Dojji

I would love to have Jose Reyes here, and suspect that a cost effective replacement (Lowrie) would go a long way in terms of the down payment to bring him in. I make that sacrifice every time. I respect the heck out of Lowrie and I'm glad he's getting his chance, but ELITE shortstops like Reyes just don't become available very often.

No, I refuse to believe you're this kind of simpleton. Ellsbury's on base ability is just fine. Ideally sure you want the .400 OBP guy with blazing speed but look around the league. THat guy does not exist. Ellsbury's on base 35% of the time and that's above average in the leadoff spot. With everything else he's providing at the moment that's more than enough. As for bunting for a hit, if the Boston Red Sox never bunt again, it'll still be too many bunts. Bunting is a very situational tactic and its effectiveness in all but a very few specific circumstances is highly suspect. It's something you only do when you catch opposing defenses poorly aligned, and even then it's rarely as effective at starting innings off properly as putting up a normal at-bat.

Because no sabremetric guys ever watched a single game in their lives. Not everyone with speed is a tablesetter. Assuming that everyone who happens to run really fast functions best ONLY in the role of a tablesetter is ridiculous, narrowminded and foolish. Crawford has extra base speed, not tablesetting speed. There's a difference. He does his best work plugging the gap and legging out doubles and triples, a tablesetters' first job is to get their butts on base and let themselves be driven in by the hitters behind them. It's fully possible to be good at one and not the other. And in Crawford's case, his best attribute between his on base ability and his power (SLG) is easily the power. Take a look at the stats if you don't believe me. Crawford is built to be a lower middle of the order hitter on a good team, replacing some of the HR power you don't get with among the best triples power in the league. Good gap double or triple clears the bases nearly as well as a homer. Guy like that can drive a lot of runs in even with slow runners ahead of him. That's what this guy does, and we overpaid for him no question in my mind, but we didn't pay for him at all to be a freaking tablesetter, and the lineup reflects that. He's here to shoot the gap and run like the devil's after him. THat's less effective if there aren't runners ahead of him.

It's not about runs scored, it's about the probability of scoring a run. Which becomes a lot easier when a guy is on the basepaths. Besides, there's a good argument catered for the baseball troglodytes like yourself for why to keep Crawford out of the #2 hole. That's the last place in the world you want 2 straight LHH's, and Ellsbury is killing the baseball so he goes nowhere.

Scutaro to the 2 hole over Crawford please. We need a guy who can work the count and put up a good at bat. Crawford is rip-and-run, which is an awful 2 hole guy. HE needs to be in a middle of the lineup or a bottom of the lineup to use his skills to best effect. Crawford is an extra base speed hitter, not a table setter. Not every player who happens to be fast should be deadbolted into the 1 or 2 holes.

Well, take it with all the salt you can eat, but apparently Andrew Miller is showing significant progress in getting his command down. He's allowed 2 walks in his last 3 starts and is getting the ball on the ground a lot more. A couple little links on the subject for your enjoyment. Apparently they adjusted the way he prepares for a game and it's yielding big dividends.

How's Yamaico Navarro doing these days? He was tearing up AAA before he got hurt, and it's been awhile.

Dustin Pedroia is fragile. Little guy wearing his body out to make the plays. Not that surprising.

By the by, Salty's OPS is now in the .730 range. Not great, but for a catcher, more than acceptable. He's also caught about a quarter of stolen base attempts (24%) which is acceptable. Not great, but people aren't running on him at will. He's starting to prove Theo right. Kinda fun to watch him mature.

Jusst once I'd like to see one of these threads created when the team has won 3 straight games.

with a .328 OBP. By the same token Pedroia had a higher obp (only .331, but still higher) and a much better steal rate in May (6 for 7), I'm as dismayed by the lack of quality contact from Pedroia as anyone else but he's doing a #2 hitter's basic job fairly well, and the hits will come.

So make a move for Jeff Francis? He's not great, but he'll eat you some innings, has some rebound upside, and he's probably available for a relatively modest price.

This isn't the best hitting we'll ever see out of Crawford, I really believe that, but it's going to take him making some adjustments to regain his consistency.

Can always count on YOTN for the penetrating insights.

