jung

That is correct.....JH wants these guys outta' here. Wants Pablo gone because he is not going to tolerate paying $20m to have a built in joke generator on his 25 man roster. Lets face it...the way he is gaining weight, the jokes are just going to be endless and this only gets worse from here on all fronts. Castillo is just money down the drain unless they can get somebody to gamble on him.

Should have kept Murphy and sent Castillo down. Castillo's only shot is AB's and he is not going to get them here. This is DD making an all out effort to move Castillo and Pablo this year. Long term there is a much better chance to move Castillo if they give him the opportunity to improve but that opportunity would likely cost them the possibility to move him this year. Pablo now has no option. He can rot on the bench turning into a Star Wars character in the process or he can himself ask to go to fat camp or can acquiesce to it if it is the Sox that do the asking. But just like keeping Castillo up hurts the chances of moving him long term but gives an outside chance of moving him this year, sending Pablo to the bench and forcing his hand, gives the Sox the best chance of moving Pablo out sooner rather than later. Have you seen how much weight he has gained just since camp has started? The real issue is he may be on the other side of his career now. He may not be a player 50 lbs south of here either. But there is no chance of moving him like he is and he gets bigger every day. This is all about moving Castillo and Pablo or at least trying to as soon as it can get done. Tough job...but what else are they going to do?

Yankee's Miller sustained a chipped right wrist bone today on a ball hit back through the middle. No announcement as yet for how long the MFY will be without Miller. He gets the oddest injuries. That ankle he injured here was I think on a come backer just not one that hit him as I recall. Miller walked directly to the dugout after being struck. Not his throwing side and he does not have to bat. Still didn't look good though. Actually maybe that injury he had with us was foot not ankle. But I think he just took a misstep going after a little dribbler and that was that.

I think both Taz and Koji will be as effective as we have seen them...just not for the duration we are used to from them. Should be fine given the added arms (Smith, Kimbrell). But those guys have to be there for this to work out.

Well before the issues with Smith we were seeing here and in the press very sensible comments about Koji: - have to watch his usage - should be fine if they just don't overuse him - as long as he can deal with not pitching the ninth...all should be good Since Smith got hurt it has been more: - Well OK we just spread those outs between the guys we have mainly pointing at Koji. Think folks were right the first time around and putting more burden on Koji is just a bad idea IMO. Even though we have Barnes and Ramirez.,,Barnes maybe having his best spring with us to date...Farrell is so inclined to go with the vet he trusts whether it results in overuse or not. Did it in Toronto...has done it here. That is what I worry about. Still don't understand why the Sox just didn't move John upstairs/sideways so he could keep his health insurance without question and could stay with the organization is just something I don't quite get. Probably would have eliminated any conjecture about whether TL would take the job as well since it would be pretty obvious to him that the Sox were giving his friend John all the help they could possibly give him. Myself I think TL would take the job anyway if offered. But moving John sideways would likely have eliminated any concerns fans had altogether.

And what about pitching which Oh by the way WINS BASEBALL GAMES. We have Owens, a control pitcher with no control who now has a post pitch pose that looks just like a bowler desperately hoping his ball hooks back off the gutter into the pocket. "Oh please, please be a strike, please". When you have a knuckle ball pitcher that does not know where its going, that is one thing. When you have a flamethrower that does not know where its going, that is another. When you have a control pitching begging the gods on every pitch for a strike, that is a whole nuther' ballgame....pardon the pun. That is the most ridiculous thing I have seen from a pitcher in a long time. Pedey must have to hold onto himself to keep from peeing his drawers that is so funny from behind. And we have the ever injured Johnson....the pitching version of Kalish. The only pitchers down there that matter are two maybe more years away.

People concentrate on Castillo's poor performance on FB's without being well enough versed to understand where it comes from. Castillo swings early in counts at any FB he sees because he can't even SEE breaking balls. His bat is a foot away from any breaking ball thrown anywhere in the strike zone. He knows it but can't do anything about it other than swing at FB's early in counts. Any other 28-29 year old that was this feeble against breaking stuff is GONE from MLB. He is in the Sox organization because what else is there for them to do. Nobody is going to take him. But he should not be up because if he has any chance at all at the ML level he needs tons of AB's and for him even a AAA breaking ball is a challenge. Send him down so he gets his AB's and see what happens. Heck he might even learn how to run bases down there because he can't do that worth s*** either. Should have kept Murphy. That was dumb as dirt and suggests DD has orders to do whatever he can to move Castillo this year. Good luck with that!

