Boston Red Sox: Recapping the Winter Meetings and What's Next

It was just over three full days of activity in Dallas, Texas—but not for the Boston Red Sox and their fans. 

While teams like the Marlins, Mets, Giants, Diamondbacks, Angels and even the Pirates all made minor or major deals the Red Sox will exit Dallas in much the same manner that they arrived. With a laundry list of needs and no concrete solutions—for now. 

As usual the Red Sox will also inherit their usual long list of critics for the lack of movement. There will be those that say they missed out on opportunities, are slow to react to the rapidly changing free agent and trade market and are of course suffering from discord and a lack of front office cohesiveness. 

Not one team in baseball has their roster set for Opening Day 2012 on December 8th, 2011. Even the Miami Marlins—a franchise acting like they've been possessed by the spirit of Monty Brewster ( maybe Hanley Ramirez will vote for "none of the above"? ) exits the Winter Meetings with potentially more question marks than they arrived with. After all, a week ago they knew who their best player was (Hanley Ramirez) and where he'd be playing next season.

The Red Sox did leave the winter meetings with one thing established. David Ortiz will return in 2012 as the team's designated hitter. That means that the Red Sox locked up the player with the highest 2011 OPS that was available over the winter meetings with the exception of Prince Fielder. Ortiz did have a higher 2011 OPS than Albert Pujols who will absurdly receive a 10-year contract from someone. 

Boston also re-signed Andrew Miller who was both inexpensive and unimpressive last season. Still Miller won't be costly and he's young enough to warrant waiting on a bit to see if he ever can harness his considerable talent. The Miller signing may signal an end of the line for long time Red Sox roster standby Tim Wakefield.  

There are still over two months until the celebrated New England tradition of " truck day" when large moving trucks show up at Fenway Park and bring all the needed equipment down to Florida for Spring Training.

That's plenty of time to take care of a few key issues.

The Red Sox need to establish a role for Daniel Bard in 2012—closer or starter and then react accordingly. If Bard is going to become the closer then the Red Sox will likely need to acquire two starting pitchers. One who is fairly high profile and one who would be a more cost effective option.

It's a five man rotation but at this point it's become fairly clear to most observers of the Boston Red Sox that entering the season with six to eight options for those five spots isn't just smart, it's probably necessary. 

Right field needs to be rectified as well. This position may actually hinge on Boston's starting pitching needs. The more trades the Red Sox feel compelled to make the more likelihood that Josh Reddick or Ryan Kalish or both could be on their way out of Boston in a trade.

If both of those chips are dealt then Boston will need to acquire an outfielder via free agency—someone like Carlos Beltran may be on the radar.  If one or both of those players remain in a Red Sox uniform then they will battle it out for the position in Spring Training. 

Will there be any "surprise" deals?  When you win 90 games and suffer through a statistically irrational final month to miss the playoffs there will be plenty of logic behind not making too many changes. Then again sometimes there are behind the scenes issues that everyone is not privy to that require more dramatic actions than most would expect. Could the Red Sox make a major deal and trade Kevin Youklis over the offseason?

Youklis is a complex player. A strong personality that will not appeal to all clubs but will inspire real appeal in some. Youklis is not too old, not too expensive and not too much of a clubhouse headache to deal. Of course those factors may make him well worth keeping as well.

Youklis made a move from first base to third base with mixed results last season. On the one hand Youklis didn't throw a fit a-la Hanley Ramirez when informed of the projected move. On the other hand, his fielding and overall durability were both impacted negatively last season.

Were Boston to deal Youklis they'd then have a major hole at third base. They could of course try and acquire a third baseman or they could wait until spring training and see if Will Middlebrooks, one of the team's top prospects is big league ready to man the hot corner. 

The Winter Meetings are over but the Hot Stove is just heating up. Yu Darvish, the Japanese ace, is to be posted later today. Prince Fielder is far from settled as well. Baseball has the best offseason and since the regular season was so painful Red Sox fans may as well enjoy the aftermath the best they can.