sk7326

I don't either - but as an actual long man/mop up guy he can help keep a staff upright. There is value to that over the marathon.

Oh I think all of that is true ... but what if you did something like 5 starters Have Kelly and Owens there to provide 4-5 innings a week of backup. More than "long men" but not starting. Then you have the back of the pen. Keep a guy like Wright around as an actual long man.

How the bullpen looks vis a vis game management is going to be a big deal. How much are the Red Sox going to lean on their starters generally. The first tough thing is that Kimbrel and Uehara are basically locked in ... you probably don't even want to warm them up without using them. So then you have Tazawa and Smith to work around that. What would be nice is if Owens or Wright could be used (or Farrell sees them) as regular "once through the order" sorts.

How he looks at the plate will matter a lot. If he seems a step slow or overwhelmed, that might be enough to slow roll him.

I think the injury gives them a lot of cover for playing both guys - and Swihart towards the end of the year (as you'd expect) started to look quite good.

I don't think the power for JBJ is real. At the same time, his numbers reflected a return to the approach which made him rise up through the minors. A .330 OBP with at least some of the power he showed last season will be plenty for a starter with that glove. Right now offensively he shapes up to be a Mike Napoli sort - where the hot stretches are on fire and the slumps look bad, but there is enough batting eye to not be totally useless.

In 2016 baseball, it is hard to put out a lead pipe cinch team. That said, I think this team has a ton of potential, with a bit less variability than last year. Ceiling is about the same as last year, but the floor is much higher. The rotation? Well, Price is obviously going to provide some stability at the top ... Buchholz will be good, but obviously there is a question about whether he can be good for 150 innings. Rodriguez had issues turning over the lineup - but clearly the stuff is there. This applies double to Owens, who I think has gone from overrated to underrated as a pitching prospect. Porcello I think started to figure things out by end of last season. I am not expecting miracles, but I am expecting steady competence. One thing that I will be curious about (and we won't learn this until the regular season) is whether the Red Sox start shifting their pitching staff management towards limiting "looks" the way that a lot of good teams were doing. That is, instead of just using pitch counts or what have you, start monitoring the pitchers the third time through the lineup and possibly pulling them prior to rotation #4 regardless. Lineupwise? I am bullish on Ramirez at 1B. Getting healthy and back to an infield corner should help him defensively, and give him some comfort with the rest of his game. Hopefully whatever healing took place can restore his approach, which fell to pieces last season. There is a lot of awful defense you can put up with if it comes with a .900+ OPS. Ramirez' .300 OBP was a really big problem, but he clearly is a good enough hitter to get back to working counts again. I am also bullish on Bogaerts who figured out how to deal with major league pitching. This season's challenge is to take the pitchers' pitches he sprayed to right field, and lay off of more of them - so he can get pitches to drive. He has conquered everything life has thrown at him, so I am optimistic - but refining his approach to get to his power is an important mission. I am not bullish on Sandoval - but between Holt, and moving Ramirez to 3B, there are credible options to work around it. Sandoval's ability to make contact would be valuable - but clearly the onus is on him. We'll have three quality outfielders - I wish I could tell you exactly who'll they be besides Betts.

LOL (looking) - I am definitely fat and brown

Many prospect for veteran trades. Signing Prince Fielder. A lot of the sort of "buying a pennant" type moves. All because the Little Caesar's guy is getting old. Most of his trades were plusses - he is a good baseball man. But I was taking issue with how Doj characterized Dombrowski vs how he actually rolled.

Zobrist came with risk - and he had a major drop off defensively last season, which was a very significant part of his value.

Dombrowski literally did everything his owner asked him in Detroit including the exact sorts of moves and trades you whine about here. The Red Sox decade was largely not built on the free agent market ... it was farm and trades. There were targeted FAs to fill gaps, which worked with varying degrees of success - but this was not the 2009 Yankees. To me, the simplest explanation of 2014 and 2015 was a franchise in transition but a bit afraid of being in transition. What you get are half measures and band aids, instead of just getting on with business.

From what I've seen, org PoTY are performance awards (as they should be) less than scouting related. That a guy who throws 100 can get single-A hitters out is not proof of that much. The Red Sox minor league players of the year (Sam Travis, Williams Jerez) are not in top half of Red Sox prospects either.

The Red Sox Report: http://espn.go.com/blog/keith-law/insider/post?id=4792 2016 Impact Fallen Rising

2008? When they were 7 innings from the AL pennant? Here's what happened. From 2002 to 2013 this team had an amazing successful run. Only the Yankees and Cardinals can lay any sort of claim to that title. The Red Sox managed to turn the roster over so that multiple "generations" were involved with the titles. 2012 is easy to dismiss since literally everything that could have gone wrong did (some of it self inflicted, such as hiring a boor to manage them). 2014 and 2015 deserve answers - mostly because (I think) the team has not nurtured the young talent with the same solidarity. There have been other forces, but that held back the process. The team that came out after the All Star Break 2015 showed (in some ways) that perhaps if the team did not dither with a rusty Stephen Drew or Grady Sizemore's entrails that some of the comfort for the kiddos would have arrived faster. That is hard to prove though. Teams that are atrophying talent do not keep getting picked for good results, but I do think the management has earned the skepticism.

Boggs was a great player, and the best 3B of his era. His numbers some of those years are hard to get your mind around now. The first time I ever watched 20/20 was because of him. And I remember the chicken. The Red Sox of the mid-80s were good, but decidedly uncuddly - but they were the team's that afflicted me with this disease.

Castillo-Bradley-Betts left to right against righties should be what you expect Against lefties, the lion's share you expect Castillo-Betts-Young. Although you also cannot dismiss Young spelling Castillo too, or that Young will give Papi the occasional rest. Like Damon Buford years ago - a fourth outfielder who was put on this earth to hammer lefthanded pitching.

.320 or .330 with that glove is a true starter, and a possible All-Star if that comes with a little pop

Obviously these are "non-pitcher" sacrifices ... as a general rule, the sacrifice can increase your probability of getting 1 run, while reducing the likelihood of getting more. That limits the situations a lot. There are almost no situations where the "expected runs scored" is better with an additional out. I think last year the A's (of course) led the way with only 14 sacrifices all season. The Red Sox 30 was 21st ... Even the World Champion Royals were 19th with 34 sacrifice bunts. For a team with their bat control, you can get a lot of the work of a sacrifice done without bunting - with at least a shot at a hit.

Some of them are older than the incumbent NL MVP!

Analysts are being paid very well to do it. Especially with the increased information on lineup turnover and such ...

You never "pick" a guy drafted last year to have an impact on 2016. However, Benintendi has the profile (accomplished collegian, slaughtered the short season levels) to at least be on a watch list. One expects he starts in Salem but with every expectation he's not gonna be there long ... although he might force them to start him right at Portland.

Really, what you have is two forces working together. 1. The 9th inning is not special. Leverage is a little higher - but fundamentally, the job of getting 3 outs without allowing a run entering a game with the bases empty is not especially difficult. 2. Workers like to understand their job function. Pitching in the 9th is a job - not the most difficult on the staff, but a distinct one. It is hard to shuffle roles and I do think that the bullpen jobs are not 100% substitutable. So - essentially having a "closer" is critical. But that closer does not have to be your best reliever. You look at the long, long, long line of mediocre pitchers who have done that job adequately (Mike Williams, Doug Jones, Heathcliff Slocumb, Joel Hanrahan) and that should tell you something. It is one of the interesting pieces of the Kimbrel acquisition that will be tricky. Neither Kimbrel nor Uehara are guys who you feel comfortable giving larger, more variable workloads. They both should be very effective - but they both will probably need specific targeted work. Farrell will have to use Tazawa and Smith to help organize the game to facilitate things for both of them. It is a little harder than the normal bullpen juggling. Fortunately both pitchers are very capable.

Greenville I think. He had to finish in Greenville last season because he was too young too be eligible for the AFL.

I think Law had Margot as a Top 30 guy anyway - good upside, but lots of polish. I put these up not so much as an endorsement as some comprehensive opinions that are behind a paywall. He is very bullish on Guerra. Really when you look at it, #4 and #10 is not a huge difference, and can come down to upside valuation. (the Red Sox have taken a large hit in the guys close to major league ready - because a lot of them are playing!)

If Benenintendi is up before September, it's either REALLY BAD NEWS (see: 2015 Catcher injuries) or REALLY GOOD NEWS (see: 2014 Betts refusing to be ignored)