moonslav59

One barrier to getting to the point where the Dodgers, Astros and Yankees are, at the moment, is building a formidable and deep farm within the structure of a draft and international free agent system that makes it much more difficult for winning and high spending teams to acquire top young talent than the previous systems in place. This was a major reason I felt it would be very difficult for the Sox to get back to being serious and long term contenders, quickly. I thought some posters were being disingenuous by saying things like “we’ll build the farm back up and sign some free agents to fill in the gaps.” As it turned out, I was wrong. With the help of some shrewd picks and IFA signings by DD, our farm was better off than I knew back in 2018-2019. Maybe better than most thought they were. The last place finish in2020 gave us some top picks. That helped, too. I still think our farm is not at the level the Astros, Dodgers, Rays and others have been at for several seasons, now, but I see hope we are on the right path to getting a farm we can depend on for low cost, quality infusions of talent on a consistent basis.

Henry can or may spend like LAD, someday, but until I see it starting to happen, I’m going on the assumption we will continue staying near the lux tax line and occasionally resetting and staying under for a couple years here and there. It would certainly be much easier to stay competitive by filling more slots with higher priced free agents, but it seems clear there have been limits, and our GMs have faced many either or choices. I expect that will continue. That being said, continuing on as a top 5 or 6 spending team should allow our GM enough flexibility to keep the team competitive from year to year, as long as he maintains a balance between the here and now and the extended future.

I think Max was being facetious. I think, like any other issue, what being a good fan looks like varies wildly from person to person. There is no right or wrong, but when you got guys like Swihart who has advocated trading, DFA'ing or worse virtually every Sox player, coach and manager, one might wonder who he is actually cheering for- the logo?

Curry certainly is worthy of all the praise he gets, but for some reason, it seems way over the top.

Tanning some hides!

Here is a breakdown of our pen's blown saves and losses by pitcher. Robles 4 BS, 2 Loses (both were from BS), 1 Win, 2 Svs, 7 Holds 5 games with no BS, Sv, Holds, wins or loses (5 IP 0 ER) 1-3 in games with BS 4/23 lost (10th) 5/7 lost (9th) 5/22 won (8-9th inning) 6/11 lost (9th inning) Diekman: 3 BS, O Loses, 2 Wins, 9 Holds 11 games with none of above (10.2 IP 6 ER) 4/26 lost (9th inning) 5/4 lost (9th inning) 5/16 win (6th inning) Brasier:2 BS, 2 Loses, 0 Wins, 3 Svs 5 Holds 15 games with none (15 IP 6 ER) 4/8 lost (10th inning) 4/24 lost (5th inning) Strahm: 2 BS, 2 Loses (1 from BS), 1 Win, 5 Holds 10 games none above: 7.1 IP 1 ER 5/27 lost (8-9t innings) 6/11 lost (7th inning) Davis: 1 BS, 1 Loss, 1 Win, 2 Holds 5/4 lost (6-7 innings) Barnes: 1 BS, 3 Loses, 0 Wins, 2 SVs, 0 Holds 14 other games 12.1 IP 10 ER 4/30 lost (8th inning) Whitlock: 1 BS, 0 Loses, 1 Win, 1 SV, 0 Holds 4/8 lost (6-8 innings) Only 4 saves were blown in the 9th and led to a loss. Out of 14 Blown Saves, 3 were during the same game as another Blown saves, so BS led to 9 loses, since we won 2 games where a blown save occured. I'm really not sure how many more wins we'd have, even if we had a perfect 9th inning traditional closer. Of course, our best pitchers would have been set up men, not closers, and maybe they do better in those roles- maybe not. No doubt, 9 losses due to blown saves is way too much, and when you add the losses by the pen in extra innings and beforehand, it's very bad. I don't think anyone disputes it. That being said, the pen has done better in more games than not, and they've done better or even as the starters in more games than not. That's not making excuses or trying to sugarcoat a bad situation, but I do feel like some posters think they've done poorly more often than ok or well.

It sure plays a role in piling up loses, doesn't it?

The same guy who complains people gang up on those with differing opinions plays the excuse police on Thursdays.

...and those who did not want Iggy as our SS, were so happy to repeatedly point out the error he made in that series- ignoring all the plays he made no Red Sox SS could have made those years.

Exactly. The statement was based on who might be the next guy, but some posters just don't get it.

Mata made a nice stride in his rehab, despite walking 3 in 4 IP. 1 Hit 0 ER 8 Ks Northcut with a 3-run dinger (21st)

I still think Sale is a fierce competitor, and I will never write him off, until he retires are sucks for a few years. I've given up hoping for a great return, too, but if anyone can do it, it would be Sale.

The whole "Story Land" saying shows your sentiments from the beginnings of his struggles. Nobody is denying he has struggled mightily for the vast majority of games. Maybe, you just need to "get over it."

