jung

V wanted Bard in the pen and Lavarnway and Iggy with the big team. Which of those roster moves did V get? answer none! This is a FO decision. I almost fell off my chair when V tried to imply that HE decided that Iggy should go down. That was a joke and another example of V's ego compelling him to try to convince people that the Iggy move was his decision. As for the difference between Paps and Bard....when has Bard proven he can close?

Which is why I think that if you are going to have a "named" closer at this point it should be Padilla. Why would V think Aceves has "the mindset" of a closer when he has never closed. Padilla does not give a s*** what inning it is. I will say it again...he will make his pitches if he is sound. Aceves got the job because Aceves was considered to be the Sox best reliever. He is the Sox best reliever but he has in my view allowed the closer role to overwhelm him with the result that he is just out there throwing. He is not pitching. I can see why V decided to bring in Aceves for Padilla and in hindsight, sure I would think Padilla would have done better. He could not have done worse. If the Sox are dedicated to having a named closer then they are going to use him that way. The reason I think it should be Padilla at this point is because he is one of the few guys the Sox have that will not in my view wilt in the face of the closers role which in effect is what has happened to Aceves. Padilla is also throwing well enough to close and he has gas. I would prefer for the moment that we use Padilla that way than have him come in for 4 innings including the 9th in one game and then be on the shelf for a few games.

Not to the FO and this is their decision, not V's. This is the best year they are going to have to vet the possibilities of Bard as a starter and it should be clear by now that the injury to Bailey did not change the FO view of that. Given the state of Sox starting pitching I can see why they would be concerned that they possibly have a starting pitcher right in front of them. On top of that I am staggered by how quickly we are willing to give that up to put Bard at the closer with no guarantees at all that he will succeed there. Sure it would easy to say he will do better than Aceves but I might do better than Aceves. Aceves at closer will turn out to be the experiment that gets the short leash I think, not Bard as a starter.

I agree pumpsei...it is all speculation and discussion. However when the discussion revolves around a roster move that is just not going anywhere while having been beaten to death then you don't get to the things that might actually happen.

The other thing that we are forgetting is that Bard is the FO choice. V does not make the decision on Bard. That has already been proven. V did not get any of the three roster moves to happen the way he wanted them to happen. So we should likely stop wasting type on Bard to the bullpen. The FO wants him to have his shot at starting and I don't see them changing that view for anything.

Melancon needs to get some pitching done outside of the closer role and then if he finally stops throwing lollypops he might be the best long term solution at closer in lieu of Bailey. Right now, for whatever reason he is throwing lollypops. In the 9th inning you are facing hitters who's blood is up and who are more focused than at any other time in the game. Throw lollypops up to them and you get the result Melancon has gotten. The difference between Melancon and Aceves is that we know Aceves is great in the middle innings role. Melancon is probably best used in late innings as long as he is not throwing lollypops.

Before this is done we will see every option we THINK we have at SP exercised to one degree or another. So I would not consider us to be all that deep in that regard. They will all be tried at some point anyway, especially if Beckett's issues are injury related.

I would like to give Aceves a little more time but the thing to keep in mind is that he is not failing but degrees in the closer role. He is failing in historic, nuclear fashion. That is also why I am suggesting that it is between his ears, not his arm. He may finally settle in. He may not. However as I have said in other threads he is not pitching. He is throwing. He will definitely still be the closer tonight against the Jays. If he settles in and does a good job, he earns another shot to me. If he continues as he has, I would end this experiment after tonight and move either Padilla or Morales to the closer spot for now.

Base on performance I would drop either Padilla or Morales into the closers role for now. My preference would be Padilla. He simply does not give a damn what inning it is. Aceves has fallen apart between the ears. It is not his arm. If Padilla is sound he will make his pitches regardless of what inning it is. The fact that we really do not know how long Padilla could go on any given night also suggests the closer role since he would be coming in for one inning stints. Granted Padilla in this role is a matter of necessity brought on by the Bailey mess but that is what I would do.

