Dojji

C'mon Buck, you have a chance to finish this if you can prevent yourself getting bogged down.

Really looks like Buchholz has put whatever was plaguing him behind him.

Actually a Ross-Nava platoon, with Ross picking up other at bats as a righthanded platoon option for our other lefty outfielders (especially Ellsbury and Crawford), makes sense in a lot of ways.

If only Nava's platoon splits went the other way. Frankly, right now, I'd platoon Nava (1.000 OPS v right) and Ross (.916 OPS v left)

In case people haven't been able to tell, I've been having the time of my life over this.

Going to the plate and striking out doesn't raise your BABIP. But it also doesn't lower it. Which is why players who strike out more, with all other rate stats equal, will result in a higher BABIP. You do have my main point correct. Nava swings hard -- and swings well. As a result he creates a lot of high quality contact such as line drives. But he doesn't quite have Pedroia's elite bat control that allows him, Pedroia, to swing hard AND not strike out a bit. Nava's contact rates superficially resemble 06 Youkilis a fair bit in the sense of high quality line drive contact and quite a few walks and strikeouts. I doubt that means much in projecting the future but either way, Youk was consistently in the .330 range in BABIP, which is right about where Nava is. That suggests (which is the sole point I was making to begin with) that there's some evidence towards an argument that Nava's numbers aren't all that flukey.

Then we miss out on a lot of useful talent when guys like Justin Masterson and Josh Reddick are playing for someone else at positions we could really use. Our payroll isn't enough of an advantage anymore where you can give away prospects by the double handful just because they're not instantly perfect.

Right. As backups go Shoppach is well above average even if he does return to his career level. I'm glad he's here. He'd be right at home in my mind catching as many as 60 games for the Sox and he wouldn't be a liability if he did. For his role that's just fine. No one is quite dumb enough to chuck Shoppach overboard when Salty is still not fully proven. You don't deliberately make holes in your roster to promote an unproven player. And you definitely don't give yourself 2 underexperienced catchers in a year where you expect to make a good run for the playoffs.

The only reason anyone would make that argument is if they forgot fourth grade math. Someone who strikes out infrequently puts more balls in play per plate appearance. That raises the denominator. and as 4th grade math should have told you, when you raise the denominator, the final value shrinks. 3/4 > 3/5 Someone who strikes out frequently, but has the same batting average as Player A, divides the same relative number of hits, over a smaller sample of balls in play. The result is a larger end number. This is elementary school math people.

How the hell can strikeouts have no effect on BABIP when ORS just established that strikeouts are a direct part of the BABIP calculation? Come up with a BABIP calculation that doesn't have strikeouts in the denominator, and then post it here and we'll talk. Baseball fans, of all sports fans, have the least right to be behind on their math like this. The idea I put forward should have been common freaking sense .

No you couldn't, because BABIP doesn't measure at bats. It measures balls in play. Your BABIP is how many times a ball put in play results in a hit. And one of the ways it controls for things that are not balls in play, is by subtracting them from the denominator. This includes but is not limited to the "true outcomes." Walks, homers, and strikeouts. Two ways you can make a fractionary number such as batting average go up -- one is to increase the numerator, the other is to reduce the denominator. In BABIP calculations a player who strikes out more over the same number of at bats has a smaller denominator because those strikeouts are subtracted from the total number of PA before the number is calculated, leaving a smaller number of at bats to divide the total number of hits among. Result? A higher number. In this case we're comparing Daniel Nava and Dustin Pedroia. Nava and Pedroia have similar averages, but Nava strikes out a little more (Pedroia strikes out once in 10 at bats, Nava strikes out twice as often), which is why he has a higher BABIP.

For the love of God, not every power reliever is a future closer. if Bard topped out as a solid power MR, I'd have no problem with that. It's better than a lot of teams get from their first rounder in any given year. People question Bard's mental toughness. I think the problem is much simpler -- a combination of physical fatigue and bad habits with his new mechanics. Both can be sorted out more easily in Pawtucket. That does not mean you give up on Bard. You don't give up on any potential SP the first time he struggles. Frankly I was amazed we didn't have an implosion like this sooner TBH. We were rushing the hell out of Bard's development as a SP, and for awhile it looked like we might just get away with it -- and we did, right up until the point that we didn't. Now hopefully things will happen at a saner pace and he can rebuild his mechanics in relative peace. The real problem right now with projects like Bard (and to a lesser extent Salty, Masterson, and even Doubront) is that the Sox have no patience -- from the fans to the FO to anyone in between -- to develop a player in the majors anymore. They think every prospect should be Pedroia -- productive up to or near their career averages the first time they're called up. Everyone who watches baseball and remembers what he sees knows that that's laughably unrealistic -- but it's obvious that the fans think that, and there's some pretty strong evidence that the front office does as well. That's a good way to throw your hands up on a lot of players who turn into gold later for someone else.

The biggest reason you don't call up Lavarnway is twofold. First: Whether or not you trust Salty's numbers to hold up as is for a full season, the fact is that FOR NOW he's earned the right to be the starting catcher. You DO NOT undermine what Salty has accomplished by overthinking the catcher's role at this time Second: We're already having enough trouble getting one prospect into the lineup in the 1B/3B/DH rotation. Now add a guy like Lavarnway who's a C/DH. There is literally no room for this guy to start every day unless we trade Salty, and we're still too close to that second wild card for me to be sanguine about a move like that when we are even less sure what Lavs will do over a full season as our starting catcher than we know about Salty. So unless you think Lavarnway can play some corner outfield, there's just no way to make that work at this time.