The guy made a valid point on a reason why we lost. You've never done that? When someone else does it, they are "making an excuse," but when you do it, it's just "stating my opinion," I'm not sure what Pivetta going against a scrub has to do with today's game. Does Max have to qualify his point, so as not to get thrashed?

It's you that needs to get over it. Max made a good point about facing their ace and a good pitcher overall. Call it an excuse, if you want, but why go off like Max was crying to the Comish? He actually ended his post with "Stuff happens. It's called baseball," and you act like he can't accept the loss.

I'm not complaining. I like the trend we are on. We've had our share of luck over the last month, so losses like this are expected.

You do seem to revel in it.

How about COPSA? OPS Against by Catcher: Vaz .596 Pivetta 278 PAs Against .716 Whitlock 183 .813 Hill 169 .694 Wacha 131 .501 Houck 123 .807 Eovaldi RP'ers .616 Davis 69 .634 Sawamura 69 .843 Diekman 66 .672 Robles 65 .637 Strahm 56 Ahead by .009 .810 Barnes 55 .492 Schreiber 53 .898 Brasier 53 .606 Valdez .846 Crawford 37 .436 Danish 33 1.167 Winckowski 18 Plawecki .693 Eovaldi 208 .378 Wacha 82 .865 Houck 50 .487 Hill 36 .513 Winckowski 20 .077 Whitlock 13 N/A Pivetta 0 RP'ers .773 Danish .761 Brasier 40 .669 Crawford 38 .628 Diekman 36 .550 Davis 35 .762 Barnes 21 .170 Schreiber 18 .646 Strahm 16 .414 Sawamura 15 .856 Robles 10 .400 Valdez 5

Again, if you take away everyone's best 7 game stretch, Story still is among the team's rbi per PA leaders. He's also been a big plus on D, but yes, the K's and lack of hits are frustrating and worrisome. He was not come close to reaching expectations as he nears the 1/12th point of his contract.

17 men LOB with our 3-6 batters. Only 2 rbi.

Those errors are extremely frustrating. Just when he seems to be showing improvement, he goes through a few weeks of silly errors.

I'm not high on Plawecki. My beef is with Vaz's steady record of getting less from our starters than his back-up does. It's been the same since Leon, and maybe before (Hanigan). Swihart was the one catcher who got worse, but the sample sizes were very small. (Salty was no pitcher whisperer, either.) I've also been very open about the fact that RP'ers seem to be more 50-50. Here are the Sox IP Leaders since 2014 (200+ IP): Porcello 4.19 w Leon 4.96 w Vaz (3.95 w Hanigan) ERod 4.05 Leon 4.18 Vaz (3.78 Hanigan) Price 2.96 v Leon 4.27 w Vaz (0.00 w Hanigan but only 9 IP) Sale 2.79 Leon 4.12 Vaz Buch 2.83 VMart 3.01 Leon 3.95 Salty 4.44 Vaz (5.12 w VTek) Eovaldi 2.99 Plawecki 4,53 Leon 4.55 Vaz (4.85 Salty) Barnes 3.83 Leon 3.96 Vaz (4.50 Swihart, 5.93 Hanigan, 6.23 Plawecki in 17 IP) Kelly 3.23 Vaz 4.63 Leon 4.83 Hanigan Wright 2.94 Hanigan 3.49 Vaz (4.06 Swihart) Pomeranz 3.32 Holiday 3.92 Vaz 6.02 Leon Workman 3.04 Vaz 3.83 Leon 4.03 AJP Hembree 3.42 Leon 4.26 Vaz (2.15 Swihart) Pivetta 2.87 Plawecki 4.24 Vaz Early returns show Wacha and Hill do better w/o Vaz, but Houck & Whitlock do better with Vaz. Out of the top 13 pitchers by IP, Vaz has gotten the best from the number 8 (Kelly) and number 11 (Workman).

My samples have always shown, pitcher by pitcher, that the majority of pitchers do better with Plawecki or Leon than Vaz. Many of the sample sizes are small and or unbalanced, but they show the same thing every year and over careers. This year's is no different. It shows 5 of our top IP pitchers doing better with Plawecki than Vaz. Only Houck has done better with Vaz, and Pivetta has no IP with Plawecki. The career numbers I listed, here, show 4 of the top 6 with better CERAs with Plawecki. Show me how my numbers never show this. I'll wait.

Our 3-6 hitters LOB: 4 JD 3 Bogey 5 Verdugo 3 Story They are 3 for 12 with 1 rbi.

Yes, a very easy call. The Rays were not one of the teams I was talking about when saying the A's have won more games than many higher and much higher spending teams and would have been more fun to watch over those years, until now. I just made a simple point about wins per dollar spent. I never implied that was the most important measuring stick or that it had anything to do with TV Viewership or how crappy a market they play in. Hell, the A's didn't even sell out their WS games in the 70's. Neither did the Pirates.