[情報] Tom Caron Interview Theo Epstein
http://www.boston.com/sports/ot/2009/01/tc_with_theo_epstein.html
TC with Theo Epstein
Posted by Tom Caron, NESN Staff January 29, 2009 05:58 AM
Red Sox executive vice president and general manager Theo Epstein thinks he has
his club ready to make another charge into October. There are obviously more
moves to be made -- unless you're comfortable with a Josh Bard/George
Kottaras/Dusty Brown combination behind the plate -- but Epstein has received
praise for making moves that should improve the club.
He missed out on signing free agent Mark Teixeira, but the additions of Brad
Penny, John Smoltz, and Rocco Baldelli fill needs and round out a roster that
made it to Game 7 of the ALCS last year.
I spoke with Epstein about the finances of building a team in a recession, the
key off-season additions, and keeping up with the Joneses in the AL East.
TC: How much do you have to keep the state of the economy in mind as you make
deals? What could happen to the future of baseball in this economy?
Epstein: Obviously, no one has the answer to what’s going to happen to this
economy on the whole, and more specifically its impact on baseball in 2009. All
things being equal, we just felt the more flexibility we could maintain, the
better. It gives us the ability to read and react, which is never a bad thing.
If you have younger, more cost-controlled and affordable talent, when is that
ever a bad thing? In these economic times it could prove to be a very valuable
thing.
TC: How do your off-season moves thus far compare with the plan you had going
into November?
Epstein: Actually, you don’t go in with one plan. You go in with several
different versions of a plan because you’re never sure if you’re going to be
able to land certain players and you’re never sure if certain trades are going
to come to fruition. The theme, I guess, is that we felt we had a really good
team coming back. We didn’t have any desperate needs at any one position per
se. We were returning a team that was really, really injured and still came
within one big hit of getting to the World Series with a lot of young players
that should get better. We felt if we were going to make moves we wanted to
find potential impact players, whether it be a big free agent or a number of
shorter-term deals with potential impact players who are coming off an injury
or coming off a down year. So we’ve ended up really following that second
path, and we like the players we’ve signed.
TC: It appears you’ve been able to improve this club without getting tied up
in too many long-term contracts. You have a lot of one-year deals in place. Is
that something you had hoped to do?
Epstein: I hope we’ve improved the club. I think that we have, but time will
tell. Things look a certain way in the off-season and they have to play out
during the season. In our situation, there are two factors that led us down the
path of preferring shorter-term deals. Obviously, with the right player in his
prime, we’re always willing to extend a longer-term deal. We have a really
good core of young players and we have a good farm system, so you don’t
necessarily want to block those players with long-term commitments to players
who might be on the wrong side of the age curve. Also, the economy. There seems
to be a downturn in the market for player salaries. It may get worse in 2009
when the economy really hits baseball, and so if it’s a down-turning market
you don’t necessarily want to get caught up in long-term commitments as the
market tends to decrease. With that kind of uncertainty, it’s better to keep
our flexibility, and compared to other big-market teams, we have only a
fraction of their commitments going forward, yet we still have a lot of talent
under control, so I hope we find that a nice position to be in.
TC: You seem to have gotten a couple of guys at the right time. A year or two
ago, Brad Penny and Rocco Baldelli would’ve cost you a lot more money for a
lot more years.
Epstein: The contracts are low-risk and high-reward. I think that’s an
important part of it. Players’ careers are really volatile, so if you’re
going to invest in a player in free agency — unless it’s absolutely the right
player — sometimes you want to look for the little valleys in their careers so
you can get them on the right turn rather than buying high. It’s not an easy
thing to do, and we’re not going to hit on all these guys, but if we hit on
one or two of them it’ll be worthwhile.
TC: What does the addition of John Smoltz do for you? What can he give you at
this stage of his career?
Epstein: He’s coming off major surgery, but we saw him throw a bullpen
[session] and it was fantastic. He threw all his pitches, he threw hard, his
arm was working really well. He’s just a bit of a physical freak who defies a
lot of the rules. He’s never been bad; he’s never even been average. He’s
always been a dominant guy, so you feel like a combination of his quick
recovery to date and [the advice of] our medical staff, if we can get him back
on the mound we have a chance to have a dominant guy that’s valuable.
TC: I know you pay a guy to perform on the field, but Smoltz has got to bring
intangibles to the clubhouse that very few people could bring.
Epstein: Yeah, he does. He’s obviously a winner. He’s incredibly experienced.
He’s got a certain swagger about him. He’s as uber-competitive a guy as you
could find. Talking to a lot of players who have been through the Braves’
clubhouse over the years, he’s a guy who stands out as really having a
positive impact both directly and indirectly on other people’s careers. What’
s not to like with a guy like that? As long as we can get him back to good
health.
TC: You’ve often said you won’t react to what they’re doing in New York and
Tampa. That said, you’ve got a lot of games to play in the division. Is it as
tough as any division in baseball?
Epstein: It is. I think the teams in this division have to hold themselves to
an awfully high standard. Eighty-five, 95 wins, whatever it may be, I think that
’s harder to attain in this division than just about anywhere else. You don’t
build your team to face any one individual team, but I think you have to build
a talented, deep team with plenty of redundancy and reinforcements just to hope
to contend in this division.
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