A Realistic View at the 2026 Red Sox Part II

[NHNative]

I think the streak put the AL in a fear of the Red Sox mode.

It ain't over.

[drewski6]

50 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

'26: 23rd in R, 26th in HR

'25: 7th in R, 15th in HR

I agree. This team feels a lot like MIL. Probably not going to make a lot of noise in the playoffs aside from beating the Yankees. 

Beat the Yankees and Ill be happy that Bres got extended. Lose to the yankees with no thump in the bats, then breslow will still have won some rope from me, but i would err towards locking him up few years out was premature.

[drewski6]

17 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

I'm curious on your thoguths: how does this Pitching, pitching, pitching winter line up in Sox history?

Gray

Suarez

Bennett

Guerrero, Gamboa, Watson, Coulombe (MIller in summer)

2024-2025

Crochet, Buehler, Sandoval, Chapman, Newcomb (Matz & May in summer) (Tolle drafted in 2024)

I think it has worked out so far so good, but eventually we'll want to get through the first round.  And while I agree that Gray should be priority, if we noodlebat out against the yankees, I will not feel like just mead and returning contreras, and hoping on RA to emerge as superstar - will be enough.  And if we roll into it next year and noodlebat 3 times running, you may hear some stuck with Breslow talk.

But its worked out better than I expected, Ill give you that.  

[JoeBrady]

3 hours ago, mvp 78 said:

Red Sox '25: 89 wins

Red Sox '26: 87 wins

We had twice as many injuries.  If Crochet repeats his 2025, we have an easy 95 wins.

[mvp 78]

4 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

We had twice as many injuries.  If Crochet repeats his 2025, we have an easy 95 wins.

If Crochet kept pitching like '26, they wouldn't have gotten to 87. 

[mvp 78]

And if Story hit like it was Coors...

And if Duran hit like it was '24...

And if Roman stopped hitting the ball into the ground and stayed healthy... 

[JoeBrady]

2 hours ago, drewski6 said:

Beat the Yankees and Ill be happy that Bres got extended. Lose to the yankees with no thump in the bats, then breslow will still have won some rope from me, but i would err towards locking him up few years out was premature.

I think that's pretty reasonable.  Most of the guys we've had did a 'reasonable' job, but the leash is only so long.  Bloom did a good rebuild of the minors.  Cora did a decent job managing.  But both hit a wall.  Right now, I'd bet on 8 of our 9 position players to have an OPS+ >100.  I doubt any other team can match that.  So I'd rathe have Gray or Skubal.

That said, I'd have no problem adding a thumper at DH.  But I'd want a real thumper.  I don't want to add a marginal upgrade which will restrict our spending elsewhere.  FWIW, had we added Alonso & Bregman, instead of Contreras, Durbin, Gray & Suarez, I seriously doubt we make the playoffs.

[moonslav59]

3 hours ago, NHNative said:

But how we got there makes a difference.

We also played a tough schedule as 5 of the top 9 AL teams are in the ALE. BAL & TOR were 1-2 GB being #6 and #7.

Last year, we had 2 of the worst 6 AL teams in the ALE.

[mvp 78]

3 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

FWIW, had we added Alonso & Bregman, instead of Contreras, Durbin, Gray & Suarez, I seriously doubt we make the playoffs.

ChiSox got in with 84 wins. If the Sox fall to 83 wins, they probably make the playoffs as the 6th seed depending on how their losses shake out vs other near contenders. Could even have a worse record and make the playoffs with how bad the AL was! 

[moonslav59]

2 hours ago, drewski6 said:

I think it has worked out so far so good, but eventually we'll want to get through the first round.  And while I agree that Gray should be priority, if we noodlebat out against the yankees, I will not feel like just mead and returning contreras, and hoping on RA to emerge as superstar - will be enough.  And if we roll into it next year and noodlebat 3 times running, you may hear some stuck with Breslow talk.

But its worked out better than I expected, Ill give you that.  

Is it the best Sox pitcher addition winter you know of?

It wasn't the Price winter.

Pedro?

Beckett?

I can't think of another winter with 3 additions close to Gray, Suarez and Bennett, and it was coming off the heals of a Crochet add winter and a Tolle draftee.

Brez left some holes, but he had a limited budget and too many holes to fill. In a sense, he was playing whack-a-mole.

[mvp 78]

5 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

We also played a tough schedule as 5 of the top 9 AL teams are in the ALE. BAL & TOR were 1-2 GB being #6 and #7.

