Dojji

You know who'd really intrigue me as a possibility to pick up if he's available? Livan Hernandez. Dude is seriously underrated IMHO. Livan has pitched well the last couple years for Washington, not exactly a great environment. He's not a great pitcher, but he's a good veteran for the bottom of a rotation, and he's a complete innings hog. Eats them like they're going out of style. Even when he's struggled with some teams he's still put up the IP. He hasn't pitched less than 180 IP since he debuted. So you know he's healthy, and you know he'll go out there and take the ball for you, and he'll gut through some bad performaces to try and keep the team in the game. Isn't that a pretty fair description of EXACTLY what we need right now? If what you really need isn't a great pitcher, but just innings and a chance to win, Livan could set ypu up nicely and I doubt he'd be that expensive considering he's pretty mugh the definition of a league average pitcher (career 97 ERA+) and hasn't missed significant time with an injury in forever. I could see him being helpful to us as long as you don't demand a rotation of 5 aces or something ludicrous like that..

Hmm... Varitek or Lavarnway, Lavarnway or Varitek... I'm guessing that if Ortiz walks we may wind up carrying three catchers. We need to get a bit more righthanded anyway, and Lavarnway, if he can hit anywhere near this well at the big league level, can carry DH offensively, and if he can feature occasionally as an adequate catcher (not expecting miracles there) he's actually pretty valuable and might mean that Tito would actually occasionally pinch hit for a catcher. Sometimes. Although that might cost us the DH spot so mayve not lol.

I still think that ultimately this team will decide to go after a bottom of the rotation guy for insurance, a guy like Bruce Chen perhaps, whose job is to just make sure there's a guy there to eat innings, and that the plan for the postseason is simply to get Buchholz healthy. Will say though, Kyle Weiland's second start has led me to believe he should have a third. We all know that I think that that second inning of Weiland's first start was a fluke exacerbated by Scutaro's terrible arm at short, and he pitched well in a more normalized environment against the same team. Not quite ready to throw away anyone who can put up 3 ER, 6 IP at this point so I hope Weiland sticks around in some capacity when Lester's back.

Since May 15, arbitrary date selected since that's when he happened to hit his forst homer, and alwso interesting because it's a little over 2 months of hitting, and a combined ~100-120 PA here's Salty's line. .280 BA .363 OBP .576 SLG .939 OPS 8 HR 17 XBH 1:2 bb/k ratio (not great, not terrible) Combine that with being at least a non-liability on D (his glove isn't great, but he's a big league catcher defensively) and I think we may have a winner here. Looks like the real Saltalamacchia might have arrived after that rough first month and a half. Which is, you know, awesome.

He didn't hit much better in pawtucket? Only if all you're looking at is batting average. Reddick in AAA: .230/.333/.508 Iglesias in Pawtucket: .227/.275/.245 We wouldn't tolerate that line in MLB to begin with, so sure, let's go ahead and promote the kid to a higher level where he's even more out of his depth offensively. I know exactly what will happen if we call Iglesias up. For about a month we'll be in love with the glove, and after that we'll be bewailing the black hole in the lineup. It's how fans operate here. Try. Navarro. At. Short. He can hit, at least by shotstop standards. He can play the position. He has something other than a bag of Jell-O attached to his right shoulder. What the freak is there to lose?

REally depends on whether you can count on Reddick to hit against the best pitchers in the league. If you can't, we should look for a pro who can.

Consider this. There is no reason whatsoever that they couldn't have DH'd Reddick and played Ellsbury on CF.

Well if he's going to suck at his position he loses the right to argue.

I managed to misspell "bait." To hot my not brain good today.

