I seem to recall vague references to a bad elbow with Story back when we signed him. Probably part of why he was lower cost than some of the other bigger names. I could look at this two ways. The optimistic one would be that the reason he had a down year last season was because of his elbow and if they fix that, maybe he will come back mid-season and hit better. The other side of this is the risk that this becomes chronic and he plays essentially hurt for the rest of his time with Boston.
In either case though, without him, our line up gets even softer. Right now, it looks like we have an improved bull pen (probably upper end of the league), a soft line up (but probably middle of the pack for runs scored), and a very questionable starting pitching rotation (potentially near the bottom of the league).
It looks to me as though there will be at least two "prospects" in the regular pitching rotation (Bello and Winckowski maybe?), Casas at 1B, and probably a prospect at SS (to start the season anyway). Wong I guess also is a prospect who will be playing regularly as the second catcher.