Beltre to Red Sox
Jeff Nye · January 4, 2010 at 5:05 pm · Filed Under General baseball, Mariners
Gammons says 1 year deal for $9 million and a player option for $5 million.
He probably wasn’t coming here anyway, so nothing to get too stressed over. Maybe this’ll get people to stop suggesting moving Lopez to first, though.
“AB’s inability to reach the” should be “Adrian Beltre Statistics and History“.
I don’t get this. Whatever his reasons were for declining arbitration, Beltre played his ass off here all through that contract, grinding through injury and everything, even though by that reasoning he should have been putting Beltre at #1 and dogging it until his next contract came due.
We don’t have any particular insight into why Beltre made his choices. Smearing him as selfish because you ascribe some set of motives to him, and you find him failing some artificial test of loyalty discounting, is totally unfair and not worth discussing.
I will always consider watching Beltre playing third base every day as one of the very top highlights of a long career as a baseball fan.
Two recommendations for Adrian before he plays his first game at Fenway:
1) wear a cup
2) stop asking the umpire for clarification on every pitch that you check swing
Thats ridiculous! I love Beltre but Yahoo just said Beltre was better than A-Rod. But it sounds like someone is a Red Sox fan who isn’t afraid to show it
I’m still surprised Philly chose Polanco over him. Everybody and their mother can hit 30 homeruns at Citizens Bank Park.
Would Adrian still have declined arbitration if he knew that the best he was going to get was 1 year/9 mill from Boston? I’m sure he declined arb thinking that he would do much better than that.
Regardless, I can’t fault him for wanting to go to a more hitter friendly park and to a team that has a legitimate world series shot. I might have to try and catch some Boston games this year.
[not classy]
Good luck, Adrian. You’ll be missed in Seattle, and I predict that, once you get a taste of the Baaston “fans” and press, you’ll miss Seattle, too.
I will always have goods memories of Beltre’s defense but his offense just never developed. It would seem over a 4 year time period that some of his holes on offense could have been fixed. Lopez while not much of a defensive player has developed offensively. In both cases patience was not in their vocabularies!! I like the addition of a Figgins with OBP AND speed (still remember the Edgar and Olerud times – got on but slowed the game down)!!!
Not true. Take a look at his home road splits for the last 3 years. I’ll use sOPS+, which is OPS compared to league and park adjusted (100 is average).
Here’s his sOPS+ at home: 68, 82, 92
And on the road: 96, 134, 127
On the road (playing in a mix of ballparks), he’s an above average hitter (just average in 2009) at a fairly difficult defensive position. In Safeco, he’s below average (dreadful in 2009).
This is why, when they came to Seattle, Jack and Tony took one look at the roster and just shook their heads.
Beltre was just fine as a hitter, Safeco makes right handed power sluggers look like slap hitting middle infielders or backup catchers.
As a Sox fan, I couldn’t be happier that I finally get to watch Beltre on a regular basis. As a Mariners fan it pains me to see such a good player go somewhere where he won’t fully be appreciated: a good majority of the Sox’ mouth-breathing fanbase is already calling this one of the worst deals this offseason.
That’ll change.
I hope you have a good season but wish you thought you could do it at Safco.
This isn’t some sort of mental issue Beltre has with Safeco Field.
Aye. And, this time next year, those same fans won’t be singing Theo’s greatness and begging for a multi-year re-signing after Beltre declines that silly option year… right?
Seems to me that a selfish, me-first player have curled into the fetal position after being struck in the nonexistent cup, and refused to move.
Apparently he did receive multi-year offers, and chose to go one year with Boston.
People are just going to have to come to grips with the fact that Safeco kills righties. Players around the game know this, and Jack knows this. That’s why he is building around pitching, defense and left-handed hitting. It doesn’t matter where you go in the Mariner universe, but there always seem to be plenty of people who don’t seem to grasp this.
This was a good deal for both Beltre and the Red Sox. The Sox got him for a bargain and I expect Adrian to have a great year in Fenway which will boost his value next year.
I’ll miss him, though. He was my second favorite player behind Ichiro.
Even though the Redsox are my second favorite team. It irritates me to no end that another Mariner, took less money to play for a bigger market team. Especially at a time when the team is headed in a positive direction.
No, thats one of the things thats awesome about Beltre.
I’ll miss him, but he have Chone for the same price who is about as good. I’m just happy he didnt go to LA.
Sadly I don’t think it will ever happen. If it isn’t the accusation of steroids, then it’s the supplanting of good-guy (and lighter-skinned) Mike Lowell. As much as we like to fool ourselves into thinking it’s no longer an issue, there is an undercurrent of subtle racial discrimination that permeates throughout the fanbase as evidenced recently in the way fans treated Byung-Hyun Kim, and even star players like Manny and Pedro (as well as Randy Moss).
Never mind that Lowell himself is Cuban.
I loved Beltre and he was my grandson’s favorite player. My only hope is that he’ll be on the DL when we go to Boston this year. He’ll kill us with that short wall in left.
Except he didn’t. The consensus was that arbitration would have been worth around $12M. Beltre took a deal worth $14M, with ten guaranteed ($9M for 2010 plus the $1M buyout) and the option to trade the remaining four for a multi-year deal that is likely to be worth a lot more based on the numbers he’s going to put up in Fenway than it would have been if he’d played half his games in Safeco.
We don’t have any particular insight into why Beltre made his choices. Smearing him as selfish because you ascribe some set of motives to him, and you find him failing some artificial test of loyalty discounting, is totally unfair and not worth discussing.
