mvp 78

Offense - Check! Pitching - Needs Help! Defense - Even worse than the pitching!

They don't make 'em like Joel Youngblood anymore! It's funny, you think these bootstraps types would just tell players to go in there and do their job (like a good Bill Belichick pet).

We'll see what happens. It's usually one good and one bad start when you face those types of pitchers. Wouldn't be surprised if the Sox bats were quiet. Agree that Rafaela should be starting.

He can't possibly go into next season with a bullpen game. There's no way. At this point, I'm not sure Paxton gets a QO either. 2024: Sale Bello Houck Crawford Pivetta That's really bad if he does nothing. It's Bello, a broken Sale and 3 number 5's. There has to be a FA addition and it better be a good one. Sox don't have any other young pitchers ready to jump into the rotation quite yet (Wikelman 2025, Perales 2026). Gambrell and Drohan may get some time up in BOS next season, but they are most likely more back of the rotation arms.

Oh, it's closer to 31 flavors like Baskin Robbins if anything.

Verdugo RF, Devers 3B, Turner DH, Yoshida LF, Duvall CF, Casas 1B, Story SS, McGuire C, Hamilton 2B

Bello vs France Sacré bleu!

@IanMBrowne Yes, Sale felt awful for Barraclough: “Especially when it’s all your fault. I ruined multiple people’s nights tonight by what I went out there and did and that's embarrassing. It's unacceptable. Who I'm supposed to be, what I'm supposed to be, I'm not even close and that that's tough pill to swallow.”

Castro is far away so maybe that's his protection? He's not going to be ready to play in MLB next season IMO. I'd punt that 40 man spot for him until December '24. Pitchers with starter upside (Drohan, Gambrell, Wikelman and Perales) were all retained per my rankings. Just a priority thing for me. I'm not worried about losing middle relievers in Rule 5. Bloom spends all year picking more up anyway. Bonaci is already in AA and he's getting all the SS reps with Mayer out. He's just a solid all around player. He's an easy fit for a 40 man spot IMO as he'd 100% get selected, but also can 100% help BOS next season at least in a part time role.

I don't even remember him complaining that much. It was a media driven story.

It was a trade made just before the game. He was allowed to continue to take batting practice wearing his previous team's jersey. During the deadline, should they just hide all players away until gametime and confiscate their phones so that their fee-fees don't get hurt? Should media be banned from the field so that they don't "swarm" for the "live reaction." Cora warned him about the potential of being dealt. Then he gets traded and the media both wants to swarm Vazquez and then point their fingers at Bloom for "allowing such a painful moment to play out in public." If the media wasn't there, or at the very least gave Vaz space, seems like it would be a much smaller problem?

That happened yesterday, no?

@JeffPassan The New York Yankees have released third baseman Josh Donaldson.

Must Keep: Wikelman, Perales (guys I would put on the 40 man immediately after the season) Should Keep: Bonaci, Drohan, Gambrell (guys I have to fit in prior to the Rule 5) Bubble Keep: Liu, Castro, Bastardo, Fernandez, Hagenman, Scott (guys I would like to keep, but am going to leave unprotected even though some may be picked) Liu should be pushed to the pen as his arm will play up there and he could reduce his pitch selection. Castro is looking like a really solid prospect right now and a team could jump on him, but it's more likely he goes unselected. Bastardo and Fernandez are bullpen arms the typically get scooped up via Rule 5. Neither of those two have late inning upside so I wouldn't bother protecting. Hagenman was a deadline acquisition for Bloom this year, so there's a good chance he is put onto the 40 man (I wouldn't protect for the same reason as Bastardo/Fernandez). Scott is terrible at throwing out runners and his pop time would be the worst in MLB. He'd be useful as a mix and match guy (C/1B/LF), but you don't want him catching too often and his bat still needs to play up. I could see a team selecting Scott for sure. There are some other relievers in the org that could also get selected in Rule 5 like Zeferjahn, Politi, Shugart and BELL. The only guy from that group that I'd personally regret losing would be Brock Bell as he just got back from an extensive injury rehab and is still a little bit of a mystery, but probably should be up in the Portland bullpen right now.

Posts like this are wild.

Last 2 starts in Greenville: 7 Innings 1 K 5 ER

The basis that every team believes they are the favorites...

At least last year he was able to deal off Vaz. He should have done a lot more or at least snuck under the CBT amount. He must have just been passed out from too much Whistle Pig this deadline. Sad!

I can't keep track of everything he says. He has that highest post count on the board and the most recent join date of anyone in the top 5 (by over 5 years).

Jacques is Bloom's 2nd best Rule 5 Draft pick??? (Whitlock, Arauz, Ort, Jacques) They clearly didn't like what they saw with Brandon Walter the last go around!

The disconnect was assuming that the Sox could go through the rest of the season with all these bullpen games and not completely wear out the pen and start churning out a lot of clunker performances. Waiting for Houck (typically doesn't pitch long into games) and Whitlock (who was just put into the bullpen anyway) to provide help to the rotation was absolutely stupid. It was the punt of all punts.

I'm sure someone said that. I don't believe it was me. This morning I saw a post of mine from last winter that was basically "I don't know if Bloom will be fired if the Sox make the playoffs or not, because it all depends on what the internal expectations are with John Henry." That doesn't seem like a "make or break year" to me.

That's my original point. They should have either added substantially or subtracted. They chose a worse third option that made nobody happy and didn't help the team.

The past is in the past. Until the ship is steered back in the correct direction, the complaints have merit.

How hot is the water? Or are we adding in some FL bacteria (flesh and or brain eating)?