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The Sox signed first baseman Sean Casey today for a 1 year deal at 700,000. I think it's a really good move for the Sox. Casey is a solid left handed bat off the bench that is also a good fielding first baseman.

The only issue I see is the versatility of Hinske to play LF if necessary which is something that Casey cannot do. The other issue going forward is that as is, we have no backup RF since Coco's arm is not good enough. I expect one more trade to clear that up before the season begins.

Good signing. They will get another outfielder if it is not Coco.

Pretty cool. Casey can still put up a decent OBP, even though he's powerless right now. Eric Hinske is pretty good. I stand by this. He's gonna put up pretty good numbers as a backup somewhere.

I see us as having Manny, Crisp, Drew, Moss, Ellsbury as the OFers right now. Moss can backup RF and so can Ellsbury and Crisp. Arm, schmarm. Plus Jon Van Every is in Pawtucket as a very nice defensive OF. Probably can't hit at the MLB level, but he's the sixth OF on the depth chart so who cares.

There are 40 men on the 40-man roster right now so they can't sign someone without dumping someone first. I don't see them bringing anyone into the organization.

dsorc wrote:The only issue I see is the versatility of Hinske to play LF if necessary which is something that Casey cannot do. The other issue going forward is that as is, we have no backup RF since Coco's arm is not good enough. I expect one more trade to clear that up before the season begins.

Exactly.

Coco is going to get moved. It's stupid to have him rotting on the bench because unless some team loses their CF for the season in May, Coco's trade value will be lower. And while Ellsbury is not going to hit as well as he did in September, he's going to be good enough that we don't need to keep an insurance policy around for in just in case. No offense to Youk or Pedroia but Jacoby has much more talent than either of them. Plus Bobby Kielty is waiting in the wings to be re-signed and he would make a perfect 4th OF. He can play all three OF positions and Drew can also back-up CF. Then you have Van Every and Moss waiting at AAA for Manny/Drew's inevitable injury. I'd prefer to land a minor league catcher for Coco but at this point, I don't see him being a necessary cog on this team. mahalo
~Chach~

Man, it sure was hard trying to find a first basemen off the bench who could hit at least .200. Thank god we found a replacement. I was beginning to get worried a player of Hinske's talent was irreplaceable.

i like hinske a lot, so i enjoyed having him on our bench. however, casey is an excellent replacement. is it just me or, since the moss deal, has theo been outperforming pioli?

TheCelticTruth wrote:i like hinske a lot, so i enjoyed having him on our bench. however, casey is an excellent replacement. is it just me or, since the moss deal, has theo been outperforming pioli?

What has Pioli had a chance to do since the Moss signing? The offseason is just underway....