You’d miss gems like this from McCarver – “Roy Oswalt is a drop and drive pitcher. What is a drop and drive pitcher? He is a guy who drops and drives. Very simple.”

Ah, McCarver — yet another honors graduate of the Ron Fairly Institute of Sports Journalism.

Apparently the Bosox have spoken with the M’s about Putz. Take two prospects and be done with it!

Interesting… depending on the prospects, could be worth it. One pitcher and a lefty corner infielder would be what I’d want, personally.

Been thinking about this rumored BoSox-Marlins-Pirates three-way for Manny (my, that sounded dirty…), and came up with a thought on what *could* get it done:

Marlins get: OF Manny Ramirez (Boston), C Ronny Paulino (Pittsburgh)

Pirates get: OF Josh Willingham (Florida), LHP Hunter Jones (Boston)

Red Sox get: OF Jason Bay (Pittsburgh), LHP Chris Sedon (Florida), OF Jai Miller (Florida)

Marlins get both the stick they need in Manny, and the upgrade at catcher they want with Paulino (not much stick-wise, but he can run a staff and won’t hurt you defensively).

Pirates get a body to plug in for Bay that I believe they control for at least one more year, and a good closer-type prospect for their rather thin bullpen.

With Bay, the Sox don’t lose much, if anything, by trading Manny (and in fact wind up a fair bit better defensively I believe), and get two fairly solid, though probably not spectacular, prospects that could contribute within the next 2-3 years.

Thoughts? Doable?

I think your interpretation may have been a little off.

The classification of Tye A and Type B (and previously Type C) free agents is based on rankings of the past two seasons numbers run through a formula by the Elias Sports Bureau.

The formula does not remotely resemble anything designed to rank players ni ay reasonable method and stats like Games Played(!) and RBI, for instance, carry plenty of weight.

Defense is not factored into the formula but is – sort of – considered by breaking the players into position groupings which further screw up rankings.

OF, 1B and DH are grouped together (depressing most CF rankings) and 3B, 2B and SS go together (a good reason Beltre is a lock to be a type A too) and SP and RP separated out and Catchers get to go on their own.

The top 20% in each group are Type A and the next 20% are Type B.

Last year the rankings included 117 outfielders with the top 23 being Type A free agents. Raul was ninth, just ahead of Grady Sizemore! Replacing 2006 with 2008 is not going to see him slide to Type B or worse.

Fun bonus fact: Emil frickin’ Brown ranked 47th as the last Type B (1B, DH and OF group), one spot ahead of Richie Sexson.

People need to remember when talking about Ibanez and keeping him to get 2 prospects that we have to offer him Arbitration and then hope he turns it down and signs somewhere else. He’s gonna accept the arbitration, count on that.

Fixed. And you’re probably right about him accepting arbitration.

Also, is he guaranteed to be a type A? If so, the classification must of slipped a tad. He’s a contributor, no doubt, but he’s hardly a top-two-shelves kinds of player anymore, which is what I’ve always interpreted type A as before.

He’s gonna accept the arbitration, count on that.

Yeah that is a serious concern. The team would basically have to beg him to not resign while simultaneously offering him arbitration. Good luck.

I suppose, however, that telling him he WILL be a DH and will not sniff a glove again could help push him out the door