jacksonianmarch

I would be SO f***ING HAPPY if you moved Crawford to leadoff and lost nearly 40 points of OBP in the spot that gets the most ABs

They copied the Yankees who named Jeter captain by naming Tek captain. I think naming a captain is really a formality. If you name a captain who isnt popular, nobody will listen to them anyway. This team had leadership issues late in the year and giving someone a C on their jersey doesnt change that

Well, yeszir swoops in and drops the hammer. Hopefully this makes the forum good again

Guys, I have been on this site for a long time and most of the time, it's Yankee vs Sox fan fighting, which is actually kinda fun. But this whole FO ballwashers and chicken little's fight needs to end. It's killing any sort of conversation about the game. The only good threads nowadays are the fitness threads. We know which one of you guys thinks Ben rode in on a golden chariot and which one of you guys thinks John Henry is laughing while the sox burn. We get it. Move on.

Kuroda was out there.

This is what pisses me off about Law. He completely throws talent out the window and looks at numbers. The guy says he's a scout, but scouts dont make such stupid, assinine decisions on players that are obviously inaccurate just by looking at the players. Case in point, he said that Ravel Santana, the Yankee minor leaguer, was going to miss the whole season in 2012. Well, the guy is nearly restriction free IN FEBRUARY. If he did his homework and actually followed up on the kid, he'd have seen that he's almost completely recovered and is already sprinting. It makes him look stupid. Also, I think Middlebrooks is a good player, but Bogaerts is WAY WAY better than him in the prospect circle. Bogaerts will be 19 for the entire 2012 season. Middlebrooks will be 23 for the whole season. They both OPS'd the same, but Bogaerts hit more HR's per AB and had the better eye. Middlebrooks made his hay with doubles. Bogaerts right now is a middle infield prospect (although nobody really expects him to stay at SS) while Middlebrooks is at 3rd. Bogaerts has the potential to be a middle of the order hitter. He dominated long season A ball at 18, something you see out of talents like Montero, Cabrera, Guerrero etc. He's got a real bat. And he has 4 more yrs on Middlebrooks in terms of developing. Without any sort of catastrophic mental or physical collapse, Bogaerts will be the better player. I just dont get how the hell he is ranked lower in anyone's rankings

If anything, the sample would have degraded at room temperature, so it's feasible that Braun's ratio was actually higher than 20:1.

Ok, I gotcha

I never said Buchholz wasn't a good pitcher. All is said was that he isn't a guy I'd include in any big 3 conversation. The sox put themselves in a position where he must be great this yr to compete. They've left their 4 spot to a career reliever who's imploded out of the rotation when he debuted as a pro and your 5th spot is a collection of trash heap players and another career reliever. I just keep seeing people write that they have a great top 3 and they'll carry the rotation. Well, your #3 is a huge question mark as well and the contingencies are poor as well.

Ortiz accepted arb for a reason. He knew his options were limited

I understand that they didnt want to lose him for nothing. But going by what most recent late stage DH's signed for, he had to know the market wasnt there for him to make that kind of money. Ortiz is locked into the AL and all the big money teams ended up signing players who could play the field to fill their 1b/DH roles. Who else had the money to pay him, Toronto? They played conservative and got burned. They kept their player but at a premium cost.

sunk cost does apply. You are assuming the $12 mil is already on the books for 2012 and that he "only" received a $2.2 mil raise. That $12 mil was not on the books when the offseason started.

And who was going to top the offer of 1yr $10 mil? We went through this already. He turned them down, yes. But when he finds out nobody is willing to offer him more money, he's gonna have to take his best offer, right?

I've posted it before and I will again. Pineda had a great yr away from Safeco. His ERA was 4.40, but his peripherals were solid. 8.7K/9IP, 3.4K/BB, 1.17WHIP. Buchholz hasnt sniffed that K rate or walk rate. So eliminate the friendly stadium and you still get a guy who is putting up ace level peripherals. Try again. Also, you are assuming Buchholz regains his velocity after FRACTURING HIS BACK. My guess is you are going to see a totally revamped Buchholz. One who is throwing 2mph slower on average, but much more refined in his mechanics to avoid injuring the back again

There were no warning signs on Crawford. He was young and coming off a career yr after a career of being very consistent. There were warning signs on Lackey that he ignored. I do agree, though. He got Crawford and AdGon while replacing Beltre and VMart. He also thought he addressed the pen with guys who at the time, looked good. How could Theo predict that Bobby would need two back surgeries and 3 months of coumadin from a PE.