I'm sure we're all grateful that Reddick rose to the occasion this year and is killing the ball as a Crawford replacement. WHen the Ortiz suspension ends this franchise is going to have to make a decision about this kid. There's plenty of evidence that the initial rush he was on has slowed right down, over the course of this month his average has dipped from over .400 (!) to about .347. July line so far .256'/.333/.590, which is a lot closer to his Pawtucket numbers. This is his line after playing every day for several weeks in the wake of the Crawford injury. So the batting average looks like it might be an illusion, but the kid can nonetheless put a charge into the ball when he gets hold of it. THe X factor here of course is that that's an OK line for a right fielder, but as a center fielder, it's absolutely absurd, and Reddick proved he has the range to handle CF if he has to. The comp I see right now for this kid, is David Murphy with more power. Murphy has made a career of being a useful and versatile 3 position outfielder for Texas who can play for weeks at a time at an adequate level if he had to. Throw on another .020 to the SLG ro Murphy's average numbers and what you have, is a starting corner outfielder. all the kid needs to do to be there IMHO is hit .250 or so On the other hand he could just as easily be a lefthanded Jeff Fraocneur. Or if his game at center is legit, or it turns out he can hit .290, he could become a superstar. Or he could be trade bait to a team more patient with prospects. Or he could turn out to be a bust because pitchers figure out some sort of poison pitch. Could go any nf a number of ways.

Yeah but writers from a lot of neutral teams default in favor of the HR leader.

Haven't you heard? Hockey isn't a sport. My only point is that we should give some credit to the current ownership group. Hands up anyone who was a fan before 2003. You people know exactly what I'm talking about.

The Cubbies are running into some minor financial issues (nothing hideous, the owners just took on some debt to buy the team and have a high payroll) and are not close to contending. Ramirez is in the last year of his deal. Until Ramirez put the kibosh on the concept of him being traded it was a legit thought.

That's why we presently have Weiland and Miller, and not Aceves, in the rotation.

It's more traditional to move third basemen who can't hack it at their position to corner outfield rather than DH. Hmm. Weren't we saying we needed a RHH corner OF?

Middlebrooks killing the balll. Hitting over .400 over his last 10 games. Apparently his defense is improving as well. A good third baseman has been very hard to find in this league for awhile now. Very glad that Middlebrooks is rounding into form. Maybe in a year and a half or so he'll be ready to go in earnest.

We have an alternative. Try Yamaico Navarro at short. He can play there. He has a pretty solid arm. He's hit a little. What is there to lose?

Superb, superb pickup that cost us nothing but money and will be cost controlled for years? As an effective long man out of the bullpen that can pitch setup caliber ball if called upon? Heck of a deal. Almost makes up for Jenks.

Would you take Coco Crisp back? Switch hitting, better against lefties, plays well defensively, puts up some decent at bats. I know he wouldn't be the sexy pick since people want power hitters, but as a 4th OF Crisp is a pretty fair fit. The worst of it is that you might see Ellsbury in right. Which isn't such a big deal this year since he has the bat to carry himself in right field this year.

The thing that's most intriguing about Lavarnway is that he bats righthanded. Isn't one of our biggest franchise needs at the moment a righthanded bat off the bench?

How long as it honestly been since we've had a relief pitcher who can do what Aceves can do in the middle innings? Think about it. What's the holy grail of middle relief? The one thing that every team can make room for in their bullpen because of its sheer value to the team? It's a guy who can pitch multiple innings of good baseball, consistently, save other relievers and pick up the pieces after the starters to give the team an honest chance to win.. Right now, that's a pretty fair description of Ace. He's pitching like the Goose out there and has all year. It's been incredible to watch what he's done in the long role. Which is why I Think Miller and Weiland are starting over Ace -- because the team recognizes that Ace has clicked where he is and needs to stay there for now. What he did for this team last night was literally the reason they won. His ability to get out there, pitch efficiently and cover multiple innings ultimately allowed the Sox to outlast the Rays on a night when it was obvious that the offense didn't have it, and allowed the team to scratch a run across. It kept us out of a tie with NYY for one more night and he should be respected on that basis alone. And considering that NYY basically threw him away? Males it all the more delicious. I hope this kid is around in a Red Sox uni for a very long time.

There's always going to be games like this. Every team has 'em. Lemme know how it goes guys. Been up since 5 and I can't stand it anymore. Night.

Come on Reddick. Nice double down the right field line would work wonders right about now.

We need baserunners.

Why? We still have 5 starters not counting Miller once Lester returns. All this means is that Wake is in the rotation fulltime from here on out.