RedSoxNotes: 12/03/2006

Worst outfield arms?

Keith Woolner at Baseball Prospectus just came out with a short piece on the worst outfield arms in baseball. Interesting idea, but his methodology leaves a little to be desired. Woolner compares which outfields did the best at keeping runners from scoring from second on a single. He compares teams' success compared to the league average, which allows runners to score 60% of the time.

The good news? The Red Sox don't make the list. The bad news? The numbers aren't park-adjusted, so Fenway's short left field may be skewing things in our favor.

Here's the worst:


Team  Players                      R   RS   %  Diff
TBA   Crawford-Baldelli-Hollins    32  26 .813 -6.8
SFN   Bonds-Finley-Winn            49  36 .735 -6.6
NYA   Cabrera-Damon-Williams       35  26 .743 -5.0
WAS   Soriano-Byrd-Guillen         44  31 .705 -4.6
PIT   Bay-Bautista-Wilson          31  23 .742 -4.4
LAN   Ethier-Lofton-Drew           46  32 .696 -4.4
TBA   Crawford-Gathright-Hollins   40  27 .675 -3.0
SLN   Taguchi-Edmonds-Encarnacion  49  32 .653 -2.6
SFN   Bonds-Winn-Alou              38  25 .658 -2.2

Here's the best:


Team  Players                      R   RS   %  Diff
TOR   Johnson-Wells-Rios           71  29 .408 13.6
DET   Monroe-Granderson-Ordonez    86  41 .477 10.6
TOR   Catalanotto-Wells-Rios       42  18 .429  7.2
OAK   Payton-Kotsay-Bradley        48  22 .458  6.8
SEA   Ibanez-Reed-Ichiro           65  33 .508  6.0
CIN   Dunn-Griffey-Kearns          61  31 .508  5.6
KCA   Brown-DeJesus-Sanders        46  22 .478  5.6
ANA   Rivera-Figgins-Guerrero      52  26 .500  5.2
ATL   Langerhans-Jones-Francoeur   110 61 .555  5.0

Break from the hot stove

Taking a breather from all the rumors and new player discussions, here is some random baseball stuff that's pretty interesting:

Sox infielder Alex Cora had the longest plate appearance that ended in a walk last season. On April 27th, he took a free pass from Cleveland's Paul Byrd after 15 pitches.

There were three plate appearances that lasted 16 pitches last year. All involved the Astros. On July 27th, the Reds' Elizardo Ramirez struck out Astro Craig Biggio. On the game between Houston and the Cubs on June 15th, Fernando Nieve got Ronny Cedeno to fly out. And finally, Mike Lamb flied out against the Rangers pitcher Vicente Padilla on June 30th.

Here is a list of the top pitchers last year in 3 pitch strikeouts:

Johan Santana 56
John Lackey 49
John Smoltz 46
C.C. Sabathia 45
Aaron Harang 42

Here are the batters who have the most plate appearances without swinging the bat:

Jason Giambi 71
Brian Giles 71
Bobby Abreu 70
Nick Johnson 61
Kevin Youkilis 59

More on Drew and Lugo

Here are links to defensive charts for Julio Lugo and J.D. Drew.

A note:

Fenway Park has been kind to Lugo over the years. He has a career line of .330/.384/.496 in 127 plate appearances in Boston. On a go forward basis, one could even argue that Lugo could benefit a tad by facing Tampa Bay's pitching rather than Boston's. He certainly knows the AL East well and has, in fact, hit .286/.358/.431 vs. the Yankees, Blue Jays, and Orioles throughout his career.

Gerald Green for closer?

With the signings of J.D. Drew and Julio Lugo, the Sox need only sign Dice-K, find a closer and a back-up catcher. We'll get to all of those in posts today, and as I've made my choice for closer (hint - he leads the NBA in 3-point shooting) we'll take Daisuke Matsuzaka first.

The Sox have a week until their signing window closes, and I think it's only a matter of time.

On the conspiracy theory front: Scott Boras recalled Major League Baseball’s recent reminder that side deals between ballclubs like the Red Sox and Seibu is not a good thing and that “the integrity of the posting would be flawed” if it were allowed.

Although Boston is not allowed to work out a side deal with the Seibu Lions, Boras told Michael Silverman of the Boston Herald, "no rules exist that would prohibit Seibu from paying money to Matsuzaka to help him come to a decision where he would sign with the Red Sox and the Lions collect their $51.1 million." If that is the case, then this deal should get finalized rather easily.

