A Realistic View at 2019: Part II

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

"Is" or will be?

 

C'mon, Moon. Our BP doesn't give us the luxury of dissing another team's reliever.

[OH FOY]

too much alphabet soup . A good ballplayer is like a beautiful woman. You know one when you see one . You don't need a numerical rating to tell you .

 

bam!

[moonslav59]

What did I say?

 

"He is back..."

 

He has sucked since being back- tiny sample size not withstanding.

 

[dgalehouse]

What if we kept...?

 

6.10 Pomeranz 72.1 IP 88 H (17 HRs) 35 BB 84 K

5.87 Kimbrel 7.2 IP 6 H (2 HRs) 5 BB 12 K

5.29 J Kelly 34 IP 38 H (4 HRs) 15 BB 42 K

 

 

 

That is absurd .

[dgalehouse]

I never ignore ya Denny. I like your posts.

 

Thanks . I like your posts as well .

[Nick]

We give Porcello 5 run lead and now it's tied.

 

It has nothing to do with our bullpen.

 

We're paying this guy $22M a year. Let him walk. Quit hanging onto to has beens.

 

There is no way we're going to go 500 vs Rays and the Yankees. Our starters are struggling. One step forward, two steps back.

Edited July 21, 2019 by Nick

[moonslav59]

We give Porcello 5 run lead and now it's tied.

 

It has nothing to do with our bullpen.

 

We're paying this guy $22M a year. Let him walk. Quit hanging onto to has beens.

 

There is no way we're going to go 500 vs Rays and the Yankees. Our starters are struggling. One step forward, two steps back.

 

This team keeps teasing us with false hopes. Our starters suck this year.

 

The pen hasn't helped, but our starters were supposed to be a big strength. They've been a huge let down.

 

No way I even offer Porcello a QO.

[moonslav59]

Updated OPS numbers after the 17 run game:

 

.967 Bogey (Steady Bogey)

.947 Devers (Will he catch Bogey?)

.887 Betts (Getting close to .900)

.874 JD (Nice to see him have a big game)

.859 Moreland (His .859 has barely been missed.)

.841 Holt (Keeps coming through)

.837 Vaz (Looking like this is for real.)

.779 Chavis (Not a bad rookie year!)

.765 Beni (Would be nice to get near .800)

.735 JBJ (Maybe a sign of a second resurgence.)

.582 Leon

 

.Low PAs:

.895 Marco

.533 Travis

.503 Pearce

 

 

[moonslav59]

Updated SP'er ERA (Listed by most IP)-GS'd

 

4.05 Sale (118)-20

4.34 ERod (116)-20

5.61 Porcello (111)-20

3.61 Price (92)-18

 

6.95 Velazquez (22)-8

6.00 Eovaldi (21)-4

7.94 Weber (11)-3

1.13 Johnson (8)-2

9.82 J Smith (7)-2

9.00 Cashner (5)-1

9.00 DHern (3)-1

 

[a700hitter]

We give Porcello 5 run lead and now it's tied.

 

It has nothing to do with our bullpen.

 

We're paying this guy $22M a year. Let him walk. Quit hanging onto to has beens.

 

There is no way we're going to go 500 vs Rays and the Yankees. Our starters are struggling. One step forward, two steps back.

No one has been arguing that Porcello has been anything but a big blob of suck all year. He needs to straighten himself out. As for the remainder of the rotation, 60% of it is good and reliable— Sale, Price, and ERod. DD has filled the 5th spot vacancy. As for the bullpen, only 3 arms out there are major league arms— less than half. And of the 3 major league arms, 2 aren’t very good. Hopefully, Eovaldi can turn the pen around. Right now, the glaring deficit of talent is in the Bullpen. One solution could be to trade for Stroman and move Porcello to the pen. That would solve 2 problems. Edited July 21, 2019 by a700hitter

[moonslav59]

Someone was saying we should extend him not too long ago.

[a700hitter]

Someone was saying we should extend him not too long ago.

Kimmi?

[S5Dewey]

It's not that I don't trust my eyes. It's that I know that there are limitations to the eye test. I have no doubt that everyone here knows a good defensive play when they see it. Do you think your eyes are ever wrong? Do you think you might see things a little differently because you are biased towards or against a player? Do you know that JBJ is better than other outfielders out there? Are you forgetting about some of the plays that JBJ missed and only remembering the great plays that he made?

 

Personally, I find it a little arrogant to believe that if a stat doesn't support your opinion, then the stat must be wrong or flawed. Could it possibly be that you are wrong instead?

 

This argument works both ways, you know. Do you know that JBJ isn't better than other outfielders out there? Have you seen all of them play? Are you able to make an objective judgement based on what you've seen?

