Red Sox (Suarez) vs Angels (Johnson): 7/5/26, 9:30pm

[moonslav59]

1 hour ago, notin said:

Bogaerts deal was reportedly fallout from a bidding war with Philly over Trea Turner.  Each team kept upping their offer until reportedly Turner told San Diego to stop, as his wife is from Philly and that was the deciding factor.  Preller then used a huge chunk of his last offer to sign Bogaerts.  Probably confident Bogaerts didn’t also marry someone from eastern PA…

I recall the Padres were also interested in Judge.

I think the Cubs were also in on Bogey, but I'm not sure if they ever made a serious offer.

[moonslav59]

21 minutes ago, notin said:

Even in a sellers’ market, Weissert and Slaten look like weak trade options.

Coulombe, Guerrero & a healthy IKF might gather better returns.

[southpaw777]

1 hour ago, moonslav59 said:

That is clearly hyperbole, at best, and a misrepresentation at worst.

You do know he added Harrison and Priester, too. They just never or hardly pitched for the big club. The Sale trade was unfortunate, and backfired spectacularly on several levels. Adding injured or injury-prone pitchers is true and very concerning, but Sale was injury-prone, and Brez is blasted for trading away injury pitchers and for signing them. Hmmm....

Okay, he traded away Sale- big whiff.

He traded for and away Harrison, Priester and Drohan. None have had more than 24 GS'd for the other team, yet. Let's count them as 4 decent pitchers dealt away from our depth. Brez also traded Fitts, who we never hear about as trading away depth.

Now, let's look at the additions, not counting the Harrison & Priester adds.

Crochet: could cancel out the Sale loss.

Giolito: had 26 GS in 2025, which is more than Priester (24) and Harrison (16) PLUS Drohan (3)

(Buehler was healthy when we signed him and during the 2025 season: he just sucked. Sandoval has been a big bust at $18M/2.)

Gray (16 & counting) winning trade

Suarez (17 & counting) Best pitching signing since _____?

Tolle (16 & counting) was drafted by Brez

Bennett (7 & counting) winning trade.

Oviedo (0) is on IL

Newcomb (5) was a bust as a SP'er, and Brez should have kept him as a RP'er. He's done very well since that tarde.

(DMay & Paxton were minor additions and busts)

Minor league depth added- some far away from MLB ready

Trade: Holobetz, Ziehl, Jose Bello & others

Draft: Eyanson, Witherspoon, Futrell, Phillips, Finley, Brown, B Morgan, Mayers, B Ortiz, Patton & others

MiLFA or IFA: Delzine, Rivera, Montero & others

Rule 5 returnees: Paez & Bastardo

Ranked Pitching prospects traded away:

4 Perales (Bennett)

8 Clarke (Gray)

10 Fajardo w Aita (Contreras)

11 Sandlin (Ziehl)

12 Dobbins (Contreras)

18 Drohan w Harrison (Durbin, Monasterio, Seigler and Comp B pick)

Do you see a net loss in rotation strength and depth, here?

 

 

Once again, the whole point is having depth. He traded for them, yes, which I mentioned. But then got rid of too much. Speaking of the Oviedo mess, let’s not mention Cooper Criswell who was pretty reliable as a fill in starter or long relief. We paid him 800k then a month later Bres acquired Oviedo and just DFAd Criswell. I remember seeing plenty of other names that could have been. But he chose another depth arm. 
four Starters are out, Bennett takes one spot.

we had plenty of good depth in 24 and 25. We needed it this year. A lot of those names we got back are not better than what we had.

Gray Tolle Bennett….do we call Bello back up? Will Sandoval fall apart before or after he’s called up. What a mess. How many of those names you listed we got back will or can help us this year? How many are on the 40-man?

