moonslav59

Some of these bargain basement additions from the past have started to pay off for us. Some of this year's, too. On Kelly, before tonight, he had the best OPS Against on the team at .450. Only Jansen (.499) and Houck (.528) are even close. What might be surprising to some is that he has more PAs Against (batters faced) than Jansen and Martin and almost as much as Booser and Bernardino. While the 13 BBs is concerning, the .125 BA Against makes up for it. He's only let up 3 XBHs in 88 ABs.

The Yoshida Issue may end up solving itself, if he does nothing over the next 1-3 weeks. It's hard to imagine the leash being longer than that, if he keeps doing little or nothing. It would be one thing, if he was replacing players hitting in the 5 or 6 hundreds, but he's not, and I'm not just talking "hot hand," here. Some of these guys are hitting better than he is and better than his career .754 for this full season. Of course, we have to realize some of the guys hitting better than him may be on unsustainable paths, and can come crashing down to earth, at any moment. If they do, even Yoshida at .600 to .650 might be an upgrade, but it's hard to project this to happen, right now. Valdez, DHam and Romy don't seem to be letting up. Ref and O'Neill are both hitting like they deserve a FT slot in the order. Abreu is back off the IL and absolutely kills RHPs. If Yoshida could play 1B, we could play him there, until Casas returns, but he doesn't. Our OF is already squeezed with the Abreu return and Ref going nutty, again. Moving Rafaela to SS helps a bit, and squeezing Vadlez/DHam/Romy looks to be better than squeezing Duran/O'Neill/Abreu/Refsnyder. It looks like DH is the only place for him, but it had been a place to get Ref, O'Neill, Valdez and others some more playing time, and they have been rocking the joint. To me, when healthy, these guys need to play almost exclusively FT: Devers 3B Wong C (as much as we can without burning out his legs) Casas 1B Duran LF (CF when Rafaela plays SS) Rafaela CF/SS O'Neill LF/RF/DH Refsnyder DH/LF/CF That's seven slots taken. Abreu should start vs all RHPs, and Valdez & DHam have done well enough to keep playing vs RHPs, too, but Yoshida will get the look over them, if possible. Since Yoshida does not play 2B, he won't beat them out, there. Sadly, it will come down to benching an OF'er vs RHPs, so Yoshida can DH. Oddly, Yoshida has a better situation to DH vs LHPs, due to the unbalanced nature of our batters, especially the OF. Since Abreu sucks vs LHPs, he's an easy platoon choice. Valdez has not earned the right to start vs LHPs, either, so DHam and Romy can play 2B or 2B & SS, as Rafaela plays CF (or SS.) We could play Rafaela at SS, Duran in CF, Refsnyder in LF and O'Neill in RF with Yoshida at DH. It's too early for me to say we should DFA him, if nobody takes him off our hands at 10-20% of his cost, or even 5%. He could still find a groove and redeem himself, but at whose expense?

We passed KCR, today and are in the WC3 slot by o.5 games (on KC.) We have the 10th best record in MLB. (-1 from #9 MN and -2 from #8 SEA. -2.5 from ATL and -3 from MIL#6. That being said, we are also just 4.5 games from the bottom 10 in MLB.

Of course. I see it more as the pace we have been playing at and not as projecting the exact same thing to happen over the second half of the season. Not long ago, we looked like we were destined to be a .500 team. At times, it looked like getting to .500 at the 162 game mark would be very difficult. Yes, one game at a time. We have a lot of tough series ahead of us, many against teams looking to make the playoffs, at our expense. A lot can happen, but this has been fun, so far.