 

I find it a little arrogant that some posters have completely bought into and defend WAR while ignoring what their eyes and logic tell them. Is it possible that Fangraphs is right when they indicate that there's a margin for error of ~16%?

[jung]

In the first place, the Red Sox have not shown a cohesive team effort to get back to the big dance even one time over the first 100 games. I do not believe that a team can show you NOTHING for a 100 games and then come on in the end to get anywhere. Yes, teams can come on at the end. But if they don't show you anything for 100 games it is highly unlikely that they will pull it together to come on and really get anywhere at the end.

 

The only cohesive effort on this entire team including its coaches and management has been X and Rafi. Clearly X has assumed Pedey's old role as the leader of the infield. Having played 3rd base it is X that has had the most influence on Rafi. I don't buy the Sox PR dept BS that JD has been the most influential player on Rafi. JD has his own issues to worry about. I think Rafi has made so much progress this year for two reasons. He has taken X's leadership and advice to heart and X signing his deal has proven to Rafi that if you have talent

AND YOU STICK TO YOUR KNITTING LONG ENOUGH, you will get paid.

 

The rest of this team has been a shambles. The entire outfield is a train wreck. Not one of them backup any of the others. JBJ has made his usual quota of great plays but he has also boned up more plays than we are used to seeing and he does not back anybody up either. The MVP and RF GG has been only average out there and Beni is a joke. The entire right side of the infield is a wreck (thank you DD for the Moreland/Pearce disappearing act and that guy playing 2nd on occasion that can't really play 2nd). I await the next Holt injury which should make things oh so much better on the right side of our infield. All I can say for the catchers is that they have had their moments. But that is it. Neither has truly distinguished himself. Vaz has been better at the plate but considering the rocket ship baseball can we really call what Vaz is doing exceptional or is it just better than we expected of him at the plate. Everybody and I do mean everybody in MLB that is anything more than a pure Punch and Judy hitter is going to have 20+ HR's by season end, a ridiculous state of affairs.

 

In the second place, our pitching sucks. Our rotation which was anticipated as the strength of the team have woefully underperformed to that very reasonable expectation and they show no signs of improving enough over the remaining 60 games to be that strength we had anticipated. You can't go from Rotation projected as the strength of the team to Rotation underperforming and mystically make it up elsewhere. This is real baseball, not computer baseball nor fantasy baseball. Our BP sucks and adding Nate at the backend, a guy that might fall apart as soon as he gets there is no consolation. Nate cannot rescue an entire pitching staff underperforming and neither can our recently acquired O's starter.

 

DD sat on his hands, resigned his 2018 in season acquisition binky's and for some utterly mysterious reason extended Sale past the 2024 season at the start of this one. Henry has quite obviously said NO MAS to adding considerably to the payroll this year. I don't blame him.

 

I am at the point of being resigned to whatever their fate as the 2019 edition of the Red Sox. I can stand less of the NESN broadcast crew and OBs endless repetition of meaningless small sample size stats covering about a week of a season. "So and so leads the league in RBI from......well......last week to this one". How about calling the game OB. You think you might just call the game. I also don't like the hard left turn the broadcast crews have made regarding the rocket ship baseball. They have suddenly gone silent or in outright denial about where all these power numbers are coming from having established a pretty realistic position on the topic earlier in the year. Of course NESN is ......a Fenway Group property so I thought their realistic analysis during the first half of the year was the shocker, not their current head in the sand, denial position.

 

Where the Sox end up is where the Sox end up. But for my money in spite of over 60 years of Sox fandom, if there are not 5 other teams more deserving of a post season spot including the WC play in game, it is simply indicative of what a mess MLB has become and that concerns me more than whether or not the Sox make it to the final five only to get bounced out either in the play in game or in the first round.

Edited July 21, 2019 by jung

[Bellhorn04]

Too much alphabet soup . A good ballplayer is like a beautiful woman. You know one when you see one . You don't need a numerical rating to tell you .

 

I'll give you a quick example of why I need the numerical rating: Mike Yastrzemski, Carl's grandson.

 

Mike is in his rookie season and his season started late. He's only played about 1/3 of a season. He's hitting .259.

 

But he has an OPS of .787 (thanks to a .487 SLG, showing power) and an OPS+ of 105, so about 5% better than average.

 

He has a bWAR of 1.0, which appears to be about half due to his defense. That would extrapolate to a 3.0 WAR for a full season.

 

I haven't seen Mike play an inning, but these numbers show he's been playing as a solid, above-average major league outfielder.

Edited July 21, 2019 by Bellhorn04

[jacksonianmarch]

Honest question for the group. Do you feel JBJ has slipped defensively this season?

