moonslav59

I'd bring up Dalbec, Chatham, Reyes, Shawaryn, Weber and maybe Centeno. This winter, I wouldn't blink if any of these guys were cut loose. (The sheer number shows how weak our upper farm system is right now.) Owings Curletta Kelley Trade fillers: Johnson Velazquez Shawaryn Weber Josh Smith Lakins Poyner Brewer? Brasier? Wright? Travis? Lin? Hembree? Soon to be FAs: Porcello Moreland Pearce Cashner Holt (The only one I'd try to keep.) Deadwood: Pedroia Leon may finally be replaced. That leaves only 18-22 meaningful players on the 40 man roster, next year.

Dalbec does have a .368 OBP this year, so the .234 BA is forgivable. However, a high OBP doesn't always translate well to MLB- see Garin Cecchini. Dalbec & Chatham should be September call-ups, maybe Reyes, too.

I'll start one, soon.

Times are bad. For the first time ever, I read all the top threads and found no post I felt any desire to respond to.

I remember my little sister couldn't say his name. She pronounced it, "Yaz-mic-stem-ski."

The Sox have 3 everyday players in the top 12 by WAR: 5. Bogey 5.5 7. Devers 5.4 12. Betts 4.8 The top Yankee is a guy I mentioned the Sox should look into: DJ LeMahieu 4.5 (17th) The Astros have 3 in the top 18: 6. Bregman 5.5 16. Springer 4.5 18. Brantley 4.4 Who'd have guessed Lance Lynn and Charlie Morton would be 2 and 3 in pitching WAR? The Sox have 2 pitchers in the top 46: 16. Sale 3.6 46. ERod 2.0 The Yanks have 1 at #36 (Tanaka 2.4) We got burned on the role players, bench and pen. The Astros have 4 in the top 45, including 3 in the top 11: 6. Cole 4.5 7. Verlander 4.4 11. Greinke 4.1 45. Miley 2.0 The Dodgers have 3 in the top 21. The Twins have 3 in the top 33. The Astros have 3 of the top 18 everyday players and 3 of the top 11 pitchers. They strengthened their bench at the deadline, too.

Weird. But then again, the signs of giving up have been around a while.

Maybe part of it is sour grapes, at least to some, but that's understandable. I'm not seeing a lot of unfounded criticism or "pot shots." Yes, there's the usual Yankee hate statements and sentiments, but nothing out of the ordinary between fierce rivalries. My placing the Yankees 3rd in odds of winning it all has nothing to do with them being the Yanks. I've always been high on having 2-3 great SP'ers. The Yanks have none (healthy).

I guess one can call it "giving up," but I just think it's just reading the writing on the wall. It's in bold print with a large font. I have no beef with anyone who still believes. I'm usually the guy arguing against the non believers, but I just don't see anything to get worked up about.

Who cares? We suck, but it shouldn't stop us from being critical of others, especially our arch enemies. I'm not sure what the issue is. Should we all go meek and mild, because we're having a down year or few years?

Because we suck. Our starting pitchers suck, too. Our pen sucks: theirs doesn't. We come up short when we need it way more than them. The Yanks have a clear weakness. It's not a big enough weakness (the rotation) to lose to the sucky Sox, but it will likely matter against Houston, LA and maybe others.

It wasn't so much the delay as it just bugged me.

While I had issues with Nomar's defense, he was way better than Jeter on D. IMO, Jeter is the worst defensive SS in my time watching baseball (not counting scrubs who hardly played.) Nomar was a much better hitter but for a much shorter time.

Spike is on my list under "neutral". He was a good fielder. I'm not sure why I never liked him all that much. I just remember liking Quinones in the field. That little bit of like was more than my like of Nomar. (Nomar's routine before each pitch bugged me, too.)

Naehring always seemed to be hurt and lacked range. (I did have him above Nomar!) My favorite Sox player, now is JBJ, so it's not about being the best player, to me. When JBJ goes, Rafael is my man!

