if beltre leaves and a couple big bats (werth perhaps?) are not added to compensate for the loss of beltre and v-mart theo epstein has outlasted his usefulness as GM. have you ever seen a team with money to spend liek the red sox have shy away from making legitimate improvements to their team? time for theo to go

Regarding point number two- Any arbitration eligible player signed before December 1 automatically nets the team losing the player a draft pick(s), regardless of whether or not they were offered arbitration by their original team. Rules outlined here: http://wiki.soxprospects.com/MLB+Compensatory+Draft+Pick+System