moonslav59

soxprospects has Casas at 1B in 2023 and Dalbec at DH. It's hard to imagine an in the system player taking over 3B, if Devers bolts. Dalbec? Fitzy? Binelas? Hamilton? Jordan is too far away and may be better suited for 1B. If Mayer is up to start 2024, who plays SS- maybe Mayer at SS and Story at 2B?

It is a little different when the small sample size is reflecting what a player has been doing or trending towards for a much longer time.

Bello 5 IP 4 H 0 ER 1 BB 10 K This guy may end up in the bigs by year end. _________________ Padron-Artiles 6 IP 3 H 0 ER 0 BB 8 K Kavadas with his first homer.

Hamilton is 2 for 3 with a couple rbis.

Larry digs the long ball.

Nice. He's building the case.

A phantom or real IL stint by Davis might be more likely.

Exactly.

Yup. Remember, Rusney started out at .928 after 10 games (2 HRs).

True dat! I guess had he let up a run, stayed in the game and shut the Yanks down, he could have maybe won by pitching 5 innings (6-10th).

They kept saying they were going to stretch him out, last year, but it never really materialized. His 4 IP, today is a career high in MLB, although his pitch count was not even close to his career high. In 2021, he pitched 3.1 IP, his most of the season, in his first outing (59 pitches were his most, too). He only pitched 3 IP once more (May 13th) and only pitched more than 2 IP five times, all season and only once (8/23) after May 13th. It's like he started out going longer in relief than he did after May 13th. Now, he did go more than 1 IP in 31 of his 46 appearances, so in that sense, he was not a short reliever. His last 4 outings, he never went beyond 1 IP.

I meant to say he "could" have afforded both. (I went back and edited.)

I'd have preferred Suzuki with the extra money used on an upgrade on pitching.

Maybe had he not let up a run and finished the game unscored upon?

Woo up 8-3 in the 9th. Casas 1-3 w 2nd HR and 2 BB Fitzy 1-3 w 4th HR Sanchez 3-3 w 2nd HR and a DBL Refsnyder 2-4 w DBL Pannone with a good start: 5 IP 0 ER 3H 0BB 7K

I'm not sure Bloom would have gotten Story had he signed Suzuki. It's not really about Suzuki making so much, he could have afforded both, but that's a lot of money spent on non pitchers, when that seemed to be our biggest weakness.

Agreed. I think each starter gets 2-4 more shots, and if anyone not named Eovaldi ior Pivetta are struggling, Whitlock might replace them.

But only if our starters are keeping the games close enough to be able to use him when he's ready. If it's his day to pitch, and we go down 5-0, he won't pitch. Next day, we are up 7-1.

I don't think that's it. I think they know Whitlock can start, but they want to give the 5 current starters a reason to move our best RP'er to a starter role. If none do, Whitlock can be very valuable in the role he has, now.

G. W. ! Forevers!

Devers Forevers!

These games count as much as others, but every season, every team has poor 4 game stretches. I just don't get all worked up over any 4 game stretch, unless it involves an elimination game or we're a game or two away from elimination games. (That doesn't make me better than anyone who does.) Hell, bad 10-25 games stretches don't both me half as much as some, here.

Pre Season Sox All Star Minor League Team: http://news.soxprospects.com/2022/04/2022-soxprospects-pre-season-all-stars.html There's a part 1 and 2, but the links are the same.

Why do you expect 1 for 8 to keep repeating itself over and over? Is that what happens more often than not?

Indeed, but there have been numerous stretches where we spend under the tax line. It doesn't appear to be random, either. I think they strategically plan ahead when to reset, stay under or go over, and going over usually happens when we have a core of players poised to be top contenders. I get the stay competitive every year mantra, and I don't disagree, but I do think we step up the spending when it looks like we are on the rise. Going by cots year end numbers, our biggest increases happened here: Red= Ring Year 2003 (105M) to 2004 (130M) +24% 2005 (116M)> 2006 (137M) +18% 2006 (137M)> 2007 (155M) +13% 2009 (140M)> 2010 (171M) +22% 2017 (189M)> 2018 (230M) +22% The biggest drops: We dropped 6M from '01 to '02 and '02 to '03, but 2001 was a 52% increase (Manny signing). We dropped from 2007 to 2008 (8M) and the following year, too (7M). We dropped from 2011 to 2012 (8M) and did increase for 2013's ring year, but the opening day 2013 budget was 21M lower than the 2012 budget- a sign we did not plan to win it all in 2013, but once we saw the team, we went all in at the deadline. We dropped after 2013 (6M) We dropped after 2016 (11M) Our biggest drop was after 2019 (59M), a clear sign that 2020 was not viewed as a highly competitive team.