jung

Maybe the bleak conditions will bring back some Spring feelings to the Sox and they will fair better than they have of late

Well if we all remember a few Octobers ago, baseball talking heads were saying that stuff that allows pitchers better grip was actually favored by EVERYBODY...MLB hitters and everybody else because pitchers in general no longer had the control to throw inside. So its hard to draw a hard line and call what is going on with SpyderTack cheating. So now the pitchers have gone too far? Is that what we are saying? Well maybe it was too far right from rationalizing a particular kind of substance being used by pitchers and allowing baseball talking heads to start telling us that everybody wanted pitchers to have better grip in the first place. Maybe MLB shouldn't have turned baseballs into rocket ships either. Now MLB has f***ed itself so far up the ass they don't know whether to s*** or fart Yankee Doodle dandy. As to the Red Sox Starters and really all of the Sox pitchers specifically they have been throwing to the middle of the plate lately, known as "wild in the strike zone". Now if you want to tell me that they have been throwing to the middle of the plate and depending on a SpyderTack kind of break to carry the ball to the black or off the plate inducing a swing and miss I would say they deserve what they are about to get if they simply cannot now pitch normally. I can't really bring myself to believe they would be stupid enough to purposefully throw to the middle of the plate. That said, from day one of this season a few of us in the game threads have been seeing it and saying it. Right from the start of this season breaking pitches have been breaking more than I have ever seen them in my lifetime. Guys with acknowledged really good breaking stuff this year have ungodly breaking stuff. Guys with a reputation for so-so breaking stuff this year have really good breaking pitches. MLB continues to f*** itself right in the ass. The start of this nonsense was expansion. In 1960 we had 16 total MLB teams. Today we have 30. There simply is not enough pitching talent to go around 30 MLB teams all with at least 3-4 levels of minor league organizations feeding them. Just is not enough pitching talent out there and as long as the action in the game all starts with the ball in the pitchers hand, not having enough quality pitching is a problem. Next came this absurd stat-mania that drives everything now. It drives salaries. It drives managerial decisions. It drives GM and upper management decisions. It literally drives everything. Its to the point now where we can look at spin rate variables and go hunting for justifications for the variables. Like I said, another example of MLB f***ing itself right in the ass. Next came what IMO was the greatest of these egregious lets f*** ourselves right in the ass decisions, the rocket ship baseball. The effort to turn a multidimensional game into a one dimensional power game. Worse MLB just could not be satisfied with the first iteration of this version of rocket ship baseballs, the 2016 official ball. They just had to keep going and going. the 2017 was hotter than the 2016. The 2018 was a little hotter than the 2017. The 2019 was an insane rocket ship. Now we are told that MLB has done an official baseball reset. OK reset to what, the 2016 ball, the 2015 ball, the 2017, the 18 ball.....WHAT???? Now the entire enterprise is going to hang itself out to dry over this SpyderTack and spin rate stuff. Their asses are going to be hung right out in the breeze possibly because they went too far with grippy stuff when they NEVER should even started down that path in the first place. Worse it appears pitchers convinced themselves to just throw everything right down the middle and let the gunk induced spin rate break the ball. REALLY BOYS....REALLY!!!! Now what?

So if you want me to say there are no great teams this year, there are certainly no teams that can sustain themselves against injury. They are all carrying too many pitchers and not enough everyday players. Oddly enough, we have not had much in the way of injury to the everyday players that have been for any sustained period of time. That worries me as well because I doubt that we will go a full season that way and there is no bench strength on this team just as there isn't anywhere in baseball these days. One of our posters asked about a week ago in a game thread if anybody would trade JD for a front line starter. Since I really question what sort of front line starter you would get back for JD I said I did not want to take JD out of this batting order. Now, I would do it in spite of the impact to the offense. Even if Sale comes back, he is not enough and there is no guarantee that Sale comes back. Further there is no guarantee that he comes back initially to the rotation. Erod may not pitch better than he is for the rest of this season. Frankly I doubt he will. Nate throws too hard early in games. It flattens out his pitches and he gets tagged by teams that can hit. So now what...depending on Richards, Pivetta and Perez?

