A Realistic View at 2024: Part III

[Old Red]

He can't hurt. But we're kind of in the midst of a total pitching meltdown here.

 

Bailey coming out to the mound as often as he does is just as useless as Busch coming out last year.

[Bellhorn04]

Bailey coming out to the mound as often as he does is just as useless as Busch coming out last year.

 

Something has gone wrong with Andrew's methods. His pupils have become a disaster zone.

[Old Red]

Something has gone wrong with Andrew's methods. His pupils have become a disaster zone.

It was just a matter of time. Bailey got way too much credit early on. Pivetta’s still the same good, and bad, Bello surely hasn’t made any big strides, and Wink has been messed with, and is not the same pitcher as last year. Houck has been pretty consistent all year, witch is an improvement, but he’s stayed healthy, and in the rotation, so I don’t know how much of that is Bailey.

[Bellhorn04]

Maybe the fact we had a bunch of guys with s***** four-seam fastballs that Bailey told them to ditch is kind of a bad thing.

 

Other teams seem to catch on to what you're doing after a little while!

[MADSTORK]

8 13

 

Bye bye Breezelow!

[moonslav59]

8 13

 

Bye bye Breezelow!

 

He's not going anywhere, anytime soon, and that's a fact.

[notin]

Maybe the fact we had a bunch of guys with s***** four-seam fastballs that Bailey told them to ditch is kind of a bad thing.

 

Other teams seem to catch on to what you're doing after a little while!

 

The big deal to me looks like they never replaced Giolito. And I’m not talking about getting some sort of leader. They never replaced him with anyone.

 

The Sox have had 98 games started by Houck, Crawford, Pivetta, Bello and Criswell. But Criswell isn’t really part of the rotation! How is he fifth on this team in starts? They lost Giolito, lost Whitlock, and have been trying to get by with a 4 man rotation in which only one guy has ever pitched 150 IP! And then didn’t add a reliable starter at the deadline!

 

 

They ignored the rotation. And now it’s crying for attention…

[Bellhorn04]

The big deal to me looks like they never replaced Giolito. And I’m not talking about getting some sort of leader. They never replaced him with anyone.

 

The Sox have had 98 games started by Houck, Crawford, Pivetta, Bello and Criswell. But Criswell isn’t really part of the rotation! How is he fifth on this team in starts? They lost Giolito, lost Whitlock, and have been trying to get by with a 4 man rotation in which only one guy has ever pitched 150 IP! And then didn’t add a reliable starter at the deadline!

 

They ignored the rotation. And now it’s crying for attention…

 

There's been a general neglect of the rotation ever since they hired Bloom. This was Year 5 of it.

[moonslav59]

There's been a general neglect of the rotation ever since they hired Bloom. This was Year 5 of it.

 

Yes, indeed. The last legit non-homegrown starter we added to the team was Nate at the 2018 deadline.

 

Granted, we did not see a big hole in the rotation going into 2019, so we can't say the rotation neglect started then, but the pen neglect did.

 

The list of names is pretty sad, with the best ones being via trade (Pivetta) and Rule 5 (Whitlock.) The best FA addition was Wacha. That's it for over 5 years!

 

This is not rocket science. Everyone has known this was our weakest area, every season since 2020. Very little has been done to fix it.

[notin]

There's been a general neglect of the rotation ever since they hired Bloom. This was Year 5 of it.

 

Bloom brought in lots of starters. Perez, Wacha, Hill, Paxton, Richards, Kluber. They all didn’t work out, but disregarding 2020, you could easily name the 5-man rotation for the Sox.

 

This year - who was the 5 man rotation before Paxton? So far, pitchers added by Breslow have accounted for 14 starts - 13 by Criswell and 1 by Chase Anderson. This team went 3 months with 4 starting pitchers…

[Randy Red Sox]

Yes, indeed. The last legit non-homegrown starter we added to the team was Nate at the 2018 deadline.

 

Granted, we did not see a big hole in the rotation going into 2019, so we can't say the rotation neglect started then, but the pen neglect did.

 

The list of names is pretty sad, with the best ones being via trade (Pivetta) and Rule 5 (Whitlock.) The best FA addition was Wacha. That's it for over 5 years!

 

This is not rocket science. Everyone has known this was our weakest area, every season since 2020. Very little has been done to fix it.

 

That is because it costs MONEY to get quality P and Henry REFUSES to spend it. We have no REAL pitching prospects that will solve the absence of a #1 or 2 SP and those are the undisputed facts.

[Larry Cook]

Bloom brought in lots of starters. Perez, Wacha, Hill, Paxton, Richards, Kluber. They all didn’t work out, but disregarding 2020, you could easily name the 5-man rotation for the Sox.

 

This year - who was the 5 man rotation before Paxton? So far, pitchers added by Breslow have accounted for 14 starts - 13 by Criswell and 1 by Chase Anderson. This team went 3 months with 4 starting pitchers…

 

I only blame bres-slow for not addressing the lack of depth in our pitching dept.

