2013 Spring Training

[VA Sox Fan]

Unbelievable.......they will either pitch or not pitch. All the rest including JBJ is noise.

 

Look at the schedule. Nasty first half. If they don't pitch in the first half I don't care if the thaw out Teddy Baseball and bring him back....it ain't happenin'

 

Well, technically they also have to reattach his head to his body...

[SoxFanForsyth]

Unbelievable.......they will either pitch or not pitch. All the rest including JBJ is noise.

 

Look at the schedule. Nasty first half. If they don't pitch in the first half I don't care if the thaw out Teddy Baseball and bring him back....it ain't happenin'

 

Defensively, having Bradley in LF rather than Gomes will help the pitching. I agree, they have to pitch, but don't discount the value of good defense behind the pitching, or the value of grinding out at bats and showing good plate discipline.

[jung]

Good one VA. That really did make me laugh.:D

[mvp 78]

Well, technically they also have to reattach his head to his body...

 

Nah, without his body he'd have such a small strike zone. A guaranteed BB whenever he gets up.

[jung]

Well and that is my other problem. I don't put that pitch fork with baseball glove on one tine called Gomes out there in left and based on how he has looked out there I don't put JBJ out there either.

 

And this is the problem with all of this. This is what I have described as a patchwork team of broken down/recovering vets let by Mr. Bootie himself Ortiz and they and we have been forced to deal with this mess before the first pitch can even be tossed.

 

and now you want to load the kid with all the pressure of resolving that mess on his own when he is clearly uncomfortable in LF.

 

I think I would be forced to start the year with Nava in LF. He has had a pretty good spring though completely unnoticed in the JBJ uproar. I would send JBJ down for those first nine games but I would send a coach with him and work his ass off in LF. Then I would see where I was. Heck by then Ells will likely be nursing his first injury of the year and JBJ can come up and play the position he should be in, CF.

[Palodios]

Unbelievable.......they will either pitch or not pitch. All the rest including JBJ is noise.

 

Look at the schedule. Nasty first half. If they don't pitch in the first half I don't care if the thaw out Teddy Baseball and bring him back....it ain't happenin'

 

The teams that should scare the pitching staff are mostly in the second half-- the Tigers, Angels, Diamondbacks, the late-season Yankees, and pitching in Coors Field. Besides the Blue Jays, most of their games are against weak offenses, or ones that lost key pieces.

[User Name]

Defensively, having Bradley in LF rather than Gomes will help the pitching. I agree, they have to pitch, but don't discount the value of good defense behind the pitching, or the value of grinding out at bats and showing good plate discipline.

 

Playing half his games at Fenway? Get real, the defensive impact isn't that significant. I agree with the part about plate discipline though, because this team needs to get away from the hacker mentality it exhibited last year.

[jung]

What??? The 82nd game of the season is on June 30th not May 30th. They have:

13 with the Jays (nuf said)

12 with the Rays (discount them all you want, they kick our asses regularly doing what they do, low scoring games)

7 with the Orioles (we want to bury them but not so fast)

6 with the Yanks (might actually be a break in the first half)

7 with the rejuvenated Guardians

4 with the Tigers

3 with the Angles

3 with the White Sox

and 4 interleague games with the Phillies

 

Just the heavy Jays/Rays content makes the first have tough. The Jays at least on paper look like they could beat us all kinds of ways and the Rays always have the same approach. Low scoring, frustrating games. I can barely stand 3 game stands with the Rays. By the 4th game of a 4 game stand we are usually so demoralized that you might decide to bet the farm on its outcome....unless the Rays have already won the first 3 games and feel like they have already had their way with us.

[SoxFanForsyth]

Playing half his games at Fenway? Get real, the defensive impact isn't that significant. I agree with the part about plate discipline though, because this team needs to get away from the hacker mentality it exhibited last year.

 

In terms of range, yea, Bradley will be limited.

 

In terms of arm strength, turning wall ball doubles into singles bc he has the arm to throw guys out, allowing Ellsbury to shade RF, where it's massive and they can cut down those gaps? Yes it makes a big difference. If you want to look at it in a vacuum, fine, it's not a huge difference, but when you take into consideration all of the effects it had, it becomes a bigger positive.

