moonslav59

...and give him extra rest. (I thought we were going to start the season with a 6 man rotation, since we had no day off for a long time.)

I like the idea of giving Sale some extra rest, but I do not think this is the best time, for the reasons Jacko gave.

Well said, and I think that if we put, "in my opinion" before everything we say, maybe it would not be taken like we are saying "My opinion is the truth and yours isn't" type perception by the readers. Of course, nobody wants to type that before every statement, and we assume others take our statements in the context of it being an opinion. I understand that when someone throws data and stats back at someone, it gives a strong impression that you are trying to prove the other opinion is wrong, and it's easy to take that as a slight on ones intelligence or baseball acumen. The thing about stats is that, if you dig deep enough, you can probably find a stat that goes against the one presented, so they often "prove" nothing in a debate, unless it is a clear cut situation, like someone claims so and so has been in a slump, when in fact they have been hitting .400 in the last 4 games, .350 in the last 10 games and .340 in the last month. It's doubtful any counter data would be available. Another thing that kind of bugs me is that stat geeks like myself are sometimes viewed as