Red Sox (Bello) vs Blue Jays (Lauer): 4/29/26, 3:07pm

[Duran Is The Man]

22 hours ago, SPLENDIDSPLINTER said:

I firmly believe 100 losses is much more realistic than 90 wins.

at their current pace, they would finish the season 63-99. they lose tomorrow and it extrapolates out to 61-101. 😂😂😂

[illinoisredsox]

15 hours ago, jad said:

do you really think he cares what the unwashed rabble (i.e., his customers) think?

Yes, but only to the extent of how many of them will pay $ to go to Fenway.  Unfortunately, the sheep keep going, and when they don’t, when certain teams come to town (Yankees, Mets, Blue Jays, Phillies), visiting fans go.  And those “foreign” dollars go into his pocket just the same as and at the same exchange rate as New England ones.

[illinoisredsox]

15 hours ago, SPLENDIDSPLINTER said:

Note to Chad:

Please stop platooning Mayer. Let him play everyday. We don't need a Cora 2.0.

Agree, but we really don’t know how much autonomy he has. If the front office is making all the calls, then Tracy has no leverage.  If Cora balked, he gets his $7M salary; he still gets that now even if he gets fired.
 

If Tracy is insubordinate, they aren’t going to send him back to Worcester, they’ll send him out the door and as a career minor league manager, there’s no way he has a best egg built up that will support his family for very long.  Maybe he gets another job in baseball, maybe he doesn’t.

[mvp 78]

9 hours ago, Duran Is The Man said:

at their current pace, they would finish the season 63-99. they lose tomorrow and it extrapolates out to 61-101. 😂😂😂

Good enough to draft an Andrew Benintendi or even a Trey Ball! 

[drewski6]

12 hours ago, JoeBrady said:

We had 4 outfielders plus Yoshida.  We weren't adding another OF/DH.  The entire focus was upgrading the IF-1B, 2B, 3B.  That was about 99% of the discussion.

Yup, and I think you are looking at the result of worrying about filling positions efficiently over chasing elite talent.

[drewski6]

14 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

The 2020 team opened the season with a rotation of Eovaldi, Perez, Weber, Springs & Hall. Our closer was Workman, who was traded at the deadline for Pivetta and promptly messed the bed. (Barnes, Brasier, Walden, Hembree, Brice & Brewer filled the rest of the pen.) OKay, ERod was out all year. Perez led the tean in IP, Ryan Weber 3rd, Phillips valdez 4th, Mazza 5th, Godley 6th, Brewer 7th, Brasier 8th, Barnes 9th, Springs 10th, Brice 11th, Osich, Kickham & Covey not far behind.

We started Jose Peraza at 2B w Beni, JBJ and Verdugo as our OF. Yes, Devers, Bogey & JD were still around. Vaz had a .689 career OPS going into 2020. Chavis finished 7th in PAs, Pillar 8th despite being traded. The bench was Dalbec, Plawecki, Arauz & Lin.

Thats close.

[mvp 78]

29 minutes ago, drewski6 said:

Yup, and I think you are looking at the result of worrying about filling positions efficiently over chasing elite talent.

In the past, they were worried about cost and signed sub elite talent to fill open positions (Story, Masa). That cost them more due to worse production and bad contracts than if they swung for the fences on larger contracts (Schwarber, Swanson). 

[moonslav59]

1 hour ago, mvp 78 said:

In the past, they were worried about cost and signed sub elite talent to fill open positions (Story, Masa). That cost them more due to worse production and bad contracts than if they swung for the fences on larger contracts (Schwarber, Swanson). 

I totally agree, but unless the overall budget was allowed to go higher, if you spend more on Schwarber and or Swanson, you choose to leave other slots neglected.

[mvp 78]

8 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

I totally agree, but unless the overall budget was go higher, if you spend more on Schwarber and or Swanson, you choose to leave other slots neglected.

I'd figure it out as I'm a very smart person. No difference between the production of their 1/10 pitchers and contracts that would be much smaller. 

Schwarber 4/79 (19.75 AAV) vs Masa 5/90 (18 AAV)

Swanson 7/177 (25.3 AAV) vs Story 6/140 (23.3 AAV) 

I increased payroll by 4M per year. Ooops! 

[Old Red]

31 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

I'd figure it out as I'm a very smart person. No difference between the production of their 1/10 pitchers and contracts that would be much smaller. 

Schwarber 4/79 (19.75 AAV) vs Masa 5/90 (18 AAV)

Swanson 7/177 (25.3 AAV) vs Story 6/140 (23.3 AAV) 

I increased payroll by 4M per year. Ooops! 

Easy peasy I guess for some, but for others not so much.

[notin]

2 hours ago, drewski6 said:

Yup, and I think you are looking at the result of worrying about filling positions efficiently over chasing elite talent.

So the Sox real failure was not signing Kyle Schwarber to play 2b….

[notin]

47 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

I'd figure it out as I'm a very smart person. No difference between the production of their 1/10 pitchers and contracts that would be much smaller. 

