sk7326

The one less pitcher should be a non factor in the postseason - short series, not using all of your starters ... you don't need to stack the bullpen. The choice for the 11 man staff ties their hands more than needed, but whatchagonnado. Berry is a better pinch runner than Bradley - but Bradley runs well and can definitely get from 1st to 3rd. And he can be a defensive replacement if Ellsbury's foot or Victorino's hammy warrants one.

Berry HAS attempted steals before though ... and more than that the ability to get from 1st to 3rd on a non trivial hit or score on a double matters too. I don't think the stolen base has to be the extent of his value on the bases. I lean towards Bradley myself just because Ellsbury and Victorino have both missed time this season and have nagging things going on - and with the roster limitations, having a guy who can actually start at those positions carries some extra weight.

Well, Ells has a good argument here since the difference in positions matter quite a bit. But it's that very positional factor that really shoots a hole in the "future value" case.

You bat leadoff one time a game. And lineup protection does not have much empirical oomph behind it - if he were a "20 HR guy" he'd have been one this season. I am being realistic - clone his 2013 for five years, at the plate and in the field ... you've sold me. But if he has to move to LF - then he basically has to turn into 2011 Ellsbury to be pumping out the same output 2013 Ellsbury the CF is producing. It's not a very good bet for a guy going into typical decline years.

They are paying Pedroia a lot less ... both in terms of now and what that money looks like when he is 38. And 2B is an easier position to wallpaper over than a below average CF. And Ellsbury has beaten his 2013 season exactly one time in terms of production, and two times in terms of plate appearances.

As well you should - he was the position player MVP of the league that year, easily. But we're talking future production here.

As well you should - he was the position player MVP of the league that year, easily. But we're talking future production here.

To be fair, the league average OBP was .320 or so. Ellsbury's .357 ish sort of OBP is certainly good. To use his 2011 as any sort of barometer for the next 5 years is stupid clearly. That said, if he could repeat his 2013 ... which is basically a good Tim Raines season with better defense (not a GREAT Tim Raines season - if you want criminally undervalued HoF candidate) ... for 5 years, he'd certainly be worth the price he is wishing for. The odds of that actually happening are very very low.

Home field is nice but assures very little. Starting with the Red Sox ... they won 2/3 of their home games and 1/2 of the roadies. So - to keep things simple, 2/3 likely they win a home game, 1/2 likely they win a road game against average competition. If they have home field, you'd expect a 3 game sweep to occur (in a best of 5) 22% of the time. If they DIDN'T have home field, it drops to 17%. It's a significant drop, but not as stark as you think. (extend this out to all of the other best of 5 scenarios and the Red Sox would be 70% with home field, 63% without) Now, in real life - against better competition you are probably looking at more like 60% at home, 40% on the road. Then you are talking about a drop from 54% to 46%, which is the difference between favorite and underdog although still basically a coin flip. Probabilities aside, home field is one extra home game per series - assuming coin flip odds the rest of the time. But does it matter THAT much for a single game? In sports like basketball and football without a doubt - but in baseball, the rotating starting pitcher basically means you are playing a different team every day in the series. You go to individual matchups and such then - I mean in a best of 7 you are basically evaluating #3 starters.

Detroit had a better rotation and better lineup than the Giants. The Giants starters pitched better - it's baseball, sometimes it's not that complicated. The Cardinals in 2006 were an 83-79 who finished the season on a 6 game losing streak and won the World Series. Can you blow out a team without the better team? The 1990 Reds did it to a vastly superior Oakland team. So let's get that out of the way. The playoffs will do a lot of things - identify the best team in the league is not one of them. But that's cool - baseball playoffs are the most exciting there are. Ultimately if you have bat-missing pitching - it is a good first step to winning short series. Red Sox are 4th in the AL in Strikeout percentage ... alas the Tigers, Rays and Guardians are the Top 3. A's are near the bottom, but the ballpark where fly balls go to die helps salve that. The offense clearly can hang with anybody - and it's not about putting up 10 runs a game. It is that the offense can grind out at-bats and create scoring chances ... and the more opportunities you get, blah blah blah.

Farrell has 14 spots based on how they are going to deploy the roster - I am not sure 11 pitchers are necessary (you probably only really need one of the Doubront/Morales/Britton trio but it is a minor quibble). So what does that mean? Assuming Ellsbury is ok. CF: Ellsbury RF: Victorino LF: Nava 1B: Napoli 2B: Pedroia SS: Drew 3B: Middlebrooks C: Saltalamacchia DH: Ortiz So 5 more spots: Carp, Ross, Gomes are obvious. That gets us down to 2 spots. I'd take Bradley for one of them. I am not betting anything important on Ellsbury AND Victorino both being able to play every day for the next month. If you would rather take Berry for that role with his pinch running, I get it - but I'd prefer the guy who can actually play in a real game. Remember, switching the roster during the series means the guy is out until the World Series. So the last spot has to be a backup infielder sort. If we are talking defensive replacement, you'd go with McDonald. If you want somebody who has a better chance of contributing at the plate, it is Bogaerts. We know Middlebrooks can fake 2B if we absolutely have to - so that is a possible option. I would love to have Berry there, but as long as the decision is to carry 11 pitchers - there might just not be room. I also would not call it sentimentality. You have to go with the best options, and the body of work and current health is the only way to do it. This has been good enough to be the best team in baseball - have to hope it works out.

