Maxbialystock

No need. I kind of like it. The Sox were also lucky that line shot took out the Royals starter. So Cora's lucky. Napoleon actually said he would rather have a field commander who was lucky than one who was brilliant. In Cora's case, luck is the residue of careful thought--and by thought I mean being ready to replace Weber early enough to limit the damage. Sox now up 4-2 with Brewer going 1.2 innings.

This game continues to be hopeless, despite the fact that JDM doubled to put men on 2d and 3d with 1 out and the score tied. WTF Cora. WTF Cora. Worst manager ever. Terrible lineup. Stupid starter.

No truer words were even spoken than that a game thread is an extended gripe session. Yes, Weber stunk today as he did last time. But this time Cora sent Brewer out with 1 out and men on 2d and 3d. He got a K and a fly out. Just lucky because we all know how dumb Cora is. Speaking of which, his stupid lineup just tied the game at 2.

He throws a lot of sinkers that break 8 ", which ain't bad. But big curves that break a lot more are more effective if you throw a lot of the same pitch. I think Weber's problems are: not enough variety; can't consistently hit the corners.

Meh. You really think switching Bogie and JDM between the 3 and 4 slots hurts? Right now Bogie is hands down the best hitter in the team and leads in runs, rbi's, total bases, OPS, slugging %, doubles, etc. But JDM, while down from last year, is 2d in OPS, slugging, dingers (tied with Bogies), etc. I like six righty bats against a lefty starter and think Chavis, Nunez, and JBJ should be 7, 8, and 9--just as Cora has them. But we'll see what happens. Four straight would be oh so nice. Weber was awful last time out, but pretty good before. Bullpen is rested thanks to last night and the day off Monday.

jacksonianmarch can be a pain, but overall is a good contributor. He can have some great insights and is good at opening new topics and discussions. Plus I have always enjoyed talking to Yankee fans because I usually know a lot about the Yankees in any given year. And this. For 86 years there was almost no point in discussing anything with Yankee fans. Now in the John Henry era the two franchise are very much on a level playing field.

Good numbers. You could be right. But my eyes tell me the changeup this year is basically a waste pitch. Last night, for example, he threw 102 pitches, 73 for strikes, and faced 29 batters. if the 15.8% held true last night, he would have thrown 16 changeups, less than 1 per batter. More to the point, he threw 72% strikes last night, but I think maybe 25% of his changeups were strikes. I could be wrong, but I remember the changeup in previous years being more than a waste pitch.

Well, you're smarter than I am because I went strictly on what I saw, not his history. jacksonianmarch predicted this current slide. The pitchers right now definitely have the upper hand, but I agree with you he should have the opportunity to make adjustments. I wouldn't trust him at SS, but the guy is a decent 3b, 2b, and 1b--despite the fact that he had almost never played 2b. Plus he has power.

I thought I'd comment on the above after having watched most of last night's game. I was right about all three pitches: slider is good/great; fastball is less fast but effective; changeup is not used much. But what I missed badly on was the combination of Sale's excellent command and Leon's pitch-calling. To me that is a big deal because in the ordinary scheme of things, no way, no how can a lefty with a great slider, good fastball, but not much of a changeup be able to pitch a 3 hit shutout--against anyone. This kind of reminds me of Uehara, another favorite. He had a great splitter, a not-so-fastball (89 mph), and great command. But he only had to go an inning or maybe 2 at the most. Last night was a dazzling 9 innings, including 12 K's (which I usually deride). From almost the first game he pitched for the Sox, I thought Sale was the most professional pitcher I'd seen on the Sox. He was completely focused on execution, which meant he let the catcher decide which pitches and which meant he was also fully capable of fielding his position. The polar opposite, I might add, of ERod and Pomeranz, both of whom took forever to agree on and then make a pitch and both of whom fielded their position fitfully. Cover 1b on a grounder to the right? Who, me? Nah. I would still like to see that changeup get back into his repertoire.

I love Sale's ERA in May, but not necessarily the way he is pitching. Slider's fine, even great. Fastball is less fast, but still effective. But the changeup has almost disappeared--more of a waste pitch now.