Our pace is 87 wins, right now, and we are looking at this, right after our best stretch of the year. It still counts, of course, and there is no reason to think we can't keep up a .538 win %. To get to 92 wins on the year, we'd have to go 50-34 or almost a 60% win%. While that does not seem impossible, that is a pretty significant step up from what we have done, so far. A 6-7% improvement is a lot in MLB. It's not impossible, for sure. As of now, we are the 3rd WC team, 1/2 game ahead of KCR and 4.5 ahead of the streaking Astros, who we have yet to face- twice. Current Pace to win: 103 BAL (#1 WC) 88 MIN (#2 WC) 87 BOS (#3) 86 KCR (outside looking in by 1 game) Maybe 87-89 wins is all a team needs to grab the last slot. Look for HOU to make a strong run. (I wish we played them, earlier in the season.) As of now, we rank as such in the AL: 5th in Runs Scored (4 behind MN and 1 ahead of KCR) 4th in OPS (.002 behind HOU and .003 ahead of MN) 2nd in OBP/ 5th in SLG 1st in SBs & Triples (2nd in 2Bs) 5th in ERA (0.07 from BAL and 0.11 from LAD/ +0.02 on CLE) 5th in WHIP (0.01 from BAL and 0.01 up on CLE & 0.02 on NYY) 7th in ERs Allowed but 21st in Runs Allowed thanks to crappy D. 24th in Outs Above Replacement (13th in DRS & 17th in UZR/150) I'd put our D in the bottom 10, but perhaps it belongs between 15-20th. Usually, a top 5 Offense and top 5 Pitching staff is enough to make a team a cinch to make the playoffs, and even a bottom 10 Defense can change that, but we are still clearly on the bubble. If we keep playing like this, we are in. It's hard to know, if we will do that. I'm hopeful. I'm optimistic. I'm also concerned we may not. The holes we had in April and May, are still there. Our rotation is not as strong as it was over the first 5-6 weeks. Our bats go hot and cold on a dime. Our poor D still shows up, from time to time, although less often, of late. Our pen has been a strength, but now we have had a few pen games that really tax the staff. We are looking at Criswell returning. Wink and Campbell have looked good in AAA, recently, and Hendriks is kin of a wild card for the last 2 months of the season. Maybe Fitts earns a shot. Maybe Crawford, Pivetta and or Crawford bounce back, a bit. Maybe Bello pitches like he did, last June, July and August. We still have some big ifs, but there is more to be optimistic about than pessimistic, right now.

While he is 5th in fWAR among OF'ers, there is also this: He was 0.1 behind Tucker, before today. He may be tied, now. He is T7th in overall AL fWAR, which is a pretty good tool for measuring the overall value of players. I think he belongs, along with Wong and Houck, but it would not surprise me, if Houck is our only rep. I do not think fWAR is what most fans look at before voting.

Woo lost 9-7, and it looks like Meidroth is taking a break from walking and just hitting the ball, now, going 3 for 5. 3-5 Westbrook w HR 2-5 Lugo w HR (.742 OPS in AAA) Sogard walked 3 times. POR lost 2-1. (I never got around to see them, this summer.) Mayer and Teel did not play. Anthony went 0-4. GRE lost 6-5 Jh Garcia homered (1.027) Bleis 1-4 w BB

Updated MLB OPS Leaders after Sox game (other games still in progress:) 160+ PAs 1.109 Judge 1.030 Ohtani 1.018 Kwan .994 Soto .986 Ozuna .979 Tucker .955 D Fry .955 Harper .917 Pederson .914 K Carpenter .900 Freeman .896 O'Neill 12th .894 Profar .893 Betts .890 Whitt .889 Devers 16th .885 Refsnyder 17th .885 H Ramos .882 Yelich .881 Pillar .877 Y Alvarez .872 JD Martinez .870 Correa .870 Wong 24th .860 J Ramirez .852 R Greene .847 Bohm .843 Westburg .842 Rooker .842 E Sosa .840 J Turner .837 Naylor .837 McMahon .837 Schwarber .835 Duran 35th .835 K Marte .833 J Ortiz .831 Rutschman .824 Paredes .823 Abreu 40th 6 in the top 40! Looks like the offense is coming around the bend!

