The Price Is Right!

$31 Million is a lot of cash to take home per season to throw a baseball, but David Price does it very well and that is what the Boston Red Sox are going to pay him. The dominating left-hander officially signed a 7 Year, $217 Million deal with the Sox on Friday and will "come on down" to Boston. Price is the definition of an “Ace” having an Earned Run Average (ERA) of 3.09 over his career and consistently eating up over 200 innings per season. This is the case over the regular season, however once the postseason comes around, Price seems to lose his touch racking up a disgraceful 5.12 ERA and a record of 2-7.

Price was arguably the premier free agent of the 2015-2016 offseason with his only competitor being fellow pitcher Zack Greinke. Greinke ended up taking a 6 Year, $206.5 Million offer from the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday evening with an average annual value of $34.4 Million, a new MLB record.

Price has been the biggest move the Red Sox have made this offseason, but not the only one. Boston has also gone along and acquired Relief Pitcher Craig Kimbrel and Outfielder Chris Young as well. Kimbrel is most definitely one of the best closers in baseball having an outstanding 1.63 ERA and collecting 225 Saves over his first 6 MLB seasons. Chris Young is great option as a 4th outfielder to platoon with Jackie Bradley Jr., Mookie Betts, and Rusney Castillo when one of the three youngsters needs a rest. Although President of Baseball Operations, Dave Dombrowski, has filled multiple needs for this Red Sox team, with the Winter Meetings starting on Monday there are still a few moves that could possibly be made to improve the organization.

If there is one move that I see as almost guaranteed, it would be picking up another arm for the bullpen. The Sox would be smart to go out and get one more back end of the bullpen guy like Tyler Clippard. Clippard is 30 years old and has a career ERA of 2.88 and would be a great addition. He would most likely assume the 7th inning role with Uehara and Kimbrel filling the 8th and 9th inning roles respectively. He would also be able to fill in for either player barring injury since he has experience in both roles.

Another move that Dombrowski has said he wants to make is trading a starting pitcher for prospects. Boston's prospect pool got a little shallower when they traded for Kimbrel so they are most likely looking to replace what they lost. With the signing of David Price, they now have 6 starting pitchers; David Price, Clay Buchholz, Eduardo Rodriguez, Rick Porcello, Wade Miley, and Joe Kelly, making one expandable. Either Miley or Kelly will most likely be the one to be shipped out. They won't receive an abundance of talent back, but replenishing the farm system is never a bad thing. If neither are traded, look for Kelly to move into the bullpen/spot starter role with his blistering 97 MPH fastball.

This move has not been talked about too much but has been speculated to be a possibility. Trading first basemen Hanley Ramirez. Many people see Hanley as a liability in the field and in the clubhouse. The potential return for Ramirez is somewhat unknown but there is one thing known: it won’t be a lot. His contract is almost untradeable and if they want any chance of moving on from the defensively handicapped “first baseman”, rumor has it they would need to eat at least half of the remainder of the contract. If they were to trade Hanley, hopefully they would follow up with a signing of someone like Pedro Alvarez. This would be logical seeing David Ortiz is retiring after this season and if Hanley were to be gone, the the team would be left without a power bat in the lineup. Since becoming a full time MLB starter, Alvarez has had no less than 27 Home Runs in any season except in 2014 where he missed 40 games and he still managed to smack 18 homers. This is an unlikely situation, but you never know what teams have up their sleeves at the Winter Meetings.

Overall, the David Price signing answers the biggest question mark the Red Sox had coming into this season; the lack of a legitimate number one pitcher. Dombrowski has filled the other important holes on this team as well and has put the Sox right back in contention for a World Series Championship very quickly. Mr. Dombrowski has said that he doesn’t plan on making any other large splashes the rest of the offseason, but who knows? Anything can happen.