Here is how it gets done:
Boston puts up $10 million per year for five years.
Seibu kicks back $3M per year to Matsuzaka.
Matsuzaka earns $13M per year from 2007-2011.
The total outlay for the Red Sox ends up being just over $100M or approximately $20M per season.
Seibu nets $36M.
Oh, and Boras earns a tidy $4M commission.
Everybody walks away happy.

Julio Lugo Analysis - Defense

So the last post was obvious - Julio Lugo is an offensive upgrade over Alex Gonzalez. No shit - Bryon Bratt is an offensive upgrade over Alex Gonzalez.

The conventional wisdom defensively seems to be that Lugo is a significant step down defensively. Many of the articles I've read take the position that Lugo is just as quick and covers as much ground, but his "hands" aren't as good so he makes more errors.

Let's take a quick trip down inane stat lane and see how Lugo compares to Gonzalez over their careers in Fielding Percentage, Zone Rating and Range Factor. (click on the link for an explanation of the stat).

Player     FPCT    ZR    RF
Lugo       0.965   0.848 4.690
Gonzalez   0.970   0.843 4.510

From those numbers, it looks like Lugo actually covers slightly more ground, and the gap in their fielding percentages is negligible. Here are their stats using the Probabilistic Model of Range:


Player          ActOut  PredOut  DER    PredDER  Difference
Julio Lugo      253     241.59   0.120  0.115    0.00542
Alex Gonzalez   350     347.62   0.117  0.116    0.00080

Lugo is the better player under this metric, 6th in the majors vs. 17th for Gonzalez.
None of these metrics measure ability to turn the double play, however. That's a tough one to measure in numbers, since the second-baseman has a lot to do with that.

Julio Lugo Analysis - Offense

Julio Lugo hits for a career .277/.340/.402. Last year, he hit .303/.373/.498 before being asked to man the entire diamond for the Dodgers in limited time, where he hit .219/.278/.267. In 2005, he hit .295/.362/.403.

In the last three years, he has shown a propensity for doubles - 41 in 2004, 36 in 2005, and had 17 in 73 games for the Devil Rays in 2006. The number is low because in 73 games, he hammered 12 home-runs as opposed to six in 158 games in 2005.

He will get himself on base at an above average rate, so I like that - even if he's not a stud in that department.

Looking at his overall production, his EqA is .270: good for 15th among all shortstops. Alex Gonzalez checks in with a well below average .245.

Lugo's Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) is 31.3 - good enough for 5th among shortstops. Alex Gonzalez barely registers with 3.2.

"He is very contagious," Devil Rays manager Joe Maddon said. "In the dugout prior to the game, this guy is the kind of guy that runs up and down the dugout, slaps everybody, high-five, has a special handshake for everybody, plays with enthusiasm always. "He's very contagious. He's a leader. He's a leader in the sense that he sets a good example. [The Devil Rays] just missed his presence on a daily basis."

Next up: Lugo's defense.

Manny to be traded today?

ESPN Deportes is reporting (I think) that Manny will be traded today to either the Dodgers or the Mariners. I read the article through an internet translator, so the translation not the best.

The article quotes "a source of whole credit to ESPNdeportes.com," as saying that the Dodgers offered Brad Penney and 2 prospects "whereas the Sailors have offered to Adrian Beltré and Richie Sexson, but Boston insists on including to one of two throwers, between lock J.J. Putz and the preinn Rafael Soriano."

The article says that both teams have agreed to pick up one of Manny's 2 option years.

J.D. Drew in quotes

Here is what some members of the Dodgers organization have to say about J.D. Drew:
Former teammate Bill Mueller:

"I tell you what, he's a great player, a great individual, and a character guy. Any left-handed bat like his, the way he uses the whole field, he could have great success there. Unfortunately for us, he went somewhere else, which is his option. The market is great and he took advantage of it.

"Boston is such a great, great, great place to play. It's hard for me to say don't go to Boston because I think everybody should be able to experience playing in Boston. It's the Mecca of the game."

"You definitely have to have a certain mentality going in. The way J.D. is, he goes about business the way I do. Usually when people have that kind of personality, they do fine because they go out there and play their hearts out."

