Crawford, Ramirez, Gonzalez, Kemp, Ethier, Ellis... If it happens, and they're all healthy, the Dodger offense should be awesome.

Personally, I think the Red Sox should hold onto Gonzalez.

Jim I stand behind your position 1000%. Except AGon has already bounced back.

We could see the A's, White Sox and Dodgers in the playoffs with significant contributions from ex-Sox players, while the Sox win 70 games. I hope Papi tells the Sox to eff off at the end of the year too. All this hoop-jumping from RSN to make AGon look mediocre and the 'prospects' we're getting look good.

What will the front office do when the fans are screaming for the team to spend in the off-season?

They'll be lauding the signings of BJ flipping Upton and Carlos Pena. "Cheaper than Agon and Crawford!!!"

The Sox are getting salary relief. Yippee!!! What are they going to spend the money on? In the next off-season, the pickings are no better than what they are giving up

This is the part that puzzles me. Every team in baseball now practices the John Hart plan of locking up their good young players - from Braun and McCutchen down to Jon Niese and Salvador Perez - the next 3-5 years are just not going to be flush with free agent talent, and as a result it seems likely that the John Lackeys of the world will become even more overpriced. I don't know how they're going to use all this extra payroll room.

We could see the A's, White Sox and Dodgers in the playoffs with significant contributions from ex-Sox players, while the Sox win 70 games

Forgot to include the Rangers in that.

Possible FA targets: Napoli. Pitchers: Shields, Jackson, Sanchez, and Soriano as a closer.

Shields has an option that will undoubtedly be exercised by the Rays.

Shields has an option that will undoubtedly be exercised by the Rays.

I thought the expectation is that it would not be. They have quite a bit of young pitching and he's got a sub-100 ERA+ in two of the last three years. I think it's 50-50 at best that they exercise the option.

It's a $9M option with a $1.5M buyout and he posted a 132 ERA+ over 249 1/3 innings in 2011. I don't think there is any chance they're going to jettison him over $7.5M. At worst they pick up the option and trade him.

I think most of the loss has been taken on Crawford. Man, the Dodgers are going to have a great offense for the next 3 or 4 years.

As a Dodgers fan, I'm thrilled with this. Sure, the payroll may be a mess down the road but: A. aggressive management in a major market with funding from a new TV contract will go a long way in patching holes; and, B. that's down the road.

As for the Red Sox, even before this deal I wondered whether Boston had reached a tipping point of bad ju-ju between the dysfunctional FO/dugout dynamic, the ankle-biting media and the all-up-in-your-business RSN fan base. To an outsider, Boston looks like an unpleasant place to play.

Josh Hamilton, Boston Red Sock?

gold star

your last remark is why any red sox fan who thinks greinke is coming to boston is daft

zack has enough self-awareness to know he would be miserable in boston

I can't see things working out better for Hamilton, either.

August 31, 2011

Red Sox 9, Yankees 5
Red Sox move to 83-52. Yankees fall to 81-53.

Players: (those in bold are now with another organization)

Red Sox
CF Ellsbury
2B Pedroia
1B Gonzalez
DH Ortiz
3B Lowrie
LF Crawford
RF Reddick
C Varitek
SS Scutaro
SP Beckett
RP Bard
RP Papelbon

Yankees
LF Gardner
SS Jeter
CF Granderson
1B Teixeira
2B Cano
RF Swisher
DH Chavez
3B Nunez
C Cervelli
SP Hughes
RP Logan
RP Ayala

Bard may as well be.

I'm telling you: Greinke will re-sign with LAA and Haren will be dealt/sign with the Sox.

Ellsbury and Ortiz are next.

Oddly enough, the Red Sox are now in roughly the same spot as the Cubs. Cherington had a lot more talent to trade away and still has more talent (Ellsbury, Pedroia, Lester) but it's still (a) hooray! we have tons of payroll room with (b) oh, there's nobody to spend it on.

As a Dodgers fan, I'm thrilled with this.

As a Yankee fan, I am too. The Sox got rid of their best or second best player. And payroll flexibility doesn't exactly put the fear of the Sox back in me. Especially when, as noted by you and Harvey, the two best players on the free agent market are unlikely to want to play in Boston.

This is another PR/money deal. It’s not a baseball deal. It’s a continuation of the short-term thinking that put this team in its current position. The fans have wanted free agent splashes, so the Sox gave them Lackey and Crawford. The fans wanted a tough manager in the off-season and the team gave them Valentine. Now the fans are calling for blood and the team is giving it to them. Gonzalez and Crawford will bounce back next year. Beckett’s track record also suggests he will pitch better next year than he has this year. The Sox are getting salary relief. Yippee!!! What are they going to spend the money on? In the next off-season, the pickings are no better than what they are giving up. What will the front office do when the fans are screaming for the team to spend in the off-season?

