The Red Sox and Daisuke Matsuzaka

[WallyGoat]

The Boston Red sox paid upwards of $51 million to engage in negotiations with Daisuke Matsuzake. They spent another $52 million to have him play for 6 years at the Red Sox organization.

This is BS. Who spends $51 million to just TALK to a club about accquiring a player, then spend $52 million to have him play?

Dumbest deal and biggest waste of money since the A-Rod/Texas Rangers deal.

[Hawknut5]

Wow, what a sign. This guy is going to be a great pitcher next year. Look out for the Sox.

[autiger1126]

this guy better be incredible, otherwise it's just sickening that the red sox are this desperate.

[Bburton86]

How many Nintendo Wiis can you buy with 52 million?

[OmahaBound]

this guy better be incredible, otherwise it's just sickening that the red sox are this desperate.

Ok as a Sox fan, I can say that any discussion of sickening contracts from this team needs to be edited slightly. Here's how: "Dice-K for $16-17 million a year? That's outrageous." should instead read "JD Drew for $14 million? That's just disgusting."

Here's why the Matsuzaka deal makes sense:

1. Japanese baseball is excellent. Right now the quality of the league is better than ever and those teams could do a better job competing than the D-Rays and Royals. Therefore, his stats over there are not meaningless and he has been dominating. It's like a AAAA league over there with several players that could easily play over here.

2. At an actual salary of 8-10 million dollars for the next 6 years, he's going to be VERY tradeable should it not work out. Look at the market right now and you'll see this is a huge steal for the Sox.

a. Andy Pettitte just signed for $16 million for one year
b. Vernon Wells just signed for $18 million PER YEAR for 7 years.
c. Frickin' JD Drew's contract (seriously, what the hell were they thinking?)
d. Soriano is getting around the same as Vernon Wells for the next 7 years and the same goes for Carlos Lee.
e. the piece de resistance... Gil Meche signed for $55 mil for 5 years with the KC Royals.

I think it's pretty easy to make the argument that all of these deals were worse than the Matsuzaka contract.

3. The Sox had to pay the $51 mil posting fee to the team he played for, not the player himself. Signing Matsuzaka was not the only reason they posted so much. When a Japanese player is a free agent, they want to join the Mets, Dodgers, Mariners, or Yankees simply because those are the teams they know well over there. The Sox want to join that list and are "planting their flag" so to speak. It's like paying less than $9 million per year for advertising all over Japan.

4. The best part: he's only 26 years old. If it works out, the Sox will have him for 6 years in the prime of his career for less money than Gil Meche would have cost them.

So yeah, basically it is a lot of money but it's not that bad of a signing when you consider how easy it will be to trade him if he doesn't live up to the hype. Considering his track record I think he'll at least be average though.

Plus look at the charitable side of this. Julio Zuleta will get another chance at the big leagues thanks to this guy. Zuleta owns Matsuzaka much like Eduardo Perez has owned Randy Johnson his entire career. If the Sox look like they're going to make the playoffs towards the end of August, you know the Yankees or one of the other contenders will sign him. :laugh:

[WallyGoat]

How many Nintendo Wiis can you buy with 52 million?

208,000 units. That's how many. :laugh: