Larry Lucchino

Red Sox president and CEO Larry Lucchino rebutted claims that his team is scaling back its spending this offseason, saying in multiple settings that his team plays on blowing past the $178 million luxury tax payroll and suggesting that the Sox will exceed the $189 million franchise payroll record, which was set last season.

In an appearance on Sirius/XM MLB Network Radio’s “Inside Pitch,” Lucchino painted a picture of a far-reaching commitment by team owners to the payroll, both over the duration of the group’s tenure (which began in 2002) and in 2012.

“Look at what we’ve done and not what we say. Since we have been here — we are now beginning our 11th year — our payroll has consistently been at the top end of Major League Baseball,” said Lucchino. “It has not been No. 1. That position has been reserved, probably permanently, for the New York Yankees, but it has been second most every year, and we have invested lots of money in amateur draft picks. We sign our draft picks at a much higher percentage than used to be the case. We’ve invested in international signings — you can look at some of our Cuban players and some of our Japanese players — and so we have invested dollars into this franchise because we recognize that the fundamental question about a franchise and about its ownership is, is there a commitment to winning. I think that our track record demonstrates that there is that commitment.

“Now, this year, if you want to talk specifically about 2012, we will have the highest payroll in the history of the Boston Red Sox in 2012,” Lucchino continued. “Will we eclipse the luxury tax threshold? To be sure, we will — once again. So I think the talk of us not spending needs to be viewed in the context of real facts and in comparisons to real dollars.”

In earlier comments to MLB.com, Lucchino also disputed the notion that the Red Sox’ spending has been impacted by the Fenway Sports Group’s ownership of the Liverpool Football Club.

“That has not been the case,” Lucchino said of the idea that the Red Sox ownership group was channeling its resources towards soccer players. “There has not been a situation where that was cited for a reason for us not to do something here.”

Asked for how he feels when his team is characterized as being “cheap,” Lucchino suggested amusement.

“It makes me laugh. It just proves the old adage that you can’t please all of the people all of the time. You certainly can’t please all of the sportswriters much of the time. But that’s OK,” said Lucchino. “What’s important to us is that our fans realize that we are in this to win it, and we operate accordingly.

“Are there financial constraints from time to time? Of course there are. No one has an unlimited budget to do absolutely everything they want to do. But with some common-sense parameters, as I said, we’re going to have the highest payroll in the history of the Boston Red Sox this year, and the commitment to winning from the very highest levels — John Henry, Tom Werner — throughout the entire organization, there is a powerful sense of obligation that our job is to commit to win, provide our fans with entertaining, competitive, winning baseball.”

(For a detailed look at the Red Sox payroll, click here.)

Lucchino also touched on a number of additional topics. Among them:

The status of free agents Jason Varitek and Tim Wakefield, who remain unsigned but have been offered minor league contracts with invitations to major league spring training by the Sox: “We’re hopeful that those guys will make decisions before spring training starts as to whether they would like to come back. They have each been invited to come to camp. But Tim is approaching his 46th year I think. Jason Varitek is approaching his 40th year. Those things are hard decisions. They have both been enormously valuable to the club,” said Lucchino. “Whenever they choose to retire — and retirement is inevitable at some point, obviously, whether it’s this year or its next year — we will always have a place of respect and admiration in the Red Sox organization. But the decisions are now kind of in their hands as to what they’d like to do in this particular season.”

On the scheduled arbitration hearing for David Ortiz: “It will be an interesting arbitration, because we both love and admire David Ortiz — both sides do,” said Lucchino. “No one is going to deny David Ortiz is a key part of this franchise and has been in many ways the face of the franchise for a long time. We love the guy and our fans respect him enormously as well.

“There was a difference of opinion between his agents and our people as to what the market would suggest would be a fair contract. In circumstances like that, baseball allows players to avail themselves of this arbitration mechanism. … It looks like we’re going to do that barring some last-minute settlement, and then we’ll move on. But he’s a signed player for the Red Sox no matter what happens. It’s just a question of whether he gets paid X or he gets paid Y for 2012.”

On whether he regrets the team’s decision to sign Carl Crawford to a seven-year, $142 million contract last offseason: “Life is a motion picture, not a still photograph. Don’t take a still photograph of year one of a seven-year deal and use it to conclude that the deal has been a success or been a failure,” said Lucchino. “We have enormous success for Carl Crawford. We know well the body of his work over several years in the big leagues. And he is going to be a key player and a key performer for this team both in 2012 and for several years thereafter. We still have a lot of optimism about the Carl Crawford who will take the field in 2012.

