Maxbialystock

Miserable game with just one bright spot. Cora sent Oviedo out to eat up 3.1 innings so the rest of the bullpen could, well, rest. Good decision. Hitting stinks except for Abreu, and Anthony is one of the stinkers. Durbin now hitless in 4 games. Dombrowski unloaded Suarez on the Sox--sort of.

So far a miserable freaking game. We can't hit, but the Astros sure can.

Thanks for the heads up. I'm looking forward to tonight's game.

Sorry, gents, but April 19 was truly the shot heard round the world. There are a flock of Leinxton's that were so named within a couple years after April 19, 1775. Like Lexington Kentucky and Lexington Virginia. It was because of Lexington that the 2d Continental Congress created the Continental Army in June 1775 and made GW its commander, after which he proceeded directly to Boston where his Army was. Sinking a British ship was small potatoes. Driving the British Army and Navy out of Boston was monumental and encouraged the 2d Continental Congress to take the next, gigantic step of the Declarartion. The immediate consequence of that was England sending an armada and fresh troops to beat the crap out of GW and the Continental Army defending NYC. That was so successful that by December 1776 the Continental Army was pushed all the way back to the other side of the Delaware River. That's when GW, after several councils of war aided and abetted by Thomas Paine's The Crisis, decided to cross the icy Delaware River and take Trenton, not once, but twice. Then he chased the British Amy back to Princeton and beyond. It still took 5 more years, Rochambeau and 15,000 French troops, and Admiral DeGrasse's fleet to prevent Clinton from reinforcing Corrnwallis at Yorktown in October 1781, the victory that convinced the British government that further efforts would be futile. Plus there were a bunch of British citizens, even members of Parliament, who were sympathetic to the American cause. My dad grew up on a farm in western MA and later was awarded 2 DSC's in WW II.

It occurs to me that this stance was taken strictly to stir the pot. Better to argue that Early should not have been sent out to pitch in the 6th inning. Crochet was pitching up a storm in his first start and Cora took him out after 80 pitches. I am by no means saying the Sox win if the bullpen starts the 6th inning. The 2 run lead still incurs risks. Weissler could still screw things up.

I like that. A better lineup with a good rationale.

You're cynical and I'm worried for the same reason.

I'm 85. I also taught field artillery gunnery at Fort Sill, so I value the ability to use data to predict outcomes. American field artillery started using weather and other data to achieve predicted fire in World War I over 100 years ago. Predicting game outcomes and batter vs Hitter outcomes are a lot dicier than gunnery, but they are no less important. On the other hand, no data anywhere would have suggested Anthony would be hitless today with 2K's and have 1 hit yesterday also with 2 K's. Meanwhile, the worst hitter in all of MLB got a single and a double today.

What nonsense. First and foremost, stats have been around as long as baseball has, only now they are even more sophisticated and predictive because of all kinds of data fed into comuters. There were 3 factors that caused Cora to make the sensible decision to pull Early: 1) 96 pitches, which was way more than Crochet threw in his first start--80 pitches; 2) this was the third time through the Redleg batting order which is when opposiing lineups are the mostly likely to hit a starter; 3) the next two battters were righties which gave righty Wichert the advantage. He threw a bunch of low pitches to walk batter #1. Then he decided to go bold against a guy who hit 49 dingers last season and threw 3 straight pitches in the middle of the zone, the third of which he clobbered. Then he got the next two guys easily with low strikes. I think Weissert choked against his first two batters. Last season Weissert had an ERA of 2.82 with 17 holds, 3d best on the Sox.

I did not see his stats from last year. WAR 2.8 ain't too shabby. 3d in ROY voting. He still stinks after 3 games, but OK. I gather the problem is that Cora and/or Breslow want to get Yoshida to get some at bats. OK, but he should never ever play LF.

Finally, something substantive to discuss. And the answer to me is simple. Dump Durbin from the lineup and add Yoshida as the DH. Anthony goes to LF, Duran to CF, Rafaela to 2b, and Abreu stays in RF. Mayer is way better at 3b than Durbin. Rafaela is probably better at 2b than Durbin at 3b. But you still lose that gold glove in CF. However, today's game convined me that Cora does not care about gold gloves. He took Rafaela out of the freaking lineup so Yoshida could play left field. Why not Anthony in LF and Yoshida as DH?

What old days are you talking about? The Sox have always been hitting centric. Breslow is changing that, but in the process giving away hitting.

Sox had their opportunities after the dinger. Abreu's hot and no one else is. OPS's are Anthony .746, Story .438, Duran .629, Contreras .540, Durbin .077, Yoshida .600, Mayer .889 (which is actually good), and Rafaela .600. Pitching was pretty good in games 1 and 3. Michigan just pulverized Tennessee 95-63. Mi

Oh stop it. This was his first start of the season and he threw 96 pitches. Weissert went in to pitch to righty hitters, walked one, and gave up a 3 run dinger to the next one.

If Durbin is average, MLB is no long watchable. He also has an error, so after 3 games more errors than hits.

Duran was brain dead.

Gotta like Durbin's bat. Who needs Bregman? Or for that matter, what's his name. Devers. Durbin stinks.

I'll buy that

Duran the saboteur.

What's fascinating about Anthony's last at bat is that they pitched to him, righty vs lefty, when righty bat Story was in the on deck circle. He struck out twice yesterday and twice today. Wong, meanwhile, has a double and a single today.

What's that song? "I lost my swing in Cincinnati." 1/9 in his last 2 games, both of them very close.

Meh. That's on Weissert not the manager.

Weissert, a name that will live in infamy. Three straight hardballs in the middle of the zone to a guy who hit 49 dingers last season.

You sure got that right. Forget how he's done today and look at his record and his age.