 

Plus, they still play half their games away, where Bradley's range is a factor.

[jung]

Playing half his games at Fenway? Get real, the defensive impact isn't that significant. I agree with the part about plate discipline though, because this team needs to get away from the hacker mentality it exhibited last year.

 

Putting JBJ in LF discounts his strengths and exacerbates his weaknesses. LF is not about athleticism. It is about judgement. The player is forced to make more critical judgements and decisions about how to position himself, how to play a ball and where to throw it and is involved in more close contact with the other fielders than any of the other outfield positions. He has the hard corner of left field to deal with instead of the soft hockey rink corner of right and in Fenway.....the wall itself. The difference is not harder vs easier. The difference between LF and the other OF positions is experience and judgement (LF) vs athleticism (CF-RF).

[rorschach]

Just because Loshe is a worse contract than Dempster doesn't convince me that Dempster was a good or helpful acquisition.

 

I'd take Dempster over Loshe for that money anyday, not to mention I find Ryan to be more consistently dependable then Kyle.

[Palodios]

What??? The 82nd game of the season is on June 30th not May 30th. They have:

13 with the Jays (nuf said)

12 with the Rays (discount them all you want, they kick our asses regularly doing what they do, low scoring games)

7 with the Orioles (we want to bury them but not so fast)

6 with the Yanks (might actually be a break in the first half)

7 with the rejuvenated Guardians

4 with the Tigers

3 with the Angles

3 with the White Sox

and 4 interleague games with the Phillies

 

Just the heavy Jays/Rays content makes the first have tough. The Jays at least on paper look like they could beat us all kinds of ways and the Rays always have the same approach. Low scoring, frustrating games. I can barely stand 3 game stands with the Rays. By the 4th game of a 4 game stand we are usually so demoralized that you might decide to bet the farm on its outcome....unless the Rays have already won the first 3 games and feel like they have already had their way with us.

 

I had been talking specifically about April/May earlier-- the Tigers/Angels games aren't until well into June. Besides the Jays, I think you're heavily overestimating the offenses of those teams.

[jung]

I had been talking specifically about April/May earlier-- the Tigers/Angels games aren't until well into June. Besides the Jays, I think you're heavily overestimating the offenses of those teams.

 

In the first half..... I did not say look at the April/May schedule. I said look at the first half.

 

In the second place, and I am tired of the sound of my own keyboard on this one. This is not the old days of the juggernaut Sox and Yanks. The rest of the league has made improvements if anything the Sox and Yanks have gone backwards if not way backwards. I am not judging teams on offensive firepower alone. I am judging the ability of other teams to beat this Sox team. In my view, while there are Twins and Royals games mixed into the first half, looking at the games and teams above, the 7 with the Guardians and the 6 with the Yanks might be the easiest of the bunch. None of them will be pushovers.

[Dojji]

Taking a quick glance at the Royals team, I think after this year people won't consider them pushovers either. Their pitching rotation has the potential to be really good if Erven Santana rebounds to his normal numbers. Their lineup is weak but it's built around some talented young position players who if any 2 of them break out, could provide average offense. And I'd much rather have their catching situation than ours, that's for darn sure.

 

I just don't see that huge advantage we're supposed to have over that team as built. Especially if David Ortiz is not healthy. They have their own question marks but they're centered mostly around players on an upward trajectory. If Lester and Buchholz don't bounce back in a huge way, the Royals could easily finish ahead of us.

[jung]

Yea', would a split with Royals be a complete surprise to anybody?

[Palodios]

. I am not judging teams on offensive firepower alone. I am judging the ability of other teams to beat this Sox team.

 

Then you're arguing against a point I didn't make.

[Bellhorn04]

Yea', would a split with Royals be a complete surprise to anybody?

 

I don't think you can break the schedule down like that. Often it's not who you play but when you play them...who's going good and who's going s***** at the time.

[jung]

For once the talking radio heads are right. The Sox should have made the concessions thing especially for the free stuff for kids up to the third inning for the whole year.

