moonslav59

I certainly expected more quality than quantity, this year- thinking we had more money to spend and less slots to fill. We may not spend that "more money" and may just match last winter's spending while losing a lot more talent than we did before last winter. 8-9 players added? I do n't get it. No spending the $80M remains to be seen, but unless we trade for salary, we'd have to buy up the best 3 FAs to spend it all.

The problem with a 5 year plan that does not include losing in most of those 5 years is how to acquire top prospects. It's not like the old days where good players fell in the draft due to "signability" issues. Once you've established a strong farm, it's a little easier not needing to focus nearly everything on adding to it, but we've only just begun to arrive at that point, and maybe they still think a while more is needed- like the full 5 years- not 3.

He might add two more LF/DHs!

True. Who in the system, now, might pass Romero? Perales? Walter? Wikelman, Anthony or some super young guy?

Well, Whitlock was acquired a couple years back and Bello just graduated. Those two alone, blow away any pair we've seen in a long time. The top pitching prospects we have now may not wow anybody, but they might be better than we've seen in a long time: 6. Mata 8. Walter 10. Perales 12. Wikelman 13. Murphy 19. Rodriguez-Cruz German, Kelly, Seabold, Drohan, Paez, Uberstine Grads: Wink, Ort & Crawford

How long should it take to complete two major aspects of a true rebuilding of the farm? 1. Acquiring high quality prospects via the draft, IFA and trades- rarely Rule 5. 2. Developing and waiting for them to mature once they reach the bigs? Did anyone really expect to start seeing 1-3 meaningful prospects called up in 2-3 years and then see that become a steady flow? Again, we saw only Houck do anything meaningful since Devers in 2017. You demand a budget slash of massive proportion and hand the GM top salaries like Sale and others like JD and Nate who were kind of up and down over the last 3 years. Was the hoax the 5 year plan or some fans' belief we could possibly reach glory in 3 years? I think you know my choice.

1) I said you CAN BLAME him for failing to project an uptick. (I doubt anyone saw Bogey getting $280M.) 2) Recognizing an elite player does mean you pay them anything and everything, and I agree it came down to what value they assigned never was what Boras demanded, which may or may not have been an acceptable market price at any time. Even if it was, the Sox never valued him that much. Right or wrong. 3) Thinking we might get Bogey at $200M/8 and saying he's a top priority may not be a lie, and nobody really knows how close we ever came to what it would have taken. If they thought they could have gotten him for ____ and they grossly underestimated, one could call that incompetence, but it still doesn't mean they'd have chosen to pay what it took. (I'm still not sure we made the wrong choice. Bogey is an elite hitter who is not an elite defender as we move away from the shift and he made it known, he does not want to change positions.) We have no idea of knowing what they wanted. IMO, they never wanted Lester at even the last offer they made him, so I do think all the talk could have been a bald face lie, but they also could really have thought they were going to get him at a price they felt he'd take and SD blew them out of the water. Incompetence? Maybe. Maybe they set a price that was what he was worth of even more, and they missed out. I'm not sure it's a mistake. Only time will tell, and the record of highest priced FAs earning their keep is not great. It's easy to scream "YOU F'd UP!" But, let's see. While I had hoped we signed Betts, I think they handled that one about as well as could be expected. $300M, at that time was a fair offer. When they knew he was going to free agency they got what appeared to be about the best they could for him. The stupid 30 year old pitcher rule was at the heart of the Lester fiasco. No argument from me on that one. What upsets me about the Bogey situation is that it doesn't appear like we are going to spend what we were prepared to offer him, whatever that was, on other higher quality players. If we trade for a solid #1/2 SP'er and sign Andrus and maybe Kluber or Fulmer, I'd be fine with the winter moves, in totality, despite hating to see Bogey go.

Well, we haven't traded but one top 20 prospect (Aldo Ramirez) since the Beeks trade in the summer of 2018. Before that, we had traded over 20 prospects and players who at, at one point or another, had been a top 20 prospect. That's quite a shift and not something anyone should have expected to see ML results in just 3 years. It's kind of a plus, we did see Whitlock and now are seeing Casas and Bello. The farm may or may not produce as hoped, but not out of lack of effort and a focused priority.

He's been very consistent for a long time.

If he isn't, it means he got worse, as he's 7th now, and Casas and Mata should graduate in 2023- maybe Rafaela, too.