“Performance is not a linear thing. Players don’t perform better in year five than they did in year four and better in year six than they did in year five,” he added. “There is some variation that’s inevitable in human conduct and human performance. We just prefer to rely on the body of work that Carl has behind him. I think he’s going to make an enormous contribution and become a very popular player here in Boston.”

The Red Sox nearly dealt for A's starter Rich Harden just before the trade deadline. (AP)

According to MLB Network and NESN analyst Peter Gammons (via twitter), right-hander Rich Harden underwent season-ending surgery to repair his right shoulder. Gammons tweeted: After 5 years of ‘always being hurt’ with a torn capsule, Rich Harden last week had surgery, aiming to come back in 2013–healthy. Finally.

The development offered a reminder of the trade to which the Red Sox and Athletics agreed on July 30 (one day before last year’s trade deadline) only to have the Sox call off the deal upon reviewing Harden’s medical records. The deal would have sent Harden to the Sox for first baseman Lars Anderson and a player to be named (both Raul Alcantara and Brandon Workman were on a list of players from which the A’s could select a player).

Harden, who turned 30 following the season, was 2-1 with a 4.30 ERA, 30 strikeouts and 10 walks in 29 1/3 innings at the time of the almost-trade. Though the Sox thought that he was unlikely to make more than a handful of starts down the stretch, Harden remained healthy enough to make 10 starts over the final two months of the season, albeit with mixed results. He struck out an impressive 61 batters (and walked 21) in 53 1/3 innings, but went just 2-3 with a 5.57 ERA while averaging 5 1/3 innings per start.

Erik Bedard, the pitcher whom the Sox ended up adding after missing out on Harden, struggled with injury issues of his own with the Sox. The left-hander made eight starts and pitched just 38 innings, going 1-2 with a 4.03 ERA while striking out 38 and walking 18.

While the Red Sox have remained open to the idea of adding depth to their rotation, according to a major league source, the team had not explored the possibility of signing Harden this offseason.

In a recent report from the Cincinnati Enquirer, Jocketty said that the Reds have had no recent talks with Oswalt.

“It’s all rumors,” Jocketty said to the Enquirer. “I’m sick and tired of it. We’ve had no serious talks. We’ve had no contact with the player.”

The Red Sox had reportedly been in talks with Oswalt, but in a report Monday from WEEI’s Rob Bradford, there has been “no traction” in the talks.

The 34-year-old Oswalt is coming off a 2011 season in which he went 9-10 with a 3.69 ERA pitching for the Phillies.

UPDATE: According to a major league source, McGrath received a $400,000 signing bonus from the Red Sox.

McGrath will travel to Fort Myers for just more than a week during spring training, but then return to Australia where he won’t graduate from high school until December. The 6-foot-3 southpaw will also pitch in the under-18 Nationals for a third time, having already shown the best velocity (approximately 91 mph) of any Australian pitcher to throw in the tournament.

According to one major league source, there were 15 big league organizations interested in McGrath, who narrowed down his decision to three teams at the end. A longtime Red Sox fan, McGrath turned down richer offers from other teams in order to sign with the Sox, the source added. The Red Sox were represented at Tuesday’s signing by the organization’s scouting director for the Pacific region, Jon Deeble, who first saw the big lefty pitch four years ago.

McGrath was thought to be leaning toward playing college baseball in the United States until recently. He was thought to have drawn the most interest from major league clubs of any Australian teenager in at least the past 10 years.

(at tip to Sons of Sam Horn.)

Hughes has more than four decades of experience as a scout and front office member. Baseball America named him one of the top 10 scouts of the 20th century. Hughes worked for nine years in the Cubs front office before resigning his post as special assistant last September after the firing of former Chicago GM Jim Hendry.

Former Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein reflected on his time in Boston and gave his thoughts on the Red Sox' off-season. (AP)

FAIRFIELD, Conn. – Speaking at an event at Sacred Heart University, Theo Epstein and Brian Cashman both gave some insight into what offseasons are like for them when it comes to making deals to improve their ball clubs. Epstein also reflected on his 10 seasons in the Red Sox organization and the impetus for his departure to become president of baseball operations with the Cubs following the 2011 season.

For general managers, the offseason is all about improving their teams for the next season and beyond. Epstein and Cashman would know better than anyone what this process is like. The two agreed that sometimes the deals that get the most publicity and public approval rarely pan out as planned.

“As a GM I get buyer’s remorse on every move that I make,” Cashman said. “When trades get resounding [approval] it is like you’re getting set up. I do cringe every time there is positive publicity. You don’t win on deals — you win on the field.”

Epstein agreed, citing the example of the Carl Crawford signing last offseason.

