"Dice"

Yes. Dice. Andrew Dice CLay? No, silly, Daisuke Matsuzaka. This is a baseball blog, remember?

Much has been made about how the large sum of money the Red Sox forked over for Dice ($103 million total) will be worth the investment if he can be a solid and consistent #1 or #2 starter. It is never mentioned, though, that this move has had an even further reaching, twofold effect on their hated rivals, the Yankees.

Yankee fans en masse were pencilling Matsuzaka into their 2007 rotations since the end of the World Baseball Classic. Certainly it stings to get outbid by your main rival for a potential stud. The Red Sox secretly got a second victory form this. Perhaps in part due to the unrest in Yankee Nation over missing on Daisuke, the Yankees went out and paid roughly $40 million in negotiation fees and salary for pitcher Kei Igawa. Igawa is being compared, on a regular basis, to Tomo Ohka. I don't think I need to explain further.

So the Red Sox not only outbid the Yankees for a top-of-the-rotation starter, but they simultaneously paniced the Yanks into grossly overpaying for a back end starter. That has to feel pretty good for Theo, even if he has continuied to ruin the spirit of Red Sox Nation to do it.