I like the WAR stat because it's the only one that attempts to evaluate the whole player and compare different skill sets--hitting, pitching, defense--to a common standard. But this example doesn't seem to pass the straight face test. No way is our bullpen comparable the Yankees.

I thought I would tack this on. I looked up the combined WAR's for 5 Yankees relievers (the 4 above plus Holder), and they added up to 4.3. I then looked up the 5 Sox relievers I named above, and their combined WAR so far is 3.8. So the idiot DD who assembled a worthless bullpen by going on the cheap ($5.5M for all five of them) just might not be a complete idiot. Since I happen to think the Yankees bullpen right now is their best asset, I actually think that $40M for their four best is worth it since their overall payroll is well under ours. And just maybe WAR isn't quite that useful if our best five have a combined WAR almost as good as the Yankees best five (actually, best 4 plus Holder).

I think the rotation and lineup can handle that, but worry about the bullpen going 17 games (including last night) in 16 days, especially if the rotation has some bad starts.

It's baseball, agree, but it's also statistics. Right now the Royals win a paltry 32% of their games, basically 1 in 3. We win a magnificent 52% of our, basically 1 in 2. So the Royals are actually a decent bet to win 1 of these 3 games based on their and our winning percentages. The Yankees win 64% of the time, so let's be generous and say they win 2 of 3. The Jays win 37% of the time which means 1 of 3, so even they are a good bet to take one of three vs. the Yankees. However, I emphatically agree with your basic point--in baseball, anything can happen, even when one starter is way better than the other.

An early start for a game thread, entirely merited. ERod should be solid, and so should everyone else.

I looked up bullpen salaries with an expectation of proving you can get a pretty darn good one for $30M/year. Wrong. The Yankees have four very good relievers--Brittan, Kahnle, Ottavino, and Chapman--who make a combined $40.4M. Chapman gets $17M, Britton $13M, and Ottavino $9M. And guess what the Sox pay their so-so bullpen? $5.5M total for Barnes, Hembree, Workman, Walden, Brasier, and Weber. Barnes is top dollar at $1.6M and Weber is low with $400K. Obviously, the Yankees can afford to pay more for their bullpen because they are paying less for their lineup and rotation.

Pretty close to my own philosophy, which means you are a traditionalist. I say that while also believing that the very rare occurrence of bringing in an outfielder to be a 5th infielder is pretty neat. What I dislike about those shifts is they are utterly mechanical and driven by stats. Indeed, the commentators now regularly spout more and more new stats about how hard a home run was hit, etc which mostly bore me. And this is coming from someone who actually likes stats and is always looking for a new statistical angle.

Something we have in common. I too was a huge Williams fan and followed his games/seasons intensely. But I never saw him in person--in the ballpark or otherwise, and rarely got to see him on TV.

I'm fairly pessimistic right now because I think this version of the Sox lacks confidence. But I could not be more pleased with the optimistic drumbeat from kimmi and from moonslav. I did not object to DD's decision not to invest heavily in the bullpen, and think they would have been fine were it not for the horrible start by the rotation which, combined with very few off days, put a heavy load on the bullpen. But right now, while I feel no compulsion to get Kimbrel back, I am envious of the Yankees bullpen. I think it is their biggest strength and gives the rest of the team confidence. Thus they are winning lots of games despite many injuries to the lineup. I do think the Sox have the hitting and the rotation to gain ground as long as the bullpen doesn't repeat what happened vs. the Guardians in games 2 and 3.

I have always said that the manager is responsible for wins and losses in the aggregate and whether they met the GM's expectations with the talent on that team. Right now it seems clear this team is under performing, so that's on Cora. I just have a problem second-guessing specific decisions because I think the manager has way more insight and stats and counsel from his coaches than we have. What he decides may not turn out well, but it is well-informed. Last year it was clear that those early win streaks became contagious. Well, so does losing become contagious. April was bad enough, but in May the Sox won 5 straight and were looking good. Then they went 7-10 or something before finally salvaging last night's win. The hitting is good. Not great or as good as last year, but good. The pitching is not good. Price is, and so are 2 or 3 guys in the bullpen. But Sale is a far cry from Sale, ERod's ERA is over 5 (it was under 4 last year with no ST, and this year he was the only starter he had a regular ST with 15 innings), Porcello is still Porcello, and Eovaldi has yet to appear. Plus Price missed several starts with the IL thing and then the flu.

