Buchholz sent down to Portland

[Rdsxmbnt]

I'm extremely disappointed this is the way it had to be but Clay just has nothing right now. Someone made a huge mistake switching around his mechanics. His straight overhand rotation made the change-up extremely hard to pickup and the curveball deadly also. Hopefully by pitching in AA rather than AAA he can work where he has had success and hopefully get back on track. Still far far too early to give up on him, but as for contributing this year it is.

[TheKilo]

It's the right move. When you have more confidence in David Pauley pitching better than Buchholz he needs to be sent down.

 

Looking forward to his contributions in 2009.

[Cocos Disciples]

Yeah that should be it for him this year. Is Pauley who we called up?

[Thumper]

Can't say I'll miss him. He should have been sent down earlier in my opinion.

 

Best of luck to him.

[dreilly]

Can't say I'll miss him. He should have been sent down earlier in my opinion.

 

Best of luck to him.

 

I agree.

[example1]

Yep. There's missing spots, giving up cheap hits and getting nervous; then there's getting rocked. He was regularly getting rocked and it's not what this team needed and its not what he needed.

[BigPapiEnFuego]

Overdue. But i feel bad. I thought he was going to be great this year.

[Jasonbay44]

Hopefully he figures it out and does better next year.

[BoSox21]

for those wondering, with off-days today and Monday, the speculation is that Wakefield could be ready by the time the team next needs a 5th starter so I'd expect another bullpen arm to be called up

[Mr Crunchy]

i wonder if his penthouse playmate will follow him....to portland...

jesus

talk about a demotion

[Dojji]

Yow. Message sent, I guess.

 

Any chance of maybe seeing Bowden this year? Or would that qualify as "repeating your mistakes?"

 

(actually considering that he's 21, I wouldn't be shocked at all to see Bowden get a full year of AAA before even being added to the 40-man roster)

[rician blast]

Yow. Message sent, I guess.

 

Any chance of maybe seeing Bowden this year? Or would that qualify as "repeating your mistakes?"

 

(actually considering that he's 21, I wouldn't be shocked at all to see Bowden get a full year of AAA before even being added to the 40-man roster)

 

I was wondering about Bowden too then thought the same thing...i.e. would that be rushing him and going down the same path they just went with Clay?

 

One could make the same case for Craig Hansen, IMO.

[Dojji]

I was wondering about Bowden too then thought the same thing...i.e. would that be rushing him and going down the same path they just went with Clay?

 

One could make the same case for Craig Hansen, IMO.

 

And Delcarmen, for that matter.

 

Here's a startling thought -- what do Kevin Youkilis, Dustin Pedroia, and Jed Lowrie have in common?

 

Three things.

 

1: they are eassily the three most successful homegrown position players of the Theo Epstein era

 

2: Each one had significant concerns about their performance that held them in AAA longer than perhaps was absolutely necessary (Pedroia, conditioning and swing mechanics, Youkilis, power, Lowrie, defensive range) and

 

3: becaise of those doubts they were held back until they proved they had overcome those difficulties. (Pedroia could have had the job in 2006, possibly, except that he showed up to camp out of shape, we all know the story with Youkilis, and Lowrie is still working to establish this)

 

The amazing thing about this is that Boston's archconservatism when it comes to promoting young position players has resulted in a stable cadre of very solid young players coming up and definitely being ready from the moment they arrived.

 

Contrast this to how they've handled young pitchers. Hansen, Delcarmen, Lester, Buchholz Masterson, and Papelbon were all in a sense rushed. None of them really saw all that much AAA time before their first MLB taste and if Masterson in particular is stretched back out into a starter his next injury rehab will be more time in AAA than he's seen thus far.

 

We got lucky with Papelbon and Masterson, and Lester eventually worked through his issues despite some extra adversity, but Hansen, MDC and Buchholz are all struggling, at the major league level, with issues the position-player parallel of which would have held them in AA or AAA until they sorted it out there.

 

What I'd love to see is some of that vaunted conservatism that has helped shape successful beginnings to the careers of Youk, Dusty, and Jed, translated to the other side of the ballgame and put to good use as a pitcher-development philosophy. Unfortunately, though, the Red Sox got lucky a few times early on in this wave of player development, especially with Papelbon, so I'm not sure it's going to happen that way.

[Mr Crunchy]

trying to catch lightning in a bottle sometimes burns you

for every success story like papplebon i can give you a hansen raise you a buckholz and close the deal with....billy rohr...for you guys who are older than dirt

[German_Sox]

[Thumper]

 

Ha ha! Sehr gut. Das ist lustig!

[rician blast]

i wonder if his penthouse playmate will follow him....to portland...

 

perhaps she's chasing masterson's tool now

[German_Sox]

Ha ha! Sehr gut. Das ist lustig!

 

thanks he drove me mad these last few months