Crawford signed a seven-year, $142 million contract in December of 2010 and in his first season with the Red Sox he batted .255 (the lowest of his career) with a .289 OBP (again, the worst of his career), .691 OPS, 11 home runs, 56 RBIs and just 18 steals.

“Ultimately [it] comes down from the players. The moves that get the most approval from the fans and media sometimes don’t work out,” Epstein said. “Last winter was good example. Crawford had a tough first year. The more public the move, the less likely it will work out in the long haul. Organizations are made through lower level moves and through the drafts. … In reality you’re not building a team for one season; you’re building an organization. It does take years and years of slow grinding and building work.”

Epstein’s belief that sometimes the smaller moves are the better ones might explain his take on the Red Sox’ offseason thus far, in which the Red Sox have not been as active in the free agent market as in years past.

“[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.”

The former Red Sox general manager went into detail about what exactly took place back in 2005 when he resigned as general manager of the team on Halloween and sneaked out of Fenway Park in a gorilla suit. Later he went to South America for five days.

“That was a time of conflict of what organization stood for. I didn’t agree with the values the ownership had of running the Red Sox. You have to be all in when you’re a general manager.  You use up a lot of energy and sacrifice your personal life. If you’re not all in you can’t do it,” he said. “Due to an internal conflict, I didn’t like what the organization came to stand for. There were a lot of internal politics. I didn’t want to sign a long-term contract with an organization [where] I didn’t stand for their values. I said no thanks and took some time away.

“The owner got more involved and we discussed what we wanted the organization to stand for. We talked through the process, the values and we got on same page and it was great. In hindsight I could have accomplished the same thing without leaving, but at the same time I am glad I did what I did.”

After winning two World Series titles in Boston and rebuilding the organization’s minor league system, Epstein was ready to move on and face a new challenge in rebuilding the Cubs organization.

“The [Cubs] job represents a great new challenge. That is just the way I am wired; I tend to get a little bit restless in places. I believe in change, rebirth and new challenges,” said Epstein. “The experience in Boston was so meaningful to me in so many different ways that I felt like I couldn’t go just anywhere as I looked around the baseball landscape. The fact that you only live once and try to be in a lot of different places and do different things, I couldn’t find many places that carry that type of meaning. I didn’t want to go anywhere because it was a nice situation, or because the weather was nice. Because the Cubs haven’t won in 103 years and have a fan base that wants a winner, the job connected with me. That is what makes it fun.”

The Red Sox are unlikely to sign free agent starter Roy Oswalt. (AP)

WORCESTER — The Red Sox have been engaged in talks with any number of free agents throughout the offseason, and according to a team source, the team continues to talk to pitchers Roy Oswalt and Edwin Jackson. That said, Sox GM Ben Cherington said that he does not expect the team to add either pitcher in the coming days.

“We wouldn’t rule out adding a starter, but I think it’s unlikely at this point,” said Cherington. “I think we’re going to keep looking for ways to improve the team, including the pitching staff, but I wouldn’t expect any major changes between now and the [spring training] report date.”

Cherington is comfortable with that approach. While there are parts of the roster that remain undefined, and several jobs (the last two spots of the rotation, the division of labor at shortstop and right field, the roles in the bullpen) will be subject to spring training competitions, the Sox GM feels that his team is in good shape with the reporting date for pitchers and catchers now less than three weeks away.

“There’s elements we feel really good about and elements that we’d like to be stronger, just like any year,” said Cherington. “We think the lineup is, we hope, a pretty balanced lineup. We think we have some options with the bullpen. That can be a strength. We like the front of the rotation. We’re going to find out more about the end of the rotation in spring training and see which guys step up. That will be a big focus of spring training.”

The Sox roster will remain a work in progress throughout the spring, and indeed, it will likely continue to be reshaped throughout the season. Assuming that the Sox do not commit the needed salary to add a starter like Oswalt or Jackson, the Sox will have money available to have a measure of flexibility to make trades and address needs as they emerge during the season.

That formula worked spectacularly for the 2011 Cardinals, who were able to add a starting shortstop (Rafael Furcal), starting pitcher (Jackson) and relievers (Octavio Dotel and Marc Rzepcynski), all of whom ended up playing key roles in a late-season surge towards the World Series. While mindful of the success of St. Louis, however, Cherington cautioned that a team could not assume that it could replicate it.

“We know that teams evolve. We know that our team has evolved. That doesn’t mean you don’t want to go into spring training with every position perfect and the team filled out, because optimally you would. That’s never the case,” said Cherington. “This year, we do have some competition. We have some questions to answer. Hopefully we’ll get some of those answers in spring training. We may not get all of them answered in spring training. We may have more work to do as we get into the season, evaluate and see how guys respond. The roster may evolve over the course of the season, as has been the case with every team.

