With the USA trailing Puerto Rico in the World Baseball Classic, 5-3, with only the bottom of the ninth left to play, it’s time for us here at Red Sox Rundown to move to a new topic of discussion. Regardless of your feelings on the WBC, you must admit it relieves some of the doldrums of Spring Training. There’s only so much analysis one can do on spring games - the statistics from the contests are notoriously unreliable predictors of the regular season (just ask the Phillies, who went 12-18 in Spring Training last year).
The Red Sox front office has been productive since October: Pedroia signed a six-
year deal in December, Youkilis a four-year extension in January, and Lester agreed to five years in March. With the long-term deals rolling in, I had great expectations for the Jason Bay negotiations - and was disappointed when it was announced that the talks had been put on hold. Theo Epstein stated that the “unusual marketplace” was to blame for the breakdown, while Jason Bay admitted it was in his best interest to “kind of explore.”
Jason Bay, don’t break our hearts. We were just starting to trust you after the breakup with our previous left fielder, and now you give us the “I need a little time” line. It’s like proposing and hearing “Just let me make sure I don’t have any better offers” in response. It stings a little.
I interrupt this blog to tell you that the USA just scored three runs in the bottom of the ninth to beat Puerto Rico and advance to the semi-finals in the World Baseball Classic. I can’t even predict the winner of a game after eight and a half innings have been played. And you wonder why I don’t gamble.
Anyway, I’ve gathered a bit of hope from Chad Finn’s most recent article, in which he states that he believes talks will continue throughout the spring (That’s not what I infer from Epstein’s statement that “we’re not going to get anything done in spring training,” but let’s not split hairs) and that the two sides will eventually come to an agreement. But here’s where Finn is dead-on: Bay is a perfect fit for the club, and the Red Sox would be wise to get the deal done.
As Finn points out, Bay’s deal won’t favor the Sox as much as the deals signed by Youkilis, Pedroia, and Lester for one reason. Bay will be entering free agency, while our merry trio were still several seasons away from free agency. But the idea of Bay being a perfect fit for the Red Sox intrigued me, so I did a little research. Unusual for a blogger I know, but try to bear with me.
The Red Sox farm system has very specific philosophies it tries to imprint on its players. Plate discipline is a big issue for the Sox. After comparing Bay’s plate discipline stats (who even knew there was such a thing?) to the stats of Youkilis, and Pedroia, two guys who came up through the Red Sox organization, I found that while Pedey is a ridiculously effective contact hitter, Bay’s stats were quite similar to Youkilis’s. Not a bad comparison, eh? Ellsbury makes contact a higher percentage of the time than does Bay, but Bay swings at a higher proportion of pitches within the zone. It’s give and take.
Another key point of the Red Sox philosophy is on-base percentage. Bay’s OBP on 2008 was .373, Pedroia’s .376, Youkilis’s .390, and Ellsbury’s .336. Bay is a fit in that group, but players are not judged on numbers alone. Bay has all the intangibles the Red Sox desire as well: he’s a scrappy, baseball-centric guy who knows how to handle the media and the pressures of playing at Fenway with class. He’s not a head case, he’s not a drama queen, he’s not a free-swinger and he loves the game of baseball.
Bottom line: Bay’s so similar to the prototypical Red Sox recuit he could have been drafted by Theo himself. He is a perfect fit for the organization and the Red Sox will be well-served when they finally sign him to a multi-year deal.
