The Red Sox won the bidding for Daisuke Matsuzaka and it l the Cubs just inked Alfonso Soriano to a monster contract. And just like that, the two biggest chips of this offseason have been taken off the table. The rest of the dominoes are falling quickly, with Gary Matthews Jr. signing with the Angels and Carlos Lee likely to make his decision any day now.

AL EAST
BALTIMORE ORIOLES
    Miguel Tejada wants out, no free agents want Peter Angelos’s money, and the Orioles stink. If the O’s were smart they would trade Tejada to the Angels for Ervin Santana and Erick Aybar (which should be a no-brainer given that Los Angeles Anaheim Angels of Southern California lost out on the bidding for both Aramis Ramirez and Alfonso Soriano). Of course, being the Orioles they’ll probably just trade one of their best young pitchers for Tim Hudson and call it an offseason.

BOSTON RED SOX
    The Red Sox are probably going to sign J.D. Drew and Julio Lugo for about a gazillion dollars. They also just threw $51.1 million to the Seibu Lions just to have the honor of giving Matsuzaka a big multi-year deal. Something tells me that the whole “we can’t spend like the Yankees” line of reasoning just went out the window. And instead of re-signing fan favorite ‘dirt dog’ Trot Nixon, they’re going to replace him with Drew. When ‘Tissue Paper’ Drew goes on the DL in May with menstrual cramps, the fans’ reaction is going to make the A-Rod-NY thing look like a romantic comedy. Add in the fact that the team has no closer, nobody knows if Jonathan Papelbon’s ‘tired’ shoulder will be okay in the rotation, and the possibility that Drew may have to replace Manny Ramirez as the protection for Big Papi, and 2007 could be another massacre in Boston. I hate to give advice to a team I despise, but if I’m Theo Epstein I’m taking a long hard look at giving Eric Gagne an incentive-laden two-year contract.

NEW YORK YANKEES
    The Yankees just traded Gary Sheffield for three pitching prospects, the best of which is a kid named Humberto Sanchez. On the plus side, Sanchez looked great in the All-Star futures game and is considered among the top 20 pitching prospects in the game. On the down side, he got drafted out of Rockland Community College, which is the de facto junior college for kids from my high school. I know people who have played on the team there, and if that’s any indication of the competition that Sanchez is used to facing, he might turn out being like the pitcher from ‘The Scout.’ Not Steve Nebraska, the first guy Al Brooks finds. The one that refuses to come out of the bathroom and then winds up puking all over the mound before he gets a pitch off.

TAMPA BAY DEVIL RAYS
Remember about 6, 7 years ago when the Devil Rays spent a ton of money on free agents (Jose Canseco, Greg Vaughn, etc.) and decided it was high time for them to stop being competitive again? Wouldn’t it be funny if they did that again and threw ridiculous a ridiculous contract at Barry Bonds and traded three of their best prospects for Jamie Moyer and a bag of baseballs? Unfortunately for unintentional comedy fans everywhere, all signs point to the Rays actually doing something intelligent, like loosening up their logjam of young talent in the outfield by dealing for one of the Marlins’ young pitchers.

TORONTO BLUE JAYS
    Vernon Wells is one of the best outfielders in baseball, and GM J.P. Ricciardi (scared by the example of Jim Bowden getting cold feet at the trade deadline and ultimately losing Soriano for nothing) is dangerously close to making a gigantic mistake by trading him for far less than equal value. If I’m Ricciardi, there are only about 15 players in baseball that I would trade Wells for. Guess what, none of them play for Texas, and that’s the most likely destination for Wells.