A Realistic View of 2024: Part II

[5GoldGlovesOF,75]

Tyler O'Neill is not the reason the Red Sox can't hit or score enough. A .250 hitter who slugs 30 home runs (which he's on pace for) isn't a problem. The problem is that the Sox have no one else in the batting order they can rely on to supply run production around Devers, and they really didn't have enough even before Story, Yoshida and Casas were injured (only the latter was expected to be a major contributor at the plate).

 

O'Neill is an all-or-nothing guy, but we knew going in he had a career 30% K-rate. That's even higher than Story's, but Boston isn't paying Tyler $140 million.

[Hugh2]

I see the juicer had a good game last night. He is at .256 now--falling fast

 

You should try juicing some time. My favorite is Avocado, Orange, Pineapple, Pear, Apple, Kale, Ginger root, lime and some protein powder.

[Bellhorn04]

The Grissom Watch is on. We know he has plenty of reasons to get off to a slow start and all, but his first 41 PA's have been rather atrocious. 1 extra base hit and 0 walks.

[moonslav59]

can't really deny that. do not like the guy. he won't be here next year thankfully. Henry [breslow} will find another 1 year replacement.

 

Most likely, yes.

 

We've done okay with one year OF'ers: O'Neill, Duvall, Renfroe...

[moonslav59]

The Grissom Watch is on. We know he has plenty of reasons to get off to a slow start and all, but his first 41 PA's have been rather atrocious. 1 extra base hit and 0 walks.

 

He has looked weak and off balance. Maybe this is sort of his ST'ing, but 41 PAs is a pretty small sample size.

 

He does need to start showing something, at some point, soon. He has looked better on D than most of what we've seen over the past 2-3 years.

[Bellhorn04]

Most likely, yes.

 

We've done okay with one year OF'ers: O'Neill, Duvall, Renfroe...

 

Breslow followed the formula - white guy, bland name, RH power LOL

[notin]

Most likely, yes.

 

We've done okay with one year OF'ers: O'Neill, Duvall, Renfroe...

 

Your inclusion of O’Neill is a bit premature and only serves to pad a list that is otherwise just two names long…

[notin]

The Grissom Watch is on. We know he has plenty of reasons to get off to a slow start and all, but his first 41 PA's have been rather atrocious. 1 extra base hit and 0 walks.

 

Grissom Watch for what?

[Bellhorn04]

Grissom Watch for what?

 

Why are you so fond of that disingenuous thing? Surely you can surmise from the succeeding sentences in that post that I'm expressing concern about whether this guy can hit major league pitching in the year 2024 or not.

 

My personal watch right now is whether he will have a better OPS after 59 PA's than Dalbec did.

Edited May 17, 2024 by Bellhorn04

[Bellhorn04]

Rafaela leads the Sox in RBI with 23.

 

The Dodgers have 6 guys with more than 23 RBI.

[moonslav59]

44 games and right at .500. That's about what many of us expected for the season, but how we got here was a little surprising- a lot in some cases.

 

4 Game Report Card:

 

A+

The rotation (2.62 ERA, 1.07 WHIP and a .623 OPS Against)

Wong (Only O'Neill and Devers have more PAs and a better OPS than his .900 line.)

 

A

O'Neill and Refsnyder (would be A+ had they not been hurt. .964 Ref and .924 O'Neill)

Duran (He has had a nice all around start to '24. Good D, 21 XGHs, 9 SBs and a decent .784 OPS)

 

A-

The pen (.620 OPS Against is actually better than our rotation! 1.17 WHIP is not bad)

Devers (.902 OPS and better D maybe should place him at A, but untimely hitting & key errors have hurt.)

Abreu (His D has looked better than I expected and the .830 OPS is solid.)

 

B+

(Big gap between A- and C)

 

B

None

 

B-

McGuire (His O has dipped, of late (.663 OPS,) but his defense and staff-handling has been superb.)

 

C+

None

 

C

Rafaela (Tough to grade this highly with a .595 OPS and so many errors, but he has made a lot of plays nobody else makes, and he leads the team in RBI.)

 

C-

 

D+

Base running (due to several costly blunders)

 

D

Our defense (better than the F of 2023)

 

D-

Cooper (He could easily be an F with his .584 OPS, but when you compare him to Smith & Dalbec...)

 

F

Henry (no explanation needed)

D Smith (.450) and Dalbec (.377) have really hurt the team over 100 PAs.

DHam (.563,) Valdez (.452,) and Reyes (.451) have hurt as much as our 1Bmen, and they have 216 PAs!