Dodgers Manager Grady Little on whether Drew can play in Boston:

"Of course he can," said the former Red Sox manager, who had Drew in Los Angeles last season. "He's an outstanding ballplayer. He can play anywhere."

"We were surprised [that he moved on]," said Little. "We thought J.D. was going to be our right fielder for a long time. We enjoyed having him on the team. We liked his game. He played hard for us."

Dave Jauss, Drew's outfield coach in Los Angeles who spent many years in the Red Sox organization:

"I expect him to be a really good player in Boston," said Jauss. "The game is the same between the white lines. J.D. is a fine athlete. He'll do so much good in the community, as he did in Los Angeles, that you can't help but like him."

"He's an excellent outfielder. He's got very good speed. He can score from first on a double and definitely score from second on a single. The fact he doesn't pull the ball is going to make him an effective hitter at Fenway. Not so much for the wall but for the fact on those cold days there, he's going to be able to go the other way and contribute as a hitter."

Sox GM Theo Epstein said that the Sox were convinced Drew would be a solid hitter at Fenway:

"He really has a great swing for Fenway Park," Epstein said. "When he pulls the ball and elevates the ball, it will certainly reach the bullpen. He's got plus raw power. The big dimensions in right field and even center field won't be a problem for him. If you look at his hit chart, those balls get out."

The Sox were also attracted, as Epstein would put it, by the thought of putting a center fielder in right field. Drew's agent, Scott Boras, said Drew has agreed to play either position.

Boras: "You look at what J.D. has done in these last three years. Other than getting hit on the wrist by a ball, this guy has put up numbers. He's an above-average defender. He's a guy that can steal 20-30 bases. He has a very fine throwing arm. He has 25-30 home run power.

"And in Fenway, with the ability for him to go to left field, because he has the ability to spray the ball around, I think it's really going to increase his average and put him in a position playerwise where he has a chance to be a very potent offensive threat."

Should Sox get Gagne?

Patrick Fitzpatrick asks:

As many of the rumors involving Manny and the Sox have centered around the acquisition of a closer, it will be interesting to see how the Sox approach Eric Gagne.

Originally it was reported that Gagne would work out for teams in about a month, giving teams the opportunity to see for themselves that Gagne’s health is no longer of concern. However, the latest rumblings have Boras seeking a new home for the former lights-out Cy-Young award winner by the end of the week. If this is true, and if the Sox are indeed going to be a major player in the Gagne sweepstakes, what implications (if any) will this have on trade talks involving Ramirez? At first glance it would be unrealistic to think that any team would sign Gagne with expectations that Gagne would come into spring training as the team’s closer.

Thus if the Sox were to sign Gagne, it would be in their best interest to have a good backup plan. However, it is equally as unrealistic to think that Boras isn’t going to squeeze every last penny from the team that signs him. With players such as Vincent Padilla locking down $34 million dollar contracts, one can only speculate how much Gagne will command in the surging market that is the 2006 off-season.

This raises two important questions: (1) how strongly should the Sox pursue Gagne, and (2) if they are successful, what affect would this have on the team’s demands for Manny?

Ideally, the Sox should try to sign Gagne to an incentive-based contract that would allow Gagne to collect the money that he seeks if he is healthy, and protect the Sox if he is not. But, and this is a major but, what are the chances that Boras would accept such a deal? While Gagne’s 2006 salary was $10 million, that figure was based on Gagne’s performance before any health concerns. Is Gagne’s upside worth the risk that he could be collecting a King’s ransom from the DL?

J.D. Drew - Defense

Obviously I haven't seen him play a lot, so I can't comment from personal observation.
Here's how Drew compares to other MLB rightfielders in the various statistical metrics:

Fielding Percentage (putouts + assists / chances): .983 (6^th)
Range Factor (putouts + assists / innings played at the position): 2.91 (3^rd)
Zone Rating (balls fielded/total balls hit into his “zone”): .891 (5^th)
Probabilistic Model of Range (difference between actual outs and predicted outs): 10^th

^{Oh, and he's a solid baserunner.}

J.D. Drew - Analysis

This will be the first in a series of posts looking into what we can expect from the two newest Red Sox: J.D. Drew and Julio Lugo.

