I just spent 30 minutes trying to think of a word to describe the whole free agency "situation" surrounding Jason Varitek. My pre-post draft looks something like this: screw-up, mistake, abomination? I finally decided on the word snafu.

sna?fu [sna-foo, snaf-oo]
noun
1. a badly confused or ridiculously muddled situation.

Yeah, that fits perfectly. The situation largely revolves around this: the Red Sox need the veteran presence of Jason Varitek for at least another year while they try to groom a catcher, BUT they don't think he's worth $12m a year on the open market (and he's not.)

Here is where it gets even more messed up, the Red Sox offered Jason Varitek arbitration (he would make $10m on a 1-year contract) but he turned it down. This can be attributed to one of two things, either he won't settle for anything less than a 2 year deal OR he vastly underestimated the free agent market for a 36 year old catcher that hits .230.

Oh, but that is far from the end of the story. It was leaked last weekend that Jason Varitek wasn't aware that a team would have to give up a draft pick to sign him. So not only was Tek and his agent (Scott Boras of course) banking on a 2 year deal for over 10 million a year but they were counting on a team giving up a draft pick as well.

The Red Sox have Varitek backed into a corner and they know it. They've given him a contract offer of 1 year (with a club option second year) for $5 mil. He has until Friday to accept or decline the contract.

Yeah, I'd say snafu works just fine.