No doubt, he's having a rough time in those specific situations which amount to these sample sizes: 78 PAs w RISP (When you factor in he was walked 12 of those 78, his chances for rbis other than by HR was 62 ABs) 25 RBI in 62 ABs 138 PAs w Men on Base (116 ABs) 30 RBI in 116 ABs All hitters have ups and downs, within a season and from season to season. I'm not reading into this low RBI start as much as others, but it certainly has hurt our chances at winning more than we have.

LOL. Not on a ledge, though, right? LOL

Jansen has become the beats he once was. Some of us were questioning his apparent declining trend, earlier this year, but man o man, were we wrong. This team has a lot of heart and soul. I'm not sure those are the best words. Maybe "grit" is better, but you gotta feel the shift in attitude and confidence. We are coming back in games, in series and overcoming some bad trends we saw earlier in the season and in May. We should all know, we will have a rough patch or two, at some point, but I'm feeling more and more confident we can keep those stretches short and the good ones, longer.

It would sure upset a lot of fans. This season, has a feel like 2021. Not many had high expectations going into either season, and a bunch of things went right that overpowered the bunch that went wrong. The Schwarber acquisition was a big part of the continued success and near ALCS championship. Lesser pick-ups like Iggy, Shaw and Robles helped, too. The highest ranked prospect we gave up, that year, was Aldo Ramirez. I could see Brez trying to do something along those lines, this deadline. Maybe we trade O'Neill and also acquire a couple key pieces. A couple weeks ago, I was feeling like we were at about a 90% sel chance. Now, it looks under 50-50.

Not even close to one. He's shown no sign of decline and is doing better in almost every category, except RBI-related ones. (BTW, I'm not one who believes that clutch is a sustainable skillset.) He's just now entering peak prime, so no, I do not expect or see any sign of decline. Ask me in 2-3 years.

He's having his career highest OPS+ season. His rbi's are low, okay, but he hasn't done real poorly with men on base (.792) or w RISP (.772.) He's still got time to right the rbi ship, this year. He's on his career pace of 33 HRs per 162. He's above his career OBP & SLG, His D has improve, a lot, since April. I'm not seeing a hint of a "curse" with Devers, yet.

He had a pretty good game, last night.

Also, I think Rafaela is starting to turn some heads and quiet some fans who wondered, if he might never hit well enough to stick. Ref has done very well for us vs LHPs for a few years, but he has improved his overall game, too. Abreu and Valdez have looked very good, despite Abreu starting out on the bench, and Valdez being demoted, after a rough start to 2024. We've seen a lot of growth from close to 10 young Sox players, this year... maybe more.

Just got caught up live, WOW! Nice game, so far. The pen has been a big plus for this team and has not gotten a lot ot props. Duran DA MAN! Ref, again, proves why he should NEVER sit vs LHPs and maybe not even most righties. Wong is no fluke. He's past the point of SSS wondering. Romy-DHam keep chipping in. Nice group effort,

While the Tax line shows about $218M ($18M under the first tax line,) the player 2024 payroll is about $171M. This number includes: 17 Sale 1.5 Cooper 1.0 Joely 1.0 Hosmer+Reyes+Jacques+ V Gutierrez In total, over $20M for players not on our rooster. and... 22.5 Story 18.6 Yoshida 18.0 Giolito 3.5 Whitlock 2.0 Hendriks This is almost $65M on the IL or just came off it (Yoshida.) Together, these two lists equal about $86M, which is almost exactly half of our 2024 payroll. Stunning!

Pittsburgh is a very nice place to live. I’d like to see a game in Cincy, someday.

I’m envious! Enjoy!

I have to admit: I had serious doubts we’d get the W, today.

That might be the best we can expect!

Left Maine, today. Back to my tiny corner in Texas. I’m off to Spain and Portugal on Monday, for three weeks. I probably will not be posting as much, so many of you will be happy about that. Go SOX!

I was really hoping he’d show he was back in the groove. Sadly, he was not.

One could go back to Pujols