moonslav59

No, 27 are not. Many will not be signing anybody for much more than min wage. I'm not saying wait until the day before opening day, but waiting will probably turn out to be the "smart" thing do do, both in terms of financial bargains found, but also maximizing your value. The Sox have such a pitiful bottom of their 40 man roster and a pretty weak bottom of their 26 man roster. They could do better finding 4-6 bargain gems than going for just 2-4 higher cost flashy guys.

Seems to me like waiting may be highly efficient.

Cleveland will receive two prominent young infielders in Amed Rosario and Andres Gimenez and a pair of Mets prospects — right-hander Josh Wolf and outfielder Isaiah Greene. -MLBTR

Dumped half a contract.

The Mets are going all in.

He's not great, but he's been pretty steady: Not counting 2020... 28-33 starts for 6 straight seasons. 159-188 IP each of those 6 seasons ERA+ between 95 and 117 the last 5 seasons with only that one season below 102 (2018). His WHIP has been between 1.15 and 1.24 the last 5 years, except in 2018 (1.345). His career ERA is 3.92 and FIP of 4.12. He walks a few too many batters (3.1 BB/9), but he K's close to 9 per 9 IP (8.6). From 2015-2020, he is 32nd in IP. Out of 77 pitchers with 600+ IP in the last 6 years, he places: 39th in fWAR at 11.6 (about 1.9 per season) 25th in WHIP at 1.23 (same as Trevor bauer, J Paxton and Sonny Gray) 35th in ERA- at 92 40th in K-BB% at 14.5% 65th in xFIP at 4.53 If you figure 30 number one starters in MLB, ranking 39th in WAR could be viewed as him being a solid #2 starter. I'd say he is easily a solid #3.

He will also turn 41 before the season starts.

So, if career WAR is your choice of value, Sale is better than anyone on the Yanks. Erod Rocks, too. You know there is more to judging value and projected value than career WAR and just fWAR from a shortened season. I can see why you choose the 4 year fWAR sample, not 1, 2 or 3 of bWAR... bWAR: 2020 Eovaldi 1.3/ Montgomery 0.1 bWAR: 2019-2020: Eovaldi 1.3/ Montgomer 0.0 bWAR: 2018-2020: Eovaldi 2.1/ Montgomer 0.5 Montgomery beats Eovaldi 2.9 to 2.1 from '17-'20 in bWAR.)

RED=most contract years over 30... 5 Sale 31-35 years old/contract began '20 4 Eovaldi 28-31/ '19 (1.3 bWAR in 2 yrs) 7 Price 30-35/ '16 (10.5 bWAR in 1st 4 yrs) 4 Porcello 27-30/ '16 (1.4 bWAR) 4 Buchholz 27-30/ '12 (5.9 bWAR) 5 Lackey 31-35/ '10 (3.4 bWAR 1 w STL, but then 8.7 next 2 yrs after contract) 5 Lester 25-29/ '09 (18.6 bWAR) 3 Beckett 27-29/ '07 (9.3 bWAR) 3 Clement 30-32/ '05 (0.3 bWAR in 2 yrs) 4 Foulke 31-34/ '04 (4.1 WAR in 3 yrs)

Best Sox pitchers by fWAR since 2002 by age groups: (note: this is an imperfect way to view age groups, as some pitchers were not with the Sox for the full time period.) 22-25 10.8 Lester (91) 7.0 ERod (88) 4.9 Buch (62) 3.6 Doubront (59) 26-29 15.2 Beckett (122) 13.8 Sale (59) 13.2 Lester (129) 11.3 Porcello (127) 8.0 Dice-K (98) 6.2 B Arroyo (61) 5.6 Buch (87) 4.6 Lowe (32) 3.7 ERod (34) 3.2 Pom (56) 2.7 Miley (32) 2.3 Kelly (41) 30-33 19.7 Pedro (92 GS) 10.6 Price (98) 6.1 Beckett (72) 4.6 Lowe (66) 4.2 Lackey (61) 3.8 Lester (21) 3.7 Buch (39) 3.6 Sale (25) 34-37 7.7 Wakefield (78) 6.5 Schilling (32) 4.5 Lackey (50) 1.8 Burkett (29) 38+ 8.6 Schilling (66) 7.8 Wakefield (138) 6.1 Uehara (0) 3.0 Wells (30) 2.7 Burkett (30)

How many pitchers had one good season, even if it was their first and only one, and never turned out very good? He's a question mark. A big one. So is Eovaldi. If I had to choose one for just 2021, it's a close call.

"The only way?"

