A Realistic View of the 2025 Red Sox: Part II

[Old Red]

56 minutes ago, Bellhorn04 said:

I absolutely agree that DH should be manned full-time by a good hitter, not used to rest guys.

The Red Sox problem is having a surplus of guys-Devers, Yoshida and Casas-whose best position is DH.

I agree, and like I kept saying before Bregman was added that the Red Sox were just playIng the cards they had dealt themselves, which meant the players you mentioned. When they were all hitting it doesn’t look as bad, but when they are not it’s even worse, and just not good roster construction. They didn’t sign Masa to just hang out, and collect his $18M, and they didn’t sign Raffy to be a $30M DH either.

[notin]

1 hour ago, Bellhorn04 said:

I absolutely agree that DH should be manned full-time by a good hitter, not used to rest guys.

The Red Sox problem is having a surplus of guys-Devers, Yoshida and Casas-whose best position is DH.

But this problem has manifested itself with a weak-fielding first baseman.  And so far, that’s it.  

We do like projecting future logjams, don’t we?

[Bellhorn04]

5 minutes ago, notin said:

But this problem has manifested itself with a weak-fielding first baseman.  And so far, that’s it.  

We do like projecting future logjams, don’t we?

Some would say we have a present and insoluble DH logjam with Devers and Yoshida.  

[notin]

46 minutes ago, Old Red said:

I agree, and like I kept saying before Bregman was added that the Red Sox were just playIng the cards they had dealt themselves, which meant the players you mentioned. When they were all hitting it doesn’t look as bad, but when they are not it’s even worse, and just not good roster construction. They didn’t sign Masa to just hang out, and collect his $18M, and they didn’t sign Raffy to be a $30M DH either.

Well, you repeatedly told us the Red Sox “signed Devers to play 3b” and ridiculed anyone who said he should move, going back to some of those folks with a brilliant yet unpopular brand of foresight to ask the Sox to sign Matt Chapman (8.0 bWAR, .793 OPS in 2 years in SF).  They signed Devers, like anyone else, to play baseball in whatever capacity he’s told.  Signing Bregman just drove this point home, that no one owns a position with the team…

[notin]

5 minutes ago, Bellhorn04 said:

Some would say we have a present and insoluble DH logjam with Devers and Yoshida.  

And you’d be 100% incorrect, because Yoshida isn’t here yet.  Is it a potential issue? Maybe.  Right now it’s proof of the need for depth, because we have one active DH and one injured/recovering one…

[Bellhorn04]

2 minutes ago, notin said:

And you’d be 100% incorrect, because Yoshida isn’t here yet.  Is it a potential issue? Maybe.  Right now it’s proof of the need for depth, because we have one active DH and one injured/recovering one…

No, it's 100% an issue because Yoshida, making 18 million a year, is only suited to DH and Devers has taken that spot from him.  So we have an 18 million backup DH that we don't really want to ever see because it would mean Devers is injured.

[5GoldGlovesOF,75]

8 minutes ago, notin said:

Well, you repeatedly told us the Red Sox “signed Devers to play 3b” and ridiculed anyone who said he should move, going back to some of those folks with a brilliant yet unpopular brand of foresight to ask the Sox to sign Matt Chapman (8.0 bWAR, .793 OPS in 2 years in SF).  They signed Devers, like anyone else, to play baseball in whatever capacity he’s told.  Signing Bregman just drove this point home, that no one owns a position with the team…

Wally just asked who stole his head.

[notin]

Just now, Bellhorn04 said:

No, it's 100% an issue because Yoshida, making 18 million a year, is only suited to DH and Devers has taken that spot from him.

And the Sox are worth $4.7billion, meaning they have 0.004% of their assets tied up in Yoshida.  I get fan level concern, but until the Sox think it’s an issue, maybe it isn’t. 

I can tell you at a bare minimum, it’s not an issue until both make the MLB roster at once.  If the Sox are going to ignore payroll for a bit - something they have not done in the past 6 years - this problem can be a temporary blip.

Don’t forget the contracts the Sox gave to Hanley, Sandoval and Rusney included rings…

[Bellhorn04]

37 minutes ago, notin said:

Don’t forget the contracts the Sox gave to Hanley, Sandoval and Rusney included rings…

Now you have to be joking.

They won the ring in 2018 in spite of those bad contracts.

But those contracts also impacted the team's payroll freakout after the 2018 ring.  Dombrowski took a lot of heat for the sky-high payrolls in 2018-2019, but the reality was that a lot of the bad contracts were ones he inherited.  

[5GoldGlovesOF,75]

6 minutes ago, Bellhorn04 said:

Now you have to be joking.

