The Red Sox have signed righty starter Bartolo Colon to a minor league contract. Colon won the Cy Young Award in the American League three short seasons ago but he’s been dogged by rotator cuff problems the last two seasons. Colon has only pitched in 29 games (28 starts) the last two seasons with the Angels and he is 7-13 with a 5.90 ERA and a 1.56 WHIP! Colon has now pitched in 309 games (306 starts) in his major league career and he is 146-95 with a 4.10 ERA and a 1.33 WHIP. He is most likely toast but the Red Sox didn’t invest much in him so it’s worth the gamble.

The Red Sox will look the same as last season behind the plate. It appears that 36-year old switch-hitting catcher Jason Varitek is starting to slip a little bit with the bat. In the last two seasons, Varitek has played in 234 games and he is 198 for 800 (.248 avg) with 103 runs scored, 29 homers and 123 RBIs. He still does a good job of calling a game behind the plate as Red Sox pitchers had a 3.80 ERA when he caught them. He also threw out 23% of runners trying to steal on him which is about average. The Red Sox will need to monitor Varitek’s work load as he is starting to look his age on the baseball field.

As long as Tim Wakefield is effective, Doug Mirabelli will likely also keep playing. The 37-year old righty swinging Mirabelli is the only catcher around who can handle catching the knuckleball effectively. Mirabelli has a career batting average of .231 (.724 OPS) in 566 games. He does however have the power to hit a occasional bomb as he has averaged a homer every 25.1 at bats over his major league career.

30 year old Kevin Cash even makes Mirabelli look like a good hitter. He has played in 126 games in his major league career and he has a CAREER batting average of .167 (.488 OPS) with 111 whiffs in only 359 at bats. Cash is a good defensive catcher and that’s why he’s still playing ball.

PROJECTED GRADE FOR 2008: C

The Red Sox kicked the tires on trading for Johan Santana of the Twins but the price was deemed too high in talent. Plus, the Red Sox figured that they had enough starters but that has changed now with the major injury to Curt Schilling that could cause him to miss at least half, if not all of the 2008 season. Still, the Red Sox were probably smart to hold onto Jacoby Ellsbury, Clay Buchholz and John Lester as they were the players the Twins wanted the most. Sean Casey was the biggest signing this off season for the Red Sox and he won’t likely get much playing time as long as the starters are healthy. Still, getting a batter with a .301 career averaged for 700K is always a solid move. The pitching staff is pretty much set but the Red Sox brought in a ton of non-roster invitees to battle for jobs at the front of the bullpen. Danny Kolb, Matt Miller, Dan Miceli and David Aardsma have the best shots of winning a job out of the non-roster guys.

FRONT OFFICE GRADE FOR THE OFF SEASON: C

The Red Sox have signed 36-year old Matt Miller to a minor league contract. Miller is a sidewinder who’s hard on righty swingers. He only pitched in 1 game last season for the Cleveland Indians and he was 0-0 with a 0.00 ERA and a 2.00 WHIP. Miller has now pitched in 100 games in his major league career and he is 6-1 with 2 saves, a 2.72 ERA and a 1.19 WHIP. This was a good low risk/high reward signing for the Red Sox.

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The Red Sox have re-signed Bobby Kielty and Junior Spivey. 31-year old switch hitting Bobby Kielty signed a non guaranteed major league contract so he will have to make the team to get paid. Kielty played in 33 games last season with the A’s and Red Sox and he was 19 of 87 (.218 avg) with 10 runs scored, 1 homer and 12 RBIs. Kielty has now played in 599 games in his major league career and he is 456 of 1,792 (.254 avg, .756 OPS) with 257 runs scored, 53 homers and 253 RBIs. 33-year old righty swinging Junior Spivey last played in the majors in 2005. He has now played in 457 games in his major league career and he is 419 for 1,553 (.270 avg, .790 OPS) with 258 runs scored, 48 homers and 201 RBIs.

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