:38 AM) Any team that refuses to speak with Boras clients immediatly cuts themselves out of a lot of quality players. What Boras client even interest you? Aside from Mark Teixiera who's going to get an absurd amount of money I don't see any players that I particularly like.

Besides being bad in general Jerry Owens just got back in the lineup like 2 days ago after missing a couple weeks with injury. He has 9 XBH, isn't drawing walks, isn't hitting for average and has forgotten how to steal bases successfully. He now officially has 0 tools.

According to Cowley Ozzie is sitting Swisher tomorrow and if Konerko shows nothing he'll be sitting Wednesday. Good to see Ozzie giving Swisher a kick in the ass, he's been god awful outside of the month of June.

AJ is starting tonight, at home against the Rays in case anyone wants to see him pitch.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jul 28, 2008 -> 03:06 PM) can you even offer arbitration to players that opt out of contracts? I was thinking the exact same thing. The clause in his contract that allows him to become a free agent should prohibit his old club from offering him arbitration since ALL ties to his former club are cut with his opting out. I didn't see anything in the CBA that said this was the case but if you can think of a good player who opted out of his deal and signed with another team in the past few years you can check if that team received comp picks for his departure.

QUOTE (Kenny Hates Prospects @ Jul 28, 2008 -> 02:51 PM) Firstly, where did you find that ratings system? Is it accurate? I'd love to see it. Secondly, even as a Type B, if you figure you're getting a supplemental first on top of Burnett, that's still a total steal. Especially if you spend a little bit of money on those picks. I'm sure you can find and sign a guy with a higher ceiling than Egbert with that pick, so you can basically look at it as Allen for Burnett, and when you imagine how much that addition would mean in terms of adding insurance to the rotation and the bullpen through a trickle-down effect, that is more than worth it IMO. I'd love this deal, but I'd be very, very, very surprised if there's any truth to it at all as it sounds way too good to be true. I'd expect the Jays to at the very least ask for something like Shelby + Poreda given what everyone else is asking for their players. I don't disagree that it would be a decent deal for the Sox even if Burnett is only a Type B free agent, I'm just trying to clarify as to his status this offseason. I also don't buy this one bit, it sounds like speculation to me and poorly thought out speculation at that. Just google "Elias Sports Bureau AL free agent rankings", the '06-'07 free agent rankings that major league baseball uses should be one of the first results.

QUOTE (Kenny Hates Prospects @ Jul 28, 2008 -> 02:29 PM) I'd do that deal in a freakin' heartbeat. s***, I'd almost do it just for the prospects. If AJ denies arbitration he's going to sign with a contending team most likely. That's a late first rounder and a supplemental pick. That PLUS Burnett for the rest of the season instead of Contreras? f*** yeah, sign me up! I think it's BS though. That would be a KW steal. You're assuming Burnett ranks as a Type A free agent. He rated out at 71.528 B for '06-'07 which was 4 points short of Type A status. Aside from innings AJ's 2008 season is much worse than his 2006 season thus far. It's not where near a foregone conclusion that ranks as a Type A free agent. Can you even offer Arb to a player who opts out of his deal?

QUOTE (tonyho7476 @ Jul 28, 2008 -> 02:13 PM) Why would he opt out...he is .500 pitcher, as usual, and is making like $13million...someone will pay him more? What is sad is that his .500 record, is better than Contreras and Vazquez. So I guess we should get him. He's a 31 year old power pitcher who still has his good stuff and has had some success in the AL over the past 2 seasons (his numbers are awful against teams that aren't the Yankees and Red Sox this season), he's due $24M over the next 2 seasons ('09 and '10) but could opt out now and get about $52M-$56M. If he doesn't opt out he'll have to play out the rest of his contract in Toronto and who knows what he'll situation will be like at the end of the '10 season, he could be burnt out and done by then. So he'd opt out in order to get another ~$30M in guaranteed money.

Ray King was released. He signed with the Round Rock Express, the AAA affiliate of the Astros.

http://trades.mlblogs.com/archives/2008/07..._the_radar.html

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jul 27, 2008 -> 11:38 PM) I'm going to be completely honest and say that you lost me when you said Quentin would move to CF. I just couldn't foresee Quentin being an even average defensive CFer. He's having enough trouble adjusting to LF, I even imagine the sort of problems he'd have in center.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jul 27, 2008 -> 05:01 PM) They do what teams like the Red Sox and Yankees do: they sit his ass on the bench. They pinch hit him. They give him spot starts against guys Youk struggles against. This is the same team that had JD Drew on the bench. That took back Mike Lowell when everyone thought his career was over. It's certainly not an ideal situation for them, but it certainly gives them some protection should Ortiz's wrist not hold up, and a very solid bat off the bench should it not. Instead of taking on a high risk, expensive player like Konerko couldn't they just agree to pay the Manny's salary for the rest of the season, trade him to a team that normally would not be able to afford him for some major league ready talent then go get Tex from Atlanta at the deadline?

But what would they do with Konerko in the meantime? If he's splitting time with Youkilis at 1B until Ortiz gets hurt again then they're greatly hurting their offense by replacing Manny with an inferior talent in LF and taking away ABs from their .929 OPS 1B (who had a higher OPS than Konerko last year as well.) It's just hard to talk positive about a guy who's still do $28M, posted a sub .850 OPS last season and is probably going to hit 8th or 9th tomorrow.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jul 27, 2008 -> 04:36 PM) Obviously, but what if Ortiz's wrist doesn't hold up? What if he reinjures it and has to miss the remainder of the season? They could then plug in Paulie at DH and swap he and Youk occasionally to keep Paulie sharp defensively. Let's face it, the Red Sox are not going to improve their on-the-field team by trading Manny Ramirez. Which is probably the reason they have always changed their minds when considering dealing him in the past. But if they really think dealing him would be addition by subtraction, I think taking back Konerko and some decent prospects would be about as good an offer as they might get. Who knows how badly they truly want him gone, but they sure are acting as if they do this time... David Ortiz is healthy and playing right now, assuming he does eventually re-aggravate his wrist injury what do they do with Konerko in the meantime? That's an awfully old, expensive, risky and well pretty bad backup plan/bench player. I don't think you acquire a 32 year old, $28M player with a .672 OPS and NO versatility to act as an insurance policy for a seemingly healthy player.