No joke. Clubhouse workers got rings for washing uniforms, because we're all just rooting for the laundry.

[Old Red]

28 minutes ago, notin said:

Well, you repeatedly told us the Red Sox “signed Devers to play 3b” and ridiculed anyone who said he should move, going back to some of those folks with a brilliant yet unpopular brand of foresight to ask the Sox to sign Matt Chapman (8.0 bWAR, .793 OPS in 2 years in SF).  They signed Devers, like anyone else, to play baseball in whatever capacity he’s told.  Signing Bregman just drove this point home, that no one owns a position with the team…

NNN you’re wrong again.  The Red Sox did sign Devers to be a 3B. That’s a fact.  I kept saying the Red Sox were just playing the cards they dealt themselves despite the results being bad on D, and that’s a fact. I didn’t ridicule anyone about the idea, or suggestion of signing Chapman or anyone else, and I repeatedly said I was posting what I thought what the Red Sox would do, and not what I would do, and that’s a fact also. It also seems pretty much undisputed that Raffy was told by the Red Sox when he signed that he would be the 3B for the foreseeable future. That changed. NNN🤭🙈!

[Bellhorn04]

It doesn't really matter what they told him.  The fact is he was always a DH in waiting.  We all love him but he got paid about twice as much as he should have.  

[Old Red]

8 minutes ago, Bellhorn04 said:

It doesn't really matter what they told him.  The fact is he was always a DH in waiting.  We all love him but he got paid about twice as much as he should have.  

I’m not disagreeing, or disputing any of this. I was just stating facts. Raffy is overpaid as a DH as Yoshida was.

[moonslav59]

3 hours ago, Bellhorn04 said:

The Red Sox problem is having a surplus of guys-Devers, Yoshida and Casas-whose best position is DH.

Refsnyder, too (as a platoon, only DH.)

Grissom sucks on D but will likely never hit well enough to be viewed as a DH.

[moonslav59]

To get an idea of how small these sample sizes are, in which some are suggesting demoting or benching some of our best hitters over the past few years, consider this:

OPS on April 18th:

.876 Story

.695 Devers

,632 Duran

As of mid-game, today...

.743 Story

.734 Duran

,710 Devers

It's way too small a sample size  to make knee-jerk moves.

What a player does over any 2-3 week sample size is not a prediction of what he will continue doing.

 

[moonslav59]

29 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

To get an idea of how small these sample sizes are, in which some are suggesting demoting or benching some of our best hitters over the past few years, consider this:

OPS on April 18th:

.876 Story

.695 Devers

,632 Duran

As of mid-game, today...

.743 Story

.734 Duran

,710 Devers

It's way too small a sample size  to make knee-jerk moves.

What a player does over any 2-3 week sample size is not a prediction of what he will continue doing.

 

With that Devers homer, he just passed Story and Duran in OPS.

I guess benching or demoting him in the line-up was not such a good idea.

[moonslav59]

We get a day of while on the road and begin a series with TOR on TUE.

We then come home for 3 vs MN & TEX.

Away for 3 vs KCR & DET

Day off May 15

Long home stand with 3 vs ATL & NYM, then 4 vs BAL

We don't play NYY until June 6th.

[moonslav59]

The much criticized offense is now 4th in runs scored, although we've played more games than several teams.

We are 3rd in Total Bases and 1st in 2Bs.

We are 6th in team OPS (3rd in the AL to NYY & SEA.)

9th in HRs and 6th in SBs.

We are second in Ks.

[moonslav59]

Like last season, we are allowing way too many unearned runs:

20 COL

19 BOS & OAK

The Astros have allowed 3 Unearned runs all year.

 

[notin]

8 hours ago, Bellhorn04 said:

Now you have to be joking.

They won the ring in 2018 in spite of those bad contracts.

 

That was the point - that they won despite those contracts.  Most people probably forgot they were all with the team.

Yoshida isn’t dragging this team down, despite the weird opinions to the contrary.  And his presence might be useful…

 

[notin]

11 hours ago, Old Red said:

NNN you’re wrong again.  The Red Sox did sign Devers to be a 3B. That’s a fact.  I kept saying the Red Sox were just playing the cards they dealt themselves despite the results being bad on D, and that’s a fact. I didn’t ridicule anyone about the idea, or suggestion of signing Chapman or anyone else, and I repeatedly said I was posting what I thought what the Red Sox would do, and not what I would do, and that’s a fact also. It also seems pretty much undisputed that Raffy was told by the Red Sox when he signed that he would be the 3B for the foreseeable future. That changed. NNN🤭🙈!

