moonslav59

The defensive improvement should be even better.

..and they say they improved the procedure.

Agreed. If Wink is not on the opening day 13 staff, I will be shocked. It could only happen with no injuries, and Slaten & Mata looking good enough to want to keep on the team. Even then, we could start Campbell, Murphy or Weisser in AAA. If the idea is to definitively make Wink a SP'er, again, I think they can give him some 4-5 IP relief outings in April, every 4-5 days, until we shake things out. Wink is too good to put in AAA.

They can add Fitts (or Gambrell), once they have an IL placement, DFA Mata, Jacques or send Slaten back. [/b]

I think Snell goes to the Yanks, Bellinger to SFG and Monty is a total guess- maybe TOR. I'm thinking the best we can hope for is Clevinger or Bauer. Sad, but maybe even these are pipe dreams.

It won't be easy replacing Turner and Duvall, but remember, Duvall just gave us 353 PAs. Dugo was 3rd in PAs for the team, but posted a 100 OPS+. So, we have to replace 979 PAs by Turner (114 OPS+) and Duvall 119 OPS+)- call is a 116 OPS+ and 602 PAs from Dugo at 100 OPS+. Combined, that's nearly 1600 PAs at an OPS+ of about a 110 OPS+. That looks daunting, but don't forget to look at who else we are replacing: 323 PAs of Kike at a 62 OPS+ 206 from Arroyo at 70 112 from Chang at 45 (Yes, that bad) 109 from Urias at 91 ~160 from Tapia 90, DHam 22, Alfaro 5 and CHam -49. That's over 900 PAs at an awful OPS+ of maybe around a 60 or 65. I'm not sure what the total OPS+ lost is, but my guess is, it is around 100 in 2500 PAs. How do we replace those 2500 PAs? Maybe... PAs Player 3 year OPS+ (2023 OPS+) +500 Grissom 105 (78- still better than Arroyo) +450 O'Neill 120 (94- could equal the 100 by Dugo) +400 Story 95 (52- he just has to be closer or over 95 than 52.) +200 Duran 96 (121- kinda "dicey, too.) +100 Casas 126 (129) +100 Reyes 91 (94) Here is where it gets dicey... +350 Abreu 132 (SSS) +350 Rafaela 78 (SSS) +50 3rd catcher

I think he has multiple poster accounts.

As much as we have crapped on Sale and Paxton, the last couple years, they were 4th and 5th in SP IP for the team, last year and had the 3rd and 4th best ERAs out of our 8 SP'ers with 7 plus starts. Combined, they started 39 games and were 1 & 1/3 of an inning from 200 IP. That seems hard to replace by Gio, as the most he can start is maybe 33-34 games. However, those two are not the only SP'ers we lost and need to replace. (Team SP ERA: 4.68 as a reference point) 4.30 Sale 20 GS/103 IP 4.50 Paxton 19 GS/96 IP 6.26 Kluber 9 GS/42 IP plus 16 GS'd by openers and the likes of Dermody & Garza In the 47 GS by Sale, Paxton & Kluber, they combined for a 4.72 ERA (126 ER in 240.1 IP). That is slightly higher than the team SP ERA. The numbers for those 16 scrub starts: 5.47 ERA (24.2 IP and 15 ERs) They averages about 1 1/2 IP per start, which really taxed the pen, mightily, and often the opener was a RP'er. So, who gets the 47 GS lost plus the 16 odd starts? That's 62 GS to replace. (4.79 ERA in those 62 GS.) Here is my stab at the question, assuming everyone is healthy. Perfect world: (2023 ERAs as SP'ers) +32 Giolito 4.88 +14 Pivetta (16>30) 4.66 +7 Houck (21>28) 5.01 +6 Crawford (23>29) 4.51 +3 Bello (28>31) 4.24 It's nearly impossible to use just 5 SP'ers over a season, so I know this won't happen, but this may show we can come close to the same sucky numbers our rotation put up, last year, or even better, assuming Gio snaps out of his funk, and nobody shits the bed in '24. Who is the 6th starter? Whitlock? Winckowski? Criswell? Murphy/Walter/Fitts? I think one key to winning more than expected is to limit the starts by anyone below those 5 SP'ers.

JH is just a JH apologist.

Agreed, if he's not traded.

I'm not sure how waivers work, but can we pull Mata back off waivers, if someone claims him? I would not be torn up, if we lose him, but the guy was very highly ranked by soxprospects.com, at various points, so maybe he has something. (Yes, I know, there is a long list of top 3 ranked pitching prospects that never amounted to squat.)

Bloom tried to add young or younger pitchers in other ways than IFA and drafting, too. Whitlock, Winckowski, Pivetta (not real young when added,) Schreiber, Bernardino, Kelly and countless flameouts. Until we draft again, it's hard to know if Brez will change our drafting strategy. We do know little changed in this IFA signing phase. Only one out of the 7 players give a $200K or higher signing bonus was a pitcher. (Dalvinson Reyes at $450K) To be fair, the next two down the list were pitchers at $175K and $140K, making it 3 of the top 9. How Soon Is Now?

They are probably kicking themselves for not trading him before his injury was discovered.

Indeed. I made the same point about him being labelled "mediocre." We used 28 pitchers in the pen, last year! YES-- 28! Hell, 23 pitched more than 6 innings, and 19 pitched 11+ IP. It was a recycling bin. Where would Schreiber fall in those rankings?

Is this just 2023, after coming off the 60 day IL? What were his 2022 numbers like? Or, 2022-2023, combined? (Where do you find these numbers?)

You don't see an upgrade from 30th to around 15th at 2B as being significant? We don't need GG at 2B to see a huge improvement over '23. Yoshida at DH has to improve LF. Casas showed growth on D at 1B, as 2023 finished out. CF depends on how much Rafaela plays there. The Duran-Duvall combo of '23 was pretty bad.

OPS+ factors in the park played in.

Makes sense. Maybe Wikelman will be promoted from AA to AAA, at some point. soxprospects.com has 6 starters listed at AA. I find them "interesting," too. Wikelman, Dobbins, Bastardo, I Coffey, Song & Penrod. They also have Rogers and Duffy as part of 6 starters listed for Greenville. Out of those 12, I see 6 or 7 with some serious promise, but not to be a 1/2 SP'er, ever. They still have Wink as the #1 SP'er for AAA, followed by Walter, Criswell, Fitts, Gambrell & Van Belle.

I'm starting to see a glimmer of hope, but adding a decent SP would be a big step, even if just Clevinger. Adding Houck to the pen would be a big boost. Rotation- about the same. Pen- about the same. Defense- significantly better. Offense- should be better.

The rotation looks about the same as last year- same with the pen. Defense is surely better. Offense is up for debate, but I think our O will improve at SS, 2B, 1B, 3B and maybe C and LF. RF might be about the same. DH might be worse. CF offense should be significantly worse. 75 wins is an okay guess, but why say 75 max. We won 78, last year. How many ALE teams got better? 1 maybe 2?

Or, just have a fire sale on all 1 year guys.

They would be a tandem choice.

Greed is the American way. Except for baseball.

I can understand thinking 70 or 75, but not the max part.

I thought I was pessimistic.