Red Sox Bolster Depth With Seby Zavala and Nate Eaton

It never hurts to have depth. Maybe they can prolong leaving some of our top prospects, like Meidroth, off the 40, a bit longer.

1 hour ago, Larry Cook said:

Some depth in the bullpen might be more helpful 

If we add Scott & Holmes, our pen depth will be very nice.

Scott

Holmes

Slaten

Whitlock

Hendriks

Guerrero

Guerrero

Winckowski

Fitts, Criswell, Priester, Dobbins

Wilson, Fulmer, Bernardino, Kelly, Penrod

Booser, Weissert, Mata, Campbell

Shugart, Mills, Kwiatkowski, Gambrell, Drohan, Wikelman

Hoppe, Troye, Sandlin, I Coffey

We have tons of depth: we just need top RP'ers!

🤔

2 hours ago, Larry Cook said:

Yes, my bad, I should have said quality depth 

I think our #9-18 pen depth may be better than most teams. If we add 2 solid pen arms, thereby pushing others down 2 slots, our 9-18 would look top 8-10, to me.

Our issue is our top 2-3 pen arms.

13 hours ago, mvp 78 said:

I'm sure this will be addressed multiple times this offseason. I would say that Penrod, Booser, Weissert, Campbell, Mills, Kelly and Mata all potentially starting in AAA provides a ton of depth they usually don't have at relief. Maybe even Wikelman is pushed to the pen and really starts to shove? If they add one really great reliever and two solid guys, it's a very strong bullpen.

This is a point I have been making, too.  Even if we add no RP'ers, this winter, which would be malpractice, our depth beyond the 8 on the big club is decent to maybe above league average. For once, pen depth looks to not be an issue.  Top pen quality is.

If we add two from Scott, Hoffman, Holmes and Esteves, I'd then say our pen depth might rate top 10 in MLB, maybe higher.

Scott & Holmes would be  a solid 1-2 punch.

Slaten, Whitlock & Hendriks are fine 7th and 8th inning options.

(If we add 2 SP'ers, as well, we can plug Crawford into the long man role)

Criswell, Fitts, Winckowski can be the 2-3 inning guys in close games (1-2 will be in AAA.)

Wilson or Bernardino will be the lefty

Guerrero, Fulmer, Penrod, Kelly, Weissert, I Campbell, Mata, Booser, Shugart or AAA SP'ers like Dobbins, Fitts, Criswell or Priester could also fill a pen role, if we get this deep.

I count 21 names, here for 8 slots.

Maybe 3-4 are long shots and 3-4 will stay as SP'ers, but that should still come to 16 for 8 slots.

1 hour ago, Larry Cook said:

Of the 21, all but scott, Hendricks, Holmes, slaten and Whitlock are fringe type pitchers that teams try to upgrade 

Ya, when your bullpen loses two guys who were the main men in the 8th and 9th innings, that doesn't leave any kind of quality depth for the relief corps (and no, I didn't accidentally leave off the "e"...).

But lost in all the hype among Hall of Famer hitter and Game One starters is the key to most champions' postseasons... pop culture hint: their dog is white with a 101 black spots.

On 11/28/2024 at 2:04 PM, Larry Cook said:

Yes, my bad, I should have said quality depth 

What are you worried about? We just added Zavala and Eaton!!! Our season looks so much brighter now! 🙄

2 hours ago, Larry Cook said:

Of the 21, all but scott, Hendricks, Holmes, slaten and Whitlock are fringe type pitchers that teams try to upgrade 

You make a good point. None of those listed, outside the top 5 look to be high leverage RP'ers, but as pen depth or low to moderate leverage RP'ers, having 16 decent or promising guys to fill 3 slots is the definition of depth. As with the vast majority of RP'ers in MLB, they are largely hit or miss. Of course, it's better to have 8 guys you can count on in moderate to high leverage situations, and then have another 5-7 like those on my list, but I do see some serious hopes in over 3 of the remaining 16.

Winckowski: He is one of only 165 pitchers in MLB with over 150 IP from 2023. He places 27th in ERA-, a stat I have always valued pretty highly. He is much lower in other stats, but does have a 3.98 SIERA. He could be a decent 2-3 IP guy in our pen.

Guerrero: He is listed above Hendriks on soxprospects.com, and his value is almost all speculative. They say, " He has some of the best raw stuff of any relief arm in the system."

Penrod: I have not been as high on him as others, but he throws hard and could do well.

Bernardino was looking like the gem in the rough we hoped Bloom would have found more of. He throws lefty and had a very nice 2023 season for us. (3.20 ERA in 51 IP. He had a .708 OPSA and was great on the road (.557.) This year, his H/A splits flipped (.939 away and .600 home.) In his first 30 IP of 2024, he had a 1.19 ERA and .564 OPSA. Those first 80 IP with the Sox were close to great. His last 21 IP seems to have taken away all the hope: 8.27 ERA and .971 OPSA.

Justin Wilson (LHP) and Michael Fulmer both have histories of being really good, but they both have struggled or been hurt, lately. Fulmer might have the better shot at looking good in '25.

Zach Kelly showed some signs of looking good, but had BB issues.

Booser was likely a flash in the pan.

To me, I think one of these guys has a good chance at being pretty good in '25: I Campbell, Weissert or Mata, but here is where we might have the best chance at finding a very good 6th man in the pen: If we add 2 SP'ers, it would be Crawford or Bello. If not, it could be Criswell, Fitts, Priester or Dobbins out of the AAA rotation. Hell, we could rob two from there.

It might take some trial and error, and I'm not sure we can afford too many errors, before we settle on the 6-8th slot pen guys, but I think that won't be an issue. However, this assumes we add 2 quality pen arms or one plus two SP'ers, and relatively good health for the whole staff.

Adding 2 quality SP'ers and 2 of the top 4 pen arms plus another good pen arm would be ideal, but if we sign Soto, I'm not sure how much will be left to spend on 4-5 quality arms. (We could trade for 1 or two, and probably would.)