Coco Crisp traded to the Royals for Ramon Ramirez
RED SOX ACQUIRE RIGHTHANDED PITCHER RAMON RAMIREZ FROM
KANSAS CITY ROYALS FOR OUTFIELDER COCO CRISP
BOSTON, MA–The Red Sox today acquired righthanded pitcher Ramon Ramirez from the Kansas City Royals in exchange for outfielder Coco Crisp.
The announcement was made by Executive Vice President/General Manager Theo Epstein.
The 27-year-old spent the entire 2008 season with the Royals, going 3-2 with one save and a 2.64 ERA. He ranked among American League relievers with 21 holds (T7th), 71.2 innings (11th), 70 strikeouts (13th) and 71 appearances (10th), the 10th-highest total in Royals history.
He limited righthanded opponents to a .153 batting average, lowest in the A.L. and third in the majors among pitchers with at least 50 games. Only the Cubs’ Carlos Marmol (.103) and Philadelphia’s Brad Lidge (.105) ranked higher. In his career he has held righties to a .198 clip with an OPS of .586. He has a 2.14 ERA with 97 strikeouts and 44 walks in 105.0 career innings outside of Coors Field. In 2008, Ramirez was one of just three A.L. relievers with at least 70 strikeouts, 70 appearances and an ERA under 3.00, joined by Los Angeles’ Francisco Rodriguez and Chicago’s Matt Thornton.
Ramirez is 9-7 with one save, a 3.62 ERA and 146 strikeouts in 156.2 innings in 154 major league relief outings with Colorado and Kansas City. He made his major league debut with the Rockies in 2006, going 4-3 with a 3.46 ERA. He placed among National League rookie relievers in strikeouts (4th, 61), games (T6th, 61) and innings (T6th, 67.2). He was limited by two stints on the disabled list in 2007, spending most of the season with Triple-A Colorado Springs where he went 4-0 with a 2.28 ERA in 25 games. The righthander did make 22 appearances at the major league level, going 2-2 with a 8.31 ERA. Ramirez was originally signed by the Texas Rangers as a non-drafted free agent in 1996.
Crisp batted .283 with 7 home runs and 41 RBI in 118 games for the Red Sox in 2008. He stole 20 or more bases in each of his three seasons with Boston and had a 80.5 % success rate, second all-time among Red Sox players with at least 75 attempts. Overall, he batted .271 with 21 homers and 137 RBI in 368 games with Boston.
RAMON RAMIREZ–2008 AND MAJOR LEAGUE CAREER STATS
Team W-L ERA G GS SV IP H R ER BB SO
2008–Royals 3-2 2.64 71 0 1 71.2 57 23 21 31 70
ML Career 9-7 3.62 154 0 1 156.2 136 67 63 64 146
— RED SOX —
Red Sox Insider Blog 
After first I was like who the heck is this Ramirez guy, but after checking out his numbers, it looks like he can be an impact guy in the pen. Good deal I say.
Greg
Red Sox Ramblings: http://thevendahhh.mlblogs.com
You should havekept Crisp & got rid of Lugo. Please resign Varitek NOW! The Sox also need to get Alex Trezza from the Worcester Tornadoes in the CanAm league. He;s a great c atcher & his bat is HOT!
I think it’s a good trade. We get some pitching that we need and hopefully Coco will get some daily playing time. Now – resign Tek & PLEASE don’t trade Lowell!
voice – you probably don’t want to leave all of the conference call info on this post – even if you posted it after the call.
yeah…good call (no pun intended)…
Much as I’m sorry to see Coco go (and good luck to you, Coco!), the more I read about this, the better a move it looks like. Good going, this takes care of our bullpen need (possible alternate closer in addition to set-up man?)…Now we need a starter (although maybe we have him already in Buchholz?) and….we need to re-sign Varitek! ASAP! 🙂
P.S. Papelbon fans: When I say “alternate closer,” that’s all I mean….Papelbon is one of my all-time favorite members of the Red Sox, and he is THE closer…But it can never hurt to have depth there.
I’m cautiously excited about the preliminary news of Tazawa (sp) being made an offer. 🙂
So, “Voice,” let’s hear about the Tek situation…We’ve seen some press, but nothing here. I understand completely not commenting officially, but your readers have provided a fair amount of feedback on this already and I’m really curious what you think the–unofficial!–current front office calculus regarding Tek is…and I’m sure I’m not the only one. 🙂
To me, the bottom line seems fairly clear: The Red Sox really like Tek and, obviously, believe he’s been a huge contributor to the team for a long time. At the same time, the Sox need all bats on deck :-), especially since trading Manny (and regardless of possibly signing Tex), and having a near-guaranteed out (with some memorable exceptions!) in Tek this year was an issue.
So you have two basic questions: If Tek does not improve offensively, do his elite-level defensive and leadership contributions still make him worth paying up for? (Paying means years, dollars and–importantly–playing time.) And, what are the chances that Tek will improve offensively next year? The latter question is interesting…As I understand it, Tek has had some external distractions this year which may have contributed to a decline there. He may well bounce back big time next year. Imagine not re-signing him, only to see him hit .280 for someone next year.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
It’s great to get more bullpen help..Now they get Littleton, from the Rangers. I really liked Coca but not as a bench guy he needs to play everday and is very exciting to watch, GL to you Coca, I enjoyed watching you!! But my question is, where is Mark Kotsay in the mix and also Mike Lowell. I felt Kotsay really helped down the stretch when Lowell was injured and Youk went third while Kotsay played first. Is he still going to be with the Sox this up coming year…Its good to have someone who can play both first base and the outfield just in case an unfortunate injury comes up. Can anyne plzz fill me in on the Kotsay situation and TYVM, I have looked almost everywhere to see where he may be headed.. Please sign Lowell, Tek, and find a spot for Kotsay LOL TYVM for listening and my first time blog…
Yeah, I don’t really care one way or the other about this guy, and I am getting impatient with the red sox. com site, and tired of waiting to hear about the signing of Jason Varitek. It’s a no-brainer!! The man is a genius, we are lucky to have him……why are they waiting? What will happen on the fan’s side is that we want TEK, but no one is signing him, so when the ticket office opens…who will buy tickets? Not as many fans as expected because we are being ignored!! We want Tek, and we want him signed as soon as possible, BEFORE we fork-over our Hard-Earned dollars to buy tickets, and go on any Spring Training Trips!
I am awful sick of the waiting business, JUST DO IT !!!!
we need some new news…i’m getting bored with this press release about Ramon. Even if there is nothing exciting to report, can’t you make up some crazy Jerry Springer Thanksgiving story for us? Speaking of which…how was your Thanksgiving Insider?
bethany
http://tekett.wordpress.com