abreu

[idseer]

i love the fact he refused the hr derby (which is a worthless endeavor anyway). i have to say i like every single thing i've seen from this guy so far. but way out in front is his attitude which is just about the opposite of what i've come to expect from a cuban player. he works so diligently on everything! his k's are way down from how he started the year, his average is now up to .292 and i fully expect he'll end the year well over .300. and it's always team first with him. at this stage he's been not only a bargain but a steal for the money.
i only hope the sox can somehow surround him with good player in the next year or two. that and realize what crap for manager they have and find someone who knows how to manage.

 

[msgkings322]

Agreed, they rolled the dice with him and got lucky. Which is something you have to do to compete with the bottomless checkbook teams.

He's already 27 in his prime so they need to make their move right away, which I think has always been the plan, to compete NEXT year.

They will have Dunn's $ and should bump the payroll up (in the lower half now, rebuilding) to try to compete starting next year. They might even trade Danks this year to a pitching-starved team like the Yankees, although he's not a bad 3rd/4th starter (overpaid sure but you need 4 quality starters and he's decent).

The thing is payroll alone won't do much, the list of free agents for next year is pretty thin of impact guys. They of course need to completely overhaul the bullpen, keeping maybe 3 of the current guys. Luckily pen arms are the easiest to find.

They have 3 decent starters and potentially 1-2 more, that's what this year is for to see if Carroll or Noesi can be solid 4/5 guys. They probably need a catcher. Garcia is back next year, so most of the positions are filled: OF Garcia, Eaton, Viciedo, IF Gillaspie, Ramirez, Beckham, Abreu
DH can be Viciedo too if they want to plug in a different OF, Abreu can DH sometimes, etc.

Here's the FAs for next year, best catchers we could get probably Suzuki or Martin, they don't have to be great just upgrades over Flowers. There are some decent FA starting pitchers next year, but they will need to avoid having to offer a 5-6 year deal.

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2013/02/2015-mlb-free-agents.html

Bottom line, Abreu was a gamble they needed to make, they did so and it worked. Now they will put a team around him to compete from 2015-2017.

The manager: yeah he sucks but so did Ozzie. Getting the players right is far more important.