sk7326

It's not a terrible AAV - but it all comes down to whether he hits the ball hard. The rest of the toolset looks unremarkable. The strike zone command thing is dependent on pitchers actually caring about whether you swing the bat or not.

Realistically, bringing both Eovaldi and Wacha back would be good ideas. I mean they are also both injury risks, but there is some actual known upside there. It's a speculative rotation, but at least one where the positive side of the coin is considerable Sale will be good assuming he doesn't tear his rotator cuff doing jumping jacks Bello has real promise Eovaldi has been one of the better starters in baseball when he has been healthy Wacha was good enough for Boston to miss him badly when he was out Whitlock was never really in a position to start for real. There is some risk that he's really just a great relieve, but he pounds the strike zone which usually is a good sign Pivetta is an innings eater

This. When you get to a certain $$ level, those are ownership calls. Extending Sale, letting Bogaerts walk - those are ownership calls.

I guess for Bogaerts, the locking in of those pre-arb raises was worth it.

It does. At the same time, while it helps sign players - for teams there is a side benefit where they can decide fresh whether they want to pay for the player's non-prime years. It complicates things for the team, but you do get a fresh look at things. With Bogaerts, it never should have gotten to the hostage taking stage anyway.

1.5 Ownership should not have been as grimly determined to make the "David Price salary dump featuring Mookie Betts"

dislocated finger from scrolling 4chan comments

I know a couple of people who were victims of the 38 studios grift.

Worth noting (on the starting front) that Eovaldi does look like someone whose market is being jammed by the QO. He could still be an option. That Jose Quintana deal made me sigh wistfully. I've accepted that Sale is going to strain his UCL again going out to fetch the newspaper.

Well, he has to find a dance partner and didn't last year. If he is happy with a 2/70 deal and getting back into the waters again, maybe he does it again.

These decisions are made by ownership - when it gets to this dollar value, it's an ownership call. Now, on paper I would not have necessarily given Bogaerts an 11 year deal - but I do want to see what the outs look like and so on ...

The tricky part is the power. For the most part, the NPB power numbers have not translated going across the pond. (basically it's Ohtani, Matsui and that's it) It's a LF/DH player without plus speed - so really all of this lies in his ability to hit for power. It's a real gamble.

Schilling is a HoF'er and probably will get in at some point. But ... the violin I play for his very very tiny.

On one hand the team is paying $17.5M a year to someone who has not been "very good" in 5 years. On the other hand, he is still above average and the bullpen did not have enough of even that.

It has been bad (.094 now!). But you look at the underlying data .. - He is striking out a lot, but like Yoan Moncada struck out more in his callup (and is still striking out) - The batted ball numbers in terms of hard contact are pretty good Really, the kid needs to work on lifting the ball ... it has been a pattern in the minors too, where he has not actually hit a lot of homeruns for the contact he gets. Just like Pedroia's call up - the numbers have been bad, but under the surface there are some things there to see what the fuss is about. Like Pedroia his .195 ... but even in 2006, he showed up as a dude who was impossible to strike out.

They wanted to see if Whitilock and Houck were starters or not - and unfortunately they both got hurt which screwed up the answer. Whitlock as a starter should still be explored - but it is possible Whitlock should just be a multi-inning relief weapon and that's great. Houck I just don't think can get lefties out (this is all eye test) at a sufficient rate longer term. What I'd like to see is Whitlock and Houck being used as 6-9 out relievers ...

Oh I think Casas is close to a lock. Kid has taken good at-bats so far. Can't scout the box score with him. The team is going to clear a runway for him to take 1B/DH PAs. I always remember that Pedroia looked the opposite of a major league caliber player in his callup.

Casas is possible, but there is the DH ... so it is sort of either/or ... fortunately finding a competent DH should be pretty easy

I think that is true as far as it goes but the swinging for the fences was happening regardless.

The first step is what happens to Bogaerts. I am ambivalent about bringing him back - but bringing him back at a reasonable number is a fine move. But if the team is bullish on its internal options for SS (see Marcelo Mayer), I could see the team signing a shorter term solution at SS. I dunno. The team needs a 1B in theory - but they traded for Hosmer, so we're stuck with him. The team needs production from RF. Judge would be great - but even just finding a decent platoon would help. I am in favor of re-signing Eovaldi, but not at a big number. Ditto for Wacha.

Shifts have been around since baseball was invented so whatever. Now to me - the big issue with entertainment in baseball is that so few balls are put in play in general ... and none of these rules (even the shift ones) REALLY impact that to me.

Right - the idea of the automated strike zone is that it's like the line calls in the US Open. There is no "challenging" to be done. The home plate umpire (who still has to be there to cover things like check swings and plays at the plate) gets a buzz from the system if the pitch is a strike. Now, the problem with it - at least from the data from the Arizona Fall League, was that they were calling way too many balls. But that's fixing the tolerances. (the thickness of the strike zone borders) I think TV broadcasts and Statcast have made this inevitable. I mean, just the idea that national broadcasts have strike zones superimposed each at bat, and that Statcast tells you where every pitch landed ... and we just all collectively go "moops" when Angel Hernandez misses call after call (and then throws a tantrum when a player points this out) is just bonkers.

The pitch clock is fine ... the anti-shift rule is stupid and goes against the spirit of baseball. Automated strike zone is a natural - though clearly from the Arizona Fall League experiemt, there is work to be done there. Now - if you really were concerned about the shift, I'd have taken inspiration from cricket. In cricket - for limited overs matches - for certain parts of the game, the fielding positions are restricted (to help facilitate scoring). Instead of banning shifts, you could say that for the first 3 innings (or whatever), the defense must have four players on the infield. (two feet on the dirt) Either way, it's silly.

The next season Okajima turned back into a pumpkin - when teams figured out how to lay off that splitter. But wow was he good in 2007. Of course there was the excitement of signing Dice-K, and then the ageonizing reality of watching him pitch. Even when he pitched "well", it was still a lot of baserunners and a game you could time with a sundial.

Hey, they celebrated the decade of it five years ago - but what is there to celebrate this season? But then I saw in Ian Browne's newsletter some reliving of the 15th anniversary - so hey why not??? So - back in the wayback machine we go to the middle child of the Red Sox 4 championships - but it really should get more play. After all, it featured: - Josh Beckett delivering a True #1's season from start to finish, a level he would never reach again - Dustin Pedroia's emergence into stardom, after a 2006 call up where it looked like he might not know how to play baseball - Everything about Hideki Okajima - The sudden discovery of Papelbon as a closer. Papelbon would stop being thoroughly dominant soon enough, but 2007-2009, he was absolutely electric in that position - Yooooooooooooooooooook - It was not the magical comeback that the 2004 ALCS was - particularly because all of the wins in the comeback were routs at the end - but this team ALSO had to comeback from a big deficit in the ALCS against what looked an awful lot like the 2nd best team in the majors that season. - The season did not have a ton of adversity, but as the season hit a bit of a lull, out of nowhere callup Clay Buchholz throws a no hitter against the Orioles - And of course Mike Lowell, the salary dump piece of the Beckett trade, wins the World Series MVP