Boston Red Sox Team Report

INSIDE PITCH

The Red Sox came close to trading for third baseman Adrian Beltre before the 2003 season when a four-player deal was discussed with the Dodgers that included Shea Hillenbrand and Jason Varitek heading to Chavez Ravine for Beltre and Paul LoDuca.

Imagine that.

Red Sox GM Theo Epstein and his front office partners maintained their long distance appreciation for the silky-smooth third baseman with the rocket-powered arm during his 11-year career. Successful seasons with Bill Mueller and Mike Lowell followed, but Epstein kept an eye on Beltre when he signed with Seattle as a free agent. In fact, Epstein remembered -- with the faintest wince of pain -- instances Beltre single-handedly beat Boston on numerous occasions with his lumber and his leather.

The Sox will finally know how the other side lives after officially agreeing to a one-year deal with Beltre worth $9 million along with a player option for 2011. It was a "pillow contract," so deemed by agent Scott Boras, and it allows Beltre to experience East Coast baseball and the Red Sox for at least season.

The deal also gives the Red Sox a third base solution for at least one season before potentially casting out their lines at the trade deadline -- or next season -- for that classic, slugging first baseman.

But that little flight of power-hitting whimsy at the corner infield spot is for another day.

Beltre takes the hot corner mantle from hip-challenged Mike Lowell. There's no denying that Beltre is coming off his worst year offensively; shoulder and thumb injuries limited him to a .265 batting average with eight home runs and 44 RBI last season. It's a far cry from 2004, when he hit 48 home runs before departing the Dodgers via free agency, and it's a far cry from his career averages of 24 home runs and 87 RBI.

There's also no denying the .325 career on-base percentage that seems the antithesis of everything held as quality offense within the Sox organization.

But Sox officials believe that Beltre will flourish outside of a Safeco Field home ballpark that is essentially Death Valley to all right-handed pull hitters. Beltre also boasts the appropriate home/road splits to back up that theory.

The left shoulder injury that significantly hampered Beltre's production last season also has to be factored into the equation. The down season is exactly why player and agent settled on the one-year contract in Boston when Boras' dream market never developed.

"We think Fenway is a fit for Adrian. It's hard to emphasize just how much Safeco deflates offensive performance for right-handed power hitters," said Epstein. "It's really a tough place to hit. Mike Cameron, I know, talked about it when he was in here. It's a difficult place to put up any kind of numbers: left field, left-center, center field, even if you hit the ball well to the opposite field. It's hard to get rewarded as a right-handed hitter.

"Obviously, Fenway is a nice place to hit if you can elevate the ball to the pull side. It also doesn't take away from a nice opposite-field stroke. Adrian's natural stroke sometimes is to the opposite field, which is fine. He'll be rewarded here in the gaps. Pull-side elevation will obviously be rewarded. We think he'll be a nice fit. Just getting out of Safeco even more so than getting to Fenway is significant if you look at Adrian's road performance over the years. It's very impressive what he's done outside of Safeco, and even before that, he was in a pitchers' park in Dodger Stadium. It will be a nice change for him."

What isn't under investigation is Beltre's sterling defense at third base.

He makes the defensive sabermetricians happy with his range factor and UZR/150 scores, and he wows old school baseball scouts with his ability to aggressively charge bunts. He's blessed with a power arm that completes a vast array of Gold Glove defensive skills, and he could potentially be part of the best defensive crew -- both infield and outfield -- ever assembled at the Fens.

"It's true we had really good defense in Seattle last year. I take pride in that," said Beltre. "Hopefully our defense here in Boston can be better. I played against Marco Scutaro -- he's a great defender.

"Pedroia, everybody knows he's a good defender. And Youkilis is really good at first. Hopefully I can do my part and give 110 percent. We have a great, great pitching staff."

While crunching the numbers following the season, Epstein and his baseball think tank discovered one season during his tenure where run prevention was off the charts. It just happened to be 2007, when a young Sox bunch flashed plenty of leather, prevented a ballpark full of runs and supported an above-average pitching staff en route to a World Series title.

Boston allowed only 654 runs that season, at least 40 runs fewer than any other season of the Epstein era in Boston -- and much more than 100 less than each of the wall-banging teams of the 2003-06 era.

Then Epstein and Co. watched teams like Tampa Bay, Seattle and Texas vastly turn their teams around with improved defensive efficiency -- and slightly less offensive thunder -- over the last few seasons.

There's a new trend in baseball toward making the defensive game relevant again and bringing new statistical evaluations out from behind the gaudy offensive stats that ruled the baseball landscape at the beginning of the decade.

It's important to note that the Sox promise they can -- and will -- improve their offense at the trade deadline if it proves to be a problem during the season.

NOTES, QUOTES

-- RHP Daisuke Matsuzaka told a Japanese magazine that he didn't inform the Red Sox about a right leg injury last spring, the Boston Globe reported. Matsuzaka believes compensating for the leg injury led to the shoulder injury that rendered him ineffective in 2009. After pitching well in the World Baseball Classic, he went 4-6 with a 5.76 ERA in 12 starts for Boston last year.

