Comments on: Red Sox Revisionism: What If the Sox Had Signed Adrian Beltre?

By: matt lawlor

matt lawlor — Sat, 31 Oct 2015 14:33:13 +0000

Yes I feel we should have signed BelTre===and skipped Crawford. We should have stayed with RIZZO, Traded Middlebrooks while he was a hot prospect. With A Gon $$ went for a good SP. Good Luk Dave !

By: Ben Carsley

Ben Carsley — Fri, 23 Oct 2015 13:04:21 +0000

I guess we’re getting a little pedantic here, but other than Ellsbury, Betts and *maybe* Josh Reddick who’s an OF the Sox have produced in the last decade who’s as exciting as JBJ?

By: S84

S84 — Fri, 23 Oct 2015 08:54:32 +0000

I agree that letting Beltre walk was the wrong call, but can we avoid sensationalism like “Bradley is one of the most exciting outfielders the team has produced in recent memory” and Oh yeah, and, barring a miracle, Boston still has four more years of Sandoval.”? Bradley’s age at level dampen his ceiling probability (see WMB), year to year variance suggests Panda should rebound, and Swihart was only behind Vazquez because of development path. Swihart is likely the much better player long term.

By: Ben Carsley

Ben Carsley — Thu, 22 Oct 2015 18:00:10 +0000

I think it’s worth bringing up that Beltre prefers the West Coast, sure, but there’s absolutely no way to know if more money from the Sox would’ve or wouldn’t have swayed him; it’s not like Texas is *that* close to LA/Seattle.

The premise of the article stands — the Red Sox at least had a chance to sign Beltre, and they clearly didn’t try.

By: Sam Johnson

Sam Johnson — Thu, 22 Oct 2015 15:08:14 +0000

Who knows? I am certain that the team would be very different, though. If they’d kept Beltre, there’s probably no A-Gon trade, and Youk stays at first base. We’re not as quite as good in 2011, so we don’t blow as big of a lead down the stretch, and Tito probably keeps his job, sparing us from Bobby V. On the other hand, we’re still stuck with Carl Crawford, since there’s no incentive for the Dodgers to take him with no A-Gon on the team.

WMB probably gets used as a trading chip before he makes it to Boston (maybe even along with Casey Kelly in a deal for some other star), with Rizzo arriving in Boston sometime in ’12 when Youk starts breaking down.

By: TGC

TGC — Thu, 22 Oct 2015 06:22:48 +0000

Good piece, I like these kinds of articles.
I know this wasn’t the exactly the focus, but the other side of the coin to keeping Beltre is no Gonzalez. This has its own good and bad implications- no dumping Crawford and Beckett on LA, but maybe Anthony Rizzo emerges for us, etc.

By: SJGMoney

SJGMoney — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 18:44:08 +0000

Interesting discussion, but I think Walt hits the nail on the head regarding Beltre’s desire and/or Boston’s desire to pay him to stay. the one year deal was a great “prove yourself” deal and he did.

Unfortuantely I also think you exagerate Bradley’s hitting ability. He has NOT been inconsistant at all, he has been very consistantly a poor hitter at the ML level. The slight abberation came during the month of August/first week of Sept this year, more specifically durng two small stretches, one from 8/9-8/15 where he went 13 for 22, and from 8/28-9/7 where he went 17-35. Other than those two stretches he was his usual wet-salami batting self. Even with that hot stretch in early September his numbers for the full month were his normal .222/.311/.456, much closer to his career .213/.290/.638.. He simply had a hot August, no more, no less.

The one thing he DID show throughout his late season call up however was surprising (read as suspicious) power numbers. The all-of-a-sudden opposite field power had never been scene before and stinks to high heaven. If he fails a drug test who here would be shocked, raise your hand? The late season reversion to the mean had to have Dombrowski pulling his hair out. He could have sold Bradley at a nice price on his August numbers, but after September, not so much. Too bad a slight hamstring pull couldn’t have occurred on say, Sept 9th. Hey, maybe I’m being too tough on the kid, maybe he just got tired. Or maybe he needed another cycle.

By: Walt in Maryland

Walt in Maryland — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 15:20:08 +0000

Your article presumes the Red Sox could have kept Beltre if they were willing to pay. Not the way I remember it. Beltre’s “middling statistics” in Seattle were better than you represent. It was a terrible hitting environment for RH power hitters, he had some injuries, and his numbers away from Safeco were actually quite good.

But those numbers depressed his free agent value, so he agreed to sign a “pillow” contract with Boston. A very smart move, as Beltre got to spend one year in a great hitting environment, put up big numbers, and go back on the market.

There was much written at the time about Beltre wanting to play on the West Coast. His family lives there, and the Angels were seen as the favorite to sign him. He went to the Rangers instead.

Boston would have had to pay significantly more than Texas gave Beltre to have a shot at signing him. It was never likely to happen, and it became impossible after his big year at Fenway.