Kimmi

I realize that and it's unbelievable. Look at his WAR every other year. He has always been a very good player despite poor defense.

I know where you're coming from.

I love 'shrooms! When I go to the Chinese restaurant, I always have the guy at the hibachi grill cook me up some bean sprouts, onions, and 'shrooms. Throw in a little tofu and I'm a happy camper. Great stuff!

That's not the point. The point is that a team can overcome bad defense at a position and a player can be an overall great player despite poor defense.

Merchandising.

Pablo was wrong to diss his teammates and former management. I did not agree with that at all. As far as him being likeable, I was speaking from the fans' standpoint.

No, I just think that being a baseball ops person as opposed to being a business man, he knows better.

That might be the case. I certainly don't expect him to become a good outfielder. With work, however, he should be able to improve enough where he is not an overall liability. Jeter played horrible defense at SS for years but was good enough offensively to make him a HOFer. And no, I'm not saying that Hanlley is a HOFer.

Well a lot of the trade was based on looking beyond 2015 and the number of controllable years the two players had. That aside, for 2015, the Sox were getting what should have been a serviceable starting pitcher back. Not as good as Lackey, but a serviceable mid to back end guy. In addition, Craig was recently one of the best hitters in the league. Coming off an injury, you would expect him to be able to rebound to be a good hitter. Craig offered at the very least some depth for the team at both 1B and the OF. Victorino and Castillo both had question marks coming into the season. At best, he could have been a formidable power bat in the middle of the line up. Another possibility is that Craig could have been used as a trade chip to strengthen another area of need.

That's fine if you want to keep the quote there. I'm not offended by it. I just think that Theo has already made his statement by what the Cubs are doing this year, so getting me to admit that he is not the genius that I thought he was is likely not going to happen.

That is certainly true. I think it's easier said than done though, not so much in terms of acquiring additional personnel, but in knowing when to "give up" on the ones that you have. You can't give up on a player just because he has 2-3 bad months, or in some cases, even an entire bad season.

In terms of this trade alone for this year only, probably not, though I don't think they expected the dropoff to be that significant. That said, we both know that that is not how most trades are evluated. You have to consider many other factors/players not only for this season, but for the long term as well. Even if you're not looking beyond 2015, there were sound reasons for making this trade.

This is what I'm saying. In 2013, the Cubs were 30 games under .500 and finished in last place. They were 16 games under .500 last year and finished in last place. They are 11 games over .500 this year with the 7th best record in baseball. I think Theo has made his statement.

Double Ha! Why do you get to establish what a serious playoff contender is? They have been in the race for 4+ months of the season. They were buyers at the deadline. They are serious playoff contenders, one year ahead of schedule.

Ha! That is not at all what I said in the quote.

Just because you disagree with it or because it doesn't work doesn't make the judgment unsound. It's the same thing with the strategy for building this team.

To be fair, Panda's defense has never been as bad as it was this season. He has always been an average to slightly above average defender. We should see better defense from him next season. I think the Sox need to require a conditioning/dieting program for him during the offseason as well as in season. As far as Hanley goes, perhaps it's more of a lesser of two evils type of thing. As I've posted before, I really do not want Hanley at 1B. He may be more of a natural infielder, but he is not mentally in the game enough to play that position well, IMO. I think he would be more of a liability at 1B than in LF. You would also hope that with a year's experience under his belt that he would get better. Either way, the FO should insist that he work on that defense during the offseason. None of the scenarios look that great as far as Hanley's defense goes. You just have to hope for improvement. I was hoping for a JBJ, Betts, and Castillo outfield, but it's looking more and more like JBJ just cannot hit big league pitching.

It sounds like the Sox are committed to keeping Pablo and Hanley at 3B and LF, respectively, unless something happens in the offseason. I am hoping that those two will be committed during the offseason to improve their defense like Bogaerts did last offseason. It can be done with hard work. I agree that the pitching shouldn't be too hard to fix. One major acquisition and one smaller one for the rotation, along with a few inexpensive middle relievers, should do it. As far as the team being competitive every year, since this ownership took over, and that includes the 4 years that Ben has been the GM, I feel that the FO has put together a team that should have been competitive every year. I never once thought that, going into the season, the team had little or no chance of making the playoffs. Things have gone really badly 3 of the last 4 years, but I think the FO did its job during the offseason. Since they can't control what happens on the field, that's really all I can ask for. If the FO didn't spend any money or if the team (on paper) looked terrible, then that would be a different story.

Baby steps, I guess.

Sandoval was a big fan favorite in SF, and not just because of his playoff numbers. His likeability, his jovial personality, and the Panda image made him a very marketable player.

I'm not buying that the Sox were seduced by his playoff numbers, but if they were, and that's a big if, it was Lucchino and/or Werner that was seduced by them, not Ben.

The offense scored a whopping 6 runs in this series. Last night's game really ticked me off. I can't believe that the Sox could not score more than ONE stinking run against CC. It's CC for crying out loud! He stinks! Eduardo deserved better.

Every game in which ARod contibutes to a Yankees win really makes me sick.

It stinks to lose, but in the bigger picture, having those 3 guys pitch well against a team that has been scoring a lot of run lately is promising.

Rusney has hit well since being recalled. Hopefully, this is a sign of good things to come.