“The Cardinals are the obvious recent example of a team doing that, but you can’t count on that. You can’t count on that and end up in the same spot they did. All we can do, we have the guys we have now and we’ll keep looking for ways to add to that group and we don’t know when those opportunities are going to come.”

That said, Cherington does feel that a solid foundation exists for the 2012 Red Sox.

“We’re confident that the group we have has a chance to be really good,” said Cherington, “and we’ll do everything we can to add to that if there are opportunities.”

The roster was all but set prior to the first pitch of spring training. At the margins, there were a couple of small questions, chiefly related to the 12th pitcher on the staff to break camp at the start of the season (the big winner having been…Dennys Reyes, whose addition to the roster cost the Sox a bit more than $900,000 for a pitcher who gave up three runs in 1 2/3 innings spanning four appearances). But otherwise, the Red Sox approached the spring like a group that had answered nearly all of its roster questions prior to the start of the regular season. That doesn’t mean that members of the team failed to work hard or purposefully, but work behind the scenes is different from a dogfight for a roster spot or role.

And so, when the team got off to one of the worst starts in franchise history, losing its first six games and then going 2-12, that lackluster spring training was blamed by some for the team’s flat-footed beginning of 2011 — a start that, of course, proved costly given that the Sox missed the postseason by one game.

This year, the Sox will take a different approach. There will be a host of positions that are awaiting definition, with the team having open competitions for playing time.

The Sox will have Daniel Bard, Alfredo Aceves, Vicente Padilla, Aaron Cook, Andrew Miller, Felix Doubront and Carlos Silva (among others) competing for the last two spots in the starting rotation. The team will have Mike Aviles and Nick Punto trying to assert themselves as primary shortstop options. In the outfield, Cody Ross and Ryan Sweeney will have the chance to lay claim to a role as the team’s primary right fielder (once Carl Crawford returns from his injury). Spots will also be up for grabs in the bullpen, where the pitchers in the rotation competition will join others such as Michael Bowden, Matt Albers and Franklin Morales in a scrum for the final spots.

“We like [competition] for spring training. We’ve had years where we haven’t had a ton of competition for the team. Some level of competition is healthy and it gives [manager Bobby Valentine] and the staff a chance to evaluate players when they’re in a little bit more of a legitimate setting,” said Sox GM Ben Cherington. “Spring training isn’t the best time to evaluate players, but when guys are trying to win a job, you’re seeing a version of them that’s closer to the real thing.

“We think there’s some benefit to having a team that’s not just going through spring training getting ready for Opening Day, but going through spring training with a purpose and something at stake. We’ll have that this spring.”

Valentine is mindful of the fact that it is difficult to hold legitimate and meaningful competitions in the spring. At the same time, he did note that there is value to the idea of having players working to win unsettled roster spots.

“I wish that the roster was extended through April so we could have real competition under the lights,” said Valentine. “I think it’s a misleading situation if they just think they’re competing on results. I don’t believe so much in results, but what we see and what there is, that’s how we’ll judge the competition. …

“[But] I think it’s always good for guys to feel like they have a chance to work and to make the team so that they work a little harder, because the more you work and practice, the better foundation you have to last the entire season.”

That, of course, is precisely where the 2012 Red Sox are looking to improve in comparison with their 2011 predecessor, a team that was as good as any team in baseball from May through August but whose season was sabotaged by its struggles at the beginning and end of the year.

Manny Ramirez might get another shot in the majors. (AP)

A’s assistant general manager David Forst, during a Q&A with fans at a team event Sunday in Oakland, said the team would consider signing Manny Ramirez.

“We’re open to it,” said Forst, backing up a comment from owner Lew Wolff last week. “We do have other things going on, and we expect other additions between now and Opening Day. We have never been in a situation where we had too many good players.”

Ramirez, who started last season with the Rays but abruptly retired after failing a drug test, must serve a 50-game suspension for his second violation of baseball’s policy on banned substances before he can suit up.

The former Red Sox slugger would turn 40 on or about the day he would be eligible to play.

“I think at this point it’s probably still speculation,” A’s manager Bob Melvin said, adding: “There’s probably some momentum to it, but certainly not anything that I’m in position right now to comment on.”

It was reported by ESPN.com’s Buster Olney earlier this week that the Red Sox had offered Oswalt a one-year deal worth approximately $5 million. Joe Strauss of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Wednesday that the Cardinals’ offer approached $5 million.

According to a major league source, the Red Sox would be content in waiting to use any financial flexibility they might have down the road instead of getting in a bidding war for a player like Oswalt (or free agent pitcher Edwin Jackson).