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Maxbialystock

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Everything posted by Maxbialystock

  1. Maxbialystock
    Very good point. Boy, have I misjudged you. Cora refused to play Story--oh, wait, he's been on the IL all freaking season Then he refused to play Chang. Oh, wait. Then he refused to play Reyes. Oh, wait. Kike was/is the 4th choice SS because the other three were on the IL.
  2. Maxbialystock
    Very good point. Boy, have I misjudged you. Cora refused to play Story--oh, wait, he's been on the IL all freaking season Then he refused to play Chang. Oh, wait. Then he refused to play Reyes. Oh, wait. Kike was/is the 4th choice SS because the other three were on the IL. After that, of course, comes not playing Duran enough.
  3. Maxbialystock
    vs. lefty pitchers these OPS's-- Turner .952 Refsnyder .932 Devers .888 Duvall .863 Yoshida .836 Chang .830 Kike .668 Arroyo .589 Alfaro .750 (career) Except for Alfaro, the above is also a pretty decent defensive alignment even though Dugo (OPS vs. lefties .654) is better than Duvall.
  4. Maxbialystock
    I've said just about all of those things over the last month, especially the job he did two years ago. It still bugs me that few Talksoxers give him much credit, but it was in fact a brilliant balancing act, especially with the pitching staff. You said at the beginning of this season that ideally Houck and Whitlock should be in the bullpen, and here you are defending Cora for using them as starters--for exactly the right reason. What other choices made sense? Right now I think most of us agree the Sox are undergoing a sea change: same overall boss, John Henry, but with a different perspective which is reflected in the hiring of Chaim Bloom, who could not be more different from Dave Dombrowski. And guess who has managed under both systems/VP's/GM's?
  5. Maxbialystock
    About Duran. I could not agree more he's been terrific this season. But, if you look at his stats, you see he was terrific in April (OPS 1.061), not so terrific in May (OPS .670), better in June (.765), and out of his mind in July (OPS 1.706). In other words, up and down. Nothing wrong with that, especially in a rookie, which he officially still is. But this board is rife with criticism of Cora for not starting Duran in every game and probably playing him every inning. That his OPS before today against lefties was .600 and against righties .906 is regarded as unimportant. The belief among talksoxers seems to be that Cora is impeding the emergence of greatness. And my rejoinder is simple: maybe the reason Duran has been so terrific--his OPS right now is .885--is partly due to the way Cora has used him. I say this in complete confidence that our collective knowledge of how to manage MLB players is at best modest and at worst obtuse.
  6. Maxbialystock
    You mean lefties on a pitching staff with a collective ERA of 6.01, of course.
  7. Maxbialystock
    Indeed.
  8. Maxbialystock
    And boy oh boy was he wrong. Without Chang at SS the Sox had no chance today.
  9. Maxbialystock
    I don't care if Kike's woebegone +0.1 is based on 9000 freaking innings because it's a plus not a minus, which makes him an average defender--15 errors notwithstanding. Also, if I'm not mistaken, this discussion is because of his errant throw on a difficult play in the very same half inning in which Walter hit the 2d batter--who later scored--to put him on base and then later didn't even cover first base on a routine grounder which should have been the 3d out. Plus the Sox won the game 10-3. I'm more than happy to agree Chang is the best defensive SS available, but I'm darned if I'm going to dump on Cora because of what happened in the 8th inning. Walter owns that "unearned" run lock, stock, and barrel. But he also pitched 3 pretty decent innings, so I'm fine if he pitches again for the Sox.
  10. Maxbialystock
    I'll take Bello, thank you, with his WAR of 2.9, 80 IP, etc.
  11. Maxbialystock
    Not that it means anything, but right now Arroyo and Kike have the same DWAR: +0.1.
  12. Maxbialystock
    I know, I know. If he had just started Chang at SS today, the Sox might have won.
  13. Maxbialystock
    This is no doubt coming as a shock to you, but nothing is more fundamental than hitting and pitching, which the Sox have done pretty nicely today and yesterday. Every now and then you can win or lose a game on defense, but at least 90% of the time it's usually one or both of pitching and hitting. There have been exactly zero MLB teams who won consistently primarily because of their defense. I am absolutely not in favor of lousy defense. I hate it when pitchers don't cover 1b. I love great defense and get pissed when the Sox trade away good fielding SS's as they have done so many times in the past because they definitely prefer good hitting SS's who aren't a disaster in the field.
  14. Maxbialystock
    As I recall, ERod hated to cover first and did so reluctantly, sometimes not in time. Sale is the direct opposite. When he releases the ball, he immediately goes into 5th infielder mode--and he is never late getting to 1b.
  15. Maxbialystock
    Wins Above Replacement-- Bello 2.9 Verdugo 2.8 Wong 1.8 Devers 1.7 Paxton 1.7 Duran 1.6 Turner 1.5 Martin 1.5 Yoshida 1.3 Crawford .9 Sale .9 Winckowski .8 Houck .8 Refsnyder .8 Jansen .7 Schreiber .6 Murphy .5 Duvall .5 Reyes .5 Pivetta .3 Whitlock .3 Sherriff .2 Walter .2 Chang .2 Hamilton (SS) -.1 Arroyo -.2 Garza -.2 McGuire -.3 Jacques -.3 Casas -.4 Kike -.5 Kluber -.8
  16. Maxbialystock
    Oh mighty seer of seers, with hat in hand and head bowed I must inform you that you don't know squat. The Sox won this game, 7-3.
  17. Maxbialystock
    Worth a celebration.
  18. Maxbialystock
    Good points. And who woulda thunk that with a 3 man rotation? I disagree with Duvall getting CF, but Cora's managing is an undeniable team strength.
  19. Maxbialystock
    However, thanks for defending Duvall. I went too far.
  20. Maxbialystock
    What freaking groove??!! The 1.669 OPS in April was for 8 freaking games. Far more relevant are his 22 games in June (OPS .548) and July (OPS .348). Or how about his OPS of .677 last year in 86 games or his lifetime OPS of .757? His OPS vs. lefties this year is .896, so that might be his niche even though Refsnyder's is .932.
  21. Maxbialystock
    Meh. I know the A's are bottom feeders at 25-64 (.281), but they are 5-5 in their last 10 games as are the Sox. Plus we are going with two bullpen games/starters with Paxton starting the middle game. However, the A's are also dead last in MLB in runs scored and in team ERA. They can't hit or pitch. But they do have 5 fewer errors than the Sox.
  22. Maxbialystock
    I think of Yoshida as a defensive liability with a DWAR of -0.5. But I also think some of that is because of his DH time. However, in 47 games in the outfield he has 3 errors. Dugo has 1 error in 79 games, Refsnyder 0 in 43 games, Duran 0 in 67 games, and Duvall 0 in 26 games--so maybe Yoshida deserves the -0.5.
  23. Maxbialystock
    I think mathematical parity has been around forever, but I don't disagree that right now it's impressive that 10 of 15 teams in the AL are at .500 or better. In the NL it's just 8 of 15 teams. A footnote to the above is that Miami, Tampa, and Baltimore team salaries are ranked 22d, 28th, and 29th in MLB and all have solid winning records. Indeed, all three have better records than the top four MLB team salaries: Mets, Yankees, Padres, and Phillies.
  24. Maxbialystock
    Impressive.
  25. Maxbialystock
    You said the same thing I said, only you said it better.
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