a700hitter

Scherzer, Verlander and Anibel Sanchez all prospered with that same defense. Also, Doug Fister did very well with that defense behind him. Lots of excuses are being made for Porcello and Cherrington's misplaced faith and investment in him.

They must be looking to really stack their pen. They just signed Soriano.

As presently constituted, this team will be lucky to play .500 ball the rest of the way. More likely they wil collapse down the stretch and lose more than 90 games again. If they want to have any chance at all of sniffing competitive baseball, they wil need to make some significant moves. If they don't make moves soon, they will be toast and their only hope will be having a Joe Hardy moment. The lack of roster moves to this point is beginning to make me think that the owners are writing this season off and that they will rebuild this team under new management after cleaning house. When the season started, I expected that at best we could play .500 ball and stay with the pack until they obtained some in season reinforcements. I am never comfortable with that strategy, because you find yourself where we are if some things go wrong. This doesn't shock me at all. It does disappoint me.

He is not a 5+ ERA pitcher, but even if he makes the jump to 3.8, that is not good enough to be a top of the rotation pitcher. That is precisely why it was a bad move to rely on him to anchor our staff. Even in the best case scenario, he is not good enough.

I'll take what you say as a given about Porcello and counter that even at that level our staff would be bad because the staff as a whole would still have an ERA around 4. That is not mediocre. It is bad.

He's a 4 or 5. We have three other guys for those slots. We have no #1 or 2. It is even shaky to say that we have a #3. This was pretty clear when the season started. None of the 5 guys were stepping up an throwing well in the Spring.

Scherzer has pitched fewer innings than Porcello.

There is not a shred of evidence that they meddled with his approach. His k ratio in 2013 was almost identical to this season. It improved from 5.5 to 7 and along with that increase, he lowered his WHIP and ERA significantly. He dropped down to a 5.7 k rate last season and is back up to 7 thus season, but this time it didn't come along with an improvement in his other numbers. The meddling argument is a baseless rationalization to avoid the fact that he just isn't very good. That is why we got him for Cespedes. Top of the rotation pitchers don't get traded for the likes of Cespedes.

I saw Bert Blyleven pitch. Porcello is no Bert Blyleven.

Touché lol!

Agreed, but it is the best barometer that we have. Projecting Porcello as a top of the rotation guy was little more than hope. He had a good statistical season in 2014, but his stuff was the same.

I can't think of many examples of pitchers who improved from a back of the rotation starter to a top of the rotation pitcher after almost 6 full seasons and 1,100 innings of being a back of the rotation pitcher. That is why.

We could have gotten a very similar pitcher off the waiver wire this week. Dillon Gee is the same type of pitcher. He is two years older, but has a lot fewer innings on his arm. These sinker balling pitch to contact guys are a dime a dozen. Paying one of them $80 million is astounding poor judgment. Chen Ming Wang was much better than Porcello before Wang got injured, and I don't think the Yankees gave him a large long term contract.

A fan that travels from Mexico to Fenway Park with his wife at his own expense to see his favorite team play on opening day is a great fan. You shouldn't be agreeing with him (UN) about iortiz as he is fairly biased against him. He did psychotically declare that he hates him with the intensity of 1000 burning suns. He's not quite objective about iortiz. More appropriately, a fan that cannot admit that a starting pitcher with a 5.25 ERA at the end of June is at best a back of the rotation pitcher is in denial. The guy (Porcello) is costing me a case of beer. I knew that he wasn't a top of the rotation guy, but he fell way short if my expectations too.

Pitchers with 1,100 innings under their belt don't usually improve from the bottom of the rotation to the top of the rotation. In the rare cases that it does happen, it is often a junk baller like Jamie Moyer or a knuckleballer like Dickey. The examples of sinker balling back of the rotation becoming top of the rotation power pitchers after accumulating 1,100 innings would be hard to find. Even if improvement over his career 4.40 ERA was to be expected, a 3.80 ERA would have been a huge improvement. Expecting anything beyond that was pure fan enthusiasm. A 3.80 from Porcello still would have had the group of 5 projecting at a combined ERA of 4, and that is not good. It isn't even mediocre. It is bad.

Or more likely he will go back to being the career 4.40 ERA pitcher that he has been over more than 1,100 innings.

It is very reasonable to expect a pitcher with 1,100 innings to pitch to career norms unless there is an injury. Pitching significantly better than career norms is hopefulness. Career norms for our starting staff would have been a 4+ ERA-- that is not mediocre. It is bad, very bad, and it is what we should have expected. 5+ ERA is even worse. We did not expect that, and I doubt that they will pitch to that level for the entire season.

In the first game of spring training that I saw in Fort Myers I expressed my concern that he could not play the OF. I am just a fan with a well-trained eye, but what I saw was alarmingly bad. The FO never should have signed him to a big contract without solid reasons or information that he could play out there. He is the worst Red Sox LFer in my lifetime. Awful.

If that is a main focus, then they wasted a lot of money. They could have finished in last place and preserved the core for around $45 million.

It wouldn't have mattered if they had performed to career norms. The career norms for this group screamed out 4+ ERA which is very bad. It just doesn't cut it in today's game. The age of McGwire and Sosa and Bonds and PEDs is over. Pitching is paramount.

I like this.

4.40 career ERA over 1,100 innings. If you think that 4.40 is a big improvement, then I will agree that he is better than what we have seen, but that is still not good enough to be a top of the rotation guy.

This is not inexplicable. It was completely foreseeable. A 5+ ERA was not foreseeable, but being bad was foreseeable. Being good was hopefulness without any statistical support. Porcello is a career 4.40 ERA pitcher with 1,100+ innings under his belt. That is no small sample size. That is what he is a 4+ ERA starting pitcher -- a number 3 to 5 at best. He is by no stretch of the imagination or statistical manipulation a top of the rotation guy. Miley is a career 3.80 ERA pitcher in the NL with over 600 IP. Put him in the AL and he is a 4+ ERA making him a #4 or 5. Masterson is a career 4.30 ERA pitcher with almost 1,200 IP. Add to that his recent loss of velocity. Kelly is an unaccomplished 27 year old and Buch has been the epitomy of inconsistency. It was to be expected that this staff would stink even if they performed to career norms. Their career norm is a 4+ ERA and that just doesn't cut it in today's game. The result will be a very bad team. Our hitting is hot now and it has been getting a lot of hits in June. I think we are right up there in hits in June, but we still stink as a team. Ben, it's the pitching stupid!

I remember optimistic posters who saw possibilities for this being an innings eating productive stafff who noted with caution that if some things went bad that it could quickly turn disastrous. There were plenty of reasons to be wary of this staff. I was very vocal about the lack of top of rotation pitchers. I was not even talking about the need for an ace. I termed this staff " a pair of 4's a pair of 5s and a 3" and that is what they are, and the results have been disastrous.

The time has come to realize that the Porcello contract was just toopid. He is maintaining a 5+ ERA and is at best a middle of the rotation guy -- a dime a dozen.