This whole Shields thing just tells us how desperate we are and more bad news today. Why the hell was Eddie throwing at all? There is no way to avoid trauma to surrounding tissue in the injury that he suffered. Even I know that having gone through more knee trauma than I care to discuss early in my sporting days. Once you see that trauma to the surrounding tissue the only thing you can do is stabilize the knee and wait for the surrounding tissue to heal. Thats it....no options here. There is no way that is what happened here. There is no way all that damage had healed at the point when they started Eddie throwing again....He should not have been throwing even off the flats...just no way. If they had announced this push back under the circumstances Eddie should have been operating under I would just say....OK...it is coming along slowly....going to take longer. But NOOOOOOO....they had to start him throwing. I have no choice but to suspect that Eddie tweaked it throwing...what else am I to believe? So what now....more rounds of throw and get pushed back...throw and get pushed back. I am not encouraged by the mid-May projection could that just says to me that instead of doing what they should do, they are just going to keep doing this. You mess with this injury without having the surrounding tissue heal properly and you are headed for the knife. The only thing appropriate for an athlete you care about is stabilization over a long period as in at least a month or more followed by therapy to strengthen the surrounding tissue and the joint itself. But NOOOOOOOOO not here, not in panic world. The Sox have been in panic mode since the Drew signing and it seems that no matter who is in the FO, who is in between Henry and the FO, its panic 24/7. Larry is gone..can't blame him. BC is gone...can't blame him. Farrell is already sounding like he is in full panic mode as nothing that makes any sense has come out of his mouth for days...weeks now. Maybe its Farrell or maybe it just comes down from the very top...from the walking cadaver John Henry.

Completely nuts...WHAT ARE WE DOING HERE???

I think this whole thing just blows up. I think what SD is trying to so is coax DD into a deal that really hurts us in prospects because they know his reputation better even than we do.

I don't think the Sox really care. If they can trade off Pablo for Shields without giving up much more than that, I think that is likely something the Sox would do. SD if actually interested will likely want some sort of prospect thrown in and that is where I would not want to give much up.

Porcello looked terrible again today. He did throw one good Sinker today...not to say he had a good Sinker through the stint. But it was by far the best Sinker I have seen him throw this spring. His best pitch today was a slider which he did get to one location successfully through the stint. But if he can only throw that Slider to that location and can only surround it with that going nowhere FB of his and that funky curve, that Slider will get tagged as well. He was as we have always seen him here, wild in the strike zone. Way too late in the spring to be pitching like this. He needs that Sinker and he sure as heck needs to be able to throw more than one good one in a 6+ inning stint.

If the Sox were out there roosting around for pitching talent there is not a team in baseball that would not try to clip us for some prospects. This is a bad time of year to be trying to play that game. Even SD will not simply suck Pablo out of here just because we would prefer to take our chances on Shields. So I don't see that one about a zillion fronts. Malcontent Sale looking to hook up with a team that will renegotiate his deal probably has more of a chance than Shields to Boston and I don't think there is much chance of a Sale deal either.

Absolutely correct....as soon as he arrives back in camp and throughout a baseball season Pablo just gains and gains and gains. On the one hand it seems like the nuttiest thing. But it is entirely consistent for him. I would not at all be surprised if he looks forward to the start of the season BECAUSE he knows it is going to be "Katie bar the gate if you can" and he is just going to really have at it having exercised what must just be some minimal amount of control in the off season. I think Merloni is correct. If Pablo is with the team, traveling with the team but not playing...Lord only knows how much weight he will gain under that exact set of circumstances.

Even Buck Showalter if you want to talk about a guy that currently has a job. Would simply look at Pablo...would not have to say a word.....Buck has that Tommy Heinsohn look. Tommy is still the only NBA coach that I can remember being thrown from an NBA game by the ref for nothing more than a look. Did not say a word to the ref. Wasn't even a second technical. Just see ya' Tommy....your gone.

i think Wright just won the job which could be a good thing if my musings about this strike zone stuff are anywhere near something worth considering. The knuckle has a lotta' swing and miss potential which could go a long way to mitigating this strike zone stuff.

Defense may be Pablo's problem. But he is no DH, certainly not for the Sox. He certainly would be no replacement for Ortiz. He possesses nothing like Ortiz power and based on Abraham's numbers appears to run the bases worse than Ortiz as incredible as that might seem. So what do you do with a guy that is basically a singles hitter that can't run worth beans when he gets on base? I would be thinking about sticking to the plan for DH until and if Hanley proves he simply does not have the potential as a hitter any longer to be a DH for this team when the time comes.

Even a healthy Eddie at this point is a question mark as he simply has not shown the ability to too often be able to throw all three of his pitches in the same stint. i read a piece recently that seemed to be taking the position that Eddie is simply not smart enough to realize that he needs to throw his slider more often. Nobody knows better than the pitcher himself what he can rely upon on any given day and I can assure you that Eddie knows better than the author of that piece or any of us that he needs all three pitches in a given stint to truly succeed. He has simply not been able to do it yet...possibly delayed by trying to fully grasp and then corral this tipping problem that he has. I truly believe that day will come for Eddie. But none of can even guess if this will be the year or not. If we had to guess today what the prospects were for this starting rotation it would have to be Price and pray for rain which is still better than the O's who are stuck with pray for rain every day.

And he was at the end of last year as well. He GAINED in season last year..always has gained in season. Simply did not gain as much during the 2014 season. He was in much much worse shape when they finally shut him down at the end of the 2015 season than when he started the 2015 season. The only difference really in Pablo now is that he is starting seasons heavier than ever and is also why it is to some extent significant. He is going INTO what has historically for him been his heavy weight gain part of the year. But if he finished around 290 which seems entirely reasonable then it stands to reason that he did not gain more than maybe 20 lbs in the off season to something like 310. There is some significance there in that he is now apparently no longer losing weight AT ANY TIME in the year. As Lou Merlone said recently, "Pablo gains weight during the season. If he is with the team but not playing, he might gain 20 lbs in April". These guys have per diems plus boatloads of cash and travel IN SEASON to cities they have gone back to year after year. They have favorite night spots, favorite restaurants in all these places. If you are a guy with Pablo's particular issue is it any surprise that the baseball season itself would be his biggest problem? His brother is apparently a chef and cooks for him...probably full time in the off season when he is not traveling with a baseball team. Actually I would be feeling betrayed if I were the brother. Pablo probably eats the brother's meals as appetizers for the main course out on the town in season.

Correct...Kelly is not a 2 and he would have to show much more consistency over a season to even start to tickle a 2. This pitching thing is becoming a real concern and it already was one. Elias is getting pounded all over the place AGAIN....giving up 3 HR and 6 runs in 2/3 of an inning. I am sure we will claim he was just a throw in and we didn't need him anyway. But it is getting down to we need everybody AGAIN as there is nobody pitching for this team right now besides the aforementioned Kelly and Price and the new closer. On another topic and am really now getting tired of seeing Farrell do anything. His mound walk is my new irritation. Trudge.....trudge....trudge....two claps as he starts up the hill to take the ball...I guess his version of the "you suck kid but you'll do better next time pep talk". I am not going to miss him when he is gone either.

Whatever it hardly matters. He was bumping 290 when he left last year. So what's your point...that he maybe gained 20???? Again he carries twenty in an armpit now. He is not 350! Do you have an idea what he would look like at 350? Well we might get a chance to see that cause THIS is when he gains most of his weight. But he is NOT 350 now.

No he didn't. He was huge when they finally shut him down last year. He just didn't lose any weight from the end of last season in the off season. That whole "he lost 20 lbs stuff" was such nonsense. He carries 20 lbs in one arm pit now. So now he starts this season heavier than he has ever been at the start of a season going into his true weight gain period.

The fact is Pablo has always gained weight in season, not off season...in season is when he gains most of his weight. Before the 2014 season he lost more tonnage in the off season than he does normally and had a bit more success keeping it off in season gaining back maybe only 15 or at the outside 20 lbs of what he lost. After he signed he went back immediately to classic Pablo only now broaching new boundaries at the upper end of the weight spectrum for him and trying to play at weights that he has never supported before. He does work at his game.....that is true. But does not at all work at the things that just take can take him down completely. He just can't play at these weights. If he does play it will be poorly and prone to injury.

Theo is a club president.....BC is professor Bunkybunk....the end.

Price was not finishing his pitches today and gave up 5 walks as a result. However he was still able to hold the Pirates for the most part at bay even giving up a walk an inning. However, I have seen a number of these spring games now.....maybe 30 games or so. It looks like they are really serious about this higher strike this time presuming they are going to call the same strike zone during the regular season. There are a number of guys in the league that just won't be able to pitch successfully if they are forced up in the zone. The Pirates Vogelsong was forced up in the zone today and just got tagged all over the place. He simply does not have the juice to pitch up there. Porcello won't be able to pitch successfully up there either...nor Owens for that matter if we ever see him again. Should be interesting to see how this plays out if in fact they are serious about this strike zone. Hanley had a couple more DD type AB's today. If he carries that into the regular season he should be able to hit enough to be a contributor. Pitching still looks like an issue for this team not because of Price but because of the rest of them with the exception of Kelly.....MAYBE.