 

As usual the totally oblivious knuckleheads down at Fenway have it wrong again. They backed themselves into this dilemma by calling this April gesture a "Fan Appreciation" effort for past support. So.....we give you a years long sell out streak and you give us..... cheaper beer (lowest quality only) and free stuff for the kids for 17 home games in April.

 

The whole year would have really sent the right message....about the first right message they would have sent in at least two years if not three.

 

They USED to be good at marketing down at Fenway. I no longer know what the hell they are good at when you combine this fiasco with the total mess they made of the 100 year Fenway thing. Bringing back the past stars was by far their finest moment of the past three years. I will give them that although even that could have been done better.

[jung]

Sweeney has announced that he will not take a minor league assignment from the Sox. So Sweeney who is not on the 40 man yet has already thrown down the gauntlet. Ya' want your double AA kid to play for the big club and gain the marketing sizzle from that move....not over my hump.

[a700hitter]

Bard had a rough outing again today:

 

Middle of the 7th: Marlins 3, Marlins 0: Tough inning for Daniel Bard. Single, single, groundout, Sac fly, Walk Two-run double.

 

Last 3 outings: 3 IP, 7 H, 7 R, 6 ER, 2 BB, 3 K. Plus a rocky minor league inning, too.

 

It looks like the winter off didn't help him reset anything. He's just as lost now as was in September.

[BSN07]

Bard had a rough outing again today:

 

It looks like the winter off didn't help him reset anything. He's just as lost now as was in September.

 

Ya his velocity came back, that's about it. It's a good thing he still has options left.

[jung]

Then you're arguing against a point I didn't make.

 

But that was my point. I don't care about offenses that "scare the pitching staff". That is their problem. I care about teams that can beat us.

 

Once you get to the schedule you are talking about games. The outcome of games for the most part relies on the cumulative impact from more than just one aspect of the game.

 

So, we have 12 games with the Rays before June 30th. The Rays kill us. They feature sharp pitching and limited offense. The games usually end up low scoring but even when they are slug feasts, the overall strength of their pitching top to bottom tends to pull them through. They tend to have enough offense when combined with their pitching to put up more runs against our pitching than we can put up against theirs. So I don't care that they don't feature much of an offense. I only care about whether they have enough team to beat us or if we have enough team to beat them. At the end of the day, if they beat us who gives a damn whether they generally don't field much of an offense. They are generally a tough team to beat and we have 12 games with them before June 30th.

 

As for not breaking down the schedule this way Bell we or I am not really breaking down the schedule. Half a season is a hell of a sample size. You are really not breaking down the schedule anyway. You are breaking down teams that are on your schedule. At this stage that is about all you can do.

 

I think the combination of Lester and Buch can and likely will come back. My real concern is that this Sox team is relatively light offensively. Lester and Buch will have to both perform well and perform well all season. In fact the Sox really have no answer if even one of the rotation guys goes down to injury. Ace is not an answer and the kids are too young at this point. The Sox might be able to cover up for an injured starter for a week or two but that is about it. The higher up the rotation any injury comes, the less likely they will be able to cover for it.

 

Injury generally should be a big concern for this year's Sox whether to pitchers or everyday players. There is not much backing these guys up. That is not unusual for the Sox. The only dif is that this year the gap between starters and bench players is somewhat reduced.

[mvp 78]

Putting JBJ in LF discounts his strengths and exacerbates his weaknesses. LF is not about athleticism. It is about judgement. The player is forced to make more critical judgements and decisions about how to position himself, how to play a ball and where to throw it and is involved in more close contact with the other fielders than any of the other outfield positions. He has the hard corner of left field to deal with instead of the soft hockey rink corner of right and in Fenway.....the wall itself. The difference is not harder vs easier. The difference between LF and the other OF positions is experience and judgement (LF) vs athleticism (CF-RF).

 

RF is much harder to play than LF at Fenway. Hard to turn a double into an inside the park hr in LF. It's easy in right.

 

Your whole judgement rationale is poor.