I am saying that the rotation was pitching over its head when we had that early 9 game winning streak. They are coming back to what we should have expected. This team is capable now of losing 4 straight more than once for what remains of this season and I have little faith in teams that can lose 4 straight. Generally speaking its a sure sign that your pitching sucks. I think they will make the post season because if you can breath you make the post season. The number of teams that don't just tells you how many sucky teams there are. Once we get there, teams will be starting their top 3 starters more often that not. Who do we have that can match that? Erod, Perez, and who????? I am not going to depend on a guy that is recovering from TJ to be a major post season contributor till I see him pitch regardless of how much Dave O'Brian wants to push that narrative. Right now we need to hit a stretch of sucky teams that can't hit their weight. The starters are either wild in the strike zone, (death against a team that can actually hit) or are wild outside the strike zone. I prefer wild outside the strike zone even if it puts runners on base. Lately the rotation has been both and neither is a good thing. Really location is more important than pitch type for ML hitters. If you keep pitching the ball right down Main St it really does not matter to good hitters if its a slider, curve, fb, cutter or change. They are going to hit it hard somewhere. If you can locate without getting predictable, the hitter is at a disadvantage no matter what you are throwing.

Watch how long some of our losing streaks will get without a stopper. You don't think these Starters are capable of 2 turns through the rotation that are crap? Two turns is 10 games! Even if you can get one of these guys to not s*** the bed two straight times through where does that leave you? Do the math. Two of our wins in this stretch were gifts from the baseball gods. The baseball gods have a way of evening out their contributions to teams. It unfortunately appears to be the kind of Sox team I watched years and years ago. All hit, can't pitch worth snot.

Thats it. Headed off to my future son-in-laws graduation party. The anticipation is killing me. It should at least he more exciting than this has been.

They need a stopper and that won't be Sale this year even if he comes back. If he comes back does he start? If he starts the chance of him making all his starts are slim and none IMO. Every team loses games and even loses in streaks. Without a stopper you can lose 4 in a row just like that. I don't care how many you can win in a row, if you can lose 4 in a row I just don't think you belong in the top tier of MLB.

Can they pitch?

Well at least we got an out before giving up a base this inning.

Ah yes... brings back memories of those double digit run, cellar dwelling Sox of old. They won't find the cellar and they probably will make the post season. After that.....I am not even sure praying for rain will work. Who would we be waiting for on this staff?

Really was true just looking at this team even before the season started. Bats need to show up just about every night or they don't have a chance.

Not sure about that. They are just trotting around the bases.

Anything would be better than meat right down Main St. This is ridiculous.

A new shift custom made for the Sox Rotation.

Do these baseballs have bat radar? They sure are seeking lumber today.

The Starters are either wild early in games or wild in the strike zone in games. Against these better hitting teams you just cannot be wild in the Strike Zone early like they have been. No need to worry about the 3rd time through the order when they are pitching like this. Hitters this good are going to get them right from jump street. They can get away with wild in strike zone when playing teams that are just not hitting. Won't work with the Astros or the Jays or anybody else with real live hitters.

Matz is just humping up now. Maybe we make him pay for it.

Xander is probably the most consistent good hitter we have. You really don't know what you are going to get day in day out from the rest of them....even Rafi who is still very young. Hence their confidence tends to be up when X is in the order. Xander to this batting order is something like what Koji used to be for us as a closer. I know I am putting Xander into a big pair of shoes here...but I think he is that important.

Come on starters. We cannot expect a miracle from the baseball gods every night.

Unless you are an alien with ungodly hand/eye coordination (and I am convinced that at least half the ML players are in fact aliens from outer space) it is about what you expect to get for a pitch. If you are looking for that heater right down Main Street there is no reason for a ML hitter to miss it. They can adjust some for a different pitch than what they expect. Adjusting for a different location than you were looking for is damned near impossible.

Boy for the number of pitchers wearing ML unis these days, quite a number of them are just tin cans, in this case wrapped in blue and grey unis. We are getting down to relief pitchers that can barely get one guy out and that is it. Sorta' tough when they have to face three batters.

Stripling nodding his head like "yup...that is where pitches like that end up".

At this rate Richards should turn into a pumpkin about the middle of the 4th. Then again, he hasn't exactly been a chariot up to this point.

Sox bullpen is being abused and they have a long way to go to get to a rest.

Well it might come down to how many lives Cat Richards has tonight. Used up one of them in the 1st