The Red Sox will hold out trying to lowball Dice-K [Matsuzaka]. And when I say hold out, I mean to the point where it becomes it was obvious just a blocking manuever to keep him from the Yankees. He wants $15Mx3Y, sox are offering 8Mperx4Y, "oceans apart". I've been told that if the Sox knew the Mets had the second highest bid ($38M), higher than the Yankees ($32M), they never would have bid $51.11 to win him. That comes from a very good source. Moreover, what I heard from the same source who is close to negotiations that what will happen is that Selig, Boras, and Seibu have a deal in place, where Boras pays Seibu $25 mil (1/2 the Red Sox bid) and he owns the rights to Matsuzaka, and puts him on the market BY X-MAS for the highest bidder, and Selig has signed off on it...
Could be hot air but I always figured the overshot on 51.1 million bid (13 mil. higher than 2nd place bid) was probably a block from a team always crying broke.
http://www.nj.com/weblogs/yankees/