According to Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe, the Red Sox have signed Carl Crawford to a 7 year, $142 million contract this evening. I guess those baseball writers who said the Jayson Werth deal wouldn't impact the Crawford deal were off a bit. Here is his tweet:
Source: The Red Sox have a seven-year, $142 million deal done with Carl Crawford.
20 minutes ago via Twitter for iPhone
Couple thoughts on this deal:
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With Adrian Gonzalez and Carl Crawford in the Red Sox lineup, along with Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis, Jacoby Ellsbury, JD Drew and David Ortiz, this team has to be the favorite to go to the World Series.
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There was talk earlier today that the Yankees could afford to sign both Cliff Lee and Carl Crawford. I guess Cliff Lee is almost guaranteed to be a Yankee, unless the Rangers step up.
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Cliff Lee is guaranteed to get a 7 year deal now. Jayson Werth gets a 7 year deal. Carl Crawford gets a 7 year deal. Cliff Lee WILL get a 7 year deal.
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Alot of folks said the Angels were the favorite to win the Crawford sweepstakes. I guess they move on to Adrian Beltre now.
In other moves, the White Sox re-signed first baseman/DH Paul Konerko to a 3 year, $37.5 million deal. Not a surprise, but I wonder if he would have signed with the Diamondbacks had the White Sox gone in a different direction.
The Cubs signed first baseman Carlos Pena to replace Derrek Lee at first base. Pena signed a 1 year, $10 millon deal, an effort to rebuild his market value for 2012. I have to agree with BP's Kevin Goldstein when he tweeted that Derrek Lee will have a better year than Pena in 2011.
Now that Carl Crawford has signed a 7 year deal, with Cliff Lee to follow, I am curious if the offers for Zack Greinke will stay as is, or if they will be sweetened by teams going after him. I could see Royals GM fielding multiple sweetened offers in the next few days.
As for Lee, I can see him signing in the next day or two.
The Cubs are in talks to deal for Rays starter Matt Garza. Two thoughts on this. I assume this means the Jeremy Hellickson era in Tampa begins in 2011. Secondly, I have to think that either Chris Archer or Brett Jackson are on their way to Tampa should this deal go down.