[Dan]

Originally Posted by Kilroys

I would say yes, it was worth it. Nick Johnson did nothing until just this year except sit on the DL. This year he had a decent year, but it would have been his free-agent year if he hadn't signed an extension. I suppose we did lose the option of signing him to the extension, but we also missed out on an injury plagued '04, a semi-injury plagued '05, and an underachieving '05. Even '06 was not spectacular. As for Rivera - he had a decent half-season in '04, a worthless '05 and a good, but not spectacular '06. Navarro will never be more than a backup catcher quality. Halsey and Choate are no great loss. Johnson on the other hand had an excellent (though not vintage Johnson) '05 (although he did suck in the playoffs). A 17-8 record with a 3.79 ERA and 211 Ks is an ace performance. Think of how we would feel if those #s belonged to Moose. We'd say Moose had a spectacular year. Heck we'd say that about any pitcher pitching in the AL, with the exception of maybe Johan Santana.

Thus, in terms of value, I'd say that we got more value with Johnson's '05 than we lost in Rivera's and Nick Johnson's '06 and Rivera's decent, but not great half-season '04.

I can't even completely kill Johnson for the '05 playoffs because if it wasn't for his great performance in Fenway against the Red Sox in the final series of the regular season we wouldn't have even been in the playoffs.