Dojji

Betts came up as a CF and was extremely effective before JBJ took the position over. I think it's fair to point out that he plays an easier position, but it's also fair to point out that the only reason Betts isn't playing CF right now is because JBJ is just a little bit better there In 2015 when Mookie played his last full year in center, he created 1.5 dWAR, Gold Glove caliber numbers, better than all but one of Trout's seasons, and better than Trout's 2018 season by half a win. He was absolutely an elite defensive center fielder when called upon to be one. It's a tribute to JBJ's incredible defensive chops that he was able to beat Mookie out and make the position his own.

Travis had his chance to win a job in Boston and it didn't work for him which is why we have Pierce in the first place. He had every chance to make that transaction unnecessary. Right now, Chavis and Ockimey are the guys on my radar.

That said, one outside the box solution might be to sign Yasmani Grandal and give him the Mike Napoli treatment. He's an adventure behind the plate but his bat is excellent. A good candidate for a move to 1B. And one imagines that he might be on board with the idea of coming to Boston and competing for championships after the last 2 frustrating seasons in LA Another possibility -- sign Beltre to a short term deal and move Devers over to first base, let him fill out a bit more and develop his power in a less athletic position and see if he takes off like I think he might.

The market at first base is buyer friendly. Pearce is about the best option out there for anyone looking for a first baseman in free agency. We are going to have some competition and Pearce is probably going to be able to name his price.

I agree with this. JD made the team better. But Betts was a special player all along and we knew he was capable of this kind of step forward for the last couple seasons. Great to see him realize his potential and he and JD probably did help each other a little bit, but neither one was THE reason for the other one's success.

The Sox had at least 2 full trips through the lineup to try to retake that lead after the Kinsler error.

The basketball analogy is "you can't teach height." You can't teach velocity. Generally speaking, with a few surgical exceptions, an athlete's velocity at any given time is as hard a physical limit as his height.

I'm not sure I agree. Building a championship decimates a farmsystem in two ways -- by promotion, and by providing fodder for trades. There is a goal of GMs to maintain a 5-7 year window of sustained success by a combination of smart free agent signings and limited poaching of talent from the minors, but indefinite success, or trying to have your farm system cake and eat it too, is not something that any GM, no matter how competent, can sustsain indefinitely. Time and time again history has proven that while you can build to win at a high level for a few years at a time, ultimately your alternatives are to invest your resources in building a winner, or not having a winner. If you're good you can put it off for awhile, but eventually you have that choice -- Go For It, or Don't. And each choice has significant long term consequences, as we saw in 04 when we went in with both feet and struggled for a few years afterward, and as we saw in 14-15 when the emphasis was on rebuilding the pipeline and the results at the big league level were extremely unsatisfying for fans and ownership. Ultimately it's a herculean effort to maintain either a top farm or a championship roster. Trying to do both at the same time is either an act of genius, or an act of lunacy, generally tending toward the latter. That said, I'd love you to produce historic examples of teams that prove me wrong by having nearly indefinite success without ever disrupting the pipeline.

Eh. We have at least 3 years before things go super-critical. We mortgaged ridiculously heavily in 2004 and people thought that after that core fell apart it would be awhile because the cupboard was bare. The 2007 roster turnover was good for 4 years and everyone was complaining that after 2008 or so the cupboard was bare. We got through 2013 and people were saying the same thing. Cupboard was bare. If we'd managed our assets better after 2013 we'd have kept the same cycle we've had all along. Small peaks of major contention followed by long shallow valleys where we're good but not great. The fact is that the objective of Red Sox management is not to win the Farm System World Series. It's to win the actual one. If you can do that while maintaining a strong pipeline, that's one thing, but if you have to sacrifice one or the other it's the farm system every time. After all the whole point of developing a strong farm is to do what we just did -- concentrate your resources and win the whole thing, as often as you can. I'd say the Red Sox are in pretty good shape, and the farm system is a 5 year problem at most. If we can nurse this core along until the farm regenerates itself, we'll be all right indefinitely. That's where we failed in 2013. And with a core this young, there will be no excuse for a similar failure this time.