[moonslav59]

17 minutes ago, southpaw777 said:

Once again, the whole point is having depth. He traded for them, yes, which I mentioned. But then got rid of too much. Speaking of the Oviedo mess, let’s not mention Cooper Criswell who was pretty reliable as a fill in starter or long relief. We paid him 800k then a month later Bres acquired Oviedo and just DFAd Criswell. I remember seeing plenty of other names that could have been. But he chose another depth arm. 
four Starters are out, Bennett takes one spot.

we had plenty of good depth in 24 and 25. We needed it this year. A lot of those names we got back are not better than what we had.

Gray Tolle Bennett….do we call Bello back up? Will Sandoval fall apart before or after he’s called up. What a mess. How many of those names you listed we got back will or can help us this year? How many are on the 40-man?

He added more ML ready pitchers than subtracted (26 and 40.)

Not many teams handle losing 5 of their top 9-10 starters this well. Why you choose pitching depth as your main point is beyond me. It's the only area we have excelled in. It's not even close.

Big bat neglected.

Pen neglected.

Middle infield strength and depth not really neglected but a major concern.

Rotation and rotation depth is the only major plus area beyond 1B.

SP'ers on the 40: Underlined = Brez addition

Gray, Suarez, Tolle, Bennett, Early, Bello, Sandoval, Rivera, Anderson

IL: Crochet, Houck, Crawford, Oviedo, Uberstine

SP'ers on other team's 40:

Sale, Harrison, Drohan

IL: Priester

Okay, I wish we had Harrison and Sale, too, but the overall net gain is tremendous, even with Crochet on the IL.

[southpaw777]

9 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

He added more ML ready pitchers than subtracted (26 and 40.)

Not many teams handle losing 5 of their top 9-10 starters this well. Why you choose pitching depth as your main point is beyond me. It's the only area we have excelled in. It's not even close.

Big bat neglected.

Pen neglected.

Middle infield strength and depth not really neglected but a major concern.

Rotation and rotation depth is the only major plus area beyond 1B.

SP'ers on the 40: Underlined = Brez addition

Gray, Suarez, Tolle, Bennett, Early, Bello, Sandoval, Rivera, Anderson

IL: Crochet, Houck, Crawford, Oviedo, Uberstine

SP'ers on other team's 40:

Sale, Harrison, Drohan

IL: Priester

Okay, I wish we had Harrison and Sale, too, but the overall net gain is tremendous, even with Crochet on the IL.

It’s what he got back. Not the net gain. More bodies back but less talent. Anderson is useless.so is uberstine and Rivera is a BP arm. 
his injury guys Sandoval and Oviedo (Criswell loss) were both questionable at the time. Why even trade Preister? Two starters and a reliable middle IFer for 2 AAAA IF utility guys and a soft hitting middle IFer profile playing out of position was dumb. 
if you think more bodies back is better than more useful talent then I guess you’re right.

[moonslav59]

Just now, southpaw777 said:

It’s what he got back. Not the net gain. More bodies back but less talent. Anderson is useless.so is uberstine and Rivera is a BP arm. 
his injury guys Sandoval and Oviedo (Criswell loss) were both questionable at the time. Why even trade Preister? Two starters and a reliable middle IFer for 2 AAAA IF utility guys and a soft hitting middle IFer profile playing out of position was dumb. 
if you think more bodies back is better than more useful talent then I guess you’re right.

I've agreed: what we got back for Sale sucked.

What we got back for Priester looked like a suck, but is now TBD.

What we got back for Harrison & Drohan started out as a major suck, but is moving towards a TBD, now.

Criswell? Seriously? Hell, Fitts had a better outlook than he did.

What about what we gave up for Gray, Crochet, Bennett & Oviedo?

The Suarez signing might be the best FA SP'er signed since I can't remember... surely better than Half-Price.

The Tolle draft might be the best Sox pitcher drafted since Lester.

I look at the totality of the rotation moves as over 2 dozen pitchers have been added and subtracted in Brez's 3 seasons.

