vjcsmoke

Nice hire for pitching coach. But when will we get an assistant GM to help plan player acquisitions?

Grissom was a disappointment. We didn't get much out of the Chris Sale trade did we? It seems we often get fleeced when giving away our veteran players. At least the guy they got back in return, Jackson, has power potential. But guess what he's left handed and an outfielder and we currently have a logjam in the outfield. He will be blocked from progression even if he tears it up for the PawSox unless we end up trading one or more of Abreu/Duran.

To me Oviedo looks like a bullpen arm. The last time he took the mound and pitched in a large volume as a SP was in 2023 when he pitched 177 innings and his overall pitching suffered for it. He had his lowest career ERA+ at 104 and his WHIP ballooned to 1.373. In 2025 his numbers "improved" but he only had 9 starts and 40 IP. That's only 4.44 IP per start and is a poor sample size. I dunno if he continues to struggle with walks as a starter he might need to be moved back to the bullpen. Who knows, the guy is still only 25. If he can stay healthy and get better maybe he gives us an option as a 4-5 guy but he might be best limited to the pen.

I didn't realize we were operating without a GM. It's a wonder deals get done. Guess Breslow has been handling it by himself somehow. As for Skubal he would definitely be a 1 year rental with no guarantee to resign him because of his agent history. He would go to the highest bidder the next year. I love the talent but I don't like giving up a lot of assets in a trade unless he agrees to negotiate a long term deal as condition of the trade. But that's likely not happening.

From what I can tell he is mostly a 2nd baseman. Early in his career he had a short stint at SS but made way too many errors which is why I believe he has stuck to 2nd base ever since. He has been deployed as an emergency CF but through his long career has only played 3B three times according to MLB reference. It really depends on the price tag because Marte is already turning 32 this season. You don't want to give up too much of the future for him. And don't we have a promising young 2B prospect already who would get blocked by him? From what I've read they would want Connelly Early for him. Is that too high a price to pay? Marte will be set to make 16m dollars in 2026 if salary is a concern.

Why would they buy him out for 1.5m and then offer 22m? I think he's just gone. Giolito spent all of 2024 on IR doing nothing. Has a decent 2025, and then jets for free agency to get bigger dollars. Red Sox at least have shed a bunch of payroll. But will they actually spend that saved money on a player that will help them win more next season?

I'm so tired of injury prone players. No thanks. Especially not for that much player capital. If we make a big trade for a pitcher I'd rather go for a player like Tarik Skubal who has been relatively available for most of his MLB career. 190+ IP each of the past 2 seasons.

The Red Sox success with Japanese players has been very hit and miss. Daisuke Matsuzaka and Yoshida turned out as well below average MLB players. Sadly for every time we missed on a Japanese player there are an equal number of nice success stories whom we passed on. So I don't even know if they will dip their toe back in that market.

Yes. It feels like the Red Sox need a little more help to get over the hump and into the playoffs this year. What moves Breslow makes remains to be seen though. I keep reading rumors online about Duran being the center of trade talks. One such rumor would have Duran going to the Phillies in exchange for Abel and other pieces. I'm not sure if this is a good enough return but it does feel like we might need more pitching help in the starting rotation.

Meh. Moving is stressful but these ballplayers have millions and millions of dollars to smooth over that move process. I've moved multiple times in my life and never had the money to pay professional movers or have a nice mansion waiting for me to get into at the end of the move. I think the fan attachment of losing a favorite player is more what moves sentiment. As a professional athlete, you already know this is part of the deal, in return you get MILLIONS of dollars to soften landing in a new area if you get traded.

We had a really nice 10 game win streak that was topped by a great sweep of the Rays. But the last 5 games we've gone 1-4 against winning clubs like the Cubs and Phillies. Did we only catch lightning in a bottle, and these are the real Red Sox? Will we be able to consistently beat good teams or only beat up on division doormat clubs? Hard to say because of course 5 games is small sample size. But it's certainly a little concerning. What's the missing jigsaw puzzle here? Or is this who we really are as a ballclub and we can't make a couple of deadline moves to improve from this?

Han Solo once said, "Never tell me the odds." 😆 I get it though. But at least there is some reason for optimism. There's still a CHANCE at postseason this year!

I'm aware we beat up on 2 bad sub. 500 teams. But you can only play who is put in front of you. So I'm glad they got to flex a bit on the bad teams. What might be more impressive is their last close 4-3 win over the Rays, a team that is actually a threat to us in the division. Still thats 7 wins in a row for Red Sox now. Let's keep that positive momentum going!

I'm looking at baseball reference and for 2025 it currently has Toro at .293 BA, .341 OBP, and .792 OPS. Those aren't earth shattering numbers but they are respectable despite the caveat of small sample size, ie only 164 at bats. Toro's best year was 2023 when he slugged 1.302... in 18 at bats. His career numbers are considerably lower with .229 BA, .292 obp, .365 slg, and 656 OPS. But who knows he could just be a late bloomer. I don't think Toro is great but at least he's not embarrassing himself with his bat this season.

Don't look now but we have won 5 games in a row! Our bats have heated up. Roman Anthony starting to get into a groove. His OPS already up to a respectable .750 now instead of the .600 horror show when he was first called up. Do you guys think we can sneak into the wildcard race and make the playoffs for the first time in ages?

Flipping some expiring deals to set up for the future makes sense to me. Red Sox will sadly miss the postseason yet again, but that fate was pretty much decided once they moved Devers in the deal to San Francisco. I'll keep tracking them, but I don't think we're better than the 4th team in the AL East.