Lester at the top is obvious - most consistent of the pitchers, best equipped to get 225-250 pitches on four days rest. He has shown this year that his 2009-2010 self is not dead, and has found it often enough to be optimistic. Games 2-4 are interchangeable, although the Game 4 starter has a chance to go into mothballs for a long time, and that has to be considered - although personally I'd move him up to the Game 2 starter in the next series if we are fortunate enough. Bullpen? Tazawa/Uehara/Breslow are obvious. I think Workman and Dempster have shown enough that they will be clear options. You get two of Morales/Doubront/Britton for the rest. My guess is one of Morales/Doubront get squeezed out, as they are performing the same role. It's October - so the goal is for the starters to take the 7th inning out of play as much as possible. That said, I expect to play matchups in the 7th and 8th. The money is on the table now, and Farrell has smartly started to stretch Uehara out. Obviously I don't expect him to get 5 out work on back to back days, but for a game 2 where there is a travel day built in - I do not think Farrell will hesitate to pull the alarm for Uehara in the 8th when necessary.

I wasn't comparing him to Griffey ... I was defending him against those who say he "can't hit major league pitching" because he has struggled in a major league role after roughly the same level of professional experience as Griffey.

Salaries go up over time. What Pedroia would need to do in his old age to justify his salary is a lot less than what he'd have to now. Part of life in the long deals is accepting negative years for the positive ones up front. Pedroia should be able to produce enough in the 5 years ahead to make the 1-2 win years when he becomes old decent. The argument could apply to Ellsbury too - but if he cannot play CF, that becomes seriously dicey because while his bat has pop, it's not a corner outfielder's level. A 6 year deal for Ells means having to evaluate 2-3 years of him as a left fielder, and that lowers his future value. Considering the datapoints of last year - Ellsbury should probably get a $20M offer from somebody ... and if it's for more than 4 years I'd enjoy Bradley's run here. Bradley has not shown "he can't hit major league pitching" - he showed that he's not Ken Griffey Jr (hitting major league pitching without any reps - and Griffey had no minor league ones). His approach is much more advanced than Ellsbury's - and he is already an above average center fielder. Those things, age, athleticism - he is a pretty safe bet. Can he put up a couple of MVP-ish seasons? I wouldn't bet on that - but I like his chances to be a good, important player.

A .280 OBP is unacceptable. But a .310 one with serious power isn't. After all, the latter is 2012 Josh Reddick ... the question is not whether WMB will be a high OBP guy - he won't be. But can he get on base enough to get to his power. That is entirely possible, and given his career so far clearly his power is not left in batting practice (unlike say Ryan Sweeney). He is also 25 and a terrific athlete - and those are generally guys worth buying some stock in. Let's put it this way, his September slash is .283/.317/.500 ... that works, or at least is not worth giving up when a 25 year old ath-a-lete is doing it. After his return from Pawtucket clearly his approach was cleaner, there is some hope from a scouting perspective.

1. Yes, they are really good - the top scoring margin in the league is your best evidence there. They have had the Pythagorean record (for what its worth) of .626 which is actually better than what they have done (in other words - based on a crude metric they have actually been unlucky). 21-19 in 1-run games ... you expect those games to be a coin flip, so no special luck there. 2. They might lose the first series anyway, and it would not change #1. This has been the best team in the AL - let that sink in - and the ability to win 11 more games does nothing to alter that. Yeah it'll suck to not have the World Series under our belts, flags fly forever and all - but we know that the best team in the field has won the title only about half the time or so. This isn't the NBA. The biggest mismatch in the playoffs is still roughly a 60-40 proposition. There are no REAL upsets.