To kick things off, I like the Drew signing a lot. I know a lot of you disagree with me on this, so fire away. I'm going to start the analysis with a look at him from a purely statistical viewpoint, and then move on to what people around baseball who have seen him play a lot have to say.

Obviously the first selling point here is his ability to get on base.

In that most crucial of offensive skills (not getting out), Drew was 4^th among all outfielders last year with a .393 OBP. That's his career number, too, ut he has gone over 400 recently.

Drew is one of the best players in history at avoiding the double play. In 960 games, Drew has grounded into only 41 DP's.

He has a good amount of pop in the bat as well:

Drew's .891 OPS was 13^th, and he was 11^th in secondary average (.293), a stat that attempts to measure the value of a player's offensive production, exclusive of singles. It's basically SLG minus AVG.

Looking deeper into the sabertrics with a couple stats that try to measure total offensive production, Drew is 5^th in Equivalent Average (.300) and 9^th in Runs Created per 27 outs (7.33).

Drew deal confirmed

J.D. Drew's agent Scott Boras has confirmed a 5 year, $70 million deal:
"He's going to be a contributor. They had two big sluggers, righty-lefty, Ortiz and Ramirez," Boras told the Associated Press. "J.D. has a great on-base percentage. He gives you a quality at-bat. He's an RBI guy. And he's really going to add a defensive component to that team that is, I think, really going to enhance their play, what they do both with arm strength and his ability to cover ground in the outfield. And his baserunning -- he can run a little bit. He is going to steal 20 or 30 bases. He's going to bring a dimension there.

Pettitte back to the Bronx?

The latest rumor out of the meetings has Andy Pettitte reconsidering retirement for a return to the Bronx. SI's Tom Verducci is reporting that the free-agent lefty is "the club's No. 1 option."

The free-agent left-hander, who is strongly considering retirement, is said to be intrigued with the idea of returning to pinstripes and "could possibly have a deal by the end of the week" with New York, according to a baseball source familiar with the negotiations.

The Yankees are willing to wait as long as necessary for Pettitte, whose original timetable was to defer a decision on 2007 until later this month.

How do his numbers stack up against other free agent starters? Here are Pettitte's numbers over the last 2 years compared with Barry Zito and Jason Schmidt:

Pitcher	W-L	ERA	IP	K/9	K/BB
Pettitte	31-22	3.28	436.2	7.19	3.14
Zito	30-23	3.78	449.1	6.45	1.71
Schmidt	23-16	3.95	385.1	8.02	2.09

Mariners offer Putz

The Seattle Mariners are rumored to be in discussions with the Sox for Manny as well. There are a couple scenarios here:
In the first, the Sox trade straight-up with the M's for reliever J.J. Putz and (depending on who's doing the rumormongering) either Richie Sexson or centerfield prospect Adam Jones.
The other rumor is a three-team deal involving the Giants with Putz and Jones to Boston, Sexson to San Francisco and Manny and Noah Lowry to Seattle.
Either way, you can cross one hole off Theo's to-do list: a closer. Putz is a stud. He is 29 years old and threw 78.1 innings last year, saving 36 games with a 0.92 WHIP and 2.30 ERA. Some deeper numbers:
11.95 K/9, 0.46 HR/9, 8.09K/BB.
The Nationals have apparently made late efforts to jump in on this trade, proposing a three-way with the Giants that would have Chad Cordero and Felipe Lopez coming to Boston and Lowry, Jonathan Sanchez and Brian Wilson going to Washington.
Cordero is a 24-year-old closer who had 29 saves last season with a 3.19 ERA and a 1.10 WHIP.
Looking at the peripherals, he had 8.47 K/9, 1.60 HR/9 and 3.13 K/BB with 3.31RA.
Lopez is a 22-year-old shortstop who hit .281 / .362 / .365. Don't be fooled by the .365 SLG, he has shown some pop in the past and projects to hit quite a few homers for a shortstop. He's also a speed demon.

Carpenter extended - Why?

The Cardinals just signed Chris Carpenter to a contract extension, reaching agreement on a deal that will pay him $65 mil through 2011, with a club option for 2012 worth $12 mil. Initially sounds like a good idea - $13 mil per season for arguably the top starting pitcher in the NL.

Upon further review, what were they thinking? They already had him under contract for this season at $7 mil and next season for $8 mil. So basically this deal amounts to adding three years to the deal for an additional $50 million, or just shy of $17 mil per year. Carpenter is nasty, but they have him under control already for his age 32 and 33 seasons. Why give him an extension that will pay him 17 mil for his 34-36 seasons before you see if he stays healthy at least through this season?

