Saturday, August 25, 2012

Red Sox - Dodgers Mega Deal

First the details:

Dodgers get:
Josh Beckett
Carl Crawford
Adrian Gonzalez
Nick Punto
12 million dollars

Red Sox get:
James Loney
Allen Webster
Rubby De La Rosa
Ivan De Jesus
Jerry Sands

Now this is mostly a sign that the Red Sox are blowing up the team and starting over.  Beckett, Crawford, and Gonzalez were their three highest-paid players and potentially all had bad contracts moving forward.  The players the Red Sox received are not stars, though Webster and De La Rosa both have potential.  This was a way for Boston to clear a ton of salary.  The Red Sox will only pay $12 million of the contracts on the four players they are moving, thus saving nearly $260 million through 2017.

This is bittersweet for me.  On the one hand, I am happy they are doing something to move forward.  On the other, I have never seen the Red Sox pull this kind of thing before.  A complete rebuilding without clear replacements for the players lost.  Loney will take over at first, but his numbers are not impressive and he will be a free agent after the season.  Boston does not have a clear first base prospect in the minors after trading Anthony Rizzo for Gonzalez and Lars Anderson earlier this season.  Ryan Lavarnway or Jarrod Saltalamacchia could spend some time there and Mike Napoli will be on the market this offseason.

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