-- OF Jacoby Ellsbury is enough of a team guy to make the move from center field to left field with Mike Cameron entering the Red Sox picture, and agent Scott Boras said that the move might just preserve Boston's base-stealing demon.
The agent has done studies on center fielders who score 100 runs and steal 70 bases, and he said that the list isn't a long one because of the grueling physical rigors required to put up that kind of performance. For the long-range well-being of his client, Boras indicated that shifting to left field -- at least for the next couple of seasons -- was something beneficial to Ellsbury's longevity as an offensive sparkplug.
"Jacoby is such a competitor. He's been a center fielder his whole life," Boras said. "But he's also a teammate. Mike Cameron is clearly a veteran guy that's been a center fielder his whole life. We agreed it was probably better to keep Mike Cameron in center field. (Jacoby) is an intense offensive player, and you're out there with that body type banging 60 or 70 stolen bases. Just go back through the model. Who scores 100 runs, steals 60 or 70 bases and plays center field long term? Who does that? Check it out. The metrics don't work. It's a lot. So the idea is that there's benefit or detriment. The idea is that the wear on your body (of playing center field) is extraordinary."

-- 3B Mike Lowell and the Red Sox both have the same goals headed into spring training, according to general manager Theo Epstein, and that's to make sure his surgically repaired right thumb is healthy. Once Lowell gets into some spring training games and proves his health during the Grapefruit League, "everything else will take care of itself." It's been rumored that the corner infielder requested a trade out of Boston when his playing time diminished last season following the trade for C Victor Martinez, and that still appears to be the course of action. Lowell was headed to the Texas Rangers in a deal for C Max Ramirez before his thumb injury nixed the deal.

-- RHP Boof Bonser, acquired from Minnesota this winter, is a potential reliever for the Red Sox. The 28-year-old Bonser was primarily a starter during his time with the Twins and is coming off an arm injury, but the Sox received good reports while he was throwing the ball in instructional league. "He certainly could be (a reliever), and he looked good during short stints that he had in the bullpen," said Epstein. "He had significant surgery, but he checked out well in the physical and we're excited to see him this spring."

-- OF Billy Hall was acquired along with cash and a minor-leaguer in a trade that sent 1B Casey Kotchman to the Seattle Mariners. Kotchman was essentially the odd man out when the Red Sox signed 3B Adrian Beltre to a contract, and Sox GM Theo Epstein envisions Hall's ability to play the infield and outfield morphing into a "super utility" role with the Red Sox. Hall is working out at the API facility in Arizona for the first time and is hunting feverishly for an answer to his offensive issues the last few seasons.

BY THE NUMBERS: 19 -- 3B Adrian Beltre's age when he broke into the major leagues and began an 11-year career.

QUOTE TO NOTE: "I think he was a little disappointed, a little concerned that it was like a demotion. We explained that it's not. Again, we've got a guy with longer strides. Jacoby can be a force in left, kind of like Carl Crawford in Tampa. We're going to have an outfield where not a lot of balls hit too much ground." -- Sox manager Terry Francona, talking to the Boston Globe about the conversation that ended with informing Jacoby Ellsbury they were moving him from center to left field.

ROSTER REPORT

The Red Sox haven't stood pat in the offseason. They attempted to improve their defense by signing free agent Mike Cameron to replace free agent Jason Bay in the outfield and by adding free agent 3B Adrian Beltre. They also upgraded the rotation by signing the best pitcher on the market, RHP John Lackey.

BIGGEST NEEDS: The Red Sox still need to find another dynamic bat for the middle of their lineup and must address the team's lack of offense away from Fenway Park. There is a pretty good chance, however, that the team will go into the season without that big bat and will work to acquire more hitting -- if needed -- around the trade deadline. It appears that the Sox will place newly acquired Mike Cameron in center field and shift Jacoby Ellsbury to left, so there will be no "big ticket" replacement for Jason Bay in left field. The Sox appear to be done shopping for the winter and figure to go with Kevin Youkilis at first base and Adrian Beltre at third.

ARRIVALS: RHP Boof Bonser (trade with Twins), INF Marco Scutaro (free agent from Blue Jays), OF Jeremy Hermida (trade with Marlins), INF Tug Hulett (trade with Royals), OF Mike Cameron (free agent from Brewers), RHP John Lackey (free agent from Angels), 3B Adrian Beltre (free agent from Mariners), INF/OF Bill Hall (trade with Mariners).

DEPARTURES: LHP Hunter Jones (traded to Marlins), C George Kottaras (claimed off waivers by Brewers), SS Alex Gonzalez (free agent, signed with Blue Jays), LHP Billy Wagner (free agent, signed with Braves), RHP Takashi Saito (free agent, signed with Braves), OF Brian Anderson (free agent, signed with Royals), OF Jason Bay (free agent, signed with Mets), 1B Casey Kotchman (traded to Mariners), SS Nick Green (free agent, signed minor league deal with Dodgers).

FREE AGENTS: OF Rocco Baldelli, RHP Paul Byrd.

ARBITRATION-ELIGIBLE: RHP Manny Delcarmen, OF Jeremy Hermida, LHP Hideki Okajima, RHP Jonathan Papelbon, RHP Ramon Ramirez.

Papelbon received the highest salary for a closer in his first year of arbitration eligibility at $6.25 million last season, and he conceivably could net anywhere from $8 million 10 million this winter.

IN LIMBO: 3B Mike Lowell was nearly traded to Texas for C Max Ramirez, but the deal was scrapped when it was learned Lowell had a thumb injury. He had thumb surgery Dec. 30, and it's possible Boston will try again to deal him.

RHP Jonathan Papelbon was mentioned in trade rumors immediately following his blow-up in Game 3 of the AL Division Series, but it's less about one playoff game and more about (1) his rising cost and (2) his potential on the trade market two years away from free agency. The fact is, the 28-year-old closer had to work that much harder for his 38 saves and 1.85 ERA this season than in past years. He could be traded if Boston could get a big-time bat or a young, top-of-the-line starting pitcher in return.

MEDICAL WATCH: