jung

Oh thats rich. Don't have NESN audio going as they have really been irritating me lately. So here comes some sort of promo about "future HOFers and they have video of Mike Trout interspersed with video of JD and Vaz. GiVE ME A BREAK NESN. Mother of God!

What the f***....I walk the dog for a about three minutes...come back and Barnes has ALREADY come in AND f***ed up. Geezuz, he can't even control this offense??????

Not sure I would put the Rays in the can't hit category since the trade deadline. That might be the best use of the trade deadline by a small market team making a run I have quite possibly ever seen. They even managed to do it in the most irritating way possible in their fight with us: - Got Sogard who drives us nuts and drives me to distraction - traded out some arms and actually ended up with better relief pitching than they had - got a monster from Milwaukee - did a few other pretty smart things as well I was just beside myself on deadline day seeing what the Rays did. Just wanted to throw up.

Don't I know it. Both knees shot....lumbar and cervical discs ....shot. Hopeful for the movie Wall-e future of people on a spacecraft gliding through weightlessness on lounge chairs to get around.

Just completely abandoning the high four seam FB has actually turned into an advantage for Rick tonight. Saved him from his usually process this year....toasted early, reassess an inning later and gut out a start. Not sure this will work against anybody that can actually hit. but it has worked tonight.

Its true that I had to pinch myself a few times during Price's last start trying to see if I was awake or asleep. Having convinced myself it was real I was forced to a feverish run to the liquor cabinet screaming the entire way..

X ran through the 3rd base coach stop sign.

At least Rick will give us an honest effort and gut out a start even without that rising FB that took him to his Cy. Sale and Price don't gut out anything lately. Sale is just awful and turning into a punk while doing it. Price is awful and is already a punk. No metamorphosis necessary.

NESN pre-game was its usual nonsensical self. Talking about the crap teams we have on our schedule coming up including the Royals. Well has anybody checked out the Rays remaining schedule. They are not exactly facing any serious metal either. Furthermore, when you are trying to make up ground you want games against the teams you are trying to catch. Well.....maybe not in our case because they tend to kick our asses this year. But we have I think 4 more with the Rays and 3 with the Guardians and thats it! We have 4 left with NY but we are not chasing them any longer.

1. Whit Merrifield ® 2B 2. Alex Gordon (L) LF 3. Hunter Dozier ® RF 4. Jorge Soler ® DH 5. Cheslor Cuthbert ® 3B 6. Ryan O'Hearn (L) 1B 7. Bubba Starling ® CF 8. Meibrys Viloria (L) C 9. Nicky Lopez (L) SS 1. Mookie Betts ® RF 2. Rafael Devers (L) 3B 3. Xander Bogaerts ® SS 4. Andrew Benintendi (L) LF 5. Sam Travis ® 1B 6. Christian Vazquez ® DH 7. Michael Chavis ® 2B 8. Jackie Bradley Jr. (L) CF 9. Sandy Leon (S) C JD scratched for a sore back. Standard fair unless under championship conditions upon which meds for pain and inflammation and treatments applied trying to free up the player's back enough so he can play.

And the Astros OPS in the ALCS was .721 with a .219 BA. You want to tell me that is all pitching and I will tell you that is BS. Their ALDS OPS was 1037. You cannot play as hurt as the Astros were for that long. You can't be Medicated and treated day after day without the meds and the treatments themselves taking their toll. Between the pain itself and the effects from the meds and the treatments a couple of weeks of that and the player is a train wreck. That is particularly true with back injuries. You know what most players do with back injuries? THEY DON"T PLAY until they can play again without pain. But at the end of the year, in playoff conditions, they don't have that option as was the case with Correa and Springer. Altuve did not have a back but he could barely move at all OBVIOUSLY. I have no idea what they were shooting into Springer to get him to go out there at the end as he did pretty well in the series but you could tell his freedom of movement was impinged. He was surely not a healthy player. You know it really would help if this site had more people posting that had actually played ANYTHING at any serious level or been around serious athletic competition at a championship level, one where championship play exposes the player to the kinds of med and treatment regimens that WILL BE EMPLOYED under championship conditions and will be employed for as long as the player can bear it no matter the consequences and no matter the overarching effect on the player beyond his pain management and the effort to free up movement in the damaged area. In fact it would help if people actually watched the games and I mean really watched the games as opposed to pouring over spread sheets post game and thinking those spread sheets tell the story.

If I were in Houston, the guy I would worry about is Springer. Altuve had a leg and it does not look like its something that will plague him through his career. Correa appears to have had a back injury that is not as severe as it could have been as he shows no signs that I can detect of impingement to his freedom of movement. Springer destroyed his back in 2018. He will likely be more plagued by his back than JD is with his. Springer may be able to avoid surgery through his career but if he does, will likely head to the operating table post career just to save himself from the pain. I suspect there was a good deal of "pain management" going on with Springer in the 2018 post season.....Correa as well though again I think his back issues are less severe than Springer's. Altuve seems back to his old self from what I can tell.

Have to keep watching in order to avoid joining the "lets stick our heads in the sand" crowd if for no other reason. In my case, even idiot Manfred can't stop me from watching. "Hey, i didn't see it. So, it must not have happened."

It was a lucky break...you are correct. You don't start moving guys like Bergman around in your lineup just because. That was a desperate last ditch effort, a hope more than a strategy which speaks buckets to where the Astros thought they were. Hinch moved Bregman to the 1 hole at the end because none of the rest of his top four could move they were so banged up. What, do we want to make believe they were all moving just fine and all got banged up in the penultimate game of that series? That would be about our speed around these parts.