Last year, we had 2 of the worst 6 AL teams in the ALE.

BAL and TOR ended up 5 GB from the 6th seed. 

[5GoldGlovesOF,75]

Meanwhile, here's what you're missing on sports TV in New England:

NESN has a Bruins show on, YES is telling us how great the Yankees best players are from Massachusetts, and NBCSportsBoston -- broadcasting from a football stadium -- is still blabbing about how much the Patriots suck.

[mvp 78]

2 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Brez left some holes, but he had a limited budget and too many holes to fill. In a sense, he was playing whack-a-mole.

What? 

[JoeBrady]

11 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

If Crochet kept pitching like '26, they wouldn't have gotten to 87. 

But he was injured in '26.  That's kind of the point.

[mvp 78]

1 minute ago, 5GoldGlovesOF,75 said:

Meanwhile, here's what you're missing on sports TV in New England:

NESN has a Bruins show on, YES is telling us how great the Yankees best players are from Massachusetts, and NBCSportsBoston -- broadcasting from a football stadium -- is still blabbing about how much the Patriots suck.

Hal Gill is a lazy POS. The Patriots are dogdoo this year. 

[mvp 78]

1 minute ago, JoeBrady said:

But he was injured in '26.  That's kind of the point.

His innings went:

25

146

205

Are we completely surprised that a guy who skipped MiLB had injury questions after hitting 200 innings? Crochet's record is a giant red flag. I hope he can stay healthy, but it doesn't seem like he will. 

[drewski6]

15 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

I think that's pretty reasonable.  Most of the guys we've had did a 'reasonable' job, but the leash is only so long.  Bloom did a good rebuild of the minors.  Cora did a decent job managing.  But both hit a wall.  Right now, I'd bet on 8 of our 9 position players to have an OPS+ >100.  I doubt any other team can match that.  So I'd rathe have Gray or Skubal.

That said, I'd have no problem adding a thumper at DH.  But I'd want a real thumper.  I don't want to add a marginal upgrade which will restrict our spending elsewhere.  FWIW, had we added Alonso & Bregman, instead of Contreras, Durbin, Gray & Suarez, I seriously doubt we make the playoffs.

Id bet that we were were the #23 offense last year.

[drewski6]

12 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Is it the best Sox pitcher addition winter you know of?

It wasn't the Price winter.

Pedro?

Beckett?

I can't think of another winter with 3 additions close to Gray, Suarez and Bennett, and it was coming off the heals of a Crochet add winter and a Tolle draftee.

Brez left some holes, but he had a limited budget and too many holes to fill. In a sense, he was playing whack-a-mole.

The team brez built was a swerve after he revolved his whole offseason around resigning Bregman, but was unable to communicate with Bregman without slapping him in the face.

And I disagree that it was a budget issue.  I dont necessarily agree that 0% chance of Ranger if got Bregman.

We got one year of Gray, and Ranger to a contract that is so far so good.

[moonslav59]

13 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

BAL and TOR ended up 5 GB from the 6th seed. 

I said record not dumb playoff seed.

HOU 81-81 had the 6th best record.

TEX 80-82 was 7th

79-82 BAL (-1.5 from #6)

79-83 TOR (-1.0 GB #7)

[mvp 78]

2 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

I said record not dumb playoff seed.

HOU 81-81 had the 6th best record.

TEX 80-82 was 7th

79-82 BAL (-1.5 from #6)

79-83 TOR (-1.0 GB #7)

Something very meaningless then. Ok! 

[JoeBrady]

17 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

And if Story hit like it was Coors...

And if Duran hit like it was '24...

And if Roman stopped hitting the ball into the ground and stayed healthy... 

Under- and over-performing is a 100% different than losing the #2 CY.  At any given time, half of your players will be better and half will be worse.  Losing the #2 in the league is huge.

[JoeBrady]

22 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

His innings went:

25

146

205

Are we completely surprised that a guy who skipped MiLB had injury questions after hitting 200 innings? Crochet's record is a giant red flag. I hope he can stay healthy, but it doesn't seem like he will. 

This started off with you comparing 2025 wins v 2026 wins.  I explained the difference.

[drewski6]

1 minute ago, JoeBrady said:

Under- and over-performing is a 100% different than losing the #2 CY.  At any given time, half of your players will be better and half will be worse.  Losing the #2 in the league is huge.