With all due respect, I think this enterpretation is baloney from top to bottom. I don't think the Sox management has made decisions in the manner you are suggesting and I think it is always possible to acquire talent with money. I love the trade.

think it is always possible to acquire talent with money

Who?

My thought is that the FO has pulled off the greatest con ever. You booed when we lost 14-13 the other night. Well you can't boo now because we have no expectations of winning. I've heard multiple people say "I'm allright with a losing season in 2013 because we're set for 2014 +". Oh the ####. There are no promises.

And all this "Ben inherited a mess." BULLFUCKINGSHIT. You want a mess? Look at the Astros. Ben inherited the exact same team that was 83-52 on August 31st, 2011. Minus Wake and Lackey. He took that team and gutted them for money and shitty relievers. There are plenty of teams that would LOVE to 'inherit' the team he got.

Inherited a mess my ass.

Who?

This sounds like ducking the question (but I don't think it is), but at this point it doesn't matter on the specifics and/or it's impossible to know the specifics. E.G. If you asked the same question of the Dodgers before this season, and someone suggested that it was possible to acquire Hanley and Gonzalez, it would have been scoffed at as near-impossible. In the past couple of seasons, the following teams have used money to acquire mlb-ready talent from outside their system: Yankees, Red Sox, White Sox, Tigers, Rangers, Angels, A's, Nationals, Phillies, Marlins, Brewers, Giants, and Dodgers. Almost all of the rest of the teams were not trying to buy talent because of lack of money or lack of a need.

edit: if you really want specifics, look at a list of the top 50 money-making players - some of them will be available. Then there are the impending free agents, random Asian players, and any Cuban players who leave the island.

The Sox had such an improbable confluence of situations that opened the window to make this trade. The timing of the myriad of changes for the Dodgers presented this opportunity in which the Dodgers were extremely motivated to acquire talent and by now had exhausted all other avenues. Going through the Sox right now was the only way for the Dodgers to get talent that would help them in their playoff push which happens to include a race against their hated rivals. And because going through the Sox was the only way, the Sox were able to get this great deal.

My thought is that the FO has pulled off the greatest con ever. You booed when we lost 14-13 the other night. Well you can't boo now because we have no expectations of winning.

Most of us had the same expectations of winning this year last week as we do now. The Red Sox have not punted 2013 - let's not blast them for doing something that they haven't even done. The only thing they have punted is 2012.

They had to give up Gonzalez to get rid of Crawford. The Crawford contract will be ugly in 3 years. They're out from under it now. They can do better.

They can do better.

Well, that's the crux of it, and the fundamental source of disagreement between the two main schools of thought on this trade here at BBTF, isn't it?

I will remain exceedingly dubious that they CAN do better until the second non-stupid acquisition I see out of this FO in the coming offseason. The only possibility that I've seen anyone suggest in the last 24 hours that I remotely care for is the mention of Haren above.

Until that time, I'm with Dale/Jim/et al, although I don't care what the motivations were to make this serious of bad moves as much as they seem to. The fact of the matter is that the team on the field is much worse today than it was yesterday, and the group of players expected to contribute in 2013 is now much worse than it was yesterday.

EDIT: One caveat - if the next shoe that drops is this trade in reverse, where Cherington robs Seattle of Felix, Wells, the 'underperforming' Smoak, and Furbush for the entire Sox miLB system, I'll change my tune and immediately pay out the bet that Voxter didn't want to make with me last night.

There are so many threads on this topic right now I'm just throwing thoughts around.

Rotation for the rest of 2012 should look something like Matsuzaka/Tazawa/Cook/Matsuzaka again/Doubront/Prior.

EDIT: My dad's suggestion: "Lackey could take a start on the days that he's soft-tossing. No difference from last year."

This deal makes a lot of financial sense for the Dodgers seeing as how Ned Coletti has only 48 hours to spend the $250 million in order to get the $2.5 billion inheritance.

Well, A-Gone is 1-1 HR 3RBI. Not a bad first at bat. LA is going for a ride.

Actually he just struck out in his 2nd AB whiffing on a 94 MPH fastball off the outside corner. So make that 1-2!

27 - Nicely done.

He also nearly botched a rundown after a Kershaw pickoff of Gorkys Hernandez. It's like he's back on the Red Sox again!

Oh retro that was brilliant

Man, headline writers just cannot or will not resist the "dollars and sense" formulation.

The Crawford contract will be ugly in 3 years.

It gets uglier??