Maxbialystock

Bloom sure looks like a carbon copy of Epstein--Yalie who loved baseball (but only Theo played in HS but not at Yale) and went into MLB right out of college. However, three big differences: 1) Bloom grew up in one system, the Rays, which placed a premium on developing players because buying them was out of the question--the Rays have consistently had team payrolls near the bottom of MLB; 2) Bloom literally wrote the book for the Rays system of developing players, especially pitchers, which has proven to be very successful; 3) Bloom's entire MLB experience was with the Rays, whereas Epstein worked for the Orioles and Padres before coming to Boston, which means Epstein was/is probably more adaptable. I think Chaim Bloom was a great hire, but I am less sure that he will be a good fit because the Sox are consistently profitable even when John Henry approves team salaries among the highest in MLB. Neither he nor his GMs nor the Red Sox Nation are known for their patience. Also, if Chaim Bloom intends to overhaul the Sox entire system, how receptive will all those scouts, coaches, minor league managers. etc be? The movie Moneyball exaggerated (for dramatic effect) the negative reactions of the scouts, A's announcers, and especially manager Art Howe to all the trades and moves Billy Bean made, but there was a kernel of truth in there. Heck, had I been an A's fan, I would have said Billy Bean was nuts. My guess is that Chaim Bloom, who wrote an article published in Baseball Prospectus in 1997 (when he was 14) and has therefore been a real student of the game for 23 years and an MLB professional for 15 years, already knows all of the above and will steer a course that blends the three approaches: 1) spending some real money where it makes sense, but 2) bringing team salaries down comfortably below the MLB salary cap, and 3) at the same time building a badly needed system for developing players, especially pitchers. Item 2 has already begun, and 3 has probably been initiated in some form, but so far I haven't seen examples of 1 (spending real money on players where it makes sense).

I enjoyed it too. Great start, and then the bullpen came in and leaked away that 4 run lead--the most infuriating being Barnes' gopher ball in the 9th. Thinking back to how the game evolved, I tend to agree with your randomness theory. Either team could have won. That said, the Yankees starter gave up 4 runs in 4.2 innings. The Yankees bullpen gave up no runs in 4.1 innings and one "unearned" run (extra inning runs are all unearned) in 3 innings. That was by and large part of a season-long pattern, the Sox bullpen completely outmatched. The Sox still have the worst ERA in MLB even though it's coming down a little. I think it got to 6.2 and maybe 6.3 and is now 5.9.

Houck's slider is gold tonight. I normally support umps, but tonight clearly Houck is outperforming the home plate ump.

I think Brad Stevens needs to bring in Houck because right now the Celtics defense sucks.

So far Houck's slider has been his best pitch. Celtics lead 34-24 in the 2d quarter.

Houck relied heavily on the fast ball in the 1st, but got lucky with those two hard hit outs. Two sliders out of the zone (low, which is good) got it to 3-2, followed by a nice fastball, swung on and missed, on the outside corner. Go, Sox!

This season I've been madder at the Sox than I can remember--going all the way back to 1949 when I started reading the box scores. But even this year I have enjoyed some of the games, including the last one, which allowed the Sox to split that 4 game series against the Rays.

I'm fine with one person for the whole series GT, but have never thought Miami was that special--even after spending half a day on Fisher Island. I wasn't that enamored with Honolulu either, and it's nicer than Miami.

Back to the OP and the question asked in the thread title. Mookie was traded because his salary was going to be--and now in fact is--prohibitively expensive for a Sox team with an already high payroll and weak pitching. He was/is unaffordable if the goal was/is to produce a winning team capable of a 5th WS in the John Henry era.

I'm doing this on the Talk Sox forum because I'm focusing on just one guy, Rafael Devers, and one team the Sox. I've tended to view WAR favorably because it does try to include the whole player in that one stat. But I just looked at the Sox stats to date and discovered that so far Rafael Devers is absolute poison for the Sox with a WAR of -0.8, which is easily the worst on the team. Next worse is JDM at -.5 and after him Peraza at -0.4. Granted, he has 9 errors, but he also is second on the team in total bases--59 to Bogie's 66--3d in RBI's, and 4th among regulars in OPS. Meanwhile, every single pitcher on the Sox woebegone staff has a better WAR than Devers. Please don't tell me that's apple and oranges because the whole idea of WAR--wins above replacement--is to allow comparisons between all players. Anybody want to join my war on WAR?