It's a major net plus, so I'll take 1 bad trade and possible 2 others  and 2 bad signings (Buehler & Sandoval) for the 4-6 good trades and 2-3 good signings.

This is not Brez's weak area.

[southpaw777]

34 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

I've agreed: what we got back for Sale sucked.

What we got back for Priester looked like a suck, but is now TBD.

What we got back for Harrison & Drohan started out as a major suck, but is moving towards a TBD, now.

Criswell? Seriously? Hell, Fitts had a better outlook than he did.

What about what we gave up for Gray, Crochet, Bennett & Oviedo?

The Suarez signing might be the best FA SP'er signed since I can't remember... surely better than Half-Price.

The Tolle draft might be the best Sox pitcher drafted since Lester.

I look at the totality of the rotation moves as over 2 dozen pitchers have been added and subtracted in Brez's 3 seasons.

It's a major net plus, so I'll take 1 bad trade and possible 2 others  and 2 bad signings (Buehler & Sandoval) for the 4-6 good trades and 2-3 good signings.

This is not Brez's weak area.

So we agree on a lot actually. 

hey, Criswell helped this team out a lot when needed. Don’t disrespect the Crizz😝

[moonslav59]

Just now, southpaw777 said:

So we agree on a lot actually. 

hey, Criswell helped this team out a lot when needed. Don’t disrespect the Crizz😝

Of course we could have used Harrison and maybe Drohan/Criswell this year. Most likely they'd have been in the pen, but I'm not going to claim those are the big mistakes, when Brez took care of their losses by adding more and better SP'ers.

His big mistakes were big bats and middle infield. It was also 3B before Durbin caught fire. One could say DH, but starting the season with Anthony or Duran with Yoshida/Romy, too as DH options, I'm not hitting Brez over the head for neglecting DH.

He neglected the offense.

I'm fine with saying he neglected the pen, but I think he had the SP depth in mind, and he did extend Chapman while adding Coulombe, Samaniego & Guerrero. It's not easy hitting paydirt on RP'ers- not like those three are "paydirt," but they have done fine. Watson, Kahnle and others- not so fine. I'd still call it a weakness.

The context needed is that had we added a big costly bat, we'd have subtracted Suarez. Had we traded for a big bat, we'd likely not have traded for Gray. Ether way may have helped balance the team and make it better, but maybe not by as much as people think, when you factor in the loss of Gray or Suarez.

In hindsight, undo the Oviedo trade and get a bat instead- maybe add a prospect or Duran, Bello or not sign IKF, and get someone like BLowe, but that is pure speculation that we coulda done that. We needed to add just the right guy like Schwarber or Alonso, who many of us wanted badly, and then found a SP'er to take the place of Suarez. Undo the Harrison trade to fix that hole, and now w e need a 3Bman, SS and 2Bman.

It's not as simple as saying "We just needed to sign Alonso." Yes, JH could have, but we all know he would not have allowed Brez to sign Suarez & Alonso. Even if we subtracted IKF $6M and traded Duran $8M, I doubt JH says yes. The AAV was just too high for him to accept.

[moonslav59]

A couple guys we let get away, we got back (the opposite of adding then subtracting Preister, Harrison and Drohan.)

Paez has 35Ks and 4BBs in 31.2 IP since his return.

Angel Bastardo 36Ks but 20BBs in 27.2 IP (not so great 5.20 ERA)

Some selected Brez farm pitching additions & OPS Against:

.454 Delzine

.465 Eyanson

.508 B Morgan

.516 Da. Reyes

.551 Berrios, .559 Mayers

.556 Olds. .579 La Sorsa, .592 E Rivera, .696 Gamboa

.568 Tolbert, .623 Bido, ,624 Gilman, ,646 D Brown

.660 Jose Bello, .675 Futrell, .694 Montero

.704 Holobetz

[moonslav59]

30 minutes ago, southpaw777 said:

So we agree on a lot actually. 

Yes. I guess we just look at things from different angles.