Dojji

It's not that Crawford's lost it. It's that he never had it full-time. The man is inconsistent due to his mediocre plate approach. If the man doesn't hit .300 -- and he doesn't always hit .300 -- he doesn't do enough else right to make his numbers strong offensively. He's a lot like Vernon Wells in that respect except Wells has more power. What we saw last year was what happens when Crawford never has the several weeks of super hot streak that usually define his campaigns. But the man has never been a consistent baseball player.

Nava's not a candidate for right field at Fenway, so alleging that he's in some way competing with Kalish is incorrect. He is competing against Crawford though, and he's making a good case for himself.

Having a defensive hole at a middle infield position is even better. I agree he should be moved out of the top of the order.

Actually he probably still is. Even with his diminished offense I'd rather have his glove in the field. Especially considering just how skint we are for middle infielders.

I think you have to leave Nava where he is until the magic wears off. It would be stupid to bench him while he's this white-hot. They bench Nava for 4 games and suddenly find themsellves, coincidentally of course, under .500 at the end of that stretch. They bring him out and they're back on a win streak. The man is playing a role in carrying this team with his ability to get on base ahead of people like David Ortiz. He might be the one best table setter in the entire league right now. Run with this. And tell CC to take his freaking time. BTW I bat Ellsbury second. Nava, LF S Ellsbury, CF L Pedroia, 2B R Ortiz, DH L Ross, RF R Salty, C S Middlebrooks, 3B R Gonzalez, 1B L Aviles, ss R

Not so fast. I'll agree that CC is faster than Nava, a better defender, and he can hit for more power. But you can give or take that with Nava's ability to put up sterling at bat after sterling at bat -- an ability that if CC actually had, he'd be the superstar everyone mistakes him for. An ability that we know this franchise, and many other, consider the single most important. Nava's a little lucky. But if you normalize the BABIP to .335 or so (his career rate in the minors) he's still hitting over .300 and the OBP is still over .400. CC can hit .300, but his OBP has never been over about .360 or so. And with the kind of power lineup we like to field, I take Nava's OBP over Crawford's speed, and suspect that if we had to choose between one or the other to lead off for a full year, with the power we can line up behind each, it would be Nava who scored more runs, as Crawford would be on base less and run himself into an out or two. In the end, the tiebreaker is probably Crawford's defense. But it's by no means as cut and dried as you're trying to make it out to be. This isn't just about Nava's numbers. His approach and swing are turning as many heads as the stat sheet. If anything we're seeing from Daniel Nava this year is legit, he's going to have a run of 2-3 years as a starting player somewhere in the majors.

He's been getting better as he goes on too. .900 OPS May, over 1.000 June.

Because the team isn't comfortable with a payroll this high?

The league has'nt seen many .450 OBP's since the days of Teddy Ballgame.

I'm not as convinced as some of you are that Ellsbury wants out. The people who are making up their minds that he's gone are doing so based on a combination of guesswork and paranoia. They're following a chain of logic that has some decidedly weak links. What the Sox really need to do if they want to keep Ellsbury though, is to stop dipping their toes in the water when it comes to the obvious need for a generational changing of the goard on this team, and dive in headfirst. Move some of these compacent elder statesmen and replace them with fresh young faces desperate to prove themselves. Every time you replace complacency with hunger, your team gets better, or at least becomes a little more than the sum of its parts. Right now this team is less than the sum of its parts, and the prescribed remedy is new blood.

Surprised? Heck, at this point it's probably the right move. He'll be back on his feet by the deadline, let him get out there and run around and see who wants a CF who can do what he's capable of.

More to the point, power is in decline around the league. You aren't going to get 30 HR hitters in every "power" position anymore. There's definitely a place in the league for a doubles expert with an extreme OBP. Yes, even in left. After all, we paid Crawford $20M with the expectation he'd hit less than Nava's hitting right now.

When the wounded duo return, I would send Kalish down actually. He needs reps by the looks of things, and he'll have a hard time getting them in Boston. Left to right, Crawford, Ellsbury and Ross, with Nava and Sweeney as backups. Although I think that Nava can give CC a run for it, bloated contract and all.

And it's beginning to lose that small sample size feel too. It's been what, a month and a half now? Closing in on the 150PA mark at any rate.

Well look who's back. Back at the top of the order and 3 for 4 again despite the layoff. Average back up to .327. Keep it up kid. Do everything in your power to be hard to bench.

Ehh, it's early. SSS you know. I do agree in principle, but he's still as good a gamble as anyone else we could run out there right now.

I really like this alignment. This is probably the best one we have until Crawford and Ellsbury return. V, you've just seen the recipe for success right there, at least in the short term. Here's hoping you recognized it for what it was.

I'm cautiously intrigued. I remember when we tried the experiment with Julian Tavarez, and that looked really intriguing at the time with his sinker stuff. It even worked in our favor -- for awhile. Bought Lester time to recover from his cancer. If we get the same results we got from Tavarez before Julian's arm played out in late June (4-5, 4.50, 5 2/3 IP per start) then that at least replaces what we had been getting from Bard before he fell apart. Worth a shot.

At this rate Daniel Nava is going to finish the night with the unusual line of having gone 0 for 0 with an RBI.

Well that was something all right.

Oh, look, it's Mark "Meltdown" Melancon.

Credit to Salty for opening the rally up. Middlebrooks, Kalish and Nava with RBI's.

22 in Salem. Good reason not to be all that impressed, right there. He's got good stuff, but he's pitching against mostly younger prospects. he needs to be promoted soon, at least to be on the ideal trajectory.

Lame, people. It's an error. Errors happen. Instead of freaking out, just count on the pitcher to work around it.

Freaking impressed by Morales, even given the weak lineup he's facing. That was a heck of a spot start by him.