FanHouse Theo Epstein

Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.

It's been quite a decade for the Red Sox, who flipped an 86-year-old script in 2004 by winning a World Series and a second in 2007, but they enter this offseason behind a very familiar eight ball.

Yes, Boston made the playoffs for the sixth time in seven seasons in 2009, but after getting swept by the Angels in the American League Division Series and watching the Yankees win their 27th World Series just weeks later, it is once again the chaser.

The Red Sox have redefined success at Fenway Park over the last few years. Now the trick is to keep duplicating it, a task that's harder than ever with their more monied rivals to the south apparently rejuvenated.

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While we await the winner of the last Division Series to be settled, a few teams that have already finished their season are in the process of trying to find new managers who can get them to the postseason next year. Two of those teams, the Cleveland Indians and Houston Astros, have interest in a couple of coaches from the recently eliminated Boston Red Sox.

The Indians contacted the Red Sox to see if they could interview pitching coach John Farrell as it seems Farrell is Mark Shapiro's top candidate to replace Eric Wedge. Well, Theo Epstein said that Cleveland can talk all they want with Farrell, but odds are he's going to be staying in Boston.

The Red Sox and Marlins met Tuesday night for the first time since 2006. This was significant -- and only in a minor way -- not because it was the first time the two teams met since the fateful Josh Beckett-Hanley Ramirez (and other significant parts) trade, but because it was the first time where we could even begin to evaluate that swap with any historical perspective.

Back then, Ramirez was just a rookie shortstop with plenty of talent and two good months under his belt. Beckett, brought in as the presumptive ace, was struggling with the transition from the NL to the AL East and sported a bloated ERA hovering near 5.00 for a Boston team headed for a mighty fall in the second half.

SAN DIEGO -- If there were any doubts that Kevin Towers was a baseball lifer, they were answered on his wedding day.

Just before exchanging vows with his wife in December 1996, the Padres general manager exchanged players with Tigers GM Randy Smith, a member of his wedding party.

"Any time you get baseball people together, especially general managers, regardless of what the venue is or what the situation is, baseball will come up," Towers said. "We started talking about players while we were waiting for my wife to show up. She was running a little late, so we decided to consumate a deal, about 30 minutes before our wedding vows."

FanHouse continues its 2009 MLB Preview with a look at the Boston Red Sox.

In a little more than half of a decade, the fortunes of the Boston Red Sox have done a 180-degree turn. Once a franchise of managerial incompetence, front office ineptitude and fatally flawed teams, the Sox have become a well-oiled winning machine -- smarter than the Yankees, but with similar financial might.

On February 23, 2009, the people that brought us the statistical analysis websites Baseball Prospectus and Basketball Prospectus, launched their hockey counterpart, Puck Prospectus.

While hockey is somewhat behind the times when it comes to this sort analysis, it's not completely unheard of at this point. Gabriel Desjardins, for example, has been running the fascinating analytical website Behind The Net for a couple of years now, while there is also the little-known Corsi Numbers.

After the jump, we had an opportunity to ask Will Carroll, one of the leading people at Puck Prospectus, a few questions on what the site can provide hockey fans.

Actress Alyssa Milano has never been a stranger to the game of baseball. From her television debut as the daughter of a washed up baseball player on "Who's The Boss?", to her MLB-themed clothing line Touch, her Dodgers blog, and her penchant for dating pitchers, it's obvious that the woman loves her baseball.

She also has a pretty profound effect on the sport, particularly the pitchers she dates, and it's no doubt something Theo Epstein looked into before signing Penny to that one-year deal this winter. According to ShysterBall, Penny is in for a bad season.

The Red Sox have locked up two of their homegrown stars -- Kevin Youkilis and Dustin Pedroia -- to long-term deals this winter. Teammate Jonathan Papelbon will not follow suit.

Just this morning, Sean McAdam of the Boston Herald reported that it was likely Papelbon would become the first player in Theo Epstein's tenure as Red Sox general manager to have his arbitration case heard. As it turns out, Boston was able to come to an agreement with its All-Star closer before it got to that point, reportedly signing him to a one-year, $6.25 million deal.

This has to be considered a small victory for the Sox, especially considering Papelbon's expressed desire to set a new benchmark for closers and the acrimony that comes with any arbitration hearing.

For better or worse, this is Jim Rice's moment in the sun. The former Red Sox outfielder was elected to the Hall of Fame in his final try last week, and now everyone wants to hear what he has to say about anything and everything, no matter how misguided it is.

Enter intrepid Newsday reporter David Lennon, who asked Rice about failing to win a World Series during his playing career and got an answer that seems both faulty and unbecoming of a guy about to be enshrined in Cooperstown.

Other than a dalliance with Mark Teixeira, Boston's offseason has been almost entirely about tying up loose ends -- keeping the core that has brought so much success lately intact and building up the depth around it.

The Red Sox kicked off their winter by locking up American League MVP Dustin Pedroia for the next six years. In recent weeks, they've added a host of familiar faces to their bench and pitching staff -- including John Smoltz, Takashi Saito and Rocco Baldelli. Now, they're "close" to a contract extension with Kevin Youkilis that could keep him in Boston for the next five years and pay him $53 million, according to Tony Massarotti of the Boston Globe.