Gotta go with Bellhorn04. Assume nothing vs. the Yankees lineup, especially when you are trying to salvage 1 game of 3.

Meh. Not much interested in the individual assessments. As for the Sox as a whole, right now they are scoring 5.33 runs/game vs. 5.41 runs/game last year when they led the MLB. The Sox have scored 315 runs to date, and the Yankees 310 (in 1 less game), but the Yankees are way, way ahead of us because their pitching is better.

They are in fact away games for Boston because during the American Revolution the Continental Army--largely, Massachusetts militia--kicked the British out of Boston in March 1776, and they never returned. The Howe brothers--general and admiral--attacked NYC in late June 1776 and the British owned it by October 1776 and until the end of the American Revolution in 1783.

Vehemently, I mean vehemently disagree with both points. First and foremost, the Sox starters do not routinely go more than 6 innings, which means the bullpen needs to handle 3 innings per game, not 1. What makes the Yankees bullpen so good this year isn't Soriano, but the other guys who precede him. Last night they shut the Sox down for 4 innings before the "lock down closer" even made an appearance. Secondly, we need Sale to start and eat some innings, not show up in the 9th in hopes that the bullpen, now under extra stress with Sale no longer starting, has somehow managed to hold the Sox lead. Yes, absolutely, the two losses to the Guardians were because the bullpen failed, and in the second game it was because Brasier who couldn't hold that 3 run lead in the 9th. But guess what? when you look at the box score, you see Walden had an uncommonly bad 8th, which forced Cora to use Barnes to keep the Sox ahead for the 9th. And Barnes did in fact stop the bleeding with 2 outs and no more runs. I suspect Barnes would have pitched the 9th too if the Sox hadn't scored 2 more in the 8th to get that 3 run lead. I might add that the rotation's regular failures to go at least 6 innings have put extra pressure on the bullpen. That started in March, but hasn't really gone away. Before the rainout Thursday at Yankee stadium, the Sox had played 13 games without a break, and in two of those games Price and Velazquez, botgh starters, combined for one stinking inning, 3 outs.

FWIW, you keep making sense, at least to me. Last year I think we can agree giving guys periodic rests, which runs completely counter to traditional views of what players should do during a 162 game season, sure didn't hurt and probably helped. It was the best season, especially the postseason, in Red Sox history, so the rest might have helped. So Cora tried to use rest for his starters in ST this year. Plus, as you say, starters throw a lot of innings and pitches and one in particular, Sale, burned out in the 2017 and 2018 seasons. That's beyond question when you compare his April-July ERA's with his August-October ERA's. Another point in favor of extra rest for starters in ST. That said, I do think April, for whatever reasons it went so badly, did create a confidence problem from which the Sox have not recovered. I suppose you can start with the rotation being so lousy in the early games, add in an 11 game west coast trip with no break which caused losses and overworked the bullpen, and suddenly the Sox are playing catch-up, the exact opposite of a year ago. The 5 game winning streak ending May 12 should have created a burst of confidence, but since then the Sox have gone 7-10 since then and are in danger of going below .500 today. During that 7-10 run the Sox played 13 games without a break, including two starts (by Price and Velazquez) then last 2 outs and 1 out, respectively, which maybe why the bullpen collapsed vs. the Guardians. Right now I think that Yankees bullpen is like the feather in Dumbo's trunk for the rest of the team--rotation and lineup--because they're thinking, "no biggie if we fall behind because the bullpen will shut them down and we can win later." Or, "all we need is a small lead that the bullpen can maintain forever." I say that because our rotation and hitting are about as good as the Yankees, but so far this season they are beating our brains out. Despite multiple injuries to their lineup and rotation.