Beckett extension imminent?

Is this real or smoke?

The Red Sox are moving closer to a four-year, $68 million contract extension with Josh Beckett that could be announced as soon as Monday.

A major league source confirmed the progress in the talks, which was first reported by Sports Illustrated. The deal is not finished, but general manager Theo Epstein and agent Michael Moye have agreed to continue talks beyond the start of the regular season, if necessary.

...

It is believed the Sox can save money on baseball’s luxury tax by waiting until after Opening Day to announce the deal.

If it's smoke, well, there's been a lot of it. It seems like that this will go through, which would be a good thing.

Beckett's been slightly overrated by Boston fans, I think, in comparison to his actual performance level, but the fact remains that he's a very good, pretty consistent, occasionally dominant starting pitcher, who makes about 30 starts per year. It would certainly take that, and probably more, to sign him next November.

Factoid: There are 67 pitchers who have made 75+ starts in MLB over the last three years. 31 of them, just about one per team, have done so with ERAs under 4.00. Three of those are John Lester (11), John Lackey (12) and Josh Beckett (19).