I am amazed at the ease with which people just bump Bard out of his starting assignment without having thrown a pitch yet in that role in order to insert him as the closer without having any idea whether Bard would resolve what issues the Sox have closing. Then we go on and express rightful concern about the Sox starting pitching having first taken the opportunity that Bard represents in a starting role and thrown it down a rat hole insisting that he must close....staggering! While the Sox will not face teams with the offensive fire power of the Tigers, my concern with the starting pitching is that Lester is so far the only one of the "big three" that has had a solid outing. If Beckett continues to be up in the strike zone, in the middle of the plate he will continue to get rocked. They may not be the moon shots we saw in Detroit but he will get rocked none the less. My biggest fear in his case is that 94 mph (top speed reached in ST) is more the anomaly and that he will no longer be able to get his fastball over 92-93. That would be OK if he had already mastered his secondary pitches such that there is enough of a velocity change between his FB and those pitches. Without that good hitters will be right on his fastball. Neither of the possible issues with Beckett is promising. He is either to injured to pitch better than this or he has not adapted well enough yet to the fact that he is no longer the young fireballing hurling he once was. Both suggest he is not going to be a solid starter this year. His poor location combined with the lack of velocity is more suggestive of injury than lack of progress toward what I call his Greg Maddux project. However if it is the injury then he is probably on the way to surgery and on the shelf for this season. Buch was at least down in the strike zone while also covering far to much of the middle of the plate. While he did not last very long either in the blaze that is the Tiger's offense, you can easily see the difference between being up in the zone in the middle of the plate and down in the zone in the middle of the plate. No moon shot homers. Buch will be OK I think but he looks less like the promising young starter he looked like a few years ago at least to me. His fragile body may simply not be able to produce like we once thought and while I suspect he can hold onto his #3 spot in this rotation, Buch does not amount to helping me achieve some sort of comfort zone with this year's rotation. I do think Aceves needs to be moved out of the closers role mainly because he just does not appear to be able to pitch there and because he is so good in the role he occupied last year. I think Aceves will get one more shot tonight against the Jays because the Sox really do not have a choice for tonight. However after tonight I would move Aceves out of that role. I might give him one more shot at it if he excels tonight but in my view, baring that, it is the Aceves at closer experiment that needs to end, not the Bard at starter experiment which has not even started.

I really do not get these shifts and while I will never claim to be somebody that could manage better than the guys that actually have the jobs, I actually do not think I would put shifts on at all and if I did I would not make them so radical as to have guys completely out of position to cover a particular part of the field. Ortiz beat the shift three times this weekend hitting right into the thing! Fielder hit a nothing ball right through it. Granted it was a masse shot banked off the bat but don't you want guys to earn hits. Do you want them dribbling the ball through a spot where there is nobody?

The Sox should certainly look better against the Jays cause the Jays cannot make them pay for their mistakes like Detroit can. That said we would hope that the Jays are not an issue anyway. By the time we are done with Rangers, Rays and Yankees we will either feel much better about things or we won't. One good thing about facing most of the teams you have to get by to even make the playoffs early in the season is that it won't take long to figure it out.

Until the day comes when fans from some other city pelt Santa Claus with snow balls and boo him, Philly fans alone occupy the spot at the very bottom of the totem pole.

Well of the three starters that have pitched so far, only Lester had command of his pitches. Beckett was up and in the middle of the plate (balls in orbit) and Buch was down but in the middle of the plate (balls in the outfield).