[Bellhorn04]

The rest of this team has been a shambles. The entire outfield is a train wreck. Not one of them backup any of the others. JBJ has made his usual quota of great plays but he has also boned up more plays than we are used to seeing and he does not back anybody up either. The MVP and RF GG has been only average out there and Beni is a joke.

 

The MVP has been only average by Mookie Betts standards, that is. He's been way above average by MLB standards.

 

Beni has been a very average player this year, but not a joke.

[jung]

The MVP has been only average by Mookie Betts standards, that is. He's been way above average by MLB standards.

 

Beni has been a very average player this year, but not a joke.

 

That is not saying much these days! Even these days there are at least 10 better OFers than Mookie for 2019. His ranking as a really good OF is much enhanced by the difficulty of playing Fenway RF. But he has not been special and in fact has fallen back behind Dewey again as a Sox RFer of note.

[notin]

Someone was saying we should extend him not too long ago.

 

Still might need to, but he’s getting cheaper..

[notin]

That is not saying much these days! Even these days there are at least 10 better OFers than Mookie for 2019. His ranking as a really good OF is much enhanced by the difficulty of playing Fenway RF. But he has not been special and in fact has fallen back behind Dewey again as a Sox RFer of note.

 

So... you’re calling the outfield a train wreck based on nostalgia and opinion?

[OH FOY]

Still might need to, but he’s getting cheaper..

 

Exactly.

[Slasher9]

Someone was saying we should extend him not too long ago.

 

I am stilll ok giving him a 2 year contract for $20mm

[Slasher9]

Honest question for the group. Do you feel JBJ has slipped defensively this season?

 

 

No. I think the rocketship baseball has affected him more then the normal CFer because JBj runs to the exact spot on contact and this year that spot has changed big time. He will adapt if they continue with this ball.

[Kimmi]

If the Sox find a way into the WC and then win the playin game, we will decimate them.

 

Don't be so sure about that.

[Kimmi]

Is that stuff even listed in the papers anymore?

 

Do we even have papers anymore? LOL

[Kimmi]

That's the trouble with the analytics people . They think everyone is , or should be , into all of that . Many fans simply are not . Out in the bleachers , they know the batting averages , home runs , etc . They are not interested in the wOBA , xUZR and that kind of stuff. Baseball does not have to be complicated to be enjoyable .

 

If you are just watching and enjoying games, there is no need to have any interest in analytics. Nobody is requiring anybody to follow analytics. However, if you are on a baseball forum debating baseball, I think you need them.

[Kimmi]

Too much alphabet soup . A good ballplayer is like a beautiful woman. You know one when you see one . You don't need a numerical rating to tell you .

 

The problem with that is, a beautiful woman to one person may not be beautiful to another. Beauty is extremely subjective.

[Kimmi]

No one has been arguing that Porcello has been anything but a big blob of suck all year. He needs to straighten himself out. As for the remainder of the rotation, 60% of it is good and reliable— Sale, Price, and ERod. DD has filled the 5th spot vacancy. As for the bullpen, only 3 arms out there are major league arms— less than half. And of the 3 major league arms, 2 aren’t very good. Hopefully, Eovaldi can turn the pen around. Right now, the glaring deficit of talent is in the Bullpen. One solution could be to trade for Stroman and move Porcello to the pen. That would solve 2 problems.

 

LOL You are on a mission against Porcello because you've never liked him. He has stunk this year. Giving a pass to the other 3 starters is ridiculous.

 

Bias, as its finest.

[Kimmi]

Someone was saying we should extend him not too long ago.

 

Kimmi?

 

I would still extend him, but as I said before, not for long term. Two years sounds good.

[Kimmi]

This argument works both ways, you know. Do you know that JBJ isn't better than other outfielders out there? Have you seen all of them play? Are you able to make an objective judgement based on what you've seen?

 

I find it a little arrogant that some posters have completely bought into and defend WAR while ignoring what their eyes and logic tell them. Is it possible that Fangraphs is right when they indicate that there's a margin for error of ~16%?

 

I don't know that JBJ isn't better or worse than other outfielders, that's why I use the stats. How is it arrogant to defend WAR? I am willing to admit that something else might be right over my own opinion, and that I am probably wrong.

 

What do you think the margin of error for your eyes is?

 

If the stats support your opinion, then you say, I already knew that and don't need stats to tell me what I already knew. If the stats don't support your opinion, then the stat must be flawed or useless.

 

I asked the question before and got crickets. Have you ever changed your opinion on something based on what the analytics told you? No, because you think your opinion can't possibly be wrong. But maybe, just maybe, you are wrong. The eyes will lie.