BOS acquires Paul Byrd from CLE for a player to be named later.
Byrd is probably a better fit in the rotation than Charlie Zink, but this move doesn't make a ton of difference. Byrd is only striking out 3.85 per game as he rounds out his fifth straight season of declining strikeout rates. He's allowing more walks than last season, but still not many at 1.65 per game. The problem with Byrd is that he's allowing 1.58 homeruns per game and is a flyball pitcher. Now Fenway is pretty neutral on giving up homeruns, and actually suppresses them slightly, but the combination doesn't give confidence in long term success.
Obviously we don't know who the PTBNL is or will be, but what about it potentially being Zink?
DET to sign Freddy Garcia
I'm not really sure how healthy Garcia is, but he's almost got to be an improvement over Kenny Rogers. The one thing you can count on from Garcia is a K/BB ratio better than 1.68 (Rogers career) and probably double 1.13 (Roger's 2008 ratio). It's a no risk signing with a decent reward.