A Realistic Look at the 2026 Red Sox: Part I

[moonslav59]

20 minutes ago, notin said:

Except that you don’t own either one…

Does this mean you will stop suggesting trades?

[moonslav59]

According to BTV, these are the most valuable Sox, Jay, Yanks players by Value/year (no money counted)

Value per year (only 8+ players listed)

40 Crochet/ 33 Cease/63 Judge

33 Gray/ 30 Gausman/36 Chisholm

31 Suarez/ 26 Vladdy/ 30 Cole

26 Duran/ 25 Kirk/28 Fried

25 Anthony/ 24 Varsho/22 Grisham

19 Bello/ 22 Springer/21 Bellinger

17 Abreu/ 16 Bieber/21 Wells

17 Sandoval/ 14 Gimenez/19 Rodon

15 Early/ 12 Barger/ 17 Rice

15 Contreras/ 11 Clement/15 Bednar

14 Mayer/9 Berrios/11 Warren

13 Rafaela/ 8 Yesavage/11 Schlittler

12 Chapman/8 Hoffman/11 McMahon

12 Durbin/ none/11 Volpe 

12 Story/none/ 9 Dominguez  

11 Campbell, Kutter/ none/ 8 Weathers

9 Tolle, Narvaez/none/none

While the Yanks have better top quality players, the Sox have 19 players valued at $9M or more. I do think the Sandoval score is way too high, but maybe some Yankee and Blue Jay scores are too high, too. 

The Yanks have 16 players at 9 or more.

The Jays have 13.

Once you get past the top 9 players on each team, the Sox win every match-up.

In the top 9, the Yanks win 6, including the one with Chisholm apparently overrated, the Sox win 2 and TOR 1 .

According to BTV, we have the Jays clearly beat in projected value per year.

 

[moonslav59]

Here is how each roster slot looks between the Sox, Yanks and Jays:

Sox-Jays-Yanks

SP1: Crochet 5.8/ Cease 3.9/ Fried 3.9

SP2: Gray 3.7/ Gausman 3.0/ Rodon 2.3

SP3: Suarez 3.4/ Ponce 2.2/ Cole 2.1

SP4: Bello 1.9/ Yesavage 2.1/ Schlitter 1.7

SP5: Oviedo 1.1/ Bieber 2.0/ Warren 1.4

SP 6-7-8-9: Sox 2.3/ Jays 2.0/ Yanks 2.2

RP1: Chapman 1.7/ Hoffman 1.0/ Bednar 1.3

RP2: Whitlock 1.3/ Garcia 0.5/ Doval 0.9

RP3-4-5: Sox 1.0/ Jays 0.8/ Yanks 1.4

C: Narvaez 1.9/ Kirk 4.9/ Wells 3.2

1B: Contreras 2.2/ Valddy 4.8/ Rice 2.6

2B: Mayer 1.0/ Clement 2.6/ Chisholm 3.1

3B: Durbin 2.5/ Gimenez 2.8 /McMahon 1.7

SS: Story 2.3/ Okamoto 2.5/Volpe 2.0

Utility: Romy 0.9/ Schneider 1.4/ Caballero 0.9

LF: Anthony 3.5/ Sanchez 1.3/ Bellinger 3.3

CF: Rafaela 3.2/ Varsho 2.7/ Grisham 2.8

RF: Abreu 2.4/Barger 1.9/ Judge 7.3

DH: Duran 2.4/ Springer 2.4/Stanton 0.8

Utility 2-3-4: Sox 0.9/ Jays 2.2/Yanks 1.8

Rotation: Sox have 3 first, 1 second and 1 third & the best depth.

Pen: Sox have the best 1-2 punch and second best depth.

Infield: 2 second and 3 thirds (worst)

Outfield + DH: 3 first and 1 second (best)

 

 

[notin]

19 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

Does this mean you will stop suggesting trades?

