Dawson and Blyleven both deserve induction.

I also would have voted for Henderson, McGwire, Murphy, Parker, Raines, Trammell and Grace.

Pavano could be this year's Cliff Lee (I'm sure he was throwing garbage a year ago when he had an ERA of 6.29. Who would have thought Ryan Dempster would have had a sub 3.00 ERA as a starter! Kyle Lohse and Todd Wellemeyer to certain degrees also came out of nowhere last year to have very solid seasons. And Pavano's much more talented than those guys and he's shown that he can be a top pitcher in the past; it's just a matter of him regaining his touch. So yeah, I'm upset that we didn't sign him to such a deal.

Pavano last year was topping out in the high-80's and his other pitches were junk. Maybe he was rusty and he'll be better in 2009, certainly possible, but if he signed with Toronto he could have realistically started against NYY, Boston, and Tampa about 10-15 times. He'd get murdered if his stuff is still on par with that I saw last year. I'm not eliminating the possibility that he has a comeback year, strangers things have happened, but he's had exactly one great year in his entire career and nothing since then. That was four seasons ago. Now he's 33 with an assortment of injuries over the last few years.

Smoltz and Penny were good moves for Boston because both guys were great in 2007 and had injury issues in 2008. The chances of them coming back strong are far greater than a guy throwing junk who hasn't been good since 2004.

I don't blame Battersbox for the lack of new posts this offseason, I attribute the lull to the sucktitude of the Toronto Blue Jays offseason.

Worst offseason ever!?

the GM's who take these risks are thinking creatively

One man's creative is another man's desperate.

This offseason has nothing on the one 14 years ago.

Gee, Wildrose, I know Barajas tailed off a bit there toward the end, but I would have thought he was worth more than 6.9 dollars.

Now Brad Wilkerson, on the other hand...

Alex Rios: Cost=$4.8 Value=$24.9 (!), this was his 2nd year in a row over $20 million

One has to wonder about the $4.5M value-per-win assumption. Inglett and his 344 AB are worth almost $10M? Rios is worth more than almost everyone in baseball is currently being paid?

I can't help but think that the sum of all their player values exceeds what was actually paid out in salaries.

I can't help but think that the sum of all their player values exceeds what was actually paid out in salaries.

Chuck your misinterpreting the numbers. This valuation is based on what a player would get on the free agent market per marginal win, obviously nobody pays that rate ( except the Yankees perhaps) as not all players are free agents, and yes Rios is one of the most valuable properties in all of baseball.

Thanks for the clarification Brent.

I'd actually be much more interested in an exercise where the $X that were actually paid out in 2008 salaries got redistributed based on a performance model. That would at least compare apples to apples.

Lots of variables.  I'll have to put something together about this

I don't pretend to understand much about economics and am just thinking back to my Econ 101 days from a hundred years ago. I'd be very interested to hear what someone who isn't talking out of their ass (i.e., me) might have to say on the matter.

I looked at it this way. The owners are paying $X in total salaries. I thought it reasonable to assume that regardless of the financial structure of the game (free market vs. current system where 0-6 players are constrained), they would still pay $X. But because income would now be more evenly distributed, presumably to align with performance (no $30M for ARod and no $400K for H. Ramirez), the low end salaries would go up and the high end salaries would come down.

So two factors, intertwined, would, as I see it, conspire to bring down the marginal cost of a win. High end salaries are lower because income is more uniformly distributed. High end salaries are lower because lack of scarcity in the market has driven prices down. Thus, the continuous influx of talent in the marketplace in a free market system would mean that the marginal cost for a win would come down.

Mine is a simplistic model of a complex economic structure that ignores some truths. Certain marginal wins are, and should be more expensive, i.e., those taking a team from 88 wins, say, to 92 and getting them into the playoffs. There are 30 different franchises with their own, non-uniform cashflows. Not all 30 franchises behave like rational, public enterprises (in fact, not all are even public to begin with).

It just seemed to me that employing a $4.5M marginal win (the putative result of the current income distribution system) to a "what if" free market system seems contradictory. It's like saying it's too bad that the tobacco company, way back when, didn't produce a ton of those Honus Wagner baseball cards given how valuable they've become, ignoring that the cards are valuable specifically because they are scarce.

The Sox are looking beyond scary good. Let's not forget Baldelli, who could be the biggest sleeper of them all.

I'd put them down for 100+ wins. And this isn't the same kind of hype as the Tigers were receiving last year. This is a team that you know is good, and they've done nothing but improve this offseason. SP depth, bullpen depth, and positional depth.

Even with declines from Pedrioa and Youk, it would not be unreasonable to expect gains from Lowell and Ortiz and Ellsbury (or if Ellsbury doesn't stick as CF, Baldelli).

It's also worth noting the textbook shape to Young's aging curve: gradual peak to age 27, explosion at age 28, gradual descent starting at age 29. He's about to embark on his age-32 season. Some players rebound in their 30's. Most don't. Even those just a hair's breadth shy of canonization.

Mick, is this over-the-top Michael Young love not a textbook symptom of what causes a team to be so crummy for so long?

The organization simply refuses to assess him objectively. And why the sentimentality? Why is he the new Puckett/Ripken/Yastrzemski? The team has had exactly one winning season this millennium, which covers his career. It's not even like he's a link to better days.

I just don't get it. Are Texans just more sentimental than the rest of us?

• Wells is entering his age 30 season coming off a 121 OPS+ year (with injuries) lifetime 109 with 3 gold gloves but none for the past 2 years, generally viewed as livable in CF but more suited to RF or LF now.  Wells is owed $117 million for the next 6 years ($8.5 comes off in March).
• Young is entering his age 32 season coming off a 96 OPS+ year (healthy) lifetime 102 with 1 gold glove (last year) but viewed as more suitable to 3B than SS.  He is owed $62 million over 5 years (ESPN) or $80 over 5 with $15 million deferred (Cot's) depending on the source.