Yesterday, in an article titled “Sox Head Backwards”, Tony Massoratti of the Boston Herald tried to make the case that the Sox had regressed so far this off-season. I thought the piece ridiculous yesterday when I read it and now, having done a bit of a analysis, I think it more so. First, I thought I would tackle the contention that the Sox had lost ground thus far on its own merits. Then, I decided to take a look at it from another perspective – that progress for the Red Sox only matters in consideration with the New York Yankees. I will compare the moves baseball’s two powers have thus far executed.

The Red Sox have lost three major contributors to the 2004 team, with another key player, Jason Varitek, as yet unsigned. Orlando Cabrera, Pedro Martinez and Derek Lowe will all play for teams other than Boston in 2005. The Red Sox have replaced the three with Edgar Renteria, Matt Clement and David Wells. For the purposes of the analysis, I am going to look at what each departing player provided in 2004 and what might be reasonably expected of the three replacements in 2005. VORP, as most know, is Baseball Prospectus’ Value Over Replacement Player.

VORP for Departing Players:
Orlando Cabrera (time with Sox extrapolated to reflect Renteria’s PA’s): 38.0
Pedro Martinez: 51.2
Derek Lowe: -11.5
Total: 77.7

3-Year VORP for Incoming Players:
Edgar Renteria:
2002: 46.5
2003: 71.0
2004: 27.3
3-year mean: 48.3

Matt Clement:
2002: 46.9
2003: 23.9
2004: 36.9
3-Year Mean: 35.9

David Wells:
2002: 39.4
2003: 36.7
2004: 40.3
3-Year Mean: 38.8

Big caveat: there are obvious flaws with my analysis. Simply accepting one’s three-year weighted VORP average, though instructive, should not be taken as gospel projection. For instance, because of David Wells’ age, injury past and the inherent red flags that accompany being a fly ball, left-handed pitcher in Fenway he is a good candidate to regress a bit. So let’s call a safe VORP projection for Wells closer to 30. It works the other way as well. Given that Matt Clement is 29 years old and is coming off a season in which he struck out 9.45 batters every nine innings, I think he is a good bet to perform closer to the higher end of his three totals. Interestingly, his page on Baseball Reference shows that the most comparable pitcher for Matt Clement through age 29 is the San Francisco Giants’ Jason Schmidt. Here’s what Schmidt has done in his two seasons after age 29:

2003: 183 ERA+, 9.01 K/9, 0.95 WHIP
2004: 139 ERA+, 10.04 K/9, 1.08 WHIP

I want to be perfectly clear that I don’t think Matt Clement will replicate these two seasons – but it’s possible. And I think we can be confident that Clement will be probably around a 40 VORP pitcher in 2005. With respect to how we might tweak a projection for Renteria, I am going to leave the three-year mean alone because Renteria is in his prime and his seasons are all over the map without any discernible trend.

The key to all of this analysis is the enormous upgrade a merely good pitcher represents over Derek Lowe. Simply replacing the 2004 Derek Lowe with Wells or Clement (take your pick) means that it would be nearly impossible for the Red Sox to literally “head backwards”. Because Lowe pitched below replacement level this season, which is to say that a AAA pitcher with any sort of talent could have pitched significantly better than him, Matt Clement and David Wells are almost sure to out-pitch the 2004 versions of Derek Lowe and Pedro Martinez. Also, Edgar Renteria is a pretty good bet to outplay Orlando Cabrera.

Of course because there is another team in Boston’s division that will not stop at anything to acquire any player they wish, this analysis matters little without comparing changes to our southwesterly neighbors. Because both teams’ offensive moves are incomplete at this point, I am going to compare the teams’ starting rotations under the assumption that the Yankees will acquire Randy Johnson. I know I stated on Friday that I thought that Randy Johnson would represent an insurmountable upgrade for the Yankees, I have changed my tune after looking at the numbers. Again, we’re talking VORP. I know the formatting sucks. Sorry for that.

#1 Starters:
Schilling Johnson
2002: 70.3 78.6
2003: 51.2 14.6
2004: 72.9 69.3
Avg: 64.8 54.2

#2 Starters:
Clement Mussina
2002: 46.9 42.2
2003: 23.9 50.9
2004: 36.9 26.4
Avg: 35.9 38.7

#3 Starters:
Wells Pavano
2002: 39.4 3.9
2003: 36.7 22.3
2004: 40.3 62.4
Avg: 38.8 29.5

#4 Starters:
Arroyo Brown
2002: 26.3 -1.7
2003: 27.1 50.9
2004: 24.7 26.4
Avg: 26.0 28.0

#5 Starters:
Wakefield Wright
2002: 47.9 -15.9
2003: 28.2 -10.7
2004: 9.4 40.3
Avg: 28.5 4.6

2004 Totals:
Boston: 184.2
New York: 224.8

Three-Year Avg. Totals:
Boston: 194
New York: 155

Obviously, this all comes down to whether or not the Yankees were right to bet on career years from both Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright. If the two have established new performance levels, the Yankees undoubtedly will have the better staff. If the two revert back to their previous performance levels or split the difference between 2004 and previous seasons as I think they will, the Red Sox will probably have the better rotation. I am not going to issue any sort of prediction right now as I still don’t know whose is the better rotation. I do know, however, that this offseason has been a very good one so far for the Red Sox and attempts by local media hacks to pass it off as anything else should be passed over in favor of more reasoned and well thought-out work.