[seabeachfred]

Bard had a rough outing again today:

 

It looks like the winter off didn't help him reset anything. He's just as lost now as was in September.

 

I said last fall that this guy was through. Some accused me of being a bit pre-mature. No more. The guy stinks; he hasn't corrected anything and he had better not be put on the Red Sox this week. He needs to go to Pawtucket and if he fails there again, t hen he goes to Portland and if he fails there he goes to "A" Ball. If he fails there he goes home.

 

This is another Craig Hansen f***-up. Cherington has made some pretty piss poor mistakes but making Bard a starter was the worst of the bunch. He needs to be send down NOW and not appear in any of the few ST games we have left. We also don't need any trash like Godfrey or the guy with two last names who stunk it up in the ninth inning today. We go with our best and try not to finish up with another rotten ST finish that I think has done much to derail our starts the past four years. The last week of ST you have to win those games.

[Thunder]

RF is much harder to play than LF at Fenway. Hard to turn a double into an inside the park hr in LF. It's easy in right.

 

Your whole judgement rationale is poor.

 

Plus any day game makes it impossible to see in RF.

[jung]

RF is much harder to play than LF at Fenway. Hard to turn a double into an inside the park hr in LF. It's easy in right.

 

Your whole judgement rationale is poor.

 

You are talking about result...not degree of difficulty. A possible mistake yielding a more telling result has nothing to do with difficulty.

 

The LFer has many more judgement calls to make in LF relative to the other two fields. Conversely he has far fewer athletic plays that he might make relative to the other two fields. A big arm is of far less value in LF than in RF. Speed is far less valuable in LF than in CF regardless of whether you are in Fenway or not.

 

For example, any throw from RF will at least be headed in the right general direction as the play is always in front of you. You can err and throw behind the play from LF much easier as the only plays that are in front of you are plays at 3rd and home. Think it will cost you a run if the LF throws to 2nd when he really needed to be throwing to or through the cut-off man? Suppose the LFer looks up quickly after picking up the ball and sees the guy rounding 1st, losing track of the guy headed for home. Any chance at all of getting the guy at home if he throws to 2nd?

[Bellhorn04]

The Fenway outfield is bizarro. All 3 outfielders have their respective challenges. I would agree with Jung that the challenges of left field are less to do with athleticism and more to do with experience and judgment.

[jung]

Baseball park designers have been trying to design in some uniqueness but there appears an effort to make for similar corner play in the outfield. There is not that much difference these days between the LF and RF corners. Some are dead symmetrical. Some still have the soft, hockey rink RF corner and the hard angle LF corner like Fenway. They built Arlington stadium that way. Kauffman still has it as does Anaheim Stadium. They actually reversed it in new Comerica Park. The hard angle turn is in RF and the soft hockey rink corner is in left. Not sure how all that got started with the older ballparks....maybe to accommodate bullpens in right and center field and still get the right amount of seating.

[jung]

The last week of ST you have to win those games.

 

The Sox fixed this by scheduling three straight games with the Twins to finish out ST. If they can't get themselves an ego rush playing the Twins for three straight I don't know what else they can do.

[DocHolliday]

I wouldn't go as far to say that the last few ST games are must wins. But I will say that the attitude in those games has to be different than previous years. They can't treat it like a must win, but they need to treat it progressively more like a regular season game so that they have the right mindset as a team come April 1.

 

It was especially evident in 2011 for me. I was at all 3 of the games in the opening series in Texas, and the Sox were an embarrassment. The Rangers were clearly ready for the season to start and the Sox, particularly the pitching, looked like they were going through the dead arm period in Spring Training. Lackey pitched the 2nd game and was absolutely rocked - 3.2 IP and 9 ER. Even with revisionist history that his elbow may have been bothering him at that time, the effort was clearly, for lack of a better word, lacking.

 

Last season, there was the bullpen debacle with Aceves and Melancon in games 1 & 3 and the ridiculous 2nd game where Beckett gave up 5 HR in less than 5 innings.

 

Even if they get through the first two weeks and are hovering around .500, that would be a step in the right direction on a lot of different fronts.