Well that sounds easy...just bring in your best reliever to close. What the hell do you think the Sox thought Aceves was...chop liver? They sure as hell did not put Aceves in that spot because he was their most experienced closer. They don't have an experienced closer without Bailey. They thought putting their best reliever in the closer spot would give them the desired result. In fact, truth be told this pitching staff is on thin ice from top to bottom. The Sox have one solid, dependable starting pitcher, not three. They have one....Jon Lester. Beckett can't figure out whether he wants to go home and babysit or pitch. I think what he really wants is for somebody to pay him like a starting pitcher while he goes home to babysit. While I am stretching a point to make a point his focus has been wavering during recent seasons. Right when he really has needed to concentrate on making the transition from a guy with a big time heater to a guy that has to pitch instead of throw, his focus has really wavered. Maybe he is not interested in being a pitcher. Maybe he simply got off on blowing people away with the #1 and has lost interest since his days at 96 mph are behind him. I don't know. I just know he has not been the same guy. 2011 was a good year for Josh but ranked with other pitchers generally, Josh has fallen from the ranks of the very best pitchers in baseball. Buch, as much as I like him, is injury prone. In fact he did not pitch that badly today. He did not pitch very well but he was not terrible either when you consider the Tiger's line up. Do you really think the Sox are trying so hard to turn Bard into a starter because they think their starting pitching is set? You have to have starters before you start to worry about the pen. As far as the pen goes, without Bailey there is not a real closer in the bunch. Aceves does not appear to be able to match the intensity that hitters bring to the table in the 9th inning and still pitch. He is just throwing out there. He is not pitching! Melancon so far has not been able to locate the ball and he does not have the stuff to get by without good location. Albers will likely not even be a good reliever never mind a good closer and there is a whole bushel barrel of guys that are Albers with a different number on the back of their jerseys. Morales is likely a decent left handed reliever but they sort of need him in that role. Padilla is probably the right guy at this point. He is just crazy enough not to care. He is not going to let adrenaline go coursing through his body turning home plate into a launch pad. His stuff is good enough to get K's. As long as he is sound he will make his pitches, at least for some length of time. That might make for another vote for having him close. While we really don't know how many innings he can go, he sure as hell can go one at a time. So while they are probably stuck for game 1 in Toronto, past that I would have Aceves and Padilla switch roles for now making Padilla the closer and putting Aceves back in the role he fits so well. As I see it because of necessity, Aceves gets one more shot at closing...the first game in Toronto. Unless he is really impressive, I would flip Aceves with Padilla at least for now.

Any idea who Toronto has got lined up for us? Hope one of them is Laffey. We could make a career hitting off of Laffey.

Eck may be right if only because of the number of innings that Morales and Padilla pitched today. We may get Aceves tomorrow in the closers role like it or not.

I don't think Aceves can close anywhere at least not like he is. That does not diminish his value in his customary role. Melancon....not sure about him. I am not sure what Melancon is. He has no control of his pitches from what I can see.

Well Detroit is a monster hitting team...their defense is weak much like ours...and once you get past JV their starting pitching is not much. The difference is that while we have good hitting especially 1-5....maybe 1-6, they have Godzilla and Mothra in their lineup and very solid pieces around them. We could not get Jackson out in three days. So the table setters are getting on and the big bats are bringing them in...Avila is filling his role behind Godzilla and Mothra. So they are a great great hitting team that will without doubt represent the Central unless they get clobbered by injuries. But they are not a great pitching team and they are lax defensively. Will win a good many games but may not get past the better pitching teams in the AL.

Bard won't be the closer and he shouldn't be. You are going to screw him up royally to send him to the closers spot at this point and for what? Is there any evidence that he would be a successful closer.....No! Padilla at least has good stuff and he is certifiably uncaring. If he is sound he will make his pitches....Aceves problem is not in his arm. It is between his ears and I think Bard has a similar issue at least as far as closing would be concerned. Padilla just does not give a damn. He will make his pitches. Sox should make him the closer....possibly Morales but I would prefer Padilla.

I suspect your closer is going to be Padilla or maybe Morales. Heck Eck thinks it should still be Aceves but I have seen enough. Aceves in my view simply is so far from having it between the ears to close that he does not even know what is happening to him and I am not convinced that he can figure it out.

Meet your new closer....Vincente Padilla as soon as he is ready to pitch again. Probably might be Morales if they did not need a guy pitching from the left.

Never should have thrown to second for the pickoff move...concentrate on the damn hitter. Cost us a run.

Remy is right...very lucky to have gotten past Prince there

Well I don't want to jinx him by saying the poor f***er's name but if whoever pitches for the Sox in the 11th gets through that murderers row unharmed...he is your new closer.