So the final day of the first week is upon us. Here are the current scores:

• German Red Sox: 699.84 vs. Wolfs GrittyHustlers 594.33
• DeNunez's Heater 516.34 vs. Devil Wears Prado 598.17
• Blowing Zephyrs (BZ) 406.67 vs. Green Fog (brogshan) 498.83
• Rogue is a Warlock 573 vs. The Mindtakers (Raj) 427.66
• Monsters of the Fens 475 vs. MY FN TEAM 479
• The Above Averages 541.67 vs Students Of The Game 498.84

Since there hasn't been a complete Draft Overview yet (atleast to my knowledge) I'll do one now:

Via Round:

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I wish all members of the best Red Sox community in the world a Happy New Year (Its allready '11 here in Germany,  you guys have to wait 4 hours and 45 minutes). This year,  i believe, the Sox will win it all again. I's so excited for the season to start. Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox !Go Sox !Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox! Go Sox!

I have to say that I'm very disappointed with the decisions by the Red Sox front office so far this offseason. Especially with what happened yesterday December 2nd. I have posted my opinion on most of these moves allready but i feel like summarizing them. Lets look at the decisions one by one:

Picking up the 12.5M $ option on David Ortiz

David Ortiz had very slow starts in back to back season. He came back strong though and finished with impressive numbers. 12.5M is certainly quite some money for an aging DH these days (compare him to Vlad, who had close numbers) but overall that was a reasonable decision by the Sox, since its just a one year commitment and Ortiz means more to the Sox than just the numbers.

Verdict: Good Move

Letting Victor Martinez walk for 4 Years and 50M $

This comes down to how long V-mart can catch. He basically has to acumulate 11 WAR to be worth his contract. 2.5 years catching should put him close to 10 WAR so i think it might be possible. The money was on the lower side of what we expected V-Mart to sign for. The judgement of that moves depends on the next one. So:

Resign Jason Varitek to 1 Year 2M $

This is simply by any means horrible, horrible, horrible. Cant phrase it any other way. That automatically makes not signing V-Mart to 4/50 bad for me, but let me explain. I believe that Tek wil be the backup with Salty starting. Salty has no options left, so he has to pass waivers to play AAA and he will never get through waivers. There might be a slim chance of the Sox trading Salty, but i doubt it. Too big of a mancrush by Theo. So the Red Sox with a 170M $ payroll will have a catching tandem that will have a hard time breaking 1 WAR. The Red Sox will therefore lose up to 2.5-4 WAR at the catcher position alone. Thats the reason why i dislike not signing V-Mart the dropoff at the position is HUGE.

Verdict Martinez: Bad Move

Verdict Varitek: Horrible Move

Tendering a contract to Papelbon

Another in my eyes a very bad move. Paps will make roughly 11M give or take a million. His steady decline will make a rebound unlikely. Without him rebounding, offering him arbitration next year to get draftpicks is extremly risky, since it will basically guarantee him 12M in arbitration a number so far above market, if he doesnt improve, that he will simply accept arbitration. So if he leaves the Sox will most likely get no draftpicks. That makes him extremly overpaid this year, since he wont generate picks very often and they are worth roughly 5M $. With this good relief free agent market spending that money on other, better and even cheaper players would have been the smarter move in my eyes.

Verdict Papelbon: Very Bad Move

Add to this the puzzling non tender to Taylor Buchholz and Andrew Miller!

The offseason is clearly not over yet but the Tek/Sal and Papelbon decisions really make me mad because I honestly believe that those severly lower our chances of making the postseason in 2011 and while I dont wanna jeopardize the future for 2011, I still believe that signing Vmart would have been better overall decision.

Hi Guys I hope you can answer a couple of questions for me. I plan to fly to New York and Boston in the begining of September. I want to get 2 Tickets for the Red Sox - Tampa Bay Rays Game on September 8th.

1. I checked out AceTicket and Stubhub, pretty expensive over there. These shop work like ebay right? So people are selling their tickets with a hefty profit.

2. I also checked out the ticket shop via the red sox homepage. Cheaper tickets but some pretty poor seats, obstructed view and shit, dont want those seats. Are there any other ways to buy tickets?

3. Maybe you can give me some advice where is a great place to sit for less than 125$ per ticket and where to get the tickets?

So the first week of the ORIGINAL OTM Fantasy League is almost over and we could use a Fanpost to trashtalk, talk matchups, trades or whatever you like.

Going into today:

• German Red Sox	369.00	Match Up
  Sox-Inda-South	311.00

• Boston Braves	280.50	Match Up
  PA Pandas (Sologub)	345.00

• BigRedDog42	246.50	Match Up
  Youk da Duke-upCHUCK	306.50

• Bloggy	256.50	Match Up
  BC USG	315.00

• tom(my) the bomb(ee)	318.00	Match Up
  Honey Nut Ichiros	263.50

• Bob Zupcic	323.50	Match Up
  Frosh Fifteen	326.50

So only one matchup is really close and the others seem to be decided allready. Have Fun all!

I was playing in a Keeper League with other Germans, but the league isnt renewed for the 2010 season, cause we dont have enough players. Since I wanna play atleast one fantasy league in 2010 i thought i might find one here or better just play a league with OTM members only.

So first is there even enough interest to play a 10, 12 or maybe 16 Team league? If you are interested please post which format you would prefer: Roto, H2H, H2H scoring, Keeper, Dynasty or whatever is out there. Which platform: ESPN, CBS, Yahoo etc., that are the only ones i know there a prolly way more. Some are free some cost like 10-20 bucks per person. I'm prolly not the best person to organize the league since my fantasy baseball knowledge is limited, only played 2 years (1 year free Roto on ESPN where basically 4 ppl were active while 6 did nothing after the draft and 1 year CBS H2H scoring keeper league), but i enjoyed it alot. I guess there is still enough time to setup a league for 2010 if there is enough interest.