Waiting For Beckett To Go

MLBtraderumors and Firebrand of the American League both link to a Peter Gammons piece which speculates about Josh Beckett's future with the Sox:

We’d better enjoy [Josh] Beckett the next three years,” one Boston Red Sox official said, “Because we won’t be able to sign him after his deal is up after 2010.

The theory is that Johan Santana's contract has changed the pitching market to such an extent that the Sox will likely not sign him when he hits his age 31 season.  It seems a bit early to be discussing this, but there you have it. Josh Beckett will be in pinstripes in 2011. He should slot in nicely as a second ace.

Probable New York Yankees 2011 Rotation
Sabathia
Beckett
Chamberlain
Hughes
Kennedy
Wang-Swingman

Comments

[SF]

Seriously, 2011? That's what we're worrying about now? Will Josh Beckett even be healthy in 2011? As much as I care about the future of the Red Sox, their farm system, the current contracts' value and duration, right now the last person I am really all that concerned about is their stud starter who is under contract for three more years, guaranteed, under market. Yeesh.

It really is the doldrums of February in baseball land.

[Lar]

Just like we were suppose to get Santana in 2008..

Still though, after 2008 should in theory be better as we get a few contracts cleared..

[AndrewYF]

You mean a fourth ace, right Nick? ;)

[Hudson]

Wow, for all the flack I've gotten about baiting, this is pretty ridiculously speculative and inflammatory stuff from a front-pager.

(I thought it was humor, but it doesn't seem to have been tagged as such...)

[yankees76]

This is COMPLETELY ridiculous. Although I appreciate Gammons' terrific career and recovery from cancer, it seems like every so often he posts something completely ridiculous that is planted speculatively by the Red Sox FO. The Yankees would have been able to afford Santana after this season, when $44 million of Giambi, Mussina and Pavano come off the books, but didn't want to take the contract on now. Similarly, if the Red Sox really want Beckett in 2011, they will be able to afford the market rate for him, whatever it is then. Look, if someone like Tom Hicks comes along and gives Beckett and A-Rod circa 2000 contract, you can't help that, but to suggest that the Red Sox won't be able to afford Beckett is silly. Who would then??

[Nick-YF]

You got me, Hudson! I was baiting.

[SF]

Seriously, Hudson!? Regardless of the lack of humor tag, this seems like pretty much straightforward humor to me.

[Paul SF]

It's an asinine comment anyway, just because -- apart from the uncertainty over Beckett's own performance -- we have no idea what the market will be like in three years.

Yes, everyone thinks the market will continue to skyrocket -- which is exactly what they thought after the last Wintwer of Excess -- 2000/01. Then what happened? 9/11, a recession, a contraction in the market probably caused partly by the recession and partly by natural corrective forces to unreasonable expansion.

Last I checked, economists aren't too rosy about the state of the economy right now. Is there any guarantee we don't look at Santana's contract in 2010 the same way we looked at A-Rod's and Manny's in 2003 -- as an outlier?

[Nick-YF]

Hudson's just annoyed because I jumped on him for a comment he made a few days ago in the Santana-Mets thread. I called it baiting. It seemed to me to be part of a larger pattern of recent confrontational comments on his part that I thought was pretty uncharacteristic.

In any case, I didn't put a humor tag on this because there is nothing humorous about the future.

[Paul SF]

there is nothing humorous about the future.

Or about delusion. ;-)