 

INC

Casas (.857 was a good start, and his D looked better, but missing 2-3+ months will hurt like HELL!)

Yoshida (.736 was okay, but all those ground outs to 2B are getting annoying.)

Grissom (starting off like an F, despite decent defense in his SSS)

Romy (He has looked good on D and has some key hits in his short time on the field.)

Breslow (too early to tell but starting out like an A to A-)

Cora (too early to tell but has looked decent, B+ to

 

Pitcher score card: (I'm factoring in what was expected to a certain degree)

 

with OPS Against listed

 

A+

Houck .542

Crawford .579

Bernardino .400

 

A

Slaten .476

 

A-

 

B+

Weissert .659

 

B

Criswell .671 (Maybe an A- based on expectations and a B- without)

 

B-

Bello .658 (He did better in the second half, last year)

Booser .594

Anderson .604

 

C+

Jansen .542 OPS Against is awesome but too many let downs (too many BBs)

 

C

Martin .664 (Turning things around, after a bad start to year)

 

C-

Winckowski (Could be INC or D+)

 

D+

D

D-

 

F

Joely

Campbell (could be INC)

Jacques

 

INC

Pivetta .763

Whitlock .616

Kelly .470

Uwasawa .464

[Bellhorn04]

I appreciate the inclusion of the F for Henry.

[moonslav59]

Your inclusion of O’Neill is a bit premature and only serves to pad a list that is otherwise just two names long…

 

'24 O'Neill (jury still out)

'23 Duvall

'22 JBJ (BUST)

'21 Kike & Renfroe

'20 Pillar

[moonslav59]

Why are you so fond of that disingenuous thing? Surely you can surmise from the succeeding sentences in that post that I'm expressing concern about whether this guy can hit major league pitching in the year 2024 or not.

 

.680 OPS after 277 MLB PAs

[notin]

Why are you so fond of that disingenuous thing? Surely you can surmise from the succeeding sentences in that post that I'm expressing concern about whether this guy can hit major league pitching in the year 2024 or not.

 

My personal watch right now is whether he will have a better OPS after 59 PA's than Dalbec did.

 

 

Just wondering what you meant. As he is sub-Dalbec levels right now, he's clearly off to a much worse start than many had hoped. He might not have a good season this year, since that's actually fairly common for players who switch leagues. But what are the expectations? .600OPS? .550OPS? Both of those are a big step up.

 

I do wonder since this is only year 2 of the "balanced schedule", is that creating yet another advantage for pitchers? Hitters that used to face the same team 18-19 times per season at least got some familiarity with the pitchers on some staffs just from the repeated exposure...

[notin]

'24 O'Neill (jury still out)

'23 Duvall

'22 JBJ (BUST)

'21 Kike & Renfroe

'20 Pillar

 

Jury is out on O'Neill, but I think an extension might not be bad idea.

 

They did give up on Renfroe after one year, but who didn't? Renfroe has become the MLB equivalent that girl everyone dated in middle school because she let everyone go further.

 

Bradley and Kike were not here for one year...

[Hugh2]

Jury is out on O'Neill, but I think an extension might not be bad idea.

 

They did give up on Renfroe after one year, but who didn't? Renfroe has become the MLB equivalent that girl everyone dated in middle school because she let everyone go further.

 

Bradley and Kike were not here for one year...

 

I don't know about an extension but I'd easily offer him a QO, barring injury or massive underperformance.

[Bellhorn04]

Just wondering what you meant. As he is sub-Dalbec levels right now, he's clearly off to a much worse start than many had hoped. He might not have a good season this year, since that's actually fairly common for players who switch leagues. But what are the expectations? .600OPS? .550OPS? Both of those are a big step up.

 

I do wonder since this is only year 2 of the "balanced schedule", is that creating yet another advantage for pitchers? Hitters that used to face the same team 18-19 times per season at least got some familiarity with the pitchers on some staffs just from the repeated exposure...

 

That could be part of it. I'm leaning more toward the advancements in pitching technology and training. You just don't see a lot of 89 MPH fastballs any more. And the sweeper seems to be a deadly new weapon. Dalbec is not an MLB hitter, but he went from striking out 30% + of the time to 50% + of the time. Grissom makes much more contact but so far it's been pretty feeble contact. The fact he hasn't drawn a walk in 41 PA's is notable. You'd think just by accident you'd make it to 4 balls once in in that time.