Brace yourselves for another Red Sox salary dump. Report here that Red Sox will look to trade away Bregman if they can't negotiate a longer term contract: Red Sox Anticipated to Trade Alex Bregman If 'Sides Can't Work Out Deal' Oof, Red Sox fans just can't catch a break! 😅

I can't project Hicks into our closer. He's been a very inconsistent albeit hard throwing pitcher who has never figured out how to locate his fastball consistently. The big difference between Hicks and Chapman is that Chapman has proven himself a very good reliever in the past even before getting the closer role. His career ERA+ is 162, career FIP 2.39, and career WHIP of 1.092 with a 14.7 K/9. Those numbers are just consistently really good. Jordan Hicks career numbers are significantly worse. 95 ERA+, 3.84 FIP, 1.322 WHIP, and only 8.8 K/9. A 102 mph fastball doesn't mean a lot unless you pair it with consistency and the craft to punch out batters once you have them on the ropes. His BB/9 at 5.1 also indicates he has control issues and could also put a dangerous runner on base instead of getting that vital out. At 28 does Hicks have some room for improvement? Yes, but it's not like he's a spring chicken who is just learning the ropes and has lots of room to improve. His ceiling is just about reached and he still hasn't full 'figured out' how to dominate batters at the MLB level. Hicks to me is not a closer, I just hope he can become a plus bullpen guy. He just doesn't impress me much. Now Harrison, I hope he can capture the mojo that made him the top pitching prospect in the Giants system but he did not impress much in his MLB callups. Only 88 ERA+, 4.56 FIP, and 1.297 WHIP. I know it's a small sample size but we can't pretend the Red Sox aren't taking on some risk for taking on this unproven starting pitcher who hasn't had a breakout season yet. At least Crochett had one season of looking really excellent for the White Sox before we made the trade for him. I can't say I'm glad that Devers is gone. He was a proven, elite batter and the return for him does not look impressive. Nor do I have confidence the Red Sox will replace his salary with good quality players. Their track record with free agents has been very spotty at best over recent years.

I don't think that the Liverpool transactions have anything to do with the Red Sox. Liverpool has been spending very frugally over the past few transfer windows and they saw a chance to obtain a generational player in Wirtz and jumped on it using the savings they had been stockpiling, aka their transfer war chest. They are now building themselves up into a potential dynasty which is a bold and laudable move to strengthen from a position of strength as current Premier league champs. As for the Red Sox, it truly sucks the way FSG have run the club recently. Selling off Betts, selling off the majority of the 2018 championship core, and now salary dumping Devers for a poor looking return. We aren't even getting back a Verdugo quality player to plug into a starting position. It's just shameful. Henry, Breslow, and the entire Red Sox front office should be ashamed. The Devers trade potentially drops us out of playoff contention for the 4th year straight. I don't know how this gets fixed but ownership has made themselves into the problem instead of part of the solution.

I just hope we get a good return on Duran. I'm not satisfied with what we got back from the Devers trade. A perennial all-star, top-10 batter who was batting over .900 OPS at the time of the trade should have brought back a bigger return. Heck, San Francisco had a really good 1st base prospect, Bryce Eldridge, who would have solved positional issues for us but we didn't push to include him in the deal. Instead we accepted Tibbs as a substitute. I think we had taken a package of Eldridge and say Wisenhunt instead of Harrison and Tibbs that would have potentially solved our big league 1b issues relatively soon.

All of those were one year deals. Bregman’s opt out clause makes it virtually a 1 year deal. Extending Crochett just made sense to solidify the trade price we paid especially when it became apparent he was the real deal as a top of rotation pitcher. Still have zero faith in ownership group and management. They have betrayed our faith too many times. Dealing away Devers for salary dump and poor return feels too much like the Betts trade.

Red Sox management literally hired Breslow to lie to us. Of course he's going to say he believes in this team. Saying otherwise would kill ticket sales. He's not a total idiot. Getting rid of Devers was dumb AF but it was probably part of management's bigger picture plan to reduce salaries. I don't see how you replace a .900 OPS hitter that was anchoring your lineup. And even if you do, let's say Bregman comes back healthy soon, all the other hitters decided to slump at the same time. Oof. And our pitching outside of Crochett is still quite unreliable. I don't see us making the playoffs in 2025. Red Sox will continue their quest for mediocrity and lower payrolls. Don't know what else to say but their quest to become Tampa North has been a failure and a disaster.

The Red Sox are famous for their PR debacles now. Nothing would surprise me at this point. Would I like to keep Bregman? Yes, he's a very good player and a solid clubhouse figure from all reports. Do I trust this cutthroat front office to do what's best for the team? Absolutely not. Not a single shred of confidence in them remains.

I don't think we have that run in us. I don't trust this team to spend big nor to spend wisely when they do. Bregman signing is an outlier compared to the usual disaster signings. I feel like Cora must have pushed hard behind the scenes to make the deal happen. Bregman was very, very good for us when healthy. Which is why it won't surprise me if ownership moves him for no other reason than salary savings. A Cheaper less competitive version of the Tampa Rays North is what they want. Well they are getting it. I feel the only reason they gave Devers his contract was they felt a revolution about to boil over if they shipped off our last homegrown star so close to dumping Mookie Betts followed by the rest of the 2018 championship core. If John Henry dare showed his face today in front of a Red sox faithful crowd he would get roundly booed for getting rid of Devers as well. Red Sox will be moving on some pieces at the trade deadline because we're not a playoff caliber team anymore, it's just a matter of what kind of return we can get for them and who goes.

I'm willing to trade any or all of them. The Red Sox already hit the tank button once they got rid of Devers. The 4-8 tailspin after the trade just confirmed the post mortem. I hate to give up on the season already but you have to be real, we're not going far with what we've got now. Can we plan for next season? In particular the guys on the last year of their deal should be moved for future value.