Hitch

Interesting tidbit from Dodges GM, Gomes. I did wonder if May might have a similar role here. "We had a lot of really respectful conversations with D-May, and he's been a huge part of the organization for a long time," Gomes told reporters, according to Bill Plunkett of The Orange County Register. "Through those conversations, it was apparent that starting was very important to him. And while we felt like he could have been a contributor out of the bullpen and an impact-type piece, trying to understand the mindset and his desire to continue to start, we took that into consideration."

Agreed, but you do see a lot of trade offers on here (and Twitter, etc) where you'd swear the Password was the No1 prosect in baseball.

True enough. If we get a Paxton repeat, I really fear for Bres.

As I mentioned in another thread, while this may be your and my view on it, if they'd sold in the position they are in, Fenway would be on fire now. We can't ignore the context of what's come before, no matter how convenient it would be.

That would be my initial leaning, too, but thy surprised me after the Devers trade, so we'll see. For Bres' sake I hope they still get the play offs. For ours, too. Not least because the young guys need the experience, but also because we need to look like a winner to FAs again and because I really don't want to see us sack another GM.

It seemed like we really did have interest in Keller and were trying to make something happen. That definitely was within our reach. Bres is a bit of a conundrum. Made a huge trade for Crochet and sent away two very highly rated prospects. Fell out with Devers and made another huge trade. Fired a scout for being insubordinate. Signed Bregman for big money when it became clear he was about to go elsewhere. So he has the ability to act decisively. But then you see these deals and what it looks like he couldn't bring himself to do and you scratch your head. It makes me think he doesn't really believe it's this year, but next, in which case he should have had the courage to sell a bit.

An interesting take (and not one I'm willing to say I agree with at this point) that I heard today was that there were several players such as Abreu and Duran, and even Gio and Chapman, slated with possibly being moved this past month, that the atmosphere will be more up than we're expecting, as they all wanted to stay. Like I say, I'm not willing to jump on with that idea, but it will be interesting to see how things play out the next few weeks.

To be fair, this conversation was in response to Ryan only. As in that was what they were asking for him, so doesn't apply to all. But yes, it was annoying seeing countless teams hoovering up interesting players for bearable costs while we twiddled our thumbs. An interesting listen on the Sox Prospects pod the other day was how they value a lot of our prospects quite a bit lower (more realistic) than the fan base (and possibly org). In that they would be furious if they were Minnesota and were offered Arias and The Password for Ryan.

Got to agree with MVP. Bieber feels (by quite a distance) more likely to give Jays pitching this year (and decent pitching at that) than Sandoval is us. Mind you, if we'd signed another reclamation project, I think this site may have crashed.

This feels fair. I don't mind admitting I laughed when the May news came through. I thought Bres' bluster would mean they would do something (and he's shown he's not afraid of making BIG moves), but by Christ this was a flop.

I don't know about that. I know execs will always shoot for the highest fruit, especially in the initial salvos of a negotiation, but Roman is considered by almost all as a shoe-in superstar. I think everyone knows they aren't getting one of those unless it's a Skeenes coming back. I really do feel it was almost certain we flinched at Duran/Rafaela/Abreu. Knowing that's the first thing they want, but that there'd be more to be added.

The gold ole days!

This is why I posted in response to a similar post from MVP a few days back - we needed someone with balls to say 'I know this is going to go down terribly and I do not care, because with the moves we make here, the time the youngsters will get for the rest of this season, and the off season changes I will enact, this team is going to be a monster for the next half a decade'. But we haven't had that since DD.

That was the sensible (and obvious to me) alignment, except I had Campbell in 2nd.

That looks like a sweep against, that's what that looks like!

I know you love war-gaming these trades out, but you rarely get trades like this. They just do not happen that often. Trading is hard enough, simplifying things is what most execs (not named Preller) try to do.

Again, could have been Anthony or Rafaela, but my understanding of it last night was that they were talking about Abreu/Duran. I had so many differently streams and twitter accounts open, I don't even recall where I saw it. My feeling is they think they can get these same players for less cost in the off season and that they think they've got enough to squeeze in Bres may pay with his job if he's got that call drastically wrong.

It definitely could have been, or Rafaela. I'm assuring the Twins were realistic enough to understand that they were never options though.

I'd make that trade in a heartbeat. I think the Pirates laughter would be heard across the continent.

Do you mean as in one package? Because Casas has next to no trade value alone, and Campbell's has taken a hit, too.

I'm more on your side of things in terms of our actual window. So then for me, the obvious choice was to buy and sell this window. Send away Chapman, Gio and Refsnyder at least, get the overpays and then reinvest those prospects and Devers money in the off season and have a core team ready to go for 5 years. In the meantime, give some of the prospects a chance the rest of the year. The reasons this couldn't really happen however is because the atmosphere around the fan base is so toxic (which is fair enough) and relations with ownership is terrible. Because of past mistakes, management now keep blundering into other (repeated) mistakes, rather than taking decisive action and setting the team up once and for all. It was frustrating as hell seeing this play out entirely as some of us had predicted this past month. Sometimes the saying 'past performance is indicative of future results' really is all you need to sum it up. As is - "the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results".

Rumour is that the Twins were asking for one of outfielders for Ryan, but we wouldn't do it. That suggests Duran or Abreu. I'm of the opinion one of them should have been sent for him.

I like Fred but he makes 50 predictions a night and often talks utter drivel in his need to hate the team. Everyone supports the team in their own, funny little way. Quite a few people thought they should have at least sold and bought. It's become even more apparent we should have after that deadline. But alternatively, if we'd got Ryan, the atmosphere would have been different. I've always felt we were a year away from any real chance at challenging, and we could have tooled up very nicely for next year and beyond, but it is what it is. I think I like Bres more than most here, but he s*** the bed after thumping his chest. Not a good look. They might still surprise us, and we have the off season to make more moves (though with the reality we missed out on moving highly sort after pieces - again.)

I thought he was 6th, but may be remembering wrongly. They got more -

I like Bres - get's a lot right (and some wrong as all do) but dear me he has done himself no favours with his whole 'we'll be buyers' nonsense. You don't shove you chest out and beat it, then make those two moves. Shambles. The teams around us significantly improved. We'l do well to still get in the play offs.