The Winter Meetings bring many transactions
1. Cubs sign Jon Lester
After being traded by the Red Sox to the Athletics at the trading deadline, the A's failed to make a deep playoff run. Lester hit the open market at the season, and many knew that he would not be returning to Oakland for another year. Lester had many suitors, including the Red Sox, Dodgers, Giants and Cubs. It came down to the wire and at the beginning of this week, he announced that he would make his decision by Wednesday.
The Cubs offered a big deal. The Red Sox offered him a return to his first major league ball club. The Dodgers offered him flashing lights and a chance to win. The reigning champion Giants offered him a chance to join their team that has won 3 championships in the past 6 years. When it came down to it, Lester narrowed his choices down to the Cubs and the Red Sox. Lester ultimately chose to join the Cubs. His new deal is for 6 years and $155 million.
The Dodgers were busy this week, signing SP Brandon McCarthy, trading for 2B Howie Kendrick, SS Jimmy Rollins, C Yasmani Grandal, SP Joe Weiland, and a few prospects, and trading away 2B/SS Dee Gordon, SP Dan Haren, OF Matt Kemp, and a couple of prospects. Los Angeles started this crazy week by signing McCarthy to a 4 year/$48 million contract. They then traded All-Star Dee Gordon, former All-Star Dan Haren, and prospect Miguel Rojas to the Marlins for four top prospects. The Los Angeles team from the NL then traded one of the top prospects received from the Marlins, SP Andrew Heaney, to the Los Angeles team from the AL for 2B Howie Kendrick. They then traded a lot of salary in Matt Kemp when they sent him with C Tim Federowicz to the division rival San Diego Padres for C Yasmani Grandal, high potential SP Joe Weiland, and prospect Zach Eiflin. The final move the Dodgers made was trading for the veteran SS Jimmy Rollins. The details of the trade have not yet been revealed.
These moves provide the Dodgers with a great mix of talent including young players and valuable veterans. Players they already have like all-stars Clayton Kershaw, Adrian Gonzalez, Zach Greinke, and Yasiel Puig only add to this phenomenal bunch. They put the reigning NL West division champions in a good place to defend their title.
After adding two All-Star bats in Pablo Sandoval and Hanley Ramirez, the Red Sox looked like a contending team. They looked like this until you realized who their rotation consisted of. They had many prospects and young pitchers nearly ready to play, but after adding these big bats, they wanted to win now. Clay Buchholz is a former Cy Young contender, going 12-1 with a 1.74 ERA in 2013 before getting hurt. He can make the rotation. Joe Kelly is a groundball pitcher acquired at the trading deadline for John Lackey, who posted 10 wins his first year starting in 2013. He can start if needed. Besides the fact that the Sox obviously needed a stud #1 pitcher, they also needed to fill out 2 or 3 pitching spots for the 2-5 places in the rotation to go along with Buchholz. The Sox got these pieces in Wade Miley, Rick Porcello, and Justin Masterson.
Miley was acquired via trade from the Arizona Diamondbacks for Rubby De La Rosa, Allen Webster, and an unnamed prospect. Porcello was also acquired through trade for power hitter Yoenis Cespedes, RP Alex Wilson, anda low-level prospect. Justin Masterson was signed to a one year deal worth $9.5 million plus up to $2.5 million more in incentives for amount of innings pitched. This ensures many innings for him.
Wade Miley was a 2012 All-Star who can put up 200 innings in a year. Rick Porcello is an above-average pitcher who had a 3.43 ERA last year and can also pitch 200 innings in a year. Justin Masterson is a former Red Sox top prospect traded in 2009 who was an All-Star in 2013. Masterson can throw 200 innings as well. If you haven't already done the math, 200 innings x 3 is 600 innings. The biggest problem with the Red Sox rotations as of late has been consistency. Guys like Clay Buchholz, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Josh Beckett, etc can't throw 200 innings. With the 3 newly acquired guys, the Red Sox have 3 reliable pitchers they can depend on for almost the whole season. Also, the best part is that the 3 pitchers have a combined salary of about $13 million. If they had signed the sought after superstar Jon Lester, they would have payed roughly $25 million a year for 200 innings. The Sox put together a great rotation in a matter of about a day.
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