I'm doing this on the Talk Sox forum because I'm focusing on just one guy, Rafael Devers, and one team the Sox. I've tended to view WAR favorably because it does try to include the whole player in that one stat. But I just looked at the Sox stats to date and discovered that so far Rafael Devers is absolute poison for the Sox with a WAR of -0.8, which is easily the worst on the team. Next worse is JDM at -.5 and after him Peraza at -0.4. Granted, he has 9 errors, but he also is second on the team in total bases--59 to Bogie's 66--3d in RBI's, and 4th among regulars in OPS. Meanwhile, every single pitcher on the Sox woebegone staff has a better WAR than Devers. Please don't tell me that's apple and oranges because the whole idea of WAR--wins above replacement--is to allow comparisons between all players. Anybody want to join my war on WAR?

Therein lies the tale of the 2020 season.

Agree with moonslav. Moreland had a spectacular start to this season, but that just gave him better trade value. Not a player to build on.

I do get espn+ and can assure the blackout extends there as well.

Apparently not. Too bad for Holt, a very likable player.

Thanks. I questioned that trade because I had no knowledge of what the Sox were getting.

I've been using it for at least 5 years to watch Sox games. MLB has a policy that games on mlb.com can't interfere with local teams coverage of games. I lived in Fairfax County, so that meant Nationals and, far more often, Orioles games would be blacked out. This was fine because I could get them on the local TV station. Now I live in Greensboro, NC and have learned that despite the much greater distance from Washington and Baltimore, I am still blacked out from watching their games even though there is no other means (TV or otherwise) of watching their games down here. Plus Atlanta--of course-- is on the blackout list. What makes all this worse in my opinion is that there is also no possibility this season that I could attend any of these games in person. In other words, MLB and especially the Orioles and Nationals franchises are throwing away a viewing customer to whom they could show commercials (on mlb.com) between innings and when pitchers are changed during an inning. One more thing. mlb.com offers two feeds for most games (that aren't shown on cable by ESPN or Fox): the home team's and the visiting team's. Given that, I wonder why they don't just blackout the Sox feed (NESN) when the Sox are playing the Braves, Nationals, or Orioles. To me it's dumb, but what do I know?

Not here for Pedroia. Title of thread is Realistic View of 2021. Thus this question: what is value of trading Workman and Barnes in terms of preparing for 2021?

Great timing and a dynamite OP by moonslav. oldtimer is right to applaud him. Almost everyone on talksox is way ahead of me on figuring what to do about 2021 in terms of deals and players. Having said that, it is a no-brainer to say that the pitching must be fixed. I'm a believer that bad pitching is bad in itself--by giving up those runs (and the Sox ERA is now comfortably last in MLB)--and also bad psychologically because the lineup players all know no runs are enough, ditto great defensive plays, stolen bases, whatever. That said, the recent experience with DD and the commentary on talksox have convinced me that no fix, no matter how clearly needed, will be easy.

I meant this to refer to vegasbob's earlier complaint about the ump.

Ahem. I don't think the umps are the problem tonight. There is a qualitative difference between these two teams so immense that, were this home plate ump actually, even deliberately calling pitches in the Sox favor, they would still lose comfortably.

One of the best opening game posts ever. Mood-setting.

Just a rotten game played by a rotten Sox team. Pitching, hitting, fielding, baserunning--there is nothing these guys do well with any consistency. No errors, but Pillar totally misplayed an easy fly out and Chavis mishandled two grounders, one getting stuck in the web of his glove.

Rays score 8 runs twice in a row, winning 8-7 and 8-2. Sox now have 2d worst winning percentage in MLB and the worst in the AL--with 28% of their season now completed. The good news? Only 47 days left in this woebegone season.

Blame the hitting, not the pitching.