Giants - repeat performance?

Baseball Prospectus reports that the Giants signed Rich Aurilia to a two year deal, on the heels of signing Ray Durham. There was also a notion going around late last night that the Giants were about to sign Bengie Molina to a three-year deal, creating the beautiful idea that Mike Matheny could credibly be used as a pinch-runner in 2007.

As Joe Sheehan points out: the Giants are painting themselves into a corner.

Every time they spend money on a player in his thirties, a player with more past than future, they make it that much more critical that they sign Barry Bonds for 2007 to complete the roster and give them that chance at winning the other moves reflect a desire for.

If they don't sign Bonds, it's 2005 all over again, an aging team with an average pitching staff that won't score anywhere near enough runs to compete.

Sox reject Dodgers offer

Will Carroll is reporting that the Dodgers' offer of Jonathan Broxton and Andy LaRoch e was rejected by the Sox today. The Sox had been seeking a package of 3 of the Dodgers' top prospects. Looking at the numbers, any package would have to include Broxton. He's 22 and shows a ton of promise.
LaRoche is a young third base prospect that the team has been interested in for a while.
The Sox are also said to be seeking outfielder Matt Kemp, first baseman James Loney, and infielder Willy Aybar.
Kemp is 21 and a nice prospect who projects to be a big masher. He played 52 games in the majors last year and hit 7 homers with a .448 SLG.
Loney also projects to have some pop in the bat. He hit .284 / .342 / .559 in 48 games last season in his first big league time.
Aybar is a plus defender in the infield who doesn't have a great deal of pop in the bat yet but is already getting on base at a stellar rate: .313 / .373 / .391.

Get the Foulke out of town? Not so fast...

The back and forth on whether Keith Foulke is coming back to the team continues to take some interesting turns. Before we get into the ins and outs of that, lets take a quick peek at why we would even want him. Here are Foulke's numbers from after the All-Star break:
2.04 ERA, 6.6 K/9, 4.33 K/BB, 1.13 WHIP - pretty tasty.
If you recall, the team had a $7.5 mil option on Foulke for 2007 which they paid a $1.5 mil buyout when they (understandably) declined to exercise. That left Foulke with a $3.75 mil player option which he turned down.
Earlier this week, the team offered arbitration to the former closer. We went over the compensation rules earlier, but here is some more info on how arbitration works:
Both the player and the team submit an amount, and the arbitrator has to pick one or the other bid - nothing in the middle. Under the previous collective bargaining agreement, a team could not submit a bid that amounted a pay cut of any more than 20%. That clause has been removed from the new collective bargaining agreement, meaning that if Foulke accepts arbitration, they could potentially offer a price as low as the minimum.
Michael Silverman at the Herald reports that the Sox do not exptect Foulke to accept arbitration, but that his agent, Danny Horwits, said he was more enthusiastic about coming back after having positive conversations with the front office, team doctors, and his teammates.
Foulke is a type-B free agent, and the Sox would get a draft pick if he were to sign elsewhere.

Everyone waiting on Manny

The entire baseball universe is revolving around Manny Ramirez. According to Nick Cafardo, the lovable slugger has dominated conversation at baseball's winter meetings, with teams waiting to see if a Manny blockbuster comes down before making other deals.
With that in mind, we'll do a special Manny day here at Notes, breaking down each potential trading partner and the pieces that would likely change hands in separate posts. Stay tuned as the day goes on.
Sox GM Theo Epstein, with the team in dire need of a closer, middle relief help and a shortstop, said yesterday that the Sox would actively seek to trade Manny only until Wednesday at midight, at which time they would turn their attention to addressing the teams other needs.
"I think at some point, if we realistically get past Wednesday, we're not going to take up more of the team's time and energy," he said. "We'll certainly be listeners. At some point, you can't let it get in the way of other things you're trying to do. There's also the free agent market and pitching to deal with."
Theo did say however that convincing teams to take on Manny's salary has not been the sticking point this season.
"In this market, teams aren't backing off from taking salaries," he said. "Trading for large salaries hasn't seemed to be an issue."
Obviously the team will be willing to trade Manny going forward. Anyone with any experience in negotiating understands that deals tend to get done at the deadline. By creating an artificial deadline for trading Manny, Theo may be able to push some of these competing teams to sweeten the pot.

