Kimmi

2012 does not count. Bobby V negates everything.

^^This too.

^^This. Henry should have kept him at the helm for 2016 to see his plan through. I'm willing to bet we would have still made the postseason with Ben as GM, and I think we'd currently have a better equipped farm system.

Maybe the FO turned the page on Shaw too quickly, but he was really, really bad after the first 2 months of the season. I had no problem with the trade. In fact, I liked it. In hindsight, it's awful, but it wasn't awful when it occurred.

Good post. I don't think anyone predicted our offense to be as bad as it has been for most of the season.

I don't think we were counting on best case scenarios. We led the league in runs scored by over 100 runs. We should have been been good offensively even without Papi. The problem is not in counting on best case scenarios, the problem is in our entire line up, except Pedroia, underperforming. It is reasonable to expect some guys not to perform to par, but it's also reasonable to expect others to overperform or at least meet expectations.

Yup, plus the next several years. This season is far from over, and we are actually in very good shape, as bad as things might seem. As I've said before, if we win a World Series during our 'window', it will all be worth it.

I think I love you.

This is why it is so important to reset this year. It will be difficult to do next year.

It will get better offensively. I like the look that Devers and Nunez give our line up.

Zing

Even though he is a homer to the nth degree, or maybe because of it, I love Gomes.

Luckily, we scored and won game on that play, but to borrow Soxhop's phrase, that was a huge cluster yuck in the making. We got lucky.

Perhaps not, but when the team was on a good run, opinions of Farrell were much different.

The performance was already not up to expectations when this story resurfaced. However, I disagree that this type of media circus does not affect performance.

I would first like to say that I am pleased with Pedroia facing the media and speaking for the team. As far as Price is concerned, I won't excuse his behavior. That said, when he was first signed, a big part of his appeal was his supposed leadership and presence in the clubhouse. Also, throughout last season when he was not pitching up to expectations, he owned up to it. He never made excuses and usually said something along the lines of "I have to do better". It seems to me that comments during the postseason and offseason have somewhat embittered him to the Twitter crowd and the media. He reacted poorly. But I can't imagine that he has suddenly become a horrible teammate or less of leader.

From the great JoeB, a fellow poster, here's the breakdown of GM acquisitions for our team: Theo-HOF 11.3 WAR at a cost of $26.4M Woeful Ben 4.1 WAR at a cost of $96.3M DD 12.0 WAR at a cost of $69.0M Those are rough numbers, but should be good. It's a tough comp. On one hand, DD has not had a chance to develop his own prospects. OTOH, most of his good WAR guys were obtained with Theo and Ben's prospects. His FA acquisitions, Young, Price, Moreland, have combined for a 0.8 WAR for $43M. For Ben, it's just bad. For Theo, he's gone 6 years, and it is still his team. I give Ben more credit than Joe does, mainly because Dombrowski's acquisitions that are performing well for us are the result of trading Ben's (Theo's players). Dombrowski deserves his share of credit for sure, but I just don't get the all out love for him while at the same time bashing my boys. You don't get where this team is today, good or bad, without the strong farm system that was in place when Dombrowski arrived.

IMO, 4 years in the playoffs is absolutely short term if it leaves your team in bad shape for the next 4 years.

I'm not sure if I'm on the Fire Farrell bandwagon yet, but I do agree that there is reason to question his leadership. Keep in mind, however, that this is the same team and manager that looked very good from June 12 to July 4 and went from 4 games down to 4 games up in the division during that span. As the saying goes, a team is never as bad as it looks when things are going bad. We've had a terrible month. Things will get better.

No, but The Playoffs Are a Crapshoot theory is the exact reason that you don't follow the Win At Any Cost theory.

Completely agree. To be fair, I think part of that is due to directives from ownership, but IMO, a competitive team could have been put together without mortgaging the long term. The problem with Dombrowski's aggressive short term philosophy is that it guarantees nothing.

Exactly.

More conspiracy theory. I'm starting to wonder if there was something in Espinoza's medicals at the time of the trade. I found it odd that Dombrowski did not back out of the trade when he had the chance.

Make that desperate, planless, cliff driving Dave! In all seriousness though, Dave has a plan and he is not clueless. We may not like his plan, but he has one, and he is a pretty smart baseball guy.

It seems that there has to be a better option than Fister. I wonder if a Fister/Velazquez piggy back would work. Fister might be okay for 2-3 innings. Tough break for Espinoza. Hope he has a speedy recovery and can bounce back from it.