To a degree that is true. But you cannot take three of your four top offensive producers down leaving the fourth to try to make up for it because effectively now you have significantly diminished the effectiveness of the top four offensive producers on your team. "In fact, the Astros were so crippled that they had to move Bergman around he tried to do too much to make up for their lost personnel, which is what we would have to do. So effectively when you lose the effectiveness of three of your top offensive players you really lose four because the guy that is left tries too hard to make up for it."

Altuve could not run with his leg issues and Correa could not hit with his back. They were not even half of what they could be and in fact Springer went down with injury during that series. So cut Mookie and JD in half and take either this year's rafi or X out of our lineup and what do you have? In fact, the Astros were so crippled that they had to move Bergman around he tried to do too much to make up for their lost personnel, which is what we would have to do. So effectively when you lose the effectiveness of three of your top players you really lose four because the guy that is left tries too hard to make up for it.

We ran up against a crippled Astros team which everybody around here decided to deny was a factor. Won't be the case this year unless the Astros suffer multiple late season injuries. The Yankmees are a good but not great team. Sorry...they just aren't. Their hitters swing at everything and will chase like a trout after a fly. Their starters are nothing to write home about. They are a bullpen.

We pushed ourselves off a cliff. Live with your fantasy before the Astros get to you.

Leave it to the Sox to try to fight the last war. The totally blew Lester. Since then ......trying to make up for their losses....predictable.

I really don't like to go start by start but I am actually more concerned with Price than Sale. Both are transitioning. Neither can throw as hard as he could throw earlier in their careers. Sale is overthrowing to hit velo he could hit repeatedly early in his career and he has clearly not even admitted to himself what is happening yet. I thought Price was farther down the road by maybe two years or more from where Sale was......until Price's last few starts. The last start, he had ERod to show him what to do to get Yankee hitters out and in fact for a brief moment Price was doing it. If you read last night's game thread, I told him what to do though I have no telepathic powers. Get to that change when you get to two strikes and bury it in the dirt. DO NOT EVEN ATTEMPT TO THROW IT FOR A STRIKE. They will just chase it all night long. Yankee fans are kidding themselves that the Yanks are more than a good team. They aren't. What does Price do? He loses command of the Change and ends up throwing it in the strike zone and he won't stop. Either he lost command of it or got frustrated because the Yankee hitters would not chase every single one. They are not going to chase every single one YOU IDIOT. The Yanks crush the thing at one point recording 5 or maybe 6 straight hits. Price ends up giving up 7 runs in less than 4 innings.The start before that, Price decides to try to throw his FB 94-95. That lasts all of about 1 and 1/3 innings. His FB flattens out....bing bang bong.....balls start flying all over the place. That is the end of that start. I don't know what is going on with Price. Maybe he is trying to throw his way out of town. Would not surprise me as he can't keep his mouth shut. He can't stop being a confrontational prick (remember "I hold all the cards now and it feels good") f*** you David. You can't even WIN with dignity, let alone loss with dignity. Sale for his part, might be groping for a FB for at least an entire offseason. I would give him one more start at most and if there is not a significant change (there won't be) shut him down for the remainder of the year. I would shut down Price as well if not for the thought that he might just throw and talk his way out of town and if that is what he wants, the way MLB is set up, there is really not much we can do about it other than let him go and take the financial hit. Better to know if that is Price's intention.

The TREND is pitching to velo and spin rate while throwing command out the window. As long as pitchers cannot command their pitches and continue to be prompted toward velo and spin rate and away from command we will never go back to anything like Starting pitchers even going 6, never mind 7. Has nothing to do with the analytics. Analytics just keeps score....thats it. Analytics don't guide pitching approach. Young pitchers simply are so driven by coaches and media and the MLB which really rules baseball and determines what matters in baseball simply by what it says matters in baseball, this is not going to turn around. MLB is trying to turn the game into a power game from both mound and batters box. Its as plain as the nose on your face. They don't give a rats behind about the consequences. They will simply come up with some new marketing game when this one has run its course. These guys are in the main throwing too hard for their techniques and their physical characteristics. Hence they break down sooner. What does MLB do? It brings up guys that should not be here at all to backfill from the casualty rate. This is a vicious cycle and not more than a vicious cycle. When an organization gives a contract to a guy they have never seen throw before because he throws 96 out in the carnival they all now have at the front gate to their parks, there is something desperately wrong. I have pointed this out before but anybody who got a chance to see Nolan Ryan throw in person and close up and is not an actual baseball player came away from that experience stunned that any hitter stood in against the kind of momentum that guy unleashed toward home plate. That is a guy that could throw hard FOREVER. You don't have to be Nolan to throw hard but if you are going to throw hard mainly throwing with your arm and shoulder forget it....you are going to wear OUT. I don't care who you are. We have too many guys throwing hard without proper technique and without the physical characteristics to throw hard for very long and frankly nobody cares. Well we are eventually going to see what kind of game baseball is without pitchers.

Some one of these days people are going to realize that JD just hits weak cheese. Throw him weak cheese and he kills it. Throw him anything else and it kills him.

Junior does the job. For shame for shame David Price.

Hey, its junior again. What junior varsity HS team did we steal you from junior.

What the f*** did you think you were going to do with that swing at that pitch Mookie?