Chad Tracy

[vegasbob]

13 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

Yoshida is not a problem in any way.  If someone wanted to take on half his salary, maybe.  But I see no reason to just give him away for loose change.

Since Yoshi won't play the field for Red Sox, and since that leaves only DH or designated pinch hitter. and he cannot run faster than a penguin, his opportunities to display his .725 hitting skills are very limited. compared to the numerous multi position backups

[notin]

9 minutes ago, vegasbob said:

Since Yoshi won't play the field for Red Sox, and since that leaves only DH or designated pinch hitter. and he cannot run faster than a penguin, his opportunities to display his .725 hitting skills are very limited. compared to the numerous multi position backups

So who is DH ahead of him in 2027?

[JoeBrady]

53 minutes ago, notin said:

Story has been good since he stopped being herniated, and it’s not like the Sox have Whitaker and Trammell in the middle infield…

Story has an 8/0 K/W, with -0- HRs, in 25 ABs.  Small sample, and I assume he is still shaking off the rust, but those are bad numbers.  But like you said, Monasterio and Seigler are quite tearing it up.

[JoeBrady]

42 minutes ago, notin said:

So who is DH ahead of him in 2027?

For me, that's the key question.  There are always better hitters available.  But if they hit better than Yoshi, they will likely cost real money.  If Yordie is available, sure.  But I wouldn't be spending real money to upgrade from a .746 to an .800.  I'd prefer the real money go to someone like Gray.

[moonslav59]

1 hour ago, JoeBrady said:

Anything can happen, but Breslow should be the Executive of the Year, if that's a real thing.  I think it would be crazy to not extend him.

Agreed.

All Gms make mistakes, and often they are in hindsight only or partially. The Sale trade was his worst, but it had serious merit when made. To those who hated it day one- hats off to you, but there was good reason to trade a guy who was hurt for a half decade. I'll leave it at that.

Many other trades looked bad out of the gate, but are now looking better or even flipped into the looking good side.

He radically improved the whole pitching system- from top to bottom- in just a few short years. Posters used to talk about Lester being the last significant pitcher from the system. Jon joined the Sox in 2006. He built up the farm, almost by himself and wasn't afraid to use it to add competent vets. DD usd the farm well, but did not build it up. Ben and Bloom built up the farm pretty well, but rarely used it to boost up the 26 man roster. Brez has done both.

Brez has yet to add a terrible big contract. Suarez could morph into one. The Bello and KC deals could end up bad, but they are not making more than $17M AAV combined. That's less than Story and Yoshida by themselves. The Rafaela & Anthony deals look good. Sure, deals like Buehler and Sandoval look bad, but they were short deals, and Buehler is looking okay, now, so maybe the stab in the dark just missed by a few months. (Same with the D May trade.) Brez has some bad luck with the Mead trade, and some could argue the Sale remaking of himself was impossible to project, and this from the guy who coined the "Freaking Chris Sale" phrase.

To me, this isn't even the best part of his tenure here. While DD built a great team, and I have zero beefs with him, the team was set up to move towards a point where massive cash or prospect infusions would be needed to sustain beyond the 4-5 year window (2016 or 2017 to 2019 or 2020.) While DD proved right in trading away many top prospects that amounted to squat and kept many that turned out better than the ones he dealt (Houck, Duran, Crawford & Devers to name 4,) the team was aging by 2019 and 2020, with few prospects ready to fill in and an owner not willing to become the Dodgers Atlantic style. DD was handed a really nice core of young stars from Betts, Bogey, JBJ and an upcoming Devers, but he had to build the staff from near nothing. The big plus by Brez is having so many good players locked up for 2-3-4 and even more years. 

Here is a brief look at locked up players under DD and Bloom:

2016: Price 7, Pedey & Rusney, 5, Porcello & Pablo 4, HRam & Kimbrel 3 and a young core of Betts, Bogey, JBJ,  ERod, Vaz, Barnes & Workman. Shorter deals: Papi, Buch, Uehara, Young

2018: Price & JD 5, Pedey & Vaz 4- the same young core from above but 2 less years of control and shorter deals: Sale & Porcello 2, HRam, Kelly & Kimbrel 1

2020: (injuries and Covid took it's toll, but you can see the control years dwindling & Betts was traded) Sale 5-6, JD, Nate & Bogey 3. That's it! 2 yrs: Erod, Pedey, Perez, Vaz, Beni, Barnes & Moreland

2022: Story 6, Sale 3-4 and basically nobody else signed beyond 2023. We had some guys under control via arbs, but nowhere near the young core of 2016 or even 2028, except for Devers, Duran, Houck & Crawford (Casas/Dalbec...)

The team Brez took over had long term deals like Devers, Story & Yoshida with 1-2 years of Sale and a bunch of one and dones like Jansen, Martin, Verdugo & Pivetta.

7 yrs: Anthony

6-8: Campball

5 yrs: Crochet, Rafaela, Tolle, Bennett, Durbin, Sogard, Gasper, Moran, Seigler, Cheng, Gamboa

4 yrs: Suarez, Mead, Jones

3 yrs: Abreu, Miller, Bello (+1?) Monasterio, Slaten, Weissert, Kelly

2 yrs: Contreras, Whitlock, Romy, Casas, Duran, Crawford, White & Wong

1 yr: Chapman, Rutschman, Guerrero, Houck, Oviedo, Story (+1?) Yoshida

0-1 yr: Gray

FAs: Sandoval, IKF

It's rather amazing.

[Donnie Sadler was short]

21 hours ago, Duran Is The Man said:

that's right. every minor-leaguer not on the 40 man will still be playing.

yup...and Tracy is technically still on his "minor league manager" contract