You have two choices in life. You either pay for what you get, or you get what you pay for.

Yes, but unlike Kinsler's error, Buckner destroyed a chance to win all by himself. No matter how you twist the facts, an error that leads directly to defeat in a potential clinching game is a lot worse than an error that ties a game and, at most, prevents a sweep.

Of bloody course it's desolate. That's partly because Cherington whiffed a few times in the draft, and hugely because we promoted and are currently playing our blue chips. Our farm is desolate because we used it to win. Winning is why you have a farm system. Of course we need to rebuild it after we've used it. you can't always just money our way out of problems, and neither can anyone else. I still wouldn't have chosen the other approach when the playoff window is this glaringly obvious, and the Yankees feel pretty much the same way about things. They have been no stranger either to trading or promoting their top talent either, the difference is a large number of our best prospects came of age at roughly the same time.

If Buckner made the play, the Sox had a fighting chance to win Game 6 with game 7 in hand. His error removed that possibility.

Joe Kelly for 2019 setup man. Honestly there's other guys I'd trust more to handle the pressure of closing for a full season. Not to mention the fact that Kimbrel is an order of magnitude better as a closer than anyone we could promote internally. Don't believe me, take a look at his numbers. He was a stud this year.

Buckner's error happened in game 6 and led directly to a defeat. Kinsler's error happened in game 3 and didn't even result in the loss of the game. At most they cost the team an opportunity to win game 3 in regulation. An error that resulted in a walkoff vs an error that resulted in a tie game. An error that resulted in the team having only one last chance to win the Series vs an error that, even if you credit it with the game 3 defeat, which is dubious, the team had 4 games with which to recover. An error that tied the Series and wiped out every postseason advantage the Red Sox had and turned the whole thing from a coronation into a coin flip vs an error that, at most, prevented a sweep. One of these things is not like the other.

Nah. Seriously, if the Red Sox had lost the series, it would have been because of mistakes or events far more significant than Kinsler's error, and those guys would be the goats. That single error meant practically nothing no matter how you look at it. Especially because the Red Sox had at least two full trips through the lineup to try to win that game after the error

Bit of both. Henry is an excellent owner and he has done a fantastic job of selecting front office personnel. He's even done a pretty okay job of taking personal responsibility when things go wrong for the team, which is pretty danged rare among owners. Most great teams stay great because of strong ownership. Most bad teams stay bad because of weak, indifferent or cash strapped ownership. It really comes down to that for me. Henry, an excellent owner, has created excellent teams. He deserves to cash in on that, and I hope he's satisfied with his share of the take. Quality tends to pay for itself.

If you spend all your time worrying about the things that could go wrong you'll never get out of bed in the morning. Yes, it was possible for a string of random events to screw the Red Sox over. It didn't happen. They were clearly the better team on paper and they won. Stop borrowing trouble.

Got news for you, friend. Every award is also a marketing tool, otherwise they wouldn't happen.

He was never in the long term plans to begin with. He was a mercenary, there to fill a hole until Pedey got healthy.

The chart is long gone, but its legacy endures

The Yankee core is no younger than the Red Sox core. The very same pressures you're talking to vis-a-vis the Red Sox will also be affecting NYY. Also, the Red Sox core has inexpensive players at a few key positions right now. Whether we dive off a cliff really depends on our ability to continue to find diamonds in the rough to augment the core, like we did this year with Brazier, Eovaldi and Pearce.

Perish the thought.

No kidding. We might let a few stars go, but the core is going to be in our uniform for as long as they're healthy, effective, and want to be here.

I've known he wouldn't opt out since he had his injury troubles last year. Price wasn't going to do better than this contract unless he stayed completely healthy and effective which mostly through no fault of his own, he did not. To me this whole thread has been a nonissue from day 1