He's only had 29 starts or 155 IP in a season, once, and you criticize Eovaldi for "only" having 2 seasons with 27 or more starts. Yes, a much longer career, but can we wait to see if he ever does it again, before we anoint him a work horse? Now, most starters have one really bad game each season, but it seems like Eovaldi has had an extra bad start each season from 2013-2015? bWAR has Eovaldi with a 2.3 (2015) and a 2.1 season (2013). Yes, Montgomery had a 2.9 season his rookie year. 2013: 3 IP 9 ER (Take away & his ERA goes from 3.39 to 2.62) 2014: 4 IP 8 ER (Take away & his ERA goes from 4.37 to 4.09) 2015: .2 IP 8 ER (Take away & his ERA goes from 4.20 to 3.74) Montgomery's worst game in his big year was 6 ER in 6 IP. If you took that away, his ERA would go from 3.88 to 3.62. Of course, one could claim cherry-picking methodology, and the point would have merit, but Eovaldi had a very nice 3 year stretch from 2013 to 2015, and his stretch in 2018, including the playoffs was not only excellent, but it was a pretty large sample size, when compared to any Montgomery season but one. Last 13 games of 2018 regular season (60 IP/21 ER) 3.15 ERA. 6 playoff games (4 as RP'er): (22.1 IP/4 ER) 1.61 ERA Combine: 82.1 IP 25 ER 2.77 ERA The guy can pitch very well for some extended periods of time. He's certainly had many bad stretches and missed time. He's a huge question mark, but so is Montgomery.

Not really all that good for several years before 2020, too. UZR/150 from 2014-2019: +0.9. That's 8 years! (To be fair, he had a +38 DRS those 8 years.)

Is he healthy? Is he still near GG level?

If we could find a gold glove level RF'er- maybe, but I don't see any of them on the market.

Surely, you don't think it's a literal crap shoot where every team has exactly the same chance of winning. Yes, enough bottom seed teams have won it all to feel the chance of anyone winning is real, but the better teams win significantly more than lower seeds, especially the last 9 years.

Even so, you do NOT fill a slot that needs filling with Hill. Yes, fine, sign him as possible rotation depth... not instead of solid starter.

I'd never bet against Sale. If anybody can comeback 100% from almost anything, it would be ... Chris Freakin' Sale

Beyond that, which I agree, I want to keep Verdugo in RF.

Okay, you asked for it. You are Crazy! We'd lead the league in questionable SP'ers.

You keep acting like Sale is 36 or something. Also, when he came back, the first time, he put up some of his best numbers, especially with K's. After posting his highest K rate in 2018 (12.9), he was higher in 2018 (13.5) and even higher in 2019 (13.3). You have also claimed he lost velocity and that it is hardly ever recovered. I provided the link on his velocity, that I'm not sure you ever looked at or responded to. Here it is again, and while it does show a slight drop from 2018 to 2019, his 2019 season was very similar to other years, especially, if you discount his first 3 starts after returning from the 2018 season. https://www.fangraphs.com/players/chris-sale/10603/graphs?pitchgraphs=true&statArr=&legend=1&split=base&time=daily&start=2012&end=2019&rtype=mult&gt1=15&dStatArray=FA&ymin=&ymax= He missed a couple starts in 2018, then came back and K's 12 in 5 IP, but was sat down again. He came back for 4 more starts. His last 1-2 starts of 2018 were low, but he still K'd 15 batters in his last 8 IP of 2018- showing that maybe he can still strike people out with out 95+ mph heat. He hit over 95 many times in 2019, so I'm not sure why you feel Severino can return to greatness, but Sale will likely never regain his velocity or dominance. Once he got past April 2019, he had these K /IP numbers: 10/6 14/8 17/7 10/5,1 5/6 10/6 12/9 10/7 10/6 8/5 10/6 5/5.2 7/4.2 12/6 10/6 7/5.1 4/3.2 13/8 12/6.2 Those last 19 starts: 186 Ks in 117.1 IP That's about 6 1/3 IP per start and a 14.3 K/9 rate! Please. Give the guy some credit. "A ton of miles?" He's 31 and has led the league in IP, once. Since joining a rotation, he has pitched over 192 IP 4 times in 8 years.

Good points, but I'm betting on the better teams.

I get your reasoning for selecting that criteria, but I was really addressing the "crapshoot" point.

I'm counting on Sale being out until July and Eovaldi or ERod being out at any given time. I'm not sold on Pivetta being a 32 start pitcher, for us. Houck's innings (and service time?) will be limited. Plus, maybe only 2 of the 3 we sign may be both healthy and effective.