Theo Epstein talks Red Sox offseason

This past Tuesday night I was fortunate enough to meet Brian Cashman and Theo Epstein before they spoke at my school, Sacred Heart University. Both were very engaging, sharing stories from the past years and giving a glimpse at what life is like as a general manager. The media met with the pair before the actual event and I was able to ask Epstein about how he feels the Red Sox did this offseason. The answer was rather suprising:

“[The Red Sox] did pretty well. They are probably are not done yet,” he said. “I think [Red Sox GM Ben Cherington] did a great job executing a strategy of acquiring a couple cost-control, impact pieces for their bullpen in [Andrew]Bailey and [Mark] Melancon. That frees them up to experiment with [Daniel] Bard as a starter and maybe see what [Alfredo] Aceves can do there as well, given they didn’t really like the options in the free-agent starting pitching market,” said Epstein. “The position player group is really solid and with some of the creativity they’ve shown in building the bullpen it will all come down to the starting pitching, but Ben did a really nice, creative job.

While I agree with Epstein that the 2012 Red Sox will come down to just how well the starting pitching is, I would have to disagree with saying they’ve had a good offseason. There were a few starting pitching options available, the Red Sox just didn’t act swiftly enough. When you have Nick Punto and Mike Aviles platooning at shortstop, I wouldn’t be too happy with that. Maybe Theo knows something that everyone else doesn’t know when he says the Red Sox aren’t done yet.

As a whole I was impressed with Epstein. He was very personable, much more than Cashman. In fact, on stage Cashman spent a lot of his time on his cell phone. He said that he is “commuting” between Boston and Chicago since his family is still back in Boston. He has been living out of a hotel room, but will look for a home with his wife in a few months.

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