No, but maybe stop placing holder posts…

[notin]

18 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

According to BTV, these are the most valuable Sox, Jay, Yanks players by Value/year (no money counted)

Value per year (only 8+ players listed)

40 Crochet/ 33 Cease/63 Judge

33 Gray/ 30 Gausman/36 Chisholm

31 Suarez/ 26 Vladdy/ 30 Cole

26 Duran/ 25 Kirk/28 Fried

25 Anthony/ 24 Varsho/22 Grisham

19 Bello/ 22 Springer/21 Bellinger

17 Abreu/ 16 Bieber/21 Wells

17 Sandoval/ 14 Gimenez/19 Rodon

15 Early/ 12 Barger/ 17 Rice

15 Contreras/ 11 Clement/15 Bednar

14 Mayer/9 Berrios/11 Warren

13 Rafaela/ 8 Yesavage/11 Schlittler

12 Chapman/8 Hoffman/11 McMahon

12 Durbin/ none/11 Volpe 

12 Story/none/ 9 Dominguez  

11 Campbell, Kutter/ none/ 8 Weathers

9 Tolle, Narvaez/none/none

While the Yanks have better top quality players, the Sox have 19 players valued at $9M or more. I do think the Sandoval score is way too high, but maybe some Yankee and Blue Jay scores are too high, too. 

The Yanks have 16 players at 9 or more.

The Jays have 13.

Once you get past the top 9 players on each team, the Sox win every match-up.

In the top 9, the Yanks win 6, including the one with Chisholm apparently overrated, the Sox win 2 and TOR 1 .

According to BTV, we have the Jays clearly beat in projected value per year.

 

Just because a player has more trade value doesn’t mean he’s a better baseball player; it just means he is better relative to his salary…

[moonslav59]

3 minutes ago, notin said:

Just because a player has more trade value doesn’t mean he’s a better baseball player; it just means he is better relative to his salary…

No. I took projected total value /divided by year. I left out the salary.

[moonslav59]

I noticed fangraphs projects a 2.1 fWAR for Durbin.

They project Contreras as 2.2.

Here are some selected projections:

2B/3B:

4.5 KMarte, 3.9 Bichette, 3.8 Bregman. 3.7 Neto, 3.4 Hoerner, 3.1 Donovan

3.0 Semien, 2.9 CJ Abrams, 2.8 G Torres & Devers, 2.7 E Tovar, 2.6 Keaschall

2.5 Meidroth, 2.4 Paredes. 2.3 B Stott, 2.2 Okamoto, R lewis 2.2

2.1 Durbin, A Bohm, 2.0 Murakami. 1.8 Polanco, 0.6 M Shaw

Basically, Durbin fell about 1.6 short of Bregman, 1.3 short of Neto and 1.0 from Donovan. He's almost even to Paredes, Okamoto & Bohm. He looks better than Polanco, Shaw & E Suarez.

1B/DH:

2.7 Schwarber & Alonso, 2.5 Yandy Diaz. L Arraez 2.3

2.2 Contreras

2.1 Rooker, 1.3 E Suarez

It looks like Contreras is not too far (0.6) from Alonso & Schwarber, but his defense probably helped him close the gap. He does look like a better choice than E Suarez.

[moonslav59]

I usually wait until a day or two before opening day to project the Sox players' season numbers, but here it goes:

PAs Player OPS (Assuming good health to all)

700 Anthony .875 (25 HRs)

675 Duran .790 (15 HRs & 25 SB)

650 Contreras .800 (25 HRs)

650 Story .730 (20 HRs & 20 SBs)

650 Abreu .800 (30 Hrs)

625 Durbin .750 (15 HRs & 25 SBs)

625 Rafaela .720 (15 Hrs & 20 SBs)

500 Mayer .740 (15 HRs)

450 Narvaez .725 (15 HRs)

400 IKF .675 (Great D)

350 Romy .800 (Platoon)

250 Yoshida .780 (Hard to predict PA total)

200 Wong .675 (Uptick projected here)

200 Monasterio .690

100 Sogard .690

__________________

IP Pitcher ERA

200 Crochet 2.75 (Top 3 Cy Young vote)

180 Gray 4.00 (IP is questionable)

170 Suarez 3.30 (Has never had 160 IP)

160 Bello 4.00 (Hardest to project)

120 Oviedo 4.20 (Stab in the dark)

100 Sandoval 4.20

100 Crawford 4.20

??? Early & Tolle ???

70 Whitlock 2.50

65 Chapman 2.00

65 Slaten 2.75

65 Weissert 3.00

55 Watson 3.75

50 Moran 3.90

40 Kelly 4.20

I might do an updated version near opening day.