Could be taking a line drive without wearing a cup influenced his rational decision making process? lol, sorry I have to point out how stupid it is not to wear a cup in the infield, love his play but simply stupid in this regards.
I’ll miss you 29. I hope you turn the monster into swiss cheese.
I hope Figgins can do half of what Beltre could do at third. I get the feeling that every time Figgins doesn’t make a play, I’ll be thinking that Beltre would have done it in his sleep.
Scott5000, thr33niL – The “Lopez to first” option is pretty much only being noted by Baker and Stone, as far as I know. Most commenters on Baker’s blog, e.g. (that I’ve read lately, anyway) see Lopez as trade bait, not an urgent problem to be remedied nor a viable option at first.
I guess I’m in the minority, but I’m not sorry to see him go. As has been mentioned, Beltre has a great glove but I won’t miss his poor plate discipline. I’m perfectly happy with Figgins at 3rd, especially if we were going to have to pay Beltre an extra $3M more than Figgins.
Thank you Mr. Beltre for all of the hard play you gave us fans in Seattle, that will always be appreciated. I hope you learn to lay off the low, outside sliders because with that Monster in left in your new home you’re going to see even more of them.
I appreciate Beltre as a player in general, but he simply was not cut out to be a Mariner anymore. Safeco Field went from being a tough place for him to hit in his first 3 years to absolutely eating him alive the last 2. You can’t carry a 3B, regardless of the glove, that puts up a .650 OPS at home. Also, for the love of gawd, Adrian, stop appealing your own check swings. You do that in Boston and they might have you committed.
Seattleguy, I’m with you. How frustrating was it to watch Beltre swing and miss a slider that started outside and then broke further outside? Seems that sort of at-bat happened way too often for a player who we all had so much hope for. All to often it looked like he didn’t have a clue offensively. He’s a rallykiller.
Had to give it to Adrian though for his defense and his toughness. Cannot dispute those attributes. But after watching him for his career here, I don’t think those attributes are worth the money for this organization.
He’s a great fit for the RedSox, they won’t need to hit him above 6th in the lineup, and they can afford to have a guy like him on their roster.
In Boston he will be known as a great defensive 3B who will hit some home runs. And he’ll be appreciated for that. Not like here, where we all wanted him to be an All-Star both in the field and at the plate.
You have a very extreme and unrealistic definition of loyalty, and I think it’s going to leave you disappointed with a lot of things. Like a guy I used to know who always wanted people to just give him stuff, the problem here isn’t with the rest of the world, it’s with your distorted expectations.
Unfortunately I think you’re right (and it was reflected in the team being the last to integrate, though skipping on the chance at Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson and indeed on any black free agent until 1993 may have helped them achieve that 86 year record of futility).
This will be a factor with Cameron too, and it saddens me to think of Cammie as Red Sox maybe even more than Beltre, especially as he closes out his career. On the other hand, this is the kind of thing that can only be fixed by time and example so Beltre and Cameron get the thankless job of contributing to that.
Anyway I’m definitely glad Beltre didn’t end up with the Angels.
Well, I don’t think he’s so big a fan that he’d actually relocate. The real question is probably: are we going to see Red featured prominently at the games when the Sox come to Safeco, and/or will he find a new (Mariner) target for his affections? If he sticks with Beltre, I hope he at least wears his Dominican jersey rather than a disgusting new BoSox one.
Yeah, there will be some of that (of course Beltre didn’t get to every ball either — it was really his remarkably strong and unfailingly accurate throws after a catch, often while falling away from the infield, that should be the stuff of legend). Then again, every time Figgins watches a low-and-away pitch go by I’ll be thinking Beltre would’ve swung at that as if he was asleep (and dreaming he had longer arms, or something). I am going to miss this though (and I look forward to a lot of oblivious Boston fans asking why he “just started” doing it).
Beltre did nothing but play hard while he was a Mariner. I just wish he wants to be a Mariner more than he wants to play for Boston, because he’s the best third baseman the team has ever had.
Action-reaction: With Beltre in at Boston, there’s no place for Kotchman, so where does he go? Seattle! (according to ESPN). Not bad. He’s cheap, still young. Would like to see his OBP increase a bit, but it’s not terrible, and he’s had a couple of .350+ seasons.
I love Beltre, but you’re forgetting a guy who has a street named after him outside the stadium. Sure, he spent most of his career as a DH, but he did play 563 games as a 3B.
Ya!! Something tells me the those insufferable sox fans might have a little problem first time 29 asks the 1st base ump to ring him up in Fenway…….
Beltre was a superior third baseman to the (underrated) Martinez. Bats? Another story, of course.
Well, as a Red Sox fan I have to say I’m elated to have Beltre in the fold. From my standpoint the biggest thing this acquisition did for us was to eliminate the possibility of trading for Alex Gonzalez and giving up way too much for him.
The Padres wanted CF Jacoby Ellsbury, SP Clay Buccholz and one of our top three prospects (Anderson/Westmorland/Kelly). That was WAY too much to give up.
With Beltre we keep those players and only have to move one to make room for him. The good news for you Seattle fans is that we’re moving that player to the Mariners.
Casey Kotchman, one of my favorites in Boston is heading to the great Northwest for a minor leaguer. Kotch is not only a good first baseman and decent hitter but also just a great guy to have in your clubhouse. While I’ll miss him, I’m happy he’ll get the chance to play every day instead of being a reserve utility infielder for us.
Let’s all hope these moves help everyone involved. ;o)