Factor in what those team's lost in their rotations and pen: NYY: Taillon (3.91 in 177 IP) & Montgomery (3.69 in 115 IP) plus a few key pen pieces TOR: Stripling (3.01 ERA in 134 IP) TBR: Kluber (4.34 ERA but the team leader in GS at 31 and 2nd in IP at 164) BAL: Lyles (4.42 ERA but also blew everyone else away in GS 31 and IP at 179.) Our rotation gains Whitlock and maybe Sale and Paxton plus a full year from Bello. I think we will add another SP'er by opening day, too. (So may the other AL East teams.)

Nothing is a sure thing. You are right. Hell, Andrus might out hit Bogey. All we can do is go by expectations and projections, and as of right now, assuming Story stays at 2B, I think we should be batter at 7 of 9 batting order slots, about even at catcher and much worse at SS. I see our pen being vastly better, despite losing Strahm and Whitlock moving to the rotation. It's better at the top, middle and bottom, as well as the AAA depth looks better, on paper. The rotation is hard to project and compare, since we had so many moving parts, last year and very few SP'ers with a lot of IP or GS'd. It looks worse, to me, on paper, but even without adding anyone else, just better health might make it much better. Again, overall, just saying better than the last place team might not be very exciting, but I'm seeing quite a bit to be optimistic about, and I'm not even counting a Sale and or Paxton rebound, or a Barnes and Taylor rebound, or any improvement from Dugo, Arroyo, Dalbec, Pivetta or others that are not really beyond prime and could easily have a better year in 2023. Just flip 2021 with 2022 for these players not past prime, and that alone could do wonders: 2021>2022 OPS+ 141>134 Devers 108> 75 Kike 107> 102 Dugo (117 in 2019-2020 combined) 107> 80 Dalbec Story 117 OPS+ (2018-2021) > 102 in 2022.

I'm fine with blaming them for not foreseeing an uptick in the market for high end players. I'm not sure any GM foresaw this much, but I agree. My point is that it's not incompetence if they never felt Bogey was worth any market prices as the timeline raised that "market value," including one last big spurt. We can judge later if paying Bogey $180M/7 or $225M/8 would have been a good or not or "better than" the Story signing. Even if they knew Bogey would eventually get $225M/8, they may still have felt he was and still is not worth even that, let alone $280M. We cannot say for sure that position is incompetence. Not trading him, if we knew this to be, earlier, is where I think the biggest mistake was made, but that just my opinion. They did feel Yoshida, Jansen, Martin and Turner were worth more than what other GMs felt they were, so let's see how incompetent they were/are.

It was for the tax line. It was when you figure the winter spending budget was $60-70M. If we keep thinking in terms of what JH could have spent, yes, you are right, but it's not the way it was or apparently still is.

Do you agree that we look better, if even slightly at 6-7 slots and even at 1-2 slots in the 9 everyday player positions, assuming Story at 2B? That's got to make up for losing Bogey's O and D. The pen looks way better on paper. That leaves the rotation and a couple months to try and upgrade it to near what we had in 2022 and 2021, too.

Can you specifically say where the odds are I am wrong on these rundowns by position? (BTW, I counted the pen as one position, when we actually should improve on 6 of 8 pen slots as well as AAA depth) Compared to 2022, I see us as being odds on favorites to improve on these positions (assuming we add a SS and SP): 1B: Casas > Dalbec/Cordero/Hosmer 2B: Story> Story/Arroyo/Sanchez-Downs 3B: Devers> Devers LF: Yoshida> Dugo/Pham CF: Kike> Kike/Duran RF: Dugo/Ref> JBJ/Dugo/Ref/Cordero DH: Turner> 2022 JD Maybe equal: C: McGuire/Wong= Vaz/Plawecki (counting D and staff handling) Much Worse: ______ Pitching: 2023 Pen >>> 2022 Pen The rotation is the great undecided and almost impossible to predict with so many returning from injuries, and trying to figure out just how good Wacha, Nate and Hill were, last year. Pivetta = Pivetta Sale =/> Sale Paxton =/> Paxton Whitlock=/> Wacha Bello =/> Bello & Hill ______ ??> Nate Crawford/Wink/Mata/Walter> Crawford/Wink/Seabold

