Dojji

Let's not forget entirely about Tzu-Wei Lin. He's got no power, none at all, but he had a very good rookie campaign and showed a bit of promise as a contact hitter. I expect him to be in the utility mix this Spring fighting with Marrero and Holt if he comes back. I wouldn't want to count on him as Plan A, but he's got to be in the mix somewhere, he did a solid job for the team this year.

I very strongly disagree about you in regards to Hosmer and Moreland. The only category in which the two compare is the HR category. IMHO the difference between Hosmer and Moreland is the difference between an average to above average starting 1B, and a backup with some good bench power. Moreland is not a starting 1B, Hosmer is a decent-not-great starting 1B, to me that's all the difference in the world. Also, the age comparison works in Hosmer's favor.

He's also done most of his hitting in one of the bigger pitcher's parks in the AL. Move him to a hitter's park and surround him with better offensive talent and I think those numbers get better. If we want a playoff leader, the list doesn't start with Duda -- or with Votto or Stanton for that matter, since I don't think either one has sniffed the playoffs. as for the years he wants the dude is 27 years old, it's not particularly unreasonable to expect him to be productive through his age 31 season, is it? We don't need a revolutionary bat, just an above average guy who can hit 4th and extend the lineup a bit. Our lineup was right around league average, small upgrades will be enough to push it into the range where we need it to be. Going ham after a big thumper is going to work against that, especially an older one like Votto in particular. In the American League, Duda is a DH. That's not what we need. Also I don't want an over-30 who put up 1.1 WAR last year between NYM and TBR. I looked at Duda when considering who I'd want to see the Sox bring in and decided to stay the hell away. If a guy can manage to hit 30 HR's and put up only 1.1 bWAR, I don't even know how that's done, and I'd rather not find out the expensive way. You would not say that of any other hitter who put up that performance in his age 27 season, I guaran-fracking-tee it.

No, we shouldn't. We might do it anyway, but Giancarlo Stanton is not a panacea. It's entirely possible to pay more for him than he's worth. Personally I am keeping an eye on Eric Hosmer. He's not Stanton, but he'd be an upgrade on both sides of the ball and contract talks with the Royals seem troubled, we may be able to get our toe in and steel the guy, and he's really good, one of the major heroes of the Royals' 2015 postseason and 2014 near miss. If our problem is in the postseason, Hosmer looks to me like he'd be very helpful.

Last time I checked I was pretty sure we had a place for discussion of that team already.

Dustin Pedroia's pitch splits: First pitch swinging 2017:.250/.250/.300/.550 Career:.337/.344/.516/.860 0-1 2017: .327/.327/.400/.727 Career:.349/.350/.469/.820 1-0 2017:.429/,405/.743/1.148 CareerL .364/.360/.593/.953 It is absolutely and entirely reasonable for Dustin Pedroia to take the first pitch. Historically he's no worse off for being down 0-1 than he is on an even count, and this year he was so ineffective swinging at the first pitch over a small sample size that he looked better down 0-1 than he did with a clean count. The reward of getting that early ball and the advantage it gives Pedroia, is absolutely worth the very small penalty to his numbers that he gets with a strike on him. Pedroia is an aggressive fellow by nature, if he thought jumping on the first pitch would reward him he'd absolutely do it, but a patient approach at the plate has always rewarded him, so why not let him play to his strengths rather than fussing about how you'd rather see him do his job?

And aggression can work, but it's a higher risk higher reward style of offense. You are going to pull off some amazing years if an aggressive hitter manages to run into the ball more often than average. But the other side of the coin is just as likely where an entire offense spends 2 weeks not being able to find the ball, and even if you get lucky for awhile, law of averages WILL catch up with you in the end. Aggression does not improve your numbers, it simply increases the statistical spread. It's worth noting that Houston is as aggressive as it is because their lineup is hella talented. If it's not your intention that the red Sox offensive lineup is every bit as talented as the immensely talented Astros lineup -- and it isn't, because that would be both wrong and insane -- then trying to illuminate your point by the fact that a lineup that is collectively very, very good at hitting, is good at hitting this year, isn't actually saying anything and sheds no illumination whatsoever on what the Boston Red Sox, with their very different team composition, should or should not do.

Bogaerts has had a career marked by inconsistency and a poor ability to pull out of slumps and adjust to new tactics from pitchers. He's also transitioning from being in one of the protected positions in the lineup, to splitting time hitting first and third, arguably the two most important positions in the lineup and the positions most strategized against by pitching coaches. I think there's plenty of things to point out why Bogaerts struggled a bit more this year without inventing vague conspiracy theories about turning him into a slap hitter. If he's shortened his swing, it's quite possibly because getting on base was the #1 job at his spot in the lineup. It's worth noting that swinging at the first pitch nets Bogaerts a .241/.290/.276 line for a dismally bad .566 OPS. In other words, those of you who want Bogaerts to get aggressive early in the count are literally asking him to play into his biggest weakness as a hitter. Bogaerts wins if he can work the count, if he swings at the first pitch it almost never results in a hit and when it does it's a single. Making him do the single thing he's most terrible at as a hitter, MORE often, is not helping.

