Dojji

I agree, if they ever intended to evaluate Swihart as a catching option for 2016, the decision was rash. Therefore, we can clearly deduce that they had no such intention at any time in 2016. Frankly it was very clear to me even in those first handful of games that Blake Swihart was not up to the task of catching a would-be championship contender. Besides, the organization had already made its decision about who they really wanted catching, and it wasn't Swihart -- Swihart was simply holding the post down until their intended starter was verifiably over his injury, which they hadn't established to their own satisfaction by the end of Spring Training.

Of course we'll look for the next Ziegler, because the bullpen is always an area that can be upgraded if you don't have a major need to expand the roster in other areas. If we don't go for the next Ziegler, it's probably because another position (1B and 3B are possibilities here) is hurting and needs help more than the bullpen does.

Honestly, Moonslav, our bullpen looks better to me than it did AT THE START of 2016. Kimbrel is not the world's best closer, but he ought to be more than adequate, and there's something to be said for stability in the closer's role. Moreover, going into 2016 we thought our setup man was Tazawa, and actually got lucky that an aging Uehara held that role together as long as he did. Going into it this year we aren't trusting to luck nearly as much, Thornberg is a very solid Plan A, and any of Barnes, Ross, or Smith could step into the role, or at least hold onto it for awhile while we sort through our options in trade. That's a hell of a lot better than a burnt-out Tazawa and a Koji held together with spit and bailing wire. Also other options such as Barnes, Ross, and Hembree, are much better-known quantities this year than they were at this time last year. Going into the year we have some good power arms to look at for middle and late innings, including any or all of Barnes, Ross, Hembree, and Kelly out the gate, and Smith down the road. That's a damn good place to start assembling a 7 man pen and I'd be willing to bet at least 18 teams in baseball are jealous of our depth of options. And that's of course figuring without whatever the 6th starter does in a bullpen role. Starting the year this is what we look like: Kimbrel Thornburg Ross Hembree Barnes Kelly (probably Pomeranz) If you look at the CV's on these guys, any of the 7 could deliver sub-4 relief in any given year, and many of them are good for sub-3 more often than not. Kelly's a wild card, but Kelly is going to be a work in progress and probably near the bottom of the depth chart in the pen anyway. We HOPE for good things from Kelly, but we are not actually in a situation where we have to DEPEND on good things from Kelly -- which from the standpoint of an experiment like this is exactly where you want to be. Now that said I fully expect the team to need to add to the pen from time to time. Injuries happen, roles shift around, underperformance is a thing that can affect anyone at any time. But guess what? We can add to the pen without spending assets, because waiting in the wings to finish his recovery from elbow surgery is Carson Smith, and even better, we don't have to throw him right into regular bullpen duty if we feel he isn't ready, because we ought to have 7 options ahead of him in theory, all of which are good enough that even if they struggle at first they're worth working with rather than making a panic move. Are there a few bullpens that are better at the top than ours is? Oh yes. Closer is one of the closest things we have to a weakness in the pen on paper, since Kimbrel had a down year. Is there a bullpen I'd take over Boston's 1-7? Maaaaaaaybe Cleveland, and that's mostly because of Miller. Maybe the Cubs, although not so much post-Chapman. Not too many others If our bullpen is the closest thing we have to a genuine concern or weakness, this is going to be one hell of a baseball season.

TBPH, I am willing to predict that the third baseman we will be fielding by the end of 2018 is not on this roster or in this organization right now.

That applies to both sides -- the starting pitching can't feast on cellar dweller lineups either. That's why guys like Curt Schilling who managed to be at a consistently high level in the playoffs are so impressive. That's not, however, a very good reason to expect every starting pitcher to be Curt Schilling. Or Madison Bumgarner for that matter. There's a reason those guys only come along a couple times in a generation.

Would you like to rephrase that? I think I'm seeing where you were trying to go with that, but if I'm right, you could have worded your point better. It seems to me that especially for a quality SP, more innings do matter a lot. The more innings your rotation pitches the less innings your middle relief tends to need to work. I think I see an argument you might have been trying to make that other elements can atone for poor durability, or that poor durability alone doesn't damn a strong contribution when the player is playing, but unless the middle relief is both unquestionably superior to the starter, and unquestionably underworked, it's hard to make the assessment that durability isn't one of the single most important traits a starting pitcher can bring to the table.

I firmly believe this has happened in a small minority of cases. There's also players who would have improved this team that we judt didn't even go after because of their reputation for fragility. Not the best example given his performance last season but Zack Greinke springs to mind.

We're really our own worst enemies aren't we? We get pie in the sky expectations for whatever top talent the ownership brings in, and then go absolutely insane when they deliver less than absolute perfection, and then we make it out like it's the player's own fault that we expected more than human beings are capable of, and wind up alienating the best talent money can buy. And then we keep doing it over and over again. Inasmuch as fan influence makes it harder to operate in Boston as a player who is not perfection incarnate (which is all of them) I have to say quite frankly that we as fans have a tendency to sabotage the very team we root for, and we need to freaking stop.

