It's true... Sometimes the best moves are the moves you don't make.
As our good friend Mibby pointed out on Wednesday, the Homer Bailey extension is, "the single most defining move made by Walt Jocketty and the Reds ownership this offseason." Some analysts love the move, some hate it, and most are somewhere in between.
Count Dave Cameron as one of those in the middle - Cameron basically says the Reds probably over-payed for a "good-not-great" pitcher. However, he concedes there are, "plenty of scenarios where this deal works out just fine." The other good news is that Bailey's price tag isn't ridiculous enough to prevent the Reds from trading him (should they decide they need to down the line). In short, it's a deal like many Walt has made over the years: probably too much money, but reasonable enough to make some sense.
Baseball Prospectus has a more optimistic outlook - Sam Miller notes that long-term deals for pitchers carry obvious risks, but given the market the Reds may have a bargain in Bailey. Consider...
Tanaka cost the Yankees $175 million over a seven-year commitment. The Reds will get Bailey for less than 60 percent of that. The Reds probably could have justified spending $10M, $20M, maybe $30M more. As it turned out, locking Bailey up wasn't that difficult after all.
Speaking of transactions, FanGraphs "The Worst Transactions of the 2014 Off-Season" - Making the list are the Diamondbacks signing Bronson Arroyo and the Rangers signing Shin-Soo Choo. At one point or another, the possibility of these guys returning to the Reds seemed at least plausible. Many fans wanted as much. While Arroyo and/or Choo would have undeniably helped the 2014 Reds, the cost was simply too much for each.
What if Chapman didn't throw so hard? - More from FanGraphs. It's kind of a strange concept for an article. Unsurprisingly, they conclude that Aroldis wouldn't be as good without elite heat.
Jonah Keri has his first MLB Power Rankings for 2014 - The Reds crack the top ten, however Keri writes, "I already hate this ranking." The poopy birds come in at number one...