So DeMarlo Hale is still at least a distant possibility. I still think he'll make a good manager. He's a veteran bench coach and one of the best 3B coaches we ever had.

The really lauchable thing is that the hitter in recent Red Sox history most likely to sit on his bat for the first pitch -- is David Ortiz. Even Youkilis was more likely to swing at the first pitch than Papi was.

Another guy very famous for swinging at the first pitch is this guy. altuve is a unique talent. He is very, very good at swinging a bat, always has been, in fact Jose Altuve is probably the single best contact hitter in the game right now. He gets away with being aggressive because he's swinging at pitches he can hit, but a lot of those pitches aren't pitches that an average hitter can hit. Saying the same strategy that an elite hitting talent like Altuve gets away with, would work for a guy like JBJ or Benintendi just as well, makes exactly as much sense as saying that it would work as well as it did for that other guy I mentioned in the link.

For that matter when was the last time the Red Sox won two consecutive pennants?

Hitting strategy means nothing when the offense is simply not good. You can't strategize yourself into extra home runs. Your lineup is either good or it isn't. Saying "be more aggressive" feels good because when hit zero percent of the pitches you don't swing at, but the best hitters tend to be patient hitters. We just don't have a big centerpiece bat for this lineup. That's the problem right now, if they started swinging at the first pitch the way you want, they'd still be a bunch of average to below average hitters, just a bunch of average to below average hitters swinging at the first pitch. I doubt this would trigger the offensive revolution you're desperately wishing it would.

Lovullo's record in Arizona: 93-69 Farrell's record in Boston: 93-69 Lovullo's Diamondbacks postseason results: swept in the NLDS Farrell's Red Sox postseason results: Lost 3-1 in the ALDS Nnnnnnnnnnnnot really seeing the huge advantage from keeping Lovullo around guys. Looks like the two managers had practically identical seasons. You might give some credit to Lovullo for doing it with a financially weaker team, but with the dead money on our roster Farrell had no actual roster advantages. They had an ace (Greinke) we had an ace (Sale). I mean... I'm looking for a difference in performance here and not actually seeing one. Wanting Lovullo over Farrell this year is pure 100% grass-is-greener mentality. They're both average managers, Lovullo is just the average manager we're not prejudiced against because he didn't fail here.

I can't think of any decisions he made that were rash either. DD is not impulsive. He makes decisive decisions, but so far everything he's done has been well-considered and logical -- he's a high roller who takes calculated risks. Exactly what you need to do to consistently field a good team. The biggest thing I saw him do that I'd consider inadvisable, was trade Shaw for Thornberg, but that has a logic to it as well, Shaw is a streaky hitter and we thought we needed bullpen help at the time. Turns out he should have kept Shaw in his pocket, since it turned out that we could really have used him -- but that wasn't really a rash decision, just a time where he took another of his calculated risks and this one didn't work.

Pedroia is a smart hitter. When his playing days are over, I'd take a look at him as a batting coach. Speaking of hitting coaches, and being among the smartest hitters of his generation... I wonder what Kevin Youkilis is up to these days. EDIT: Ahh, working for player development in the Cubs system apparently, good for him. Theo knows brains when he sees them.

I want DeMarlo Hale. Former Tito staffer, was a big part of the salad years and a very experienced bench coach. He'd be a great candidate to give a veteran team because he's been around the block so long. I think it's his turn to break into the managerial circuit and I want it to be here.

I agree with that, it's almost impossible to get rid of a manager who won the World Series once. They have to really, really stink and look completely lost. Farrell is neither, he just didn't win when it mattered.

I did. Farrell is what he is. An average manager. While there were other holes to plug and a sense that the team was playing over his head there was no need to make this move, but the team underperformed this year including another one-and-done in the division round. He got is this far but other than adding maybe one power bat, it's going to take a more consistent effort from the players to take us any further. That's a good time to go looking for a new manager. An average manager can absolutely win the World Series if he manages at a great level for a year. Farrell did it in 13, Ned Yost did it in 15, both are very average. But counting on it is inadvisable. Personally I want to see them interview DeMarlo Hale. He's a coach from the winning era, served under Tito, knows his system, and he knows many of the veterans on the team, he's one of the most experienced non-managers in the league right now. Get him in here and see what he can give us.

I'm still thinking that DeMarlo Hale would make a pretty solid manager, and wouldn't mind bringing him back.

Sale Pom ERod Porcello I don't think we're winning the series. But I think this is what gives us our best chance.

If Marrero is in, no need for Holt. I want Travis on the roster. We might need his bat off the bench, and I am not confident in Moreland. With 2 bench slots open, I would choose Nunez or Marrero, and Travis. Since all of our starting outfielders can at least theoretically play center I'm not too worried about injury per se, we should be able to figure it out without an extra outfielder if we lose a guy in the middle of the game and we can bring Davis or Young onto the roster if we need to make replacements after the game. Meanwhile we need some thunder off the bench and with Young struggling this year, that means, at least to me, that we need Sam Travis.

For me Devers has made all the angst of that trade go away. We still shouldn't have traded Shaw for THornburg, but at least we were able to resolve the 3B position so that it isn't a festering sore.

No. Look where we are. Look where the Marlins are. No. No. No.