But what thesis are you trying to make that this would fall under?  What was the original disagreement.  Is it 85 wins vs 87 wins?  Because in2025 we were 7th in runs scored / game and in 2026 we were 23rd.

In runs allowed, we were 10th in 2025 but in 2026 we were third.

So going from 2025 to 2026, our pitching got much better.  Our hitting got way worse.  My thesis is you over-prioritized pitching.  If your point is that we were able to go from 10th best pitching to 3rd best pitching despite losing our ace, you are making my point for me, so TY.

And here you are again, saying that on a team that was 23d in runs scored, and 3rd in runs allowed - and is already adding Crochet to 3rd in runs allowed....You are day dreaming about Skubal.  ANd telling me that the 23rd ranked offense in runs scored is grrrrrrreat

[drewski6]

7 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

Under- and over-performing is a 100% different than losing the #2 CY.  At any given time, half of your players will be better and half will be worse.  Losing the #2 in the league is huge.

our pitching was better in 2026 than it was in 2025 though, so that doesnt explain why we had 2 less wins despite a weaker division.

[mvp 78]

21 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

Under- and over-performing is a 100% different than losing the #2 CY.  At any given time, half of your players will be better and half will be worse.  Losing the #2 in the league is huge.

It's just different underperforming and one that wasn't all that surprising. 

[drewski6]

1 minute ago, mvp 78 said:

It's just different underperforming and one that wasn't all that surprising. 

I like my argument better.

We went from 10th in pitching and 7th in hitting (2025) to 3rd in pitching and 23rd in hitting (2026) - Joe Brady told us that our problem was not enough pitching going from 2025 to 2026.  And here Joe Brady is again to tell us that our biggest needs are pitching because of this great offense we had that finished 23rd and the excuses hes making our injuries to guys that he wanted off the team (Story).

I think that the Crochet injury was surprising, and its the best thing that could have happened to Breslow.  Because we ended up needing all the pitching depth that Breslow acquired due to an unforeseen avalanche of injuries.....on the pitching side.

My point is no matter what - people are going to say that our priority should be pitching.  Because right now, we are 3rd in pitching and 23rd in hitting, and Im hearing that we have enough hitting but need Skubal and relief pitchers.

I give it one hours until the cliches come out "everyone knows good pitching beats good hitting" "cant have enough pitching" "pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching"

[notin]

4 hours ago, drewski6 said:

Beat the Yankees and Ill be happy that Bres got extended. Lose to the yankees with no thump in the bats, then breslow will still have won some rope from me, but i would err towards locking him up few years out was premature.

They’d at least have some more thump if not for inside pitches after 2 plate appearances…

[drewski6]

4 minutes ago, notin said:

They’d at least have some more thump if not for inside pitches after 2 plate appearances…

Thats not a long list of hitter injuries.  We should plan to always be down a couple bats.

[notin]

22 minutes ago, drewski6 said:

I like my argument better.

We went from 10th in pitching and 7th in hitting (2025) to 3rd in pitching and 23rd in hitting (2026) - Joe Brady told us that our problem was not enough pitching going from 2025 to 2026.  And here Joe Brady is again to tell us that our biggest needs are pitching because of this great offense we had that finished 23rd and the excuses hes making our injuries to guys that he wanted off the team (Story).

I think that the Crochet injury was surprising, and its the best thing that could have happened to Breslow.  Because we ended up needing all the pitching depth that Breslow acquired due to an unforeseen avalanche of injuries.....on the pitching side.

My point is no matter what - people are going to say that our priority should be pitching.  Because right now, we are 3rd in pitching and 23rd in hitting, and Im hearing that we have enough hitting but need Skubal and relief pitchers.

I give it one hours until the cliches come out "everyone knows good pitching beats good hitting" "cant have enough pitching" "pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching"

The thing is - bad hitting is sort of limited and capped.  You can only go down to .000.  And the overwhelming majority of hitters bat between .200 and .300, and the ones who don’t fall in it are usually not outside by much, it’s actually a tight range encompassing only 10% of all possible outcomes.  Picture a test where the entire class got between 70-80% on a test.   Did the student that got 80% really demonstrate an understanding of the material that much better than the student that got a 70%?

But bad pitching can go up all the way to infinity.  No range.  No upper limit.  Just bad pitching…

[moonslav59]

1 hour ago, mvp 78 said:

Something very meaningless then. Ok! 

The ALE was better this year. Perhaps that explains 2 less wins. Perhaps not.

I'm sure you know what is meaningful.