It's about my favorites. I'm high on D, especially at SS, CF and catcher. Nomar was all flash on D with very little substance. He made easy plays look hard. Loved his bat. When he was traded, no lie, I said to my brothers-in-laws, "We just traded Nomar for Orlando Cabrera! This trade will win us a ring!" Certainly, OCab alone did not win us the ring, but his solid defense was a big plus, and he hit pretty well, too. Too bad he couldn't leave the other wives alone.

What "pot shots?" The team has glaring weaknesses that even Yankee fans know and bitch about.

I started rooting for the Sox in the early 70's, my favorite SSs have been: 1. Rick Burleson (most innings at SS by any Sox since 1970) 2. Luis Aparicio (one of the first players that showed me the value of defense) 3. Alex Gonzalez (for some reason his defensive metrics did not meet my eye test) 4. Xander Bogaerts (his offense way more than makes up for his D) 5. John Valentin (not great on D but an unsung player) 6. Alex Cora, Pokey Reese, OCab, Iggy, Rey Quinones, Mario Guerrero (many were no stick) 7. Tim Naehring 8. Nomar (Man, the guy could hit!) Neutral: Hoffman (5th in innings) & Luis Rivera (6th in innings) just never got my heart Spike Owen & Gutierrez (Jody Reed) Lowrie, Scutaro & Aviles Drew Worst: 1. Lugo 2. Renteria

So, me placing them 3rd may not be so wild & crazy.

I cried buckets when Alex Gonzalez was traded. Does that count? (He actually started hitting HRs after he left us.)

How about second fewest errors made by a SS since 2011 (6,000+ innings)? Only Peralta made less. How about 3rd best Flg%? How about 2nd best UZR/150?

No. It was a big deal. I just think 2 bad plays does not tip the balance. We'll never know if Iggy makes 2 big errors for us, had we kept him. Would he have still gotten hurt in 2014? It's my opinion, and I respect yours. Drew and Peavy helped us in 2013, and we won a ring. The trade worked. That doesn't mean I have to agree Drew was better than Iggy in this time frame.

I've watched every play of every Sox game for over a decade. Those were horrible and extremely costly errors. I never judge players on 2 plays. Nobody should. I hated the trade at the time, but I said it made sense. We needed a SP'er. The trade worked. We are talking about two different things. Iggy was not traded for Drew. I'd rather have had Iggy from 2013-2015 than Drew. That was my point.

It's not denigration to say I feel they have the 3rd best chance to win it all. Nobody has had a better than 50-50 chance of winning it all going into the playoffs that I remember. The percentages of winning it all, to me, is something like this: 30% HOU 28% LAD 25% NYY 17% the rest of the field. I'd say giving the Yanks a 25% chance to 17% for the 7 teams is giving them a lot of credit. To me, SP'ing means much more in the playoffs, especially your best 2-3 starters, who start 80% of the games not 50-60% as the regular season shows. Best SP'ers by WAR 6. Cole 4.5 7. Verlander 4.4 9. Buehler 4.3 11. Greinke 4.1 12. Ryu 4/1 21. Kershaw 3.4 39. Tanaka 2.5 47. Paxton 2.3 52. Maeda 2.0 53. Miley 2.0 By ERA- 1. Ryu 39 5. Verlander 63 7. Greinke 63 12. Cole 65 19. Miley 72 (Why can't we get guys like him? Thanks, Ben.) 22. Buehler 74 53. German 90 66. Paxton 97 69. Tanaka 98 The Guardians and Rays both have at least 2 SP'ers better than the Yankee 3. Hell, even the Sox have 3! Now, before you start going off on how important the pen is, the Yanks have the best, but others are much closer to them than the Yank's distance behind in SP'ing. Team Pen WAR 1. NYY 6.3 2. TBR 6.0 3. MN 4.9 4. CLE 4.7 9. HOU 4.0 16. LAD 2.3 (BOS is 6th at 4.5) xFIP 1. Hou 3.97 5. NYY 4.25 5. BOS 4.29 13. LAD 4.45 WHIP 2. HOU 1.20 3. LAD 1.21 4. TBR 1.21 5. CLE 1.26 8. NYY 1.33 11. BOS 1.35

Yes, so Drew is better over two plays in his career? And for a guy apparently known for making errors on easy plays, he has 43 career errors. That's only 13 more than Renteria had in one year with the Sox.