You keep saying $1-$2 mil. That assumes the $12 mil was sunk cost. And for the record, it's $2.2 million, but who's counting. If he was under contract at $12.5 mil and he got a $2.2 mil raise, that's one thing. He wasnt under contract, so the cost is the whole frickin nut.

and last I checked, last season was 2011. How was Buchholz's fastball then? And what makes you think he will be able to stay healthy and apparently consistent like he's shown throughout his entire career, lol. I didnt know consistency for starters was 4 consecutive seasons of at least 76IP, lol

You are saying he needs consistency, yet Buchholz has had exactly one season where he's thrown as many innings as Pineda. How can you say Pineda's problem in comparison to Buch's is consistency when Buch hasnt been consistent himself. It's frickin laughable, lol. You dont want to argue it anymore because you know I am right!

Right, but they had to know that offering him arbitration was going to end up with him staying in Boston. You have been championing this cause for months man, cmon now, don't up and play hypocrite on me now. You had said before that on the open market he's maybe an $8-10 mil per year player based on what recent 1 dimensional players have been signing for later in their careers. Now, you think it would have taken 30-40% more than that to sign him? The premise comes down to if they have a hard budget or not. If they have a hard budget, then it's a stupid move. If they really don't have a hard budget and just wanted David back for one season regardless of the money, then it is a smart move. But the way they've been acting, I think the likelihood is the former vs the latter

Nova I have never said is anything more than a #2 and more suited to a #3 role, ie middle of the rotation. And in terms of BABIP, Nova's was at .281. Buchholz's from 2011 was .258. So if we're playing the luck card, it would seem that Nova had worse luck than Buchholz, even though they both played to similar ERA's and WHIP's. Buchholz does strike out more guys and they both go 6+IP per start. I actually think the comp is pretty close. But one guy is coming off a vertebral fracture and the other guy is coming off a forearm strain. I think I'd take the strain over the vertebral fracture. Pineda is in another world and you know it. Let's compare a few things here. Buchholz in 2011- 6.53K/9IP, 1.94K/BB, 1.29WHIP Pineda in 2011- 9.11K/9IP, 3.15K/BB, 1.10WHIP in his rookie season. Also, Pineda is 4 yrs younger, throws harder, and has a bigger frame. Plus, all 3 of the guys you are putting this comparison into play with threw about 170IP in their career high seasons. It just so happens that last yr was the rookie campaign for both Nova and Pineda, while Buchholz has been throwing innings all the way back into 2007. So in short, how the hell can you say Buchholz is more of a sure thing than Nova or Pineda. Nova had a similar, albeit slightly inferior season on average due to the luck factor and the fact that Buchholz does strike out more batters than he does. But his season was MUCH better due to the fact that he was healthy the whole season. Pineda was on another planet from Buchholz.

I could care less.

Another thing I wanted to bring up here is that everyone seems to be talking about the sox being 3 deep and being able to count on their top 3. How did you get 3 deep? Beckett was awesome last yr, but he isnt durable and has thrown 200IP exactly once in the last 4 seasons. But I'll give you that one Lester had an off season, which was still a great season by most standards, and he is a horse. I'll give you that one. How is Buchholz all of a sudden considered a lock to be as shutdown as the sox need him to be in the #3 role? He's thrown 170IP once. He's never thrown over 180IP. He's coming off a season in which he allowed more HR than in 2010 in less than half the innings, AND he is coming off a vertebral fracture. He's a very solid middle of the rotation pitcher when healthy, but he is nowhere near a sure thing. And the reason why I say middle of the rotation is because he doesnt go terribly deep in games, has good but not great command and doesnt K a lot of hitters.