Carl Crawford

[Triple B]

Josh Hamilton sort of broke out 3 years ago with the Rangers, but then bombed 2 years ago, and slightly rebounded last season.

Slightly rebounded?? ..... Dude.

[Bull Dozer]

Sucks not being able to go down to the Trop a few times a year (I'm a marlins fan) and watch one of the best players in baseball.  Carl is doing what's best for him but as a Red Sox hater it sucks to see him go there.  I was hoping he would go out to Cali and play for the Angels instead of one of the big two.  But Jesus Christ the Sox are making moves First Gonzalez and now this, that line up is going to be Nasty good this season. 

[Bruce Blingstein]

Josh Hamilton sort of broke out 3 years ago with the Rangers, but then bombed 2 years ago, and slightly rebounded last season.

Slightly rebounded?? ..... Dude.

Are we talking about the same Josh Hamilton who batted .359 with 32 HRs and 100 RBIs and won the AL MVP last season?

With Gonzo and CC, Sox lineup is going to look like the Yanks. 

Im guessing

Ellsbury

Pedroia

CC

Gonzo

JD Drew

Ortiz

Beltre

Scutaro/Lowrie

whoever their catcher is since V Martinez is gone. 

wow

[Bruce Blingstein]

Oh crap I forgot about Kevin Youklis.  **** I hate the Red Sox.

[Danm1983]

Will the Red Sox have the pitching? Lester, Buchholz, Josh whats-his-name, ...angry douche papelbon in the closer role.

[smazza]

baseball is flush with money

[Bruce Blingstein]

Will the Red Sox have the pitching? Lester, Buchholz, Josh whats-his-name, ...angry ***** papelbon in the closer role.

Lester, Buchholtz, Becket, Daiskue and Lackey...they have the pitching even without the lineup. 

Power ranking is higher than the Yanks with or without Cliff Lee (who they are getting)

[Bullshiznitz]

Realistically the lineup isn't that much better than what they had going into last year.  They've just replaced Beltre (.919 OPS) and Martinez (.844 OPS) with Gonzalez (.904 OPS) and Crawford (.851 OPS).  The key for them will be to have Ellsbury, Youk, Pedrioa come back healthy and stay healthy, as well as for Lackey, Beckett and Paps to make rebounds from sub-par seasons. 

Personally I think they way overpaid for Crawford.  I love him, but even at his absolutely best he's barely worth $20 mil.  And with a player who's whole game is based around speed (basestealing, 3B's, SB's, defense), it won't take long into his 30's until some of that starts slipping.  He may be worth the money for the first 2, maybe 3 years of the contract, but will be severly overpaid the last 3-4 years.   

As far as some of the Rays losses, think some people (mostly some of the talking heads on sports radio) are going way too far into the doom and gloom.  The Rays (even if they trade Garza) will still have one of the 5 best pitching rotations in baseball, and will still have solid defense.  Crawford was a loss, but Jennings should be able to put up atleast 75% of his production.  Bartlett isnt a loss at all as Brignac had equivalent offensive numbers last year while playing much better defense.  Pena isn't much of a loss either (if we were replacing 2007 Pena yea, not 2010 Pena).  Sadly I think Dan Johnson for a full year could easily replicate or even out perform the 2010 we got from Pena.  The bullpen will ulitmately be the biggest question mark.  We've lost basically everything from a very good bullpen.  However there's still a lot of good to great BP arms out on the market.  Once the contracts start coming back down to reality and the market slims, the Rays could still put together a pretty solid BP.  They also still have an opportunity to improve upon last years DH (how could you not improve over the Burrell/Aybar combo).  Now competing with the Evil Empire and Blow Sox Nation will be difficult, but just like last year I think....they're both just a couple injuries away from opening the door to the Rays to stay in playoff contention for most if not all of the year. 

[smazza]

poor tampa bay

[flsportsfan83]

poor tampa bay

;D