sk7326

Too bad. Bradley won't be making the Red Sox HoF, but he has more ALCS MVPs than most people on earth. He was a terrific outfielder who provided JUST enough offense - usually through about a month worth of tantalizing hot streaks a season - to be a solid starting CF. But the bat died and got mutilated beyond any sort of utility and this is what you get.

Maybe - but pitch calling still comes down to what the pitcher is comfortable throwing. I think that is still a bit opaque fans. It's also possible the pitchers are just not that good. The pitchers looked fine last season.

Flags fly forever - and Vazquez is taking a position they had from "terrible" to "not terrible" ... for a team like that, differences are on the margins ...

2021 was a bad season compared to most since he has been a starter. He likely won't hit 20 HRs ever - that was a fluke for sure. But he has put the ball in play enough to allow the rest of his game to play. He's nothing special - but the Astros were getting nothing from the position so it is a terrific pickup for them considering the price.

I think you were basically right about 2022 - the team had a lot of luck with health and so on. Now, it was an excellent FA class and the Red Sox did get a piece of it ... now Story has not been very good (relative to the purchase price) and that has been a problem. The team needed a lot of plausible maybes to come through (like 2014 and 2015 actually) and they largely haven't. Basically, the positions where most teams get production, the Red Sox have gotten basically nothing ... and the pitching injuries just exacerbated it.

The Astros has gotten basically nothing from C and 1B, and Vazquez will be a big help there. Maldonado has more power for sure ... but Vazquez has gotten pretty solid results from simply having a good approach and making a lot of contact.

I won't overthink the rankings. But Abreu has a cannon arm in RF and while there is a very wide range of outcomes - a solid starting RF outcome is certainly possible, and that would be a win for renting out Vazquez. The other dude has been so productive that you can't ignore it - but Marwin Gonzalez feels like a high end outcome.

At the time he signed it, Bradley was a better player simply by playing a more valuable position.

Abreu seems like the prize of the trade - though both guys are interesting.

Players will go for where they get paid - and then secondary factors (chance to win, nice place to live). Hosmer has not been a 2-win player since 2018. I think this is a good pickup in that the Red Sox had jack squat and now they have an above replacement level body even if he is not good.

$13M is closer to what he is actually worth as a player. Basically the deal comes down to whether Jay Groome is good or not ... the Sox got a couple of prospects of some level of decent and the Padres basically threw in Hosmer (who is an average major league 1B) for free.

it is a mutual option at $6M ... so Pham might turn it down ... but I think there is a decent chance both sides are okay with going forward

Pham looks like Babe Ruth compared to the non-Verdugo incumbents in the OF. And I think there is at least a decent chance the option is picked up.

The team selling pending FAs is fine ... it hurts, but not more than being out of the race does

So that explains the low thrown out percentage!

The best way to look at it is that they traded a catcher who was headed to FA for an outfielder they have under contract for 2023. And Pham is an average regular in the OF which would make him prime Jim Rice by 2022 Red Sox OF standards. We will see what the prospect prices were in each of the deals. I feel for Vasquez - he clearly loved being a Red Sox and it is hard not to have a soft spot for a starter who was nothing but solid.

Dalbec has a better approach than Middlebrooks ever did ... but with that many holes in your swing, approach stops mattering

Law's updated Top 60 based on midseason check-in and prospects being called up https://theathletic.com/3461142/2022/08/01/mlb-top-prospects-2022-minor-leaguers/ Preamble 15. Marcelo Mayer (up from 18) 31. Triston Casas (56 previously)

It is. Really 1B has been the maddening one for me, only because the offensive threshhold was so high. Of course, now that I said that watch Dalbec go on a 2 month heater again.

Yeah, Mookie is a separate thing - it is disturbing, but that is disturbing relative to ownership priorities. Once ownership decided to fire sale David Price along with dealing Mookie, Bloom made a pretty good baseball deal all things considered. It's NOT sufficient value for a player like Mookie - but that horse left the barn and was at least two counties away by then Benintendi's value had soured, and ex ante Cordero was enough of a high ceiling lottery ticket to try, but it has worked out like most lottery tickets. The thing with Bradley is that the first time he was here, he combined terrific defense with wildly inconsistent offense, but at least enough peaks to pay for the valleys. But the guy who came back was a guy who struck out less, but also worked counts less and made less good contact. So, woof. That said, both Binelas and Hamilton have shown flashes of interesting somethings. But clearly the Brewers have gotten the best of it. I know we have talked about the Tampa Bay best practices and such. But one of those is fielding the ball, and one thing that has been true in Bloom's time is that the Sox have been very bad at that. It's even starker noting that of course they traded their best defensive outfielder to the Dodgers. Indeed the last two years have been bad enough that it raises questions whether it is purely a lack of talent or whether the defensive positioning algorithms the team has are effective.

That is fair ... they probably could get something better than you'd expect if they took calls for Schreiber ... good reliever, lots of team control. If you could turn Workman and Hembree's entrails into a decent starting pitcher, who knows?

To get a good hitter for free??? (or a non-premium prospect)

Ownership drives the train here - in terms of what sort of team they want back. In 2014 ownership wanted a major league level return for Lester so that was the trade Cherington made.

He has been a homerun machine ... but he also has had an excellent ground ball rate and his strikeouts and walks are still pretty good. If his warts offer enough for a reasonable contract I'd do it. Like 3 years 40-50 million is kind of okay?

Getting some high-A lottery tickets with upside along with at least some "likely average regular" potential would be fine. Eovaldi has been one of the better starters in the league when healthy - I think he could get something decent. JD might have some market but the Sox might have to eat some salary. But he is still a professional bat.