moonslav59

How is this not just like making excuses?

He might have done better, but I just don't get this whole idea that the circumstances would have changed, because DD stayed. I think the friction started between DD and upper bosses, soon after 2018. The changes in budget and prospect trading strategies seemed to change at the time the friction happened. Coincidence? Maybe. I am very certain, there is no way DD wins a ring with BOS from 2020 to 2023, unless some parameters changed drastically. He didn't get them to change their minds back in 2019, I doubt he'd have done it in 2020 or afterwards.

If winning is all that matters, we just need to win and this "light" thing won't matter anymore.

No doubt, many will fail or fall short of many of our expectations. It's hard to imagine many farm systems can reproduce a Betts, Bogey and Raffy in such a short period of time. I don't think any of us are thinking that is what we should expect. Yes, our young players who looked good, this year, still need to prove it was a not a fluke, but it's more encouraging to see so many do well than poorly. Even guys we gave up on, or nearly did, showed signs of life in 2023, namely Duran, Crawford and Wink, so early discouraging signs can't always be believe, either. I think you are wrong to say a better ranked farm only means it might be better than before. It also means it looks better than most other teams, at this moment, and that is much more encouraging about the future than being ranked 26th to 30th. They may all be duds. They may all end up like ben's farm that was traded away. That is true, but all a GM can really do is to try and improve the possibilities of positive outcomes. Nothing is certain in MLB. I happen to think our possibilities have improved over 4 years. Some think otherwise or don't want to be bothered with even thinking about this. To each his own. All I can say is I think our future looks better now than it did after any season since 2019, except for before 2022, due to our fine showing in '21.

I'm not "confident" the team leadership will switch gears, anytime soon, but I do think the foundation of our roster and budget have improved noticeably since 2020. It's not just about the farm. Although there are still many questions about our younger players and what we can expect from them going forward, we have a a lot of them, who have already shown glimpses of high abilities. Yes, we can be fooled by players like Dalbec and Duran, before 2023, but we don't need them all to do as well or better than they have shown. While Wong and McGuire sort of ended the season on a sour note, along with the whole team, they look more promising, now, than this time, last year (to me, anyway.) Casas looks like the best case for saying he has proven he belongs as a FT MLB player. His D needs a lot of work, but I am confident in his bat. I feel 10 times better about him than this time last year. EValdez looks scary on D, but has shown some promise he can transfer his minor league offensive numbers to the bigs. Reyes and Urias both have show skills, at some points in their careers- Urias for 2 full seasons.) Our OF took leaps and bounds forward from its pitiful 2022 showing, but mostly from vets (Dugo, Duvall and Japan vet Yoshida,) but Duran looked like a different person in 2023. Rafaela and Abreu showed some skills in limited time. With Dugo, Yoshida and Ref still on the roster, we don't need all 3 to be great in 2024- just maybe one, or two to be just good. What most excites me is how well some of our younger and pre-prime pitchers did, this year. Wick and Crawford look way better than we thought, this time last year. While Bloo struggled at the end of 2023, I'm not sure a single poster felt more highly about him, last October than this one. Houck and Whitlock took steps back, and it's hard to know what they will give us, next year, but I'm guessing at least one will be good, especially if neither are in the rotation. Devers, Story, Yoshida, Dugo, Martin and Jansen are the vets. (Devers may be younger than some of the "kids" I mentioned, but he's a vet.) I like our base, but we have 4 gaping holes (and they are doozies): SP1 SP2 SP4 Big RHB (CF? or 2B?) Maybe LH RP can make it 5, but I don't count our 5th or 6th best RP'er as "major."

I've thought about that, too. If that was the "long term plan," all along, the Story, Yoshida and Devers contracts still fit into that window. All the others were just placeholders, including Jansen and Martin. I had hopes 2023 would be "the year," and I see 2024 as promising, but only if we go "all in" on the rotation, which seems doubtful. We'll still need pitching in 2025, so maybe we go for a young one, this winter (and punt 2024) and add another in 2025. Like I've said, I'm done expecting it to happen, ever. I'm not saying I think JH will never spend, again, but I'm not going to expect it to happen for any "next season." I believe it when I see it.

Espinoza was a top 20 pitcher nationwide. How many of those do we get?

Playing it halfway was the worst choice, although Abreu, EValdez, Rosier and McGuire may end up being more helpful than originally thought. 2023 was basically halfway (or no way,) as all we did was add Urias.

