“Screw the Luxury Tax” if Red Sox Want to Win

The Red Sox need at least one more bonified starter, an established closer and likely two or three bullpen arms before anyone would be confident in their pitching.  Throw in a right-field option that isn’t as important and suddenly the Red Sox would look more like contenders rather than pretenders.  The problem is, with the luxury tax threshold looming like a bad hangover on a hot day, the Red Sox are treading carefully.

Well, it may be painfully obvious, but if the Red Sox want a chance to contend in 2012 they may have to say “screw the luxury tax threshold.”

Now before all you Red Sox haters start jumping all over me about a pompous, arrogant, spend as much money as you can attitude, hear me out.

Alex Speier of WEEI does a great job examining the Red Sox current salary situation.  Basically, the Sox find themselves between a rock and a hard place, with a potential heartache on the horizon.

This is still a great ballclub on paper, in fact with the current offensive lineup it’s hard to deny the fact that this club will score some runs.  In no particular order you’ve got a lineup consisting of Ellsbury, Pedroia, Gonzalez, Youkilis, Ortiz, Crawford, Reddick/Kalish, Scutaro/Lowrie and Saltalamacchia/Shoppach.  Enough said on the offense.

But as everyone knows, pitching wins championships and right now that is exactly what the Red Sox are missing the most; good, viable pitchers that can make a difference.  Currently the Sox have their top three starters in Beckett, Lester and Buchholz.  After that there is a lot of uncertainty.  Daniel Bard will be groomed as a starter, so let’s pencil him in the rotation.  What turns out to be the rotation’s gain is the bullpen’s loss.  A legitimate closer is needed for this club to have any shot at winning and while Bard is the best internal candidate, he very well could stick as the number four starter.

Ryan Madson has once again been linked to the Red Sox and he won’t come cheap, likely around $10 million per season.  The Red Sox could trade a handful of prospects to Oakland for Andrew Bailey which would be a cheaper option, but doesn’t solve their payroll woes.

As Speier highlights, the Red Sox are contract heavy on just 13 players, making up almost $130 million for next season.   Speier states that there were 23 players that were tendered contracts on Monday that will likely amount to an additional $20 million. Throw in Big Papi’s expected raise of at least $14 million on that and suddenly there isn’t a lot of room to make many improvements.  With the most recent signing of Kelly Shoppach for $1.35 million that brings the club’s payroll to around $175 million.

Again, this current roster isn’t deep enough in the pitching department to win the second wild card let alone compete for the AL East division.  Andrew Miller, Matt Albers and Kyle Weiland aren’t the type of names that will come out of the pen and dominate hitters all year long.

I understand where the Red Sox brass are coming from.  This will be the third straight year the club goes over the tax threshold and the financial penalty of 40% tax on every dollar spent over the $178 million dollar limit could be substantial.  The other option is stay under it and next year the rate re-sets itself of 17.5% the next year they go over as explained by Speier.

With big fat contracts of John Lackey, Daisuke Matsuzaka and Carl Crawford weighing down the financial books, the Red Sox don’t have much of a choice here.  Bring in the talent that will make this club better and give them a chance to win.  The natives are getting restless and a mediocre club will not suffice.  Not after last year’s epic collapse.  This is no time to be pinching pennies when the three-headed monster has plenty of dimes.

This is a fan base that has become accustomed to a competitive ballclub that should compete every year.  You saw the potential batting lineup, it’s fantastic.  But you can’t rely on winning games every night by a score of 9-8, or expect a closer by committee to close out tight games.

This club doesn’t need a blockbuster signing or trade like last winter.  But a Ryan Madson to go along side two additional bullpen arms and a good proven starter would suffice.  Problem is, even addressing those four roster spots will send the Sox over the threshold.  That is of course barring a trade that sees Kevin Youkilis getting shipped out of town.  While that doesn’t appear to be happening, Ben Cherington may be forced to forfeit the financial penalties and pay the piper.  It just might turn into a World Series contender.

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