Think of this as just a speculative exercuse, but if it turns into a discussion of some of our less HR-tastic, but nonetheless consistent hitters, I won't mind that much. It's an interesting question to me because of run expectancy. The maximum run expectancy of a homer is 4. The maximum run expectancy of two doubles, assuming no errors or bases advanced on the throw, is 6, and at the end of each double, you have a RISP. By the same token, the MINIMUM run expectancy of two doubles is zero. A homer? One. So if you're in a situation where you need to score a lot of runs you actually want the two doubles. But if it's close and late you probably want the guaranteed minimum one run. I guess the reason this comes up is the Gonzo thread. I think his average and consistency going up in Boston is far more important than his home run power. He's got good oppo power, but I don't care if that results in more homers or more doubles. Also we have a number of hitters up and down the lineup, most notably Pedroia, Lowrie and Youkilis, who have a history of thriving on doubles power and they're an underrated factor in our offensive consistency. Let the Yankees live by the homer and die by the homer.

A large amount? Sure. More than Petco? Don't honestly care. There's too many things that go into HR numbers for me to expect them to be predictable year by year. Besides, we all know homers aren't the only way a hitter chips in, I'm more interested in offensive consistency than I am in the long bomb.

True. And that's the thing. He's a LHH at Fenway, those don't hit more HR's than they can in other places. Even if the other place is Petco Park. Bot what they do hit if they know what they're doing is a ton of doubles. We are about the middle of the pack as a HR field overall, but we are usually one of the very top doubles parks in all of baseball, and that leads to average and RBI's that he wouldn't have been able to find in San Diego.

Soxprospects is overreacting to Lin's lack of developed power and forgetting that as a speed burning defense guy, he's a type of player that least NEEDS power to be a useful big leaguer. He's a big league elite defensive centerfielder right now and his hitting discipline is very very solid (more walks than strikeouts each of the last 3 years). He could play right now in the big leagues as a So Taguchi type, that really should be somewhere in the top 10 prospect because most of the guys in that list won't do even that. That and he's our only seriously advanced RHH OF at the moment. Considering that he has wheels, I'm not prepared to say that he can't round out into a really good leadoff hitter if he can adjust to the bigs well enough. I will never quite understand why big league D with no offense is enough to get people steamy about Iglesias, but a guy who adds high level hitting discipline and much more speed to the same mix doesn't do it for people with Lin.

FINALS!!!!

Poor comparison. No one is saying that Crawford is the kind of power hitter Adgon is. Adgon is one of the best hitters in the league, by no means is Crawford comparable as a hitter, nor is he intended to be.

Yep, once in his rookie campaign (which I referenced) and one I missed in 2008. He's still pretty danged consistent at it. While you're telling the future, how do the Bruins do this postseason? I don't think it is misleading. SLG is a reference for offensive consistency, it doesn't matter how you get the bases per at bat as long as you do.. Also another guy who tended to just barely hit .450? Mike Lowell. I'd call him a "power hitter."

Proposal: Lin is a righthanded CF who is astounding defensively, has nearly Ellsbury like wheels and a good discipliine, making him a great choice for a 4th outfield role on a team with 3 righthanded outfielders. He should be called up immediately to replace Mike Cameron as our bench outfielder. Arguments against -- He's only 22, he does have time to refine his game and may develop into a better overall player if we don't jerk him around and bench him in the big leagues. -- He just cleared AA and could probably stand at least a little more seasoning in regular at bats in AAA -- He is not on the 40-man roster yet and we would have to release someone to make room for him, compounded by the fact that our 40 man roster is fairly crowded with guys with some usefulness and it's hard to decide who to drop. -- What the heck do you do with Cameron? If you waive or release him without a viable Plan B (and if you're calling up Lin, you have no viable Plan B ) you could be up **** creek if Lin can't get 'er done. Arguments in favor -- While Lin is young, he's been in system for awhile and we have a pretty good idea what he is. -- Lin may never develop the power to perform as a true starting Boston outfielder. If he cracks the roster it's going to be in exactly the role he'd fill right now, as a So Taguchi type, and any starting gig he earned would be based on what he did with his time after the callup -- As we have a crowded outfield with more young players than slots, letting other big league teams see the kid in action is probably the best way to inflate his value as a trade piece. -- Lin, as a player who's been in our minor league system for 4+ years, is vulnerable to Rule 5 Draft soon IIRC and would have to be added to the 40-man roster by the end of the year anyway. -- Don't forget, if anyone claims Cameron they have to pay his contract, it is very likely that we can stash him in the minors in case the experiment doesn't work or he gets his stroke back.

Carl Crawford has not failed to slug .450 or more since his rookie campaign. He isn't a home run hitter but he uses his legs to leverage a high SLG and gets a lot of triples (having led the league in them 4 different seasons). So a traditional power hitter he isn't, but saying he isn't a power hitter at all is just not true.