moonslav59

Yes, I meant to say "should" not "can." Going by age and injury history, the Yanks seem to have more doubts than the Sox with Sale and our two top RP'ers, who have very little injury history buy are very old. Not many of our returning pitchers have major injury histories. I guess Whitlock and Sale. Others have missed a little here and there.

Some is about health, for sure, but what else is new for the Yanks. You guys hoard injury-prone players like nobody else. Some are not about "health." Pen 2022>2023 fWAR 1.7>0.9 M King (more IP in '23) 1.5>1.1 Holmes (same IP) Kahnle pitched more IP in '23 than '22 and '21 combined (make that '18 + '20 + '21 +'22 combined) I'm supposed to cry over his loss? SP Cole, German and Schmidt pitched more IP in '23. We tried to convince you Rodon was injury-prone, last winter, but you would have no part of it. You were all over Paxton. I hope you won't expect sympathy for Severino's health, just like I won't for Sale.

You didn't mention our best returning pen arm: Martin. We also have Schreiber, Kelly and a few others that may shine in '24.

I'm not a big fan of FIP, and never have been. It is useful, but not as useful as OPS Against, ERA-, WHIP and K/BB factors. I'm fine with calling our pens even, but I still think ours would be better, if Houck, Whitlock and Crawford were in the pen FT. We can't project that for 2024, but we can't project bounce backs from Yankee players, either.

I like BTV and think they do a good job, for the most part. I don't agree with every valuation, and I think they are way off on Yoshida. I think he's more like -$5-10M in value.

The Sox pen pitched 36 more innings, but that's not the only reason we had a better fWAR. You cite FIP, the K rate, BB rate and HR rate, which is basically what FIP is. The Sox did have a better Save % (73% to 70%) and IR Scored% (31% to 36%) If you factor in the crappy D behind Sox pitchers, maybe we'd be leading the Yanks in several categories, not K and HR/9, obviously.

You certainly have a better rotation foundation. I'm not so sure your pen is better. Our 2023 pen had a better fWAR, and we had to use some of our best pen arms in the rotation. If Houck, Whitlock and one of Crawford or Pivetta stay in the pen, I like our better- for sure. Jansen, Martin, Wink, Schreiber, Houck, Whitlock, Crawford, Bernardino You mention the offense as being better and deeper, but that's not one position. It's not. You do have some promising ML ready prospects, but "promise" seems to look better to you, when they wear pinstripes. Casas, Duran, Rafaela, Abreu, EValdez, Wong and others have shown some skills at the ML level, too, as have pitchers Whitlock, Houck, Crawford, Winckowski and others. Promise is promise, but the starters we have, right now are mostly enter or in peak prime. Many of yours are past prime. Our oldest everyday returning player is 30 (Story)!!! You can talk about prospects, and they may turn out great. Ours have proven they can play or at least have shown some promise in small sample sizes in the bigs. 26 Devers 23 Casas 27 Dugo 26 Duran 22 Rafaela & 24 Abreu 27 Wong & 28 McGuire 26 Urias & 29 Reyes (24 EValdez) 29 Yoshida 30 Story NYY 31 Judge 34 LeMahieu 33 Rizzo 33 Stanton 26 Torres 33 Higgy & 30 Trevino (23 Wells 75 PAs)) 22 Volpe (.666 OPS) 27 Bauers (.693 in 272 PAs) 24 OCabrera (.574) 23 OPereza (.539 in 191 PAs) & 28 I K-F (.646) 20 Dominguez (33 PAs) 22 Peralta (.427 in 103 PAs) Ages of your returning pitchers in order of most IP (looks a lot better) 32 Cole 27 Schmidt 30 German 28 King 25 Brito 30 Rodon (should be #2 in IP, if healthy) 28 Cortes 30 Holmes 27 Abreu 28 Hamilton 31 Peralta 27 Marinaccio 33 N Ramirez 33 Kahnle The Sox 24 Bello 30 Pivetta 27 Crawford 27 Houck 34 Sale 25 Wink 27 Whitlock 37 Martin 31 Bernardino 25 Murphy 29 Scheiber 35 Jansen 22 Robertson The Sox 1-2 RP'ers are very old, but they may have a slight edge in age, elsewhere. Your pitching foundation is better. No argument, here.

BTV really loses some cred by having Yoshida at +$12.6M value.

Cabrera reminds me of DHern, too much. MIA does not want Yoshida, unless we may near half his deal. They don't want 1 year of Dugo for many years or EC. They might take Duran + for him.

Empty dreams. Rodon and Cortes can. The others are only getting older.

Maybe looking ahead to USC, and that is on the coach. How can the O line and rushing game look much better vs Ohio St than Louisville? They got beat fair and square. They have not been a top team in a very long time. The nationwide TV contract should lure top recruits, but I think the rigorous academic requirements hurt, badly. Not only do many great players not even get a look due to academics, the team usually benches several good players, every year, due to low grades. Don't get me wrong, they have "pad the GPA" classes at ND, too, and ways to get a GPA up that others students don't have access to, for free, but it hurts the skill level of the team. Lou Holtz somehow skirted the rules and won a championship, and that was our last one- way back in 1988.

