moonslav59

I think Brez thinks he's right. He does make it seem like he's "the one" making the calls.

I was talking from the Sox and buyer perspective.

Very true, but I do feel like GMs worried more about Duran being unpredictable than others. His history was part of that. Some of his antic probably bothered some GMs.

We had our moment! LOL

I think you got em all, not just the important ones. Some are clearly TBD or neither side will get any plus or minus from, but you graded them anyway. Thanks for taking the time to do this. If you had to narrow down to 5 or 10, which ones would you choose?

Games started by the 3rd place Boston Red Sox in 2026: 0 Houck 0 Crawford 0 Sandoval 0 Oviedo 0 Uberstine & E Rivera and many prospects 2 Moran (1 IP opener) 2 Bennett 5 Tolle 6 Crochet 7 Bello 8 Gray 9 Early 9 Suarez

I thought so, too, but correct me if I'm wrong: Delay has been getting more time at C with WOO, right?

Almost everyone thought it best Early and Tolle start in AAA, knowing chances would arise.

Nobody has any proof that 11 people were offered the job and said no. One was not allowed to interview by his current team. Some declined to interview for various reasons. How many were offered the job and declined? I'll wait forever for the 11 links, but I know I will keep hearing "12th pick" again and again. Like I said, maybe he was they 2nd choice- maybe the 22nd, and maybe the 12th, but nobody has the proof. https://www.masslive.com/redsox/2023/10/mlb-notebook-inside-the-job-search-that-landed-craig-breslow-with-red-sox-mcadam.html

Seriously? This guy changed his stance 34 times. He sucked on D, then looked good, then looked inconsistent as all hell. Bat 69 OPS+ first 335 PAs (21-22) Okay, throw this out, like many won't with Mayer's first 335. 121 (2023) .837 first 1/3, .889 middle 3rd, .761 last 3rd 132 (2024) .777 first 3rd, .960 middle 3rd, .741 last 3rd 117 (2025) .736 first 3rd. .802 middle 3d, .787 last 3rd (pretty steady last year) His career shows very nice June & July (.860 and .855) April & May: .717 and .725 AUG & SEP: .754 & .633 Yes, he's consistent at being predictable in his inconsistencies. Bad, then good, then bad each year.

Take Brez's 5, 6, 7...10, whatever you choose, biggest trades and grade them.

This whole 12th in line thing is speculation, but it has been repeated so many times, it is viewed as fact, now. Teams interview or ask people to be interviewed all the time and not necessarily in order of who they want. It is also now true that everyone they interview, they'd end up wanting after the interview. One could argue some interviews are given for other reasons, besides a possible interest in hiring the chosen one. Maybe they wanted to pick their brain and get some ideas. (This is not to say it happened here.) I'm not arguing the atmosphere is anything but toxic, but no way anyone knows if Brez was pick #12 or #2 or even #22.

I think Duran's inconsistency and history of bad PR events hurt his value.

Too funny.

Did you even read where I said "I never said it was a good trade?" Bad trades are made every deadline. This one was not unique. GMs who need pitching settle on "wings and prayers." Nobody was excited abut Matz, either, but you don't mention that trade- for obvious reasons. I did not like the May trade at the time, but there was a chance he could have turned his season around. Stating that he got sent to the pen is unrelated to the why the trade was made at the time. Apparently, the Ryan deal fell through, at the last minute, and Brez was left in the cold, got desperate and flubbed up. Losing Tibbs is near meaningless, as of now.

Yes, pretty much. Tibbs was our 7th ranked prospect behind Garcia. I never said it was a good trade, but these kind of deals are made a lot. GMs take flyers on pitchers who once were good, who look like change of scenery might help, who might help a little now while the prospect is years away and maybe not a sure bet, anyway. You doubt these moves are made often by many contending teams?

The same thing could be said about every player ever traded. It was a shot in the dark trade- the type many teams try at the deadline.

To you maybe. He was a nice return for a salary dump. The fact that Brez later traded im does not change that.

Without knowing Brez personally, it's hard to distinguish between "aloof" and "smug." He has had some bad trade results, but I liked the Sale trade, at the time and the Priester trade may still end up a plus. Devers was a dump trade. Harrison may burn us, but the better he does, the better the Devers trade looks. He's made some good trades, too: Crochet, O'Neill, Narvaez, Gray, Contreras...

Maybe I should unsquint my eyes.

I think Azocar gets promoted, soon. Maybe... Azocar to GRE Jackson to POR (He's 22, YRod 20 and Gonzales 19.) Jo Garcia to WOO (mostly to DH) Montero or Thaiss traded or cut loose.

It's hard to know if Breslow learned a lesson from 2025. He's so smug & righteous, he likely doesn't even know he blundered the deadline. If we turn out to be buyers, it could be interesting to see how far he's willing to go. If we are sellers, it's easier to figure out who goes, and who stays. It would just be about who we get vs who we might have gotten.

To make his point look better. That one is easy. It's 13.9 to 8.0 from '22, when Story joined the Sox. Here are the trend lines since '22: 5.7>4.2>1.2>2.0> 2.4 (projected for '26) Bogaerts 2.5>0.8>0.8> 3.8> 0.3 (projected) Story

It's hard to think Durbin is just in a slump. I guess it's possible, but I can't see a .700 hitter no matter how hard I squint my eyes. He's been really bad. Because our 3B options are limited, he's comfortably holding the 6th slot in most team PAs at 158. With Mayer (142) still platooning, and Narvaez (102) sharing catching duties with Wong, Caleb may stay in the 6 slot for a while. If .650 is the "new .700," then .500 is the new .550. Durbin can't even stay over .500! We saw IKF jump over 100 points in one game (to .615), but he just reached to 50 PA sample size. It's bad enough having the worst hitter in MLB play almost everyday, but when we see/saw guys like Story (.547 and 4th in PAs) Duran (.593 and 3rd in PAs) Mayer (.596 and 7th in PAs) Narvaez (.624 and 9th in PAs) plus IKF with 50 PAs, you can easily see why our offense has sucked and sucked badly. Granted some better batters have very small sample sizes, but here are the PA total rankings of our best OPS guys: .839 Contreras 2nd .808 Abreu 1st .794 Gasper 14th out of 15 .793 Rafaela 5th .709 Yoshida 10th .697 Sogard 15th .692 Wong 12th .682 Monasterio 11th I'm not trying to argue we'd have more wins, if these "better batters" played more, but 5 of out top 8 most played players are outhitting many players with way more PAs. Wee are starting to see Monasterio and Sogard play more, due to Story's IL stint, and Durbin has sat a couple games, recently, but Duran (who might be starting to heat up) Durbin & Mayer are still playing a lot. In many ways, they sorta have to.

24+ IP ERA (OPSA) 0.74 Eyanson .350 1.85 Bennett .518 3.03 Futrell .621 3.06 Brown .602 3.91 Bickerstaff .711 100+ ABs 1.026 Arias .947 Gasper .943 Gonzales .919 Capra .915 Azocar .908 M White .877 Godbout .871 Sogard .865 Winnay .835 Baez .810 Heyman