moonslav59

The July-August collapse.

Yes, but it won't be much per year. I'm still confident the contract will be a winner for both sides.

Any return is better than non tendering him.

They are toast. Burnt.

I think we pay his arb cost and trade him.

I stand by my position. We'll need to be bad to get good again. It's nearly impossible to keep spending to fill all holes. We need some cheap youth, and the system makes it VERY hard to rebuild the farm while winning and spending to the penalty phases every year.

Ok. The offense has done absolutely nothing wrong all year. It's 100% on the staff.

Of course the pitching is the reason we are where we are, but it seems like our offense has done very well when needed the least and not too well when needed most. Again, this is not meant to lessen the blame on the staff. Our pitching sucks.

The cliff came early, and even outspending everyone by tens of millions when including taxes & Castillo couldn't keep the nice run we had going. Trying to play it half way will only prolong the recovery. We will need to be bold this winter. Reset the tax sooner not later. Keep the young core and blow up the rest.

Nobody can rebuild with only low draft picks, limited international money and tax penalties up the wazoo

Unless we are willing to have a sell off and or down year or two , it will be nearly impossible for DD or any new GM to rebuild in a short time. The system is now rigged against teams like ours.

I agree 100%, but the offense has not done what it took to win a few more games. That is not meant to lessen the blame on the staff.

We have scored a lot of runs, but still have our share of 1 to 2 run losses preceded or followed by blow out wins. That is what I meant by too much untimely hitting. Certainly, the pitching has been the major reason for this anti universe from 2018 to 2019.

I can't remember and Sox GM emptying the farm as much as DD did as well. We went from top 5 to bottom 5 without hardly any in system graduations. (Note: I was fine with the strategy and the expected consequences.)

Since Cora is not a player, how does that work?

To me, there is no light shining anywhere. I suppose we can get back in this thing, but I see no indication that this team will pull together to do what needs to be done for any meaningful stretch of time. We are flat. We bitch at the umps, and get no favors by doing so. We hit when we don't need it and don't hit when we should. On paper, it looks like we should be good enough to compete, but on the field, we just plain suck.

To me, his best moves have been in-season minor deals like the ones for Eovaldi, Reed & Pearce. He has also avoided the catastrophic FA signings like Crawford, Sandoval & HRam. He all but emptied the farm, which was fine by me, since it brought us the 2018 ring. The time has come to pay the piper. Let's see how DD handles the rebuild.

A lot of things went right, last year. We have a few things going right this year (Devers, Bogey, Vaz & Workman), but it has not been enough to offset all that has gone wrong. Here are a few "wrong" things worth mentioning: 1) The starting rotation was supposed to be a strength- possibly top 3-5 in MLB. 2) The pen has done a lot right (in terms of what was expected) but has failed by blowing too many saves. 3) The defense, except for Devers has slipped a bit. 4) Performance decline by Betts, JD and others, especially when needed most. 5) Mistakes by DD, Cora, coaches, players and even the umps seem to have happened at the worst times. 6) Too many "snake bite" games. So, where do we go from here? Our farm is weak, and the best of our farm are 2-4 years away. Our budget is tapped out, and we are maxing out on taxes, because we have gone over the limit in consecutive seasons. We are losing some dead and near dead salary this winter (Pablo & Porcello) and next (Castillo), but with arb raises and 5 high priced players on the roll, our hands will be tied, unless we keep going over the second or third tax line year after year. The league has made it much more difficult for winning and high-spending teams to build their farms up. We have been both winners and spenders for several years in a row, so in my opinion, we will need to pick a time to reset the tax and maybe right off a season or two to get some decent draft picks and international free agents. I've lived through decades of frustration and incompetence. I'm okay with needing a year or two to regroup, but I worry trying to play it "half way" might make it next to impossible to build the farm to a point where it can get us to the promise land once again. Let's not forget, although we did need some FA help to win all these rings, the core of homegrown players were essential to each ring season. If anybody thinks Chavis, Dalbec, Marco, DHern and others are similar to the prospects that came up from 2002 to 2016 or that were traded for pieces that helped us win in 2018, I think you may be in for a rude awakening. Just my opinion.

Point me towards the light. All I see is darkness.

Place Porcello, Moreland, Pearce, Price & JD on waivers and pray someone claims one and takes them off our hands (and budget).

Start a thread named "Countdown to Elimination."

Insert fork. We should have sold off.

I'd pick him, if I wanted someone to try and throw a ball at him and miss.

Here's something else I bet we lead the league in: Player comes up with men on base and makes an out. Next time up- no men on- hits a solo HR.