Devers was an IFA from 2013, but was certainly on the radar under DD's term, and he did not trade him. He was not acquired by DD. The rest were... All acquired under DD: 2016 Crawford 16th rd draft, Mata IFA, Dalbec 4th rd, 2017 Bello IFA, Houck 1st rd draft, Rafaela IFA 2018 Casas 1st rd,, Duran 7th rd draft, Wikelman IFA, Bonaci IFA, Paulino IFA 2019 Murphy 6th Rd, Perales IFA, Castro IFA, Walter 26th Rd, SScott 10th Rd

I like Crawford, a lot. He looks to be very nice rotation depth and could possibly be a great long relief guy. I'm just extremely reluctant to count on anyone, other than Bello, as a reliable SP'er who can go 25+ GS and 175+ IP. Pivetta is reliable in this one sense, but we can't count on better than 4.50 from him. He'd be fine as the number 5, as long as our top 4 are solid. It is my preference to add 3 SP'ers and have Sale/Pivetta as the #5/#6. If Sale is healthy, we'd have a near revolutionary group of upside long men in the pen: Houck Crawford Whitlock Pivetta (In no particular order.) It would make yanking SP'ers early much easier, perhaps keeping them fresher for the late season and playoffs. Yes, PLAYOFFS! I know even 2 solid pitchers added might be just wishful thinking, but we should have the resources to add 3, if we trade for one.

I'm not counting Crawford's RP numbers. 2023 23 GS 4.51 ERA 1.189 WHIP 3.66 K/BB Garrett 30 GS 3.62 ERA 1.130 WHIP 5.34 K/BB Strength to go 30 starts? Last 10 GS or 2023 2.85 Garrett (after already starting 20) 4.75 Crawford Last 11 2.56 Garrett 4.30 Crawford

His 4.75 ERA over the last 10 starts screams at letting him start in the pen and maybe spot start or become the 5th SP, if someone gets hurt. I don't think he's ready to be pencilled infor 27 GS and 175+ IP. Like I said, I'd be okay with him as our #5, if we add two top quality SP'er. If you look at my breakdown, I don't count on Sale for anything, so with Crawford as my #6, it is likely he'd be the #5.

The whole "emptied the farm" was a mirage, at best and complete bunk at worst.

Garrett is a proven SP'er of #2 quality and upside #1 abilities. This is not even close. Crawford has proven nothing as a SP. In fact, he's "proven" he's much better as a RP'er. I would not mind Crawford as our #5, but to me, Pivetta has proven he is better suited at the #5 than Crawford. SP1: addition SP2: addition SP3: Bello SP4: Sale (too undependable for my liking at #4) SP5: Pivetta SP6: Crawford (better in long relief) If you guys want us to get a solid SP, but don't think Garrett qualifies, then be prepared to spend a ton getting someone better, either in money or traded prospects. Garrett is a top 25 to 55 SP'er in every meaningful stat or metric I can find. To think Crawford has proven he is near that is wishful thinking.

1. Garrett has done it for 2 years. 2. Crawford's numbers are improved by his RP innings factored in. He is 4.51 as a SP in 2023, which is like Pivetta's numbers over 3 years, so that's a #5 IMO, if we know he can repeat it. He is 5.05 career as a SP. 3. Crawford's last 10 starts showed he might have been tiring and may not be able to handle 25-30 GS and 175+ IP (4.75 in his last 10 starts.) I'm not dissing Crawford. I really like him, but Garrett is more proven. 2022-2023 Garrett ranks (some are RP'ers with 150+ IP) 77th in IP (248) 54th in fWAR (which suggests he's a #2 SP by WAR) 53rd WHIP at 1.18 44th ERA- at 85 (middle #2) 35th K%-BB% OtheOne meaningful number suggest he's a top 30 SP in MLB. 25th xFIP at 3.45 (same as Snell and better than Peralta, Luzardo & Kirby)

Who has even hinted at being "perplexed" he struggled at AA? Talk about assumptions. You say "guys" like there is more than one or all of us are perplexed, when I don't see one coming even close to that position. Why is it okay for you to assume, but nobody else? Nobody says it's a big deal. Nobody is saying they are sure he's coming to Boston real soon. Somebody questioned the comment on him "stepping back," and even you agree it might not be that. Somebody mentioned the injury might be part of the reason for his small AA sample size numbers not being good. That's it. Who (more than one) was "perplexed?"

Was it that painful to say?

I can't help but think back to the glory days, and the fact that the championship we won my freshman year was as a result of our 3rd string QB getting a shot due to injury to the #2 and flopping by the #1. Dan Devine had Joe Montana 3rd of the depth chart in 1977! You'd think QB, being the cerebral position, would be the one area we could recruit well in.

It's like comparing apples to oranges as Bloom made no major prospect trades, perhaps by mandate. No doubt, DD mastered the trade market and chose the right prospects to keep. It's really quite amazing. Some have argued he might not have even know who Bello, Casas and Houck were, at the time, and that their trade values were very low, when he was here, but the bottom line is he kept the right ones and won just about every trade he made. Even the ones he did not win, he never lost one badly. BTW, it's not just Devers, Bello, Casas and Houck, it is also Crawford, Duran, Rafaela, Murphy, Walter, Wikelman, Perales & Mata. I probably missed some. DD deserves some blame for where we have been from 2019 to maybe today, but in this area, he nailed it. In hindsight, the highly rated prospects he traded, mostly were overrated. The ones he kept were underrated or too far away to know much. The ones we wish we still had, we still got great returns for, so what's the beef? He nailed it- time and time again.

We did pay some bonuses, too.

My bad. I did not know there were two. I was surprised to see him ranked that highly. BTV has our Logan at 0.0 value, lol.

I'm not sure, either, but it might have just had to be Kluber and Mondesi or Joely.