Oh that’s right.  I forgot you were involved in those negotiations.  I forgot - on what page was the clause where he got to play 3b in perpetuity?

And while you were telling me what the Red Sox WOULD do, it turns out they agreed with me about what they SHOULD do.  And it’s really weird that you’re still clinging to being right the Sox keeping Devers at third.  Especially since I seriously doubt I saw the need to move Devers off third before the Sox did.  It’s an extremely safe bet a Devers move was in their plans LONG before he signed that deal…

[Bellhorn04]

15 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

With that Devers homer, he just passed Story and Duran in OPS.

I guess benching or demoting him in the line-up was not such a good idea.

Started the year in horrific slump.  Broke out of it for a few games.  Went into another slump.  Broke out of it for a few games.  

Hopefully he's back for good now.  It does look like the horrific start was mostly about rust.

[Bellhorn04]

11 hours ago, notin said:

That was the point - that they won despite those contracts.  Most people probably forgot they were all with the team.

Yoshida isn’t dragging this team down, despite the weird opinions to the contrary.  And his presence might be useful…

 

It's a survivable bad contract, I agree on that.

His presence might be useful, but let's face it - the only way it is is if Devers goes down to injury, which nobody wants...

So if Yoshida is going to have an MLB career of any sort, the Red Sox would be doing him a favor by trading him to a team in need of a DH. 

But of course they're not really in the business of doing favors.  They'd have to recoup some dough in the process...

[notin]

1 hour ago, Bellhorn04 said:

It's a survivable bad contract, I agree on that.

His presence might be useful, but let's face it - the only way it is is if Devers goes down to injury, which nobody wants...

So if Yoshida is going to have an MLB career of any sort, the Red Sox would be doing him a favor by trading him to a team in need of a DH. 

But of course they're not really in the business of doing favors.  They'd have to recoup some dough in the process...

I could argue that he could be useful beyond a simple Devers injury.  While both he and Devers are bad defenders, it’s not an automatic loss to put one in the field.

Not sure why it matters about whether or not anyone wants a Devers injury.  Unpopular or not, key injuries happen.  And if Devers were to get hurt, would the Six be better off or worse off with Yoshida?

[mvp 78]

21 hours ago, notin said:

And the Sox are worth $4.7billion, meaning they have 0.004% of their assets tied up in Yoshida.

That's not what those words mean.

[mvp 78]

21 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

Refsnyder, too (as a platoon, only DH.)

Grissom sucks on D but will likely never hit well enough to be viewed as a DH.

Grissom is a bad MIFer. That doesn't mean he can't play elsewhere. He's probably athletic enough for COF/1B maybe 3B. Just because a guy is terrible at SS doesn't mean he's a DH.

[Old Red]

1 hour ago, Bellhorn04 said:

Started the year in horrific slump.  Broke out of it for a few games.  Went into another slump.  Broke out of it for a few games.  

Hopefully he's back for good now.  It does look like the horrific start was mostly about rust.

Let’s not get to excited yet. It has been pointed out he had a good weekend earlier against the Cardinals, and that’s all it lasted. Cleveland didn’t have any hard throwers except for their BP, so we’ll see how he fairs against Toronto.

[TheSplinteredSplendor]

22 hours ago, notin said:

And the Sox are worth $4.7billion, meaning they have 0.004% of their assets tied up in Yoshida.

 

That's just silly.

It's not about how much of their assets are tied up in the player.

It's about how it impacts the salary cap every year.

[Old Red]

17 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

With that Devers homer, he just passed Story and Duran in OPS.

I guess benching or demoting him in the line-up was not such a good idea.

So it has been a small sample size all year when Raffy wasn’t doing much of anything, and now after a even smaller 3 game series the naysayers were all wrong, and Raffy is now back, and proven everyone wrong, and he back?👏

[moonslav59]

21 hours ago, Old Red said:

NNN you’re wrong again.  The Red Sox did sign Devers to be a 3B. That’s a fact.  I kept saying the Red Sox were just playing the cards they dealt themselves despite the results being bad on D, and that’s a fact. I didn’t ridicule anyone about the idea, or suggestion of signing Chapman or anyone else, and I repeatedly said I was posting what I thought what the Red Sox would do, and not what I would do, and that’s a fact also. It also seems pretty much undisputed that Raffy was told by the Red Sox when he signed that he would be the 3B for the foreseeable future. That changed. NNN🤭🙈!

The "foreseeable future," if that was the term used, ended when the guy who said it was replaced.

He signed the deal in January 2023, so he got too play too more years at 3B that he should have.