The way I see it, we need to match or improve from the 2021 team. We can get better than 2022 and still finish last, but I have actually made this point several times, already. Compared to 2022, I see us as being odds on favorites to improve on these positions (assuming we add a SS and SP): 1B: Casas > Dalbec/Cordero/Hosmer 2B: Story> Story/Arroyo/Sanchez-Downs 3B: Devers> Devers LF: Yoshida> Dugo/Pham CF: Kike> Kike/Duran RF: Dugo/Ref> JBJ/Dugo/Ref/Cordero DH: Turner> 2022 JD Maybe equal: C: McGuire/Wong= Vaz/Plawecki (counting D and staff handling) Much Worse: ______ Pitching: 2023 Pen >>> 2022 Pen The rotation is the great undecided and almost impossible to predict with so many returning from injuries, and trying to figure out just how good Wacha, Nate and Hill were, last year. Pivetta = Pivetta Sale =/> Sale Paxton =/> Paxton Whitlock=/> Wacha Bello =/> Bello & Hill ______ ??> Nate Crawford/Wink/Mata/Walter> Crawford/Wink/Seabold

Let's see how both contracts work out, even assuming Story at $140M/6 and Bogey at $160M/6, which we don't know he'd ever have taken. It's not a radical idea, but it's not a slam dunk choice, either.

It does, but you know he really might have been. They just never foresaw a $280M offer- not many of us did, and now in hindsight, we all scream coulda-shoulda.

I would think $8M matters to all but maybe 5-6 owners in MLB. I'm sure it's pitiful to think a GM might decide to spend $2-4M less because of the $8M check to JBJ, this winter. I agree JH could and should spend more, but I think that about every filthy rich company owner squeezing what he can out of his workers at the least amount of expense possible.

I know many poo-poo BTV and disagree on many of the values they assign to certain players, but it is shocking to see how the top Sox and Yankee players compare to other AL East teams. According to BTV, and remember this includes prospects, TBR and TOR blow everyone else away, and even BAL has better than NYY and BO do. I won't name names just values of the top 5 and the next 10: (Remember, this is not how good the players are: it's how good they are or project to be for the money they make or project to make) Top 5 TBR: 136, 128, 53, 47, 45 TOR: 154, 94, 56, 54, 52 BAL: 146, 87, 52, 39, 36 BOS: 55, 41, 37, 34, 33 NYY: 50, 31, 28, 27, 19 6-15: TBR: 32, 30, 30, 25, 22, 19, 18, 18, 18, 16 TOR: 35, 28, 26, 25, 17, 12, 11, 11,10, 10 BAL: 25, 25, 24, 21, 20, 16, 15, 13, 13, 12 BOS: 19, 19, 15, 14, 9, 8, 7, 7, 7, 6 NYY: 17, 14, 13, 12, 11, 11, 11, 10, 9 TBR's 16-25 even best our 6-15! 15, 15, 14, 13, 11, 9, 8, 8, 7, 6 This is not too encouraging.

They would salvage the off season to some degree, but I expected so much more, this winter. Granted, with the prices the big FA signed for, the wish list could never have met my expectations, without us going over the tax line, which I felt was never going to happen. I was hoping we added 4-5 kept players for $80M and not 6-7 at $40M, which is what we've spent, so far in AAV. Adding these 2 more players at maybe $25M AAV combined makes it 8 players at $65M (Yoshida, Turner, Andrus, Kluber, Jansen, Martin, Joely & Mills.)

Ownership is choosing greed and building for the future. That's why they hired Bloom. I don't see it as incompetence, just because they are choosing the long game over the short one. I think we had a legitimate chance at making the playoffs after the Story signing in March. I think most here did. Now, because we sucked, we were all wrong, too, but calling it incompetence, when most of us felt we were "competitive" seems a bit over the top. If you are talking about the Bogey situation, I can understand how the word incompetence can be used. I, too, think they could have handled it differently and grossly misjudged the market explosion, but again, I don't think they ever wanted to pay Bogey the market price at any point on the timeline. Even now, they would not give Bogey $225M/8, IMO. They should have traded him after signing Story, at the latest. He'd have waived his no trade clause, if they told him Story was going to play SS.

Yup. Nobody was talking Kluber and Andrus even 2 weeks ago. Now, we are acting like they are saviors. This team has not traded a top prospect, other than #8 Aldo Ramirez since #5 Jalen Beeks was traded for Nate in the summer of 2018. I'm not sure they think the timing is right to break this streak. (I do, as long as we get someone with 4+ years of team control.)

I'm not even sure Kluber or Nate clears them of malpractice. I'd like to see us trade for a solid #2 and sign Flumer, so we can DFA Brasier, once and for all, and bump Crawford, Wink & Co to AAA.