In terms or wins and losses, yes. Story's injury and the decline from many returning players, some still firmly in their prime years was just too much to overcome. I look at the 2020 roster during a 60 game season, where we used 20 batters and 30 pitchers, and the roster now and see a northward direction. I look at the 4-5 years of youth and prospects from no prospects of note, other than Houck, to come up to the big club and help from mis 2017 until Casas and Bello, and what we have seen recently from our youth as northward movement. I see the farm as looking vastly better, but I know you don't care, until you see results. Back before 2021, I thought and said we had about 12-14 roster slots that need improvement to become a contender. I think Bloom swung and missed with many of his 2021 additions, but somehow we did well. Maybe that was just adding to false hopes, but 12-14 was better than the 18-22 open slots going into 2020 (after the Betts & Price trades and word that ERod and Sale were missing the full season.) Before 2022, I thought we had 6-8 open slots to fill- a continued move in a northward direction, despite crappy W-L records. No, I see 3-5 major slots that need to be filled from outside the system: SP. SP, SP, RHB (OF/2B) and maybe LH RP. The rest of the foundation seems good, with maybe a few relying too much on younger kids to come through, but those slots have 2-3 options, in case one fails. I guess I'm near alone in seeing progression amongst all the disarray and smokescreens thrown at us by team spokesmen. 2020 Team: https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/BOS/2020.shtml 2024 Foundation: https://www.soxprospects.com/2024.htm

I agree and by a wide margin. If it wasn't for the 2021 season, we'd be talking 4-5 years.

I remember arguing this point, back then. I wasn't so upset about trading so many top prospects away as I was about who we got. I loved the sale trade. I thought the Thornburg trade made sense. I thought Kimbrel was paid like a FA and was not worth trading so many prospects, when we should have just signed him a year earlier. As it turned out, closer costs sky-rocketed right after that trade, and that negated that critism. (Note: I WAS WRONG.) I had hoped we traded for Quintana not Pomeranz, although he would have cost more. All in all, I still have no issues with his trades. They helped create the best 3 year stretch in over 90 years. They helped create that magical 2018 season.

I never said it wasn't true, or that only a few believe it to be true. Personally, I think they know what they want and are doing, but are either horrible at communicating it to fans and the media, or they know the fans and media will not like what the hear, if the truth is fully told.

No doubt, but look at the balance sheet of successes. It's not even close. I'm not sure why you are so hesitant to admit that at worst, he got lucky and at best, he ended up doing okay with the farm, despite the 5 year gap that hurt us from 2019 to 2022.

It fits his narrative the Sox management is in disarray. He will latch onto any quote or story that supports his bias. Rinse and repeat.

I have admitted I was wrong, and will again now, if that makes you happy. Unlike you, I have no problem admitting I have been wrong many times, and more than these two you listed. I had no idea how good Bloom would be. It seemed like the direction we were going was to go cheap and try to build a roster with roughs in the gems, and Bloom seemed like that kind of hire. (I thought the same about the Dan D hire back in the 90's.) He did not succeed at what I hoped he would do. I did not make a prediction on whether he would be good or bad. You did and you were right. I'd pat you on the back, but it's all bruised and red from self-patting. I was a big Kike fan. You had big issues with that, for some reason. Yes, I thought the $10M deal for Kike as our 2023 CF was a good deal, at the time. I was dead wrong. No excuses. I was wrong. Very wrong. Is that enough, for you? I'll say it again, if you want. I was wrong on dozens of other opinions and suggestions. I make tons of suggestions and give my opinions freely and often. I get some right and some wrong. When I'm right, I don't pat myself on the back for months and years.

Some of the prospects traded by DD got hurt, and that is something very hard to predict. We will never know just how good Anderson Espinoza might have been. I thought, at the time, he was an overpay for Pomeranz, but maybe due to his injury, the trade looks fine, now. It does seem pretty amazing that DD traded about 20 players that were or once were top 20 prospects on the Sox rankings lits. The ones he kept have done way better. Call it mostly luck or happenstance, but it is true. In hindsight, those who said he "emptied the farm" turned out to be wrong, despite the sheer number of prospects dealt away.

This has become your new endless rant.

You need to work on you sentence structure.

I don't need to remind anyone about who the blind squirrel running up a broken clock is. You do that enough.

I didn't hear anyone say it was a 100% right hire. Who was it? Go look and get back to me... https://www.talksox.com/forum/threads/19592-Chaim-Bloom-in-as-DD-replacement/page4

Agreed. I no longer have any expectations the team will chneg course and add what is needed to build a true and serious contender. It may or may not ever happen, again. I hope we do, but hope has gone to the wayside 2 straight years.

I do think most fans down on the corner have no clue, and that is why they would just see this as no major change made. They jump to conclusions before a GM first day on the job. We've seen that here with one poster, in particular.

Lackey's deal was probably top 10 or 11, with inflation factored in. Not counting Devers, if you figure inflation, maybe 4 out of the top 10 have been traded (Sale nearly made it 5), and 2 were DFA'd (Pablo & HRam) before their time was up. With the Bogey opt out, he was not top 10.

I might have missed a couple pre-arb deals and extensions. Cots didn't list the Jenks deal, and I caught that, and maybe they and I missed more. Many of the guys not in red did not finish playing with the Sox, their final year of their deals, due to injury- like Clement. I should have put Peavy in Red, as we traded him in the big rotation purge..

I'd be fine with that, but it's not much of an image of "change" for the masses down on "the corner."