Victor Martinez: 'I would want to stay' in Boston

I now declare that “position players” includes pitchers. My comment is get 2 GREAT AND YOUNGISH (under 40) AND RELIABLE starting pitchers.

after this year, it’s time for Tek to go out to pasture

I think we’ve solved that every-5th-day black hole. I could see Victor being a very productive 1B/DH for us in future years too, when Papi is gone.

Extend V-Mart for 3 years past his option, maybe. Weigh the benefits of Bay vs. Holiday and pick up one.

I personally would elect to pass on the SP free agency market this year. There’s gonna be a lot of guys with inflated demands due to having one really good season (Wolf, Piniero, et al) and a lot of oft-injured guys (Bedard, Harden, Duchscherer, Sheets), and not much in the way of proven AL-worthy talent. I say sign Mark Prior to a minor league deal because the worst that could happen is he never sees a major league game.

If we do acquire a pitcher, I’d say it should maybe be in a trade involving Daisuke depending on how the issues between him and the organization work out.

But VMart is looking like an awful catcher. In the last several games, I’ve counted three times where he made a throw to second to try to catch a runner. Three times the ball SAILED OVER PEDROIA’S GLOVE and INTO CENTER FIELD. At least once an average throw would have caught the runner. As it happens, his misthrows allowed two of the runners to advance a base. While Tek is also an atrocious thrower, he rarely lets it fly into CF.

Martinez is at best a stop-gap. Unless Theo wants to concede defense at the C position, he needs to bring in someone who is a legit catcher, not someone who plays one on TV.

We should pick up VMart’s option and back him up with someone with defensive skills. Tek should be released or traded (i.e. pick up his team option, and then give some money to an NL team to take him), he has no role on this team any more. Anything Tek does, VMart does better, including play terrible defense. Then we make a move for a good catching prospect or the FO plays one of our minor league catchers.

Harden is pretty awesome, and we have the depth to sustain us if he goes down. I’d pass on the other pitchers USG mentioned.

In re: J-Bay v. Holliday, ideally the pick is Holliday. He plays better defense while swinging a comparable bat to Bay. In practice, the pick is whichever of these guys the Yankees don’t sign. If the Yankees are smart, they sign Holliday.

The Sox also need to think seriously about SS. Lowrie is looking a lot more like Kerry Wood than a SS-playing Dustin Pedroia (which is what he was billed as). Maybe he’ll recover, but this season has been setback after setback. Even if he does return, how good will he really be after playing surgical test dummy for the past year. So unless Nick Green / Jed Lowrie is the future, Theo should look into getting a new shortstop.

but I’d like them both to return.

I am really liking what I’m seeing from VicMar so far (his Mr. No-Depth-Perception impersonation when it comes to throwing out base stealers notwithstanding…and people say that a walk becomes a double when ‘Tek is behind the plate…walk becomes a triple??). And I was one of the ones who jumped on board with the whole "don’t trade for V-Mart" thing that was goin’ on around here. I also think he is having a very positive effect on Ortiz…he seems to loosen him up a great deal, which is a good thing. He’s only been around a few weeks, though, so I’m not ready to sign off on him yet. I’m liking him…but I’d have to give him til the end of the season before I say with 100% certainty to wrap him up.

Bay? Bay was fantastic when he first came over in the Great Manny Fiasco of 2008 and in the first part of this year…but since then hasn’t been phenomenal. As such, I’m definitely not will to say that we must re-sign him. I’d like to have him…but it would have to be based on finances. If he wants an assload of cash, he can try to get it from the Cubs or something.

I think Holliday would be a good fit…maybe Boras will choke on a turkey bone at Thanksgiving….

I would bet that Theo will be going full throttle for King Felix in the off season. Especially if Felix balks at the idea for a Seattle extension.

GMs saw what happened with Haladay and Santana and if Felix looks like he does not want to stay in Seattle, he will be moved.

Here is an odd idea, why not package Dice-K with prospects to Seattle for Felix? Dice-K is relatively cheap, the part of ownership is Japanese, Jojima is his catcher and his boy Ichiro is on the team.

VMart is fine, why not sign him up for a few more years. He can play 1st and be the 2nd catcher. Sounds good to me.