 

 

 

 

 

[Michigan Adam2]

3 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

I usually wait until a day or two before opening day to project the Sox players' season numbers, but here it goes:

PAs Player OPS (Assuming good health to all)

700 Anthony .875 (25 HRs)

675 Duran .790 (15 HRs & 25 SB)

650 Contreras .800 (25 HRs)

650 Story .730 (20 HRs & 20 SBs)

650 Abreu .800 (30 Hrs)

625 Durbin .750 (15 HRs & 25 SBs)

625 Rafaela .720 (15 Hrs & 20 SBs)

500 Mayer .740 (15 HRs)

450 Narvaez .725 (15 HRs)

400 IKF .675 (Great D)

350 Romy .800 (Platoon)

250 Yoshida .780 (Hard to predict PA total)

200 Wong .675 (Uptick projected here)

200 Monasterio .690

100 Sogard .690

__________________

IP Pitcher ERA

200 Crochet 2.75 (Top 3 Cy Young vote)

180 Gray 4.00 (IP is questionable)

170 Suarez 3.30 (Has never had 160 IP)

160 Bello 4.00 (Hardest to project)

120 Oviedo 4.20 (Stab in the dark)

100 Sandoval 4.20

100 Crawford 4.20

??? Early & Tolle ???

70 Whitlock 2.50

65 Chapman 2.00

65 Slaten 2.75

65 Weissert 3.00

55 Watson 3.75

50 Moran 3.90

40 Kelly 4.20

I might do an updated version near opening day.

 

 

 

 

 

Those are al east champ numbers. Those HR totals were even over mine, and I thought I was being aggressive. Those are we don't need to go get anyone at the deadline numbers. 

[moonslav59]

45 minutes ago, Michigan Adam2 said:

Those are al east champ numbers. Those HR totals were even over mine, and I thought I was being aggressive. Those are we don't need to go get anyone at the deadline numbers. 

The homer numbers are based on top PA projections and I rounded up by 5's

[JoeBrady]

7 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

Basically, Durbin fell about 1.6 short of Bregman

The numbers (Steamer I assume) for Bregman and Durbin were based on 638 & 437 PAs.  The difference becomes ~ 0.8 if Durbin gets Bregman's 638 PAs.

[JoeBrady]

1 hour ago, Michigan Adam2 said:

Those are al east champ numbers. Those HR totals were even over mine, and I thought I was being aggressive. Those are we don't need to go get anyone at the deadline numbers. 

I thought the same thing.  I didn't do any fancy math, but that's a pretty high OPS.

[moonslav59]

1 hour ago, JoeBrady said:

The numbers (Steamer I assume) for Bregman and Durbin were based on 638 & 437 PAs.  The difference becomes ~ 0.8 if Durbin gets Bregman's 638 PAs.

Good point, and what happens if Durbin gets 638 and Bregman 437?

[UtahSox]

On 2/21/2026 at 2:20 PM, notin said:

Definitely not.  Unless you have much greater concerns about Mayer’s durability, not that Keaschall has established himself as immune to injury.

Mayer has similar offensive numbers in the minors but also is a capable defensive MLB-caliber shortstop, giving him a much higher floor.  Keaschall is a bat-first infielder whose minor league numbers are lower than Kristian Campbell’s were before making the Sox.  

The problem with bat-first prospects is if they don’t hit, you don’t have anything else.

I’d keep Mayer and the higher floor here. With Mayer, his defense is a better reason to keep him in the lineup to learn to hit MLB pitching.  Keaschall doesn’t give you that…

I think it’s very concerning that AC is using media to try and motivate MM. There are plenty of guys who have high ceilings that never develop into anything. But I do think you’re right with Sox current infield set up, probably not needed with Monasterio/ IKF. 

[moonslav59]

18 minutes ago, UtahSox said:

I think it’s very concerning that AC is using media to try and motivate MM. There are plenty of guys who have high ceilings that never develop into anything. But I do think you’re right with Sox current infield set up, probably not needed with Monasterio/ IKF. 

It looks that way, especially with Romy out.

[moonslav59]

2 hours ago, JoeBrady said:

I thought the same thing.  I didn't do any fancy math, but that's a pretty high OPS.

Look at my projections:

 

700 Anthony .875 > Uptick

675 Duran .790 = about the same as last 3 years

650 Contreras .800= about the same as his last few years

650 Story .730 < lower than 2025

650 Abreu .800 > career high, but he's been close

625 Durbin .750< not much higher than '25

625 Rafaela .720< not much higher than '25

500 Mayer .740 <stab in the dark

450 Narvaez .725 < lower than 2025

400 IKF .675 = about career avg

350 Romy .800 > worse than '25

250 Yoshida .780 = about career

200 Wong .675 = close to career

200 Monasterio .690= under career

100 Sogard .690 = same

 

[JoeBrady]

4 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Look at my projections:

I did, but I didn't look close enough to see if agreed with all the detail.  That said, I haven't seen a single thing that would lead me to believe that we won't have an above-average offense.

