I'm pretty sure Bloom isn't even thinking about Judge as an option for the Red Sox. It'd be fun to see the Yanks and maybe the SF Giants get in a little bidding war for him, though.
It's always about money, no doubt about that.
We know the owners wanted 14 this year but had to settle for 12.
I'm skeptical that 16 playoff teams is anything in the near future.
But the teams with the 2 best records in each league deserve an advantage. This new system rewards regular season performance.
The Phillies are coping quite well with the disadvantage so far.
"The timing was off" is pretty useless as an explanation for such things. The real questions are how did Perez and Springs get better after leaving the Sox, and why did Bloom think Springs was so expendable on a team desperately in need of pitching?
The Wild Card games in previous years were obviously a crapshoot, and so are the new best-of-threes.
Now we have 4 clear-cut favorites in the Yankees, Astros, Dodgers and Braves. Let's see how they do.
Refsnyder joined the team "for good" on June 10.
On June 26 the Red Sox were 42-31, their high point over .500 for the season.
Ergo, Refsnyder was not "too late" and that was not really a significant part of the team's problems this year.
Cot's is not much good any more. Notice how they just removed traded guys like Bradley and Vaz from the 2022 numbers?
We need another source for payroll.