I actually disagree with this. It's moderately plausible that Devers could position himself for a September callup. He'd have to break camp in Portland and then not struggle in order to put himself in range but if he does break camp with the Seadogs, he needs to earn one promotion and then look good in a Pawsox uniform, and then the team probably gives him a cup of coffee in the big leagues this coming season. Once a player has completed a season at the A+ level, he's in range where a couple breakthroughs could put him on the big league roster in a matter of a few months. Do I think it will happen? Well I bet against both Moncada and Benintendi this year, so I tend to err on the side of caution with my predictions, but it's telling that I got burned doing it twice this season. DD has never been afraid of rapidly promoting a prospect.

I'd be very happy to accept that, but I honestly think that if Wright is healthy all year, that's a bit low as well. When a guy's only had one full season, it's really hard to project him statistically, I really think Steven Wright may just open some people's eyes this year. Don't forget, Wright was our leader in IP/GS with a super impressive 6.5 IP per start, so over a full 34 starts that actually projects to a wildly optimistic 223 1/3 IP. I'm not saying it's definitely going to be that of course, but that's the inning load he was on pace for last year, so with a full healthy season that kind of inning load is well within his demonstrated ability. If he could match that with a performance similar to the one he put up last year on an K/BB, WHIP, and BABIP fronts, he might put up an ace type year. But 200 innings of low 4 or high 3 ERA is absolutely acceptable, especially with what ought to be at least a solid offense, and I would be happy to see him cement his career by delivering a good solid #2 starter performance, which is what that would be. I think it would be absurd to relegate that kind of workhorse to the pen, and am extremely confident that Wright will crack the rotation despite the stiff competition. That level of durability can be impossible to find, no sane management team will turn their nose up at it when they might just already have it. People rant and rave about E-Rod's potential but to be honest, Wright might be over 30, but I honestly believe he demonstrated that his potential is not inferior, even if it is tied to the knuckler.

That seems extremely low for Wright who was good for 2.1 bWAR last year, was our second or third best starter by most metrics, and has always been productive when given a starting role.

Except that we know that Papi had had pain problems with his feet and ankles all that year, and that his lower body was basically a complete mess. Once that piece is in place, pinching for him makes a lot more sense If Farrell could tell that Papi was in trouble, he had to get him off the bases because we needed that bat all year. If Papi was signalling get-me-out-of-here, or it was clear to Farrell that he was on borrowed time with Papi's creaky wheels, then it was time to make whatever move he could to keep Papi in the lineup every day. As much as I loved what Wright did for us this year, him getting hurt hurt us less when it happened than if Papi had had to take any length of time off with ankle issues.

So Wright or a guy you already knew was slightly damaged.... yeah, Farrell made a defensible call there.

Well, that's not true in the slightest for one big reason -- both Ortiz and Schilling had a HELL of a lot more postseason experience than Price has had.

Especially because if I recall correctly, he had the choice of Wright or Buchholz at the time. We all know what would have happened if it had been Buchholz.

Swihart? I'd rather be trying Swihart in the outfield if something happened to one of our starting 3 rather than either Brentz or Castillo

Opinions really haven't changed at all Moonslav. We just know the team has gone all in on the guy this year and are pulling for him to prove them right because there aren't a ton of options. In other words we realize we're stuck with Pablo and want him to make good. Our opinions of the guy really haven't changed that much, but now we're forced to go all in on hope.

Does Wright even have options at this point? He was called up to the majors in all of 13, 14 and 15. Also, as the oldest of the three candidates for the 2 rotation slots, Wright is the guy I'm least eager to screw around with in terms of jerking him around from one assignment to another. Personally I suspect that with injury concerns still on the horizon, E-Rod is the guy with things to prove and he'll be the guy who has to earn his way into a rotation spot.

And then there's a certain second baseman that hit 15 HR's and 52 XBH's last year and is even smaller. When Pedroia manages to stay healthy, his power is noteworthy, especially for a middle infielder.

It should be noted that our starting pitching depth is no worse now than it was before we acquired Sale.

Of course FIP favors Ryan, he was a true outcomes pitcher who threw a lot more strikeouts. FIP ignores balls in play, and Maddux was a master at pitching to contact. Pitchers like Maddux are why FIP stats are manipulated with FIP- and xFIP

Mike Trout Tim Salmon

No one should sell out entirely for a kid who's only played ~30 games of big league ball. But the talent is there, and if he falters we have options, so we're in a good spot to be hopeful.

Not really. We have 2 distinct choices to replace Benintendi if he falters -- one being Swihart, the other being a Young/Holt platoon. Neither of those options are as good on paper as Benintendi living up to the billing, but then again, that's just what depth options are.

Blaming a pitcher for unearned runs is a complete defiance of the whole principle of the unearned run. It's a fact that most of Wright's best starts took place in the first half of the year before we got our defensive crap together.