Last year's fiasco was so out of character from the way the organization had operated until then, that is seems VERY unlikely that the GM was driving on a lot of it. I can't sit here and say Ben was not culpable. But this was arguably the best organization in baseball until essentially attention to non-baseball things threw stuff out of kilter. And even then, it was a bunch of injury-related historical "right end of the bell curve" hooey which drove it. Last year was an overreaction to 2011 - the work of a team which was listening to WEEI instead of actually paying attention to what their people were saying. Fortunately the embarassment was abject enough to essentially undo their mistakes and get back to the apparatus Epstein and company (Ben of course part of said company) put together before. Frankly we were lucky that the opportunity was possible to hire a manager who knew the operation, and that there was a trade to create some financial flexibility. And then that there was a suitor who would take the money. And then that the baseball people figured out how to make the deal a good baseball deal and not just a straight dump. This is not to bash the ownership per se. This is CLEARLY the best ownership the Sox have ever had - the proof is everywhere. But part of their best was hiring and delegating the baseball stuff to the brightest folks. That slipped last season with move after move right out of the Steinbrenner of the 1980s script. Crawford, Gonzalez did not work out - but they were all elite gets of their class, and mistakes that 29 other owners would have made given the chance. You generally do not expect a 29 year old 1B to turn into a pumpkin after one season - nor an elite athletic LF to forget how to play baseball. The good thing was last year's failure was bad enough that the ownership got right with going back to the formula which worked. Farrell has done a good job. He will win manager of the year because seasons like this guarantee that. It is hard to evaluate the "clubhouse" stuff a manager does (and that is a lot of the job) - but he handles the media well, and is not a lunatic fishing for a paycheck. Valentine was such a poor communicator with his coaching staff (let alone his players) that any sort of normal human being would have done well - and frankly this season has been a lot about just things that should work working. Ellsbury being a brilliant CF, Pedroia going back to being Petey, Lester finding his command and confidence, Lackey finding his quasi-Cy form from his Angel days. It has also been about a phenomenal stroke of luck in Victorino's season (driven by a rather fortunate injury which got him hitting from his stronger side full time) which his age:trend combination did not forecast. (even optimistically, "down-ballot MVP" was not in the cards) Farrell has done a good job managing the platoons, getting the right guys out there in the right spots - which is what a manager does more than anything else. His bullpen usage has been curious at times - and a little bit too "Tony LaRussa-ish" at times, but he has generally run the pitching staff well. Most importantly, the coaching staff is on the same page. The funny thing identified about Friedman and Huntington is that they have done it with no money, yes ... but a LOT of very high draft picks - which is also a big edge. It's not that these teams are not spending (or at least prior to the current CBA), it was that they decided to pour the money into the scouting and development and the draft. Duquette did not make the Chris Davis trade nor did he draft Manny Machado (though he does credit for aggressively promoting him). That fell into his lap (Koji Uehara giveth, Koji taketh away). The manager was already there even (and is one of the best at developing kids).

Cherington grade: A, this season ... and it can't be separated from the ownership for the first time in 2 or 3 years, focusing on letting the baseball ops work on their own time horizons.

You evaluate or guess on prospects - you'll miss ... a lot. It's a bug, not a feature. Butler is interesting - and with replacement level for catcher being "able to walk", it doesn't take much to be able to do this for a living.

I don't think it was that bitter ... it's not like he walked from the negotiations. And surely another suitor could have dug up a modest guarantee ... there was a job opening here, and a team with a ton of upside despite the 69-93.

All interesting, all major red flags ... 2009 Albert Pujols ain't walkin through that door. Doesn't really change the thesis - Napoli has been much better than Morales this season, though Morales has a 2 year age advantage. Abreu has the most upside but he's already as old as Cespedes, lacks the elite athleticism of Cespedes/Puig and has questions about bat speed. Napoli should be rewarded well, if not with job security at least a higher base salary for sure.

He can "want" anything. But the market probably won't go for it. That said, there is a ton of money out there chasing a relatively thin group of 1B (and he is the best of those) - there will be more money for Napoli than anybody thinks. In terms of years, he is probably not going to get a long deal. At the same time, could a team end up shattering what Boston would be willing to guarantee? That is definitely possible.

That is not an unreasonable argument ... but the walk rates are still a function of waiting for good pitches, a hitting personality. I mean Barry Bonds had remarkable plate discipline from 1990 onward - it was just how he was wired as a hitter. Vlad Guerrero, whose raw power was in the Sosa ballpark for sure - his walk rates were roughly the same his entire career (save for your usual blips). That is much more normal.

Ellsbury's soxprospects scouting report: http://www.soxprospects.com/players/ellsbury-jacoby.htm I think his homerun power did confound folks - but there was a meaningful change in approach (mostly doing the work to be able to get to inside pitches with intent). Really, he was projected more as a Lance Johnson or Lenny Dykstra type than any sort of true power threat. What you mention - and Ryan Sweeney is a great example - I think is the difference between what the scouting sorts call raw power vs power. Sweeney has always had a lot of batting practice power - but has not been able to get it into games. Encarnacion is rare - like Sammy Sosa ... doesn't mean it doesn't happen. Also Encarnacion was still starting from a decent place ... after all his career lows in walks was still higher than anything Nomar put up. It is hard to say the growth has not been somewhat within his ability. http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=2151&position=3B http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=190&position=SS Compare it to - the ultimate example here - Sammy Sosa. http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=302&position=OF ... the ability to really change your offensive personality is very, very difficult It is hard to get to something like 30 HRs without some rudimentary raw power. That said, Dustin Pedroia is certainly an example of a player who has confounded scouts with his power and consistency.

Power is a tool, as is plate discipline. The thing that makes it a tool is that you are scouting and projecting it - and that there is a natural physical ceiling for each player. Will Middlebrooks is/was never going to turn into Barry Bonds, no matter how much coaching or instruction he gets. He can improve that part of his life a little bit - be able to spoil the slider away more, but he ain't going to be a walk machine. Youkilis did not show his power in 2005, but his body had some projection and in the minors he had some success getting to it. The power was projectable at least, and once he learned how to crush his pitches, presto. Another example on the 2013 team is Bogaerts. He certainly is not a 30 HR slugger now - but his frame and age and how he swings the bat etc to date ... all of that seems to indicate he is going to grow into that power.