 

But I think ownership had more to do with that than anything bres-slow did or did not do.

[Randy Red Sox]

I only blame bres-slow for not addressing the lack of depth in our pitching dept.

 

But I think ownership had more to do with that than anything bres-slow did or did not do.

 

Breslow has done exactly what Bloom did--bring in a bunch of low risk P and acquired a few lowerish ranked P prospects --in another words really nothing

[Duran Is The Man]

The loss of Betts was a huge gut punch.

 

It was worse than not offering Carlton Fisk a contract, in time, and then blowing up the team of the mid and late 70's.

 

Guys like Betts are generational- even multi-generational. He's like a hundred year storm event. You just can't let a guy like that get away, and we did.

 

Even if we somehow-someway get ourselves back to a championship, I'm not sure that stench will ever go away.

 

For me, I doubt I can ever let go and stop "giving a s***" about the Sox. They are in my blood and bones. I guess a blood transfusion might work, but I've never heard of complete body bone transplants.

 

I'm doomed.

 

same here. i get pissed as hell and it probably makes my BP go up and i hate Henry and i hate what the idiots in FO have done with "my team" but i could never stop.

[moonslav59]

Bloom brought in lots of starters. Perez, Wacha, Hill, Paxton, Richards, Kluber. They all didn’t work out, but disregarding 2020, you could easily name the 5-man rotation for the Sox.

 

This year - who was the 5 man rotation before Paxton? So far, pitchers added by Breslow have accounted for 14 starts - 13 by Criswell and 1 by Chase Anderson. This team went 3 months with 4 starting pitchers…

 

I think everyone agrees that Brez missed the boat on quality and quantity rotation additions, last winter, and when you count trading Sale away, the net additions were close to zero.

 

These were the starting pitchers we had, before the known injuries:

 

Giolito

Bello

Pivetta

Crawford

Whitlock

Houck

Mata

Murphy

Criswell

Anderson

Walter, Gambrell, Alexander, Fitts, Van Belle, Wikelman/Perales/Penrod

 

It's not like the list was just 7 deep, but we did find out many were injured and others were known to not be the types that could give us even 120+ IP, let alone 150+.

 

The biggest shock was doing nothing to replace Gio, when he was the one guy who might have given us 170 IP. Whitlock was lost after 4 starts, but that should not have been shocking, as you have pointed out, correctly, several times.

 

Brez did put some focus on the pen, but even there, we ran into issues and injuries.

 

[moonslav59]

same here. i get pissed as hell and it probably makes my BP go up and i hate Henry and i hate what the idiots in FO have done with "my team" but i could never stop.

 

Hate is a strong word, and I'd have given my left nut for just one ring up to the time JH came here. I seriously doubt we have even one, without him, so I cannot hate the man. I just hate what he's been doing for 6-7 years.

 

Plus, the farm and foundation give me some optimism, and I can't believe any GM is too stupid to not insist on trading from our everyday strength to build up our weak link area- pitching. I do not think Brez is dumb, just because many of his biggest winter and deadline deals back-fired.

[a700hitter]

What did Breslow realistically expect from Paxton? I think he got it.

[moonslav59]

What did Breslow realistically expect from Paxton? I think he got it.

 

Exactly. There was now way, he could claim ignorance.

[dgalehouse]

Did anyone hear what Jarren Duran yelled to a heckler at Fenway today ?

[moonslav59]

Did anyone hear what Jarren Duran yelled to a heckler at Fenway today ?

 

He said, "Yell at Henry, not US!"

[dgalehouse]

He said, "Yell at Henry, not US!"

 

No. Try again.

[moonslav59]

No. Try again.

 

I wasn't there.

 

Why not tell us?

[dgalehouse]

It was picked up on the NESN mike. I won't say it here because I would probably get booted. Let's just say it wasn't exactly a celebration of Pride Month.

[Old Red]

It was picked up on the NESN mike. I won't say it here because I would probably get booted. Let's just say it wasn't exactly a celebration of Pride Month.

 

There’s an article on ESPN.

[moonslav59]

It was picked up on the NESN mike. I won't say it here because I would probably get booted. Let's just say it wasn't exactly a celebration of Pride Month.

 

You don't get booted for just saying what someone said.

[Old Red]

You can also replay the video.

[dgalehouse]

People have gotten fired or cancelled for just repeating what someone said.

[dgalehouse]

The video is showing up all over the place by now.

[dgalehouse]

The Sox management and Duran have already issued the standard statement/ apology.

[notin]

Breslow has done exactly what Bloom did--bring in a bunch of low risk P and acquired a few lowerish ranked P prospects --in another words really nothing

 

Breslow didn’t do what abloom did at all, and Bloom didn’t bring in a bunch of low risk pitchers. Guys like Mike Wacha and Rich Hill are far from “low risk”…