[mvp 78]

12 hours ago, JoeBrady said:

The numbers (Steamer I assume) for Bregman and Durbin were based on 638 & 437 PAs.  The difference becomes ~ 0.8 if Durbin gets Bregman's 638 PAs.

That's the underlying problem with these projections models. It's less about forecasting the future and more about "here's what they did previously."

[moonslav59]

51 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

That's the underlying problem with these projections models. It's less about forecasting the future and more about "here's what they did previously."

How they come up with projected PAs is questionable, and also a big part of someone's projected WAR and HR/RBI totals.

[mvp 78]

12 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

How they come up with projected PAs is questionable, and also a big part of someone's projected WAR and HR/RBI totals.

Steamer gives David Hamilton a 82 wRC+ which is HIGHER than his career wRC+ for some reason. I just don't put much stock into the projections. 

[mvp 78]

ZiPS has Hamilton tying his career high 1.6 fWAR.

[UtahSox]

10 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

Look at my projections:

 

700 Anthony .875 > Uptick

675 Duran .790 = about the same as last 3 years

650 Contreras .800= about the same as his last few years

650 Story .730 < lower than 2025

650 Abreu .800 > career high, but he's been close

625 Durbin .750< not much higher than '25

625 Rafaela .720< not much higher than '25

500 Mayer .740 <stab in the dark

450 Narvaez .725 < lower than 2025

400 IKF .675 = about career avg

350 Romy .800 > worse than '25

250 Yoshida .780 = about career

200 Wong .675 = close to career

200 Monasterio .690= under career

100 Sogard .690 = same

 

I think these Moon projections are rooted in data. Duran bounce back year…  Durbin/ Contreras rake in Fenway are my bold predictions.

I hope you’re right on top 9 guys AB’s. After that a few exceptions, Also noticed no Casas, no KC in 2026? Care to elaborate trade or stuck in AAA?

[mvp 78]

Ian Browne pumping Mikey Romero's tires this early in camp is a little silly. Good player, but not ready for MLB. Romero needs to learn how to make contact in AAA first. In ST, he'll be hitting off a lot of guys that are not ready for prime time and guys just working through stuff. You can throw those numbers out. He'd have one of the worst k%'s and chase rate's in MLB with below average defense. No point in bringing him up for a bench role. 

[mvp 78]

“What he did last year, the last three months, he was one of the best hitters in the big leagues,” Cora told Smith.

Story 6/21-EOY

84 G

15 HR (38th)

58 RBI (14th)

836 OPS (57th)

2.8 fWAR (23rd)

[5GoldGlovesOF,75]

1 hour ago, mvp 78 said:

That's the underlying problem with these projections models. It's less about forecasting the future and more about "here's what they did previously."

For some reason it always seems harder to predict the future than the past.

[notin]

33 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

ZiPS has Hamilton tying his career high 1.6 fWAR.

Playing time, plus a more hitter-friendly ballpark that transformed Travis Shaw from a stopgap infielder in Boston to the Mayor of Ding Dong City…

[notin]

4 minutes ago, 5GoldGlovesOF,75 said:

For some reason it always seems harder to predict the future than the past.

… said every weatherman ever..

[mvp 78]

15 minutes ago, notin said:

Playing time, plus a more hitter-friendly ballpark that transformed Travis Shaw from a stopgap infielder in Boston to the Mayor of Ding Dong City…

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/statcast-park-factors?type=year&year=2025&batSide=L&stat=index_wOBA&condition=All&rolling=3&parks=mlb

MIL is 25th for LHB, BOS is 2nd. 

[moonslav59]

58 minutes ago, UtahSox said:

I hope you’re right on top 9 guys AB’s. After that a few exceptions, Also noticed no Casas, no KC in 2026? Care to elaborate trade or stuck in AAA?

I had no idea how much those two play.

I think Casas can hit .800 if healthy.

I think KC will bounce back and be over .725.

[notin]

53 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/statcast-park-factors?type=year&year=2025&batSide=L&stat=index_wOBA&condition=All&rolling=3&parks=mlb

MIL is 25th for LHB, BOS is 2nd. 

So maybe he only becomes the Mayoral Assistant of Ding Ding City…