[Randy Red Sox]

That could be part of it. I'm leaning more toward the advancements in pitching technology and training. You just don't see a lot of 89 MPH fastballs any more. And the sweeper seems to be a deadly new weapon. Dalbec is not an MLB hitter, but he went from striking out 30% + of the time to 50% + of the time. Grissom makes much more contact but so far it's been pretty feeble contact. The fact he hasn't drawn a walk in 41 PA's is notable. You'd think just by accident you'd make it to 4 balls once in in that time.

 

meanwhile Chris Sale is 6-1 with a 2.54 era and .088 whip. But of course John Henry looks at that trade as a win given how much $$$ he is saving.

[Randy Red Sox]

Most likely, yes.

 

We've done okay with one year OF'ers: O'Neill, Duvall, Renfroe...

 

really hurts jersey sales $$ for John Henry though

[notin]

I don't know about an extension but I'd easily offer him a QO, barring injury or massive underperformance.

 

He definitely accepts a QO. But it takes him from being $5.85mill player to being a $19mill player.

 

I’m thinking more like $24/27mill over 3 years. Same AAV for 1-2 years is fine, but he’s too injury-prone to go longer than 3…

[Randy Red Sox]

Tyler O'Neill is not the reason the Red Sox can't hit or score enough. A .250 hitter who slugs 30 home runs (which he's on pace for) isn't a problem. The problem is that the Sox have no one else in the batting order they can rely on to supply run production around Devers, and they really didn't have enough even before Story, Yoshida and Casas were injured (only the latter was expected to be a major contributor at the plate).

 

O'Neill is an all-or-nothing guy, but we knew going in he had a career 30% K-rate. That's even higher than Story's, but Boston isn't paying Tyler $140 million.

 

People on here should know by now that I am far from an O'Neill fan but my issue is deeper than that. I am sick to death of all these 1 year rental players we have been watching rotate through year after year and I am sick to death of John Henry.

[Randy Red Sox]

He definitely accepts a QO. But it takes him from being $5.85mill player to being a $19mill player.

 

I’m thinking more like $24/27mill over 3 years. Same AAV for 1-2 years is fine, but he’s too injury-prone to go longer than 3…

 

NOT A CHANCE IN HE$$ John Henry bucks up 19 million for O'Neill

[Old Red]

Just wondering what you meant. As he is sub-Dalbec levels right now, he's clearly off to a much worse start than many had hoped. He might not have a good season this year, since that's actually fairly common for players who switch leagues. But what are the expectations? .600OPS? .550OPS? Both of those are a big step up.

 

I do wonder since this is only year 2 of the "balanced schedule", is that creating yet another advantage for pitchers? Hitters that used to face the same team 18-19 times per season at least got some familiarity with the pitchers on some staffs just from the repeated exposure...

 

Oh that darn switching leagues thing again. You even used the same excuse for JBJ of all people.🤭🙈

[Old Red]

Jury is out on O'Neill, but I think an extension might not be bad idea.

 

They did give up on Renfroe after one year, but who didn't? Renfroe has become the MLB equivalent that girl everyone dated in middle school because she let everyone go further.

 

Bradley and Kike were not here for one year...

 

The jury isn’t out on O’Neill he is what he is, and I think an extension at this point would be a BAD idea.

[Duran Is The Man]

The Grissom Watch is on. We know he has plenty of reasons to get off to a slow start and all, but his first 41 PA's have been rather atrocious. 1 extra base hit and 0 walks.

 

Sox brass swindled again. bunch of f***ing morons.

[Nick]

The jury isn’t out on O’Neill he is what he is, and I think an extension at this point would be a BAD idea.

I agree. The season is not half over. He definitely has couple of holes in his swing.

 

What idiot would give him a qualifying offer? Geez....let's get real.

[Nick]

I would extend Duran and Abreu.

[notin]

That could be part of it. I'm leaning more toward the advancements in pitching technology and training. You just don't see a lot of 89 MPH fastballs any more. And the sweeper seems to be a deadly new weapon. Dalbec is not an MLB hitter, but he went from striking out 30% + of the time to 50% + of the time. Grissom makes much more contact but so far it's been pretty feeble contact. The fact he hasn't drawn a walk in 41 PA's is notable. You'd think just by accident you'd make it to 4 balls once in in that time.

 

 

Pitching advancements are a definite help for the pitcher. New schedule? No real data to support it; it’s just a logical theory right now…

[notin]

I would extend Duran and Abreu.

 

 

Duran has another pre-arb year and Abreu has two more.

 

The issue is neither bats right-handed and the OF is getting crowded. Duran might best be used as trade bait at some point…