Dojji

I'd like to give Bard some time in AA-AAA this year to prove that he's definitely improved his command as much as Spring Training made it look like he had. If it has, then all's good and he needs to be fast-tracked to the bigs. But I don't mind holding Bard in reserve either in case we need to replace Takashi Saito sometime in the middle of the season. Certainly Saito's elbow makes it problematic to want to trade relief pitchers right now. Sure it looks healthy, but so did Brendan Donnelly in '07 and look how that turned out.

I disagree with that. Wang's Platoon Splits Webb's Carmona's Lowe's Between them, Wang, Lowe, Carmona and Webb are, in no particular order, perhaps the best sinkerballers in the league. All of them have significant platoon splits. Some more than others of course (Webb's surprised me by being frairly significant) but it's a hurdle sinkerballers learn to overcome if they're left in the rotation. I do NOT believe that three bad starts made that a different thing for Masterson than for those other 4 starters, especially considering his upside and just how effective that sinker is for him. JMHO, but I think Theo let the illusion of depth lure him into making the easy call and it cost us in the long run.

Or the opposing lineup. Wakefield would tend to be more effective IMHO against aggressive teams, Sonnanstine against patient ones.

So what you're saying is a dominant bullpen this year will pick us up a number of marginal wins.

Yeah that one confuses me too. The only guy who really finished below his normal numbers is Papelbon and Masterson picked up a lot of Mike Timlin's slack.

Well I've already stated my opinion on calling up Tazawa -- if it happens it'll be in the second half because they want to get his innings up. I don't think they see him as just a reliever. I think he's going to grace our rotation at some point.

Wouldn't be against trading MDC but I'd want to wait to see how the bullpen settled in together first. I'd be much more open to the prospect of trading Javy Lopez and moving Jones up to Boston as the last man in the pen.

I think Expo would need to prove he can get on base before we start deciding where he'll hit in the Boston lineup. I like everything about him but the .330 OBP. That's a good way to become Rod Barajas.

Actually you've got it right. My other point is not to panic over every minor flaw in the Red Sox rotation to the point that we start conceding things to teams who might have the same weaknesses except we just don't hear about it as much.

who for the purposes of this discussion is considered a question mark. opinion noted. I doubt very much that anyone considers Joba Chamberlain the Yankee 5th starter. He's just the guy I mentioned last. What a good thing we don't just go 4 deep... http://americancivilwar.com/volcano/pictures/fissure_eruption_5.jpg He's also racked up a crapload of pitcher abuse points and missed a fair number of starts for the Rays last year, with elbow and forearm problems and due to his slipshod command had trouble going deep into the games he did pitch. Helath is a legitimate question mark. So what you're saying is that Masterson, Bowden and Buchholz are each 1/3 as good as Hughes, and half as good as Price. Can't help but disagree with you there. Price will be a fantastic pitcher but Buchholz is a couple developmental steps ahead of him yet, and Masterson also has more positive big league experience than Price. The only one he cleanly beats in terms of immediate MLB utility is Bowden. Even your math was true our depth is better than theirs at dealing with multiple, simultaneous injuries. Which happens in the course of a season more than we want to remember.

Sonnanstine throws strikes. He doesn't look like much, but he gives himself a better than usual margin for error by the simple expedient of not getting himself in trouble. He's probably got a future in the bigs as a Paul Byrd type as long as he can keep that level of command. Strikethrowers are the bane of patient teams. They force them to get out of their preferred mode of offense and that tends to lead to weak offensive performances.

Please. The Rays have Shields, Garza and who? Kazmir certainly has question marks with his command and durability, especially recently. Sonnanstine is #4 starter. Price is a rookie. And who the heck is the other team? Not the Yankees for sure. They have Sabathia and a whole rotation full of question marks. Is Burnett going to pitch more than 130 innings or so? Is Wang going to stay healthy? Is Pettitte going to be effective a year further from his prime? Can Joba last a full season as a starter and stay healthy and effective doing it? And even Sabathia hasn't exactly been playoff money in his career. Heck, if we swapped rotations with the Yankees we'd be in PANIC mode right now.

He was a respectable offensive player in 2006, so I was thinking mostly of his 2007 campaign when I said he was blocked at the corners. He got no shortage of reps in right field with Nixon around because Nixon, as often as not, wasn't healthy enough to play. Also because he was hitting at that point, which magically mends all defensive flaws.

I guess I agree. Kinda a shame though, the one thing he does he does so well that you wish he could develop the companion skills to make use of it.

We stunted his development by sticking him on the bench and blocking him in all but his worst position (CF). That limits his ability to get consistent development time severely. Of course most of the damage was done by whoever rushed him to the majors in the first place. but the guy proved he could hit at the big league level in 2 years as a Cincinatti Red -- despite not getting 400 at bats in any season in Cincy. It was only here where he learned how not to be able to hit.

True, but most teams are lucky to have 2 guys in their rotation that isn't a question mark so saying right off that we have three is a good thing right there, besides the fact that 3 of the 6 "question mark" guys are youngsters with strong upside which is also an advantage we have over most everyone else.

That's because Wily Mo wasn't an injured 5th outfielder who can't field or get his bat on the ball when we got him. He struck out a lot but he slugged consistently enough to get his OPS up into the .800 range fairly regularly despite a low OBP. He was killing the ball for the Reds, and at first for us too. What happened to him happened on our watch. In other words the guy we got in trade was worth the trade, it was we who ruined Wily Mo Pena.

I think we have the same lefty-righty hitting with Baldelli-Carter. Throw in Kots for good measure.

Which of our pitchers would you fire and not replace with Buchholz or Bard for the sake of a 30 year old career minor league first baseman? Not that I have anything against Bailey -- heck, I wanted him over Kotsay in the playoffs last year. But that's really what it comes down to.

BTW -- Masterson to the pen, officially. Makes it very unlikely that he gets his innings limit raised this year, so I have to ask: Is this going to more or less be a permanent thing or is it more like when Derek Lowe was our setup man and closer?