Maxbialystock

Great stat.

I can't remember who, but at least one or two Sox have made good bunts this season. Maybe they were fined afterward.

No one was/is going to take Yoshida at half his salary--which I'm sure the Sox have tried to do. He is a DH/PH, not an outfielder. His OPS in July was .625 but so far in August is .822. Ref DH's against lefties. Why would the Sox ever want to bring up another outfielder? Tryouts are over. The argument about bringing Grissom up vs returning Hamilton is a better case, but Grissom is a righty hitter, as is Gonzalez. End of argument. Great observations on swinging vs taking pitches, but we should not forget that the Padres have one terrific bullpen. Last night Cease went 6, giving up 0 runs. In the 7th, Duran led off with a walk and Story singled, so in came Adam in relief of Cease. Adam hit Yoshida to load the bases, but then Bogaerts booted a sure double play grounder, to bring in the only 2 Sox runs. Abreu singled to load the bases again, still with no one out. Then both Rafaela and Toro struck out badly. With Anthony coming up, lefty Morejon was brought in and struck him out on a 3-2 count with his 5th sinker which was well inside (not in the strike zone). That sixth pitch was the only one Anthony swung at. Saturday night King started for the Padres and gave up 2 runs in 2IP. Then Peralta, Estrada, Morejon, Miller, Suarez, and Adam went 8 IP giving up 2 runs.

i like this better. I'm completely in favor of bunting--sabermetrics be darned--but don't think the Sox know how to.

The oven mitt is a mixed blessing.

A balanced game. The hitting absolutely stinks, and the pitching is just short of that.

That hurt. Two very bad pitches. First the HBP, then the fast ball in the geometric center of the strike zone on an 0-2 count. Does Bello simply lose focus?

I swear Bello is the only pitcher onthe Sox with a decent changeup, which works really well. Why do the other Sox pitchers avoid changeups like they're the plague?

Good golly, miss molly, did that double play put Bello in a groove or what?

Nice grab by Duran. Oh, wait, that doesn't count because Duran drops the ball all the time.

Well it sure gets brought up on talksox a lot. Plus during games by the so called analysts who don't know spit from shinola.

That double play was a thing of beauty. More than that, it had to be hugely beneficial to Bello's state of mind after walking the first batter. The freaking total errors by the Sox are hugely misleading. This Sox team can play defense, even with Rafaela at 2b and not in CF.

Check-the-check is almost as old as MLB. The difference is that MLB agreed homeplate umpires did not have the best view of batters' swings, so it was moved to the 1b and 3b umpires--except when the homeplate umpire is confident he saw a swing. And what I like about the current version is that there is no appeal. Most of the time they signal it was not a swing. No MLB pitcher in MLB is capable of 5 different pitches in the 90's. But it is true that the mix of pitches is crucial to pitching success. In 2013 Koji Uehara was hugely successful as a closer even though he threw just 2 pitches--a slow fastball that peaked at 89 mpg and a nasty splitter. Plus excellent control. Swinging at first pitches takes cojones in this modern era of scientific hitting (sabermetrics). I mean the entire movie Moneyball was about how Billy Beane went after hitters with good OBP's. Pitching didn't matter. Hitting dingers sure didn't. Fielding was in the back seat. So was stealing bases. Near the end of the movie John Henry offers him the highest GM (now CBO) salary in MLB. But guess what? John Henry was not the least bit interested in going cheap as Billy Beane did. He wanted good hitters and good pitchers, whatever the cost. When the curse ended in 2004 the Sox payroll was the 2d biggest in MLB--behind the Yankees of course.

Makes me think of the ABMC.

Amen!

One thing that kind of amazed me about the Padres pitching last night is how many of them liked throwing changeups. Almost no one on the Sox is a changeup artist. Bello comes the closest.

Of course not. When your OPS is as low as Hamilton's, you are obligated to practice your bunting.

A trick he later repeated with Rafaela. It seems it's ok to semi-push a baserunner off the bag.

Despite the loss, still a heckuva game. Hamilton is a clown. Can't steal 2b and can't bunt. That was a double play ball hit to Bregman except it bounced over his head/glove/arm.

Heckuva ballgame. On the West Coast against a pretty good Padres team.

😄

Now that is a deep freaking lineup. Anthony with a gigantic double after Rafaela steals 2b and Wong K's. Please note I crapped all over Anthony earlier on this game thread.

Too bad Hamilton was out, but the Padres bullpen remains omnipotent. Toro and Abreu both K.

Somewhere today I opined the Sox have a deep lineup, but tonight Bregman and Duran have 5 of the Sox 6 hits. Leadoff man Anthony is 0/4 with 2 K's.

With 6 walks maybe Giolito stayed in too long, but you know Cora and his pitching coach want to get as many outs from him as possible. Padres bullpen, as already noted, is better than the Sox. Anthony 0/4 with 2 K's. Bregman 3/3. Those batter timeouts by the Red Sox sure are effective. They're basically a white flag.