Lester back this year?

The Globe, Herald, and ESPN are all reporting that Jon Lester's cancer is in remission and he expects to be with the team in spring training this season.
According to Gordon Edes and Nick Cafardo:

A source with direct knowledge of Jon Lester's medical condition said yesterday that Lester's latest CT scan was clean and his cancer seems to be in remission.

Lester was diagnosed in late August with a rare form of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a blood cancer, and began treatment in September. The condition was identified as anaplastic large cell lymphoma, a rare cancer accounting for 1-2 percent of all lymphomas. The cause is unknown.

Dr. Robert Soiffer, chief of the division of blood cancers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, indicated at the time of Lester's diagnosis that the cancer was responsive to chemotherapy, and predicted that if it did help, Lester would be able to return to pitching after his treatment was finished. Lester began treatment in Boston but returned home to continue at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle. He has one more course of chemotherapy to undergo, the source said.

Broxton from LA?

Ken Rosenthal is reporting that the Sox and Dodgers met at midnight last night to discuss a possible Manny trade. Rosenthal says that the Red Sox almost certainly would want right-hander Jonathan Broxton, a future closer, in a Ramirez package. Broxton is a very exciting possibility, even though he may not be on many Sox fans' radar. The guy is 22-years-old, and had a nasty second season in the majors last year with a 2.59 ERA in 73 relief innings. In addition to his low ERA, his peripheral stats also portend future success: 11.44 K/9, almost 3 strikeouts per walk, and he held opponents to a .216 avg/.300obp/ .348 slg.

Rosenthal also reports a package of Brad Penny (ERA over 6 after the all-star break last year), third baseman Andy LaRoche and first baseman James Loney might entice the Red Sox. Penny, 28, is signed for $7.5 million next season and $8.5 million in 2008, with an $8.75 million club option for '09.

The Dodgers, however, might not want to part with top prospects if they're required to take on Ramirez's $20 million club options in both 2009 and '10, which would be the likely price for persuading him to waive his no-trade clause.

Winter Meetings Preview

With baseball's winter meetings beginning today, very few GMs have more on their plate than Theo Epstein. Here are some tidbits from the latest post by Peter Gammons:

Look, the Red Sox don't even know if Manny Ramirez will be or can be traded at the winter meetings, so no one does.
They don't know if they can get the Dodgers and Angels in a marketing war and end up with something close to what they want. They don't know if the Mariners would trade rookie center fielder Adam Jones and pitching.

It would shock no one if, after weeks of bartering, the Red Sox got a deal with a team like the Dodgers and Manny exercised his 10/5 rights or held up the deal, pressuring Genske to get 2009 and 2010 guaranteed at the $20 million per year, per the contract option.

The club has told Genske in no uncertain terms that if they accede to his trade request and the deal gets held up, Ramirez will have to sit in Boston for the remainder of the deal.

The sense around the Red Sox is that while they may reach for the antacid they aren't going to roll over if Ramirez comes back; if Julio Lugo were to sign (for less than the Cubs' or Mets' offers so he could play short and be with his old friend David Ortiz), then the Lugo/Coco Crisp/Ortiz/Ramirez/J.D. Drew front five would be extremely powerful.

It is assumed that Epstein will complete the Drew deal (my analogy is that J.D. Drew equals Fred Lynn), try to sign Lugo and find a closer. Would Seattle deal J.J. Putz for Manny? Dubious. Scott Boras would like to get Eric Gagne to Boston; problem is, are the medicals real or off the set of General Hospital? Joe Borowski has been calling now that his medicals were declined in Philly.

Jonathan Papelbon's recent MRI was precisely the same as the one he took when he first signed out of Mississippi State, so they are very encouraged by his progress and convinced he will be a 200-innings horse.

The Giants offered Carlos Lee $113M, and they are trying to get into the Ramirez thing … anything to not take Barry Bonds back. Boston has no interest in Bonds.

The Padres have dabbled in the Ramirez talks but don't think they have enough without trading Peavy, which is not going to happen. Boston does not think Scott Linebrink is a closer, and the one available starter in that kind of deal would be Clay Hensley. "That," says one GM, "isn't going to get it done."

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