Amazes me just how quick fans here are to abandon ship on a player when things are going unexpectedly well. Salty's progression isn't that unexpected. He showed plenty of signs of that ability last year, and he's smoothed out some of the rough patches so far this year. Age 27 was the year Varitek stepped forward and took the catcher's position for himself, so if Salty follows that pattern color me unsurprised. I wouoldn't be shocked if he backslid a bit. Catching is a gruelling job. But I wouldn't be shocked to see him finish with an OPS between .820 and .850 either. He's got more than enough talent -- the bottom had to fall off completely for him for the final 2 months to get him numbers as "bad" as they were last year.

The thing with Pods v Nava, is that Podsednik is at the end of his career, and his contract is for this year alone. Meanwhile if this is the real Daniel Nava, we'll have up to 3 more years of it and be paying peanuts for the privilege, depending on the unknowables such as health. That changes the math in Nava's favor -- although I don't want to downplay what a badly needed godsend Podsednik's little run has been for us. Besides, we have a good baseline for Podsednik's career. He's going to fall back towards that as he plays more. People are cynical of Nava,and they're not wrong to be because he is a complete unknown and those don't have a good track record as long term investments. But we don't know what his baseline is -- he may actually be one of those rare players who comes out of nowhere and put up numbers that remind us that no scout is perfect.

And you, when you tout the POSSIBILITY that he'll fall off like he did last year, instead of giving credit for the REALITY of his present numbers, are doing what exactly? More evidence that cynicism is not realism IMHO. The fact is that right now, Salty is pushing with Napoli for the AL's starting catcher in the All Star Game if he doesn't fall down a cliff between then and now.

If you blindly assume he'll be the Daniel Bard you remember the moment he gets to the pen, you're setting yourself up for disappointment. There's a reason they countenanced this move even when they had possible alternatives like Cook and Aceves. I think Dan Bard was considered damanged goods as a LIRP before he ever was pencilled in as a starter

Just sayin'. I think the kid's really come around. We'll see if he can hold onto it but as things stand, he has to be pretty pathetic with the glove not to be a worthy investment as a starting catcher. With Shoppach also doing well we may have one of the best catching tandems in the big leagues -- certainly the best in the AL at the moment. Nice to see.

Striking out lowers your AVG without creating a ball in play. Therefore it raises your BABIP.. or more correctly, it doesn't lower it. So if you strike out more and have the same average, you have a higher BABIP. This Nava has a higher BABIP than, say, Dustin Pedoia who is a similar hitter in some respects but almost never strikes out.

Yeah, I found it myself after about another 2 minutes of digging. Anyway, the gorilla in the room seems to be the BABIP. Nava's BABIP has gone back up to around .340, which seems high to people because it's well above the league average. It's the biggest weapon in the arsenal of those concerned that Nava is a fluke. Food for thought: Nava's BABIP has been consistent throughout his minor league career. His BABIP average over his mL career was .337, well within the margin of error of his current .344 in the bigs. He's a line drive hitter who can really put some good swings on the ball, and tends produce a lot of sharp contact. That will generate more hits than the average when contact is made. He has a power swing for such a small player, a lot of bat speed to make up for his lack of being physically built. Thus the line drives. And he strikes out a bit from swinging hard to hit those drives, which increases the BABIP a bit on the other end. And we've all seen him hit some screamers. He's been Laser Show, Jr. from time to time. So the BABIP isn't relly something that concerns me. It might normalize, or this might BE his normal BABIP. We don't know yet. As for power: Nava's power is mostly in low line drives, and he can get it to the wall in a hurry from time to time. If Nava ever found a way to change his swing just a little and get under the ball just that one tiny fraction of an inch more, like Pedroia did, the home runs could come for him like it did for Pedroia. I dunno if it'll happen, but the skill is there to make it a possibility if he can make the right adjustments. That said? Nava is probably a little bit of a fluke. For his career. whatever he gets of it in the bigs he's going to be closer to .270/.380/.420 than his current line. I don't think he's going to continue being one of the league's best top of the order hitters from now to retirement, in other words. I still take that line in the 2 hole over most of the league's #2 hitters.

Out of curiosity, exactly when was the last time Nava failed to reach base at least once in the course of a game? EDIT AFTER A BIT OF DIGGING: Ahh. May 27 against the Rays. But that's one of only 3 games he's had where he hasn't touched first at least once. This guy has been a very adequate top of the order hitter and he's been very consistent so far in the one thing a top of the order guy should be doing -- getting on base. He's not got elite speed, but his OBP skills, contact ability and propensity for doubles marks him as an archetypal #2 type. He's not quite the born #2 hitter Pedroia is, but he's above the league average considerably among players in that role, and he'll more than do for a replacement until we get Pedey back. I'd have a hard time not seeing another big league team give this kid a shot if we let him go now. He's earned a look for any team who's a bit light at the corners and can use a good #2 hitter. There might even be some trade value here.

Iglesias just hit the DL so we're stuck with what we've got for now.

How about YOU not overreact? As bad as he was last night, that's an isolated outing from Bard, and it's the first and only time that he's really gotten himself lit up. I think we need at least one, probably more than one, more start from Bard before we start throwing our hands up and heading for the fire exits. It's not fair after he's been generally adequate up till now to be panicking over this one performance, despite how bad it was.