Schwarber 4/79 (19.75 AAV) vs Masa 5/90 (18 AAV)

Swanson 7/177 (25.3 AAV) vs Story 6/140 (23.3 AAV) 

I increased payroll by 4M per year. Ooops! 

Swanson was a pretty mediocre player the bulk of his career with the Braves.  Before the outlier 2022 season, his career OPS+ was 90.  And he has always had one of the weakest arms of any MLB starting SS.  Great hands and range, but throws like a 6 year old girl using her weak arm. 
 

It’s been working out great for the Cubs, but I  don’t fault any team for looking past Swanson…

[mvp 78]

10 minutes ago, notin said:

So the Sox real failure was not signing Kyle Schwarber to play 2b….

They've had Youk, Vaz and Dalbec play there. Why not Schwarber? 

[notin]

5 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

They've had Youk, Vaz and Dalbec play there. Why not Schwarber? 

Because Schwarber’s defense is so bad that he couldn’t catch COVID if he licked every doorknob in 2020?   I mean, thats all I got on it…

[drewski6]

3 hours ago, notin said:

So the Sox real failure was not signing Kyle Schwarber to play 2b….

Cedanne to infield, Duran to Center, Masa to LF, done.

[drewski6]

3 hours ago, notin said:

So the Sox real failure was not signing Kyle Schwarber to play 2b….

The sox failure was not targeting very good players, instead they targeted positional fits when they had enough positional versatility to fit any great bat, regardless of position.

[drewski6]

Very good players move around MLB every year, I just cant give a break for any kind of "well who did you want them to get"

[drewski6]

This team took a giant leap backwards and Breslow fired Cora to save his own job.

[mvp 78]

17 minutes ago, drewski6 said:

Cedanne to infield, Duran to Center, Masa to LF, done.

Drewski to change channel

[moonslav59]

5 hours ago, notin said:

So the Sox real failure was not signing Kyle Schwarber to play 2b….

Easy peasy for some, I guess, but for others not so much.

[JoeBrady]

7 hours ago, drewski6 said:

Yup, and I think you are looking at the result of worrying about filling positions efficiently over chasing elite talent.

Then that assumes that you were okay with prioritizing DH over the infield?

[JoeBrady]

1 hour ago, drewski6 said:

Very good players move around MLB every year, I just cant give a break for any kind of "well who did you want them to get"

Do they?  I looked at the top-30 players in fWAR from 2023-2025.  Disregarding moves from LF/RF, I see Betts, that's all.

[JoeBrady]

1 hour ago, drewski6 said:

Cedanne to infield, Duran to Center, Masa to LF, done.

Downgrade three positions all with one move?

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

23 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

The 2020 team opened the season with a rotation of Eovaldi, Perez, Weber, Springs & Hall. Our closer was Workman, who was traded at the deadline for Pivetta and promptly messed the bed. (Barnes, Brasier, Walden, Hembree, Brice & Brewer filled the rest of the pen.) OKay, ERod was out all year. Perez led the tean in IP, Ryan Weber 3rd, Phillips valdez 4th, Mazza 5th, Godley 6th, Brewer 7th, Brasier 8th, Barnes 9th, Springs 10th, Brice 11th, Osich, Kickham & Covey not far behind.

We started Jose Peraza at 2B w Beni, JBJ and Verdugo as our OF. Yes, Devers, Bogey & JD were still around. Vaz had a .689 career OPS going into 2020. Chavis finished 7th in PAs, Pillar 8th despite being traded. The bench was Dalbec, Plawecki, Arauz & Lin.

Great synopsis, Moon.

[Old Red]

1 hour ago, moonslav59 said:

Easy peasy for some, I guess, but for others not so much.

It appeared that way for Bloom, which was whom I was referring to.😉

[moonslav59]

2 hours ago, SPLENDIDSPLINTER said:

Great synopsis, Moon.

The thing about that roster is that it highlighted the total lack of any depth on the 40, and although the farm produced better than expected (as some called it "decimated,) the idea that building up a foundational depth needed to be done first was not a bad strategy. 

That did not mean the budget had to be severely limited for 5 years, but clearly adding 2-3 stars would not have been enough.

To me, one major factor that messed up the Sox was how the team did pretty well in 2021, and taht reinforced JH's idea that we could win without major investments. It took a couple last place finishes to get him to budge a tiny bit on upping the investments.

[moonslav59]

2 hours ago, Old Red said:

It appeared that way for Bloom, which was whom I was referring to.😉

To not sign a DH only guy to play 2B?

[Old Red]

1 hour ago, moonslav59 said:

To not sign a DH only guy to play 2B?

Anything’s possible with the Red Sox, but I don’t think there would have been any idea to play Flintstone at 2B.

[moonslav59]

36 minutes ago, Old Red said:

Anything’s possible with the Red Sox, but I don’t think there would have been any idea to play Flintstone at 2B.

Duh.

You missed the point once again.

[Old Red]

1 minute ago, moonslav59 said:

Duh.

You missed the point once again.

I may have I really wasn’t paying very close attention after the Bruins fiasco tonight.