So I was thinking the other day. What if we had known about Schilling's shoulder issues prior to signing him to a contract? What might we have done differently? Numerous options abound:
- Sign Hiroki Kuroda. I don't remember how involved we might've been with him from the start. He signed with the Dodgers for 3 years @ an AAV of ~ $11.8M. Would we have signed him for the same amount? Would he have been interested in coming to the Sox? These, my friends, are the questions.
- Sign Carlos Silva. The proven mediocrity option. The Mariners gave him 4 years @ an AAV of $12M. I'm not sure the Sox would've signed him, but they definitely would've been more likely to explore this option.
- Make a bigger effort to trade for Johan Santana. Would we have made this trade happen, had we known what we know now about Schilling? Would both Jacoby Ellsbury and Jon Lester be in Twins camp right now? Definitely, the Twins would've had better leverage on us than they actually did.
- Sign: Jon Lieber, Jason Jennings, or Jeremy Affeldt. Gambles all, in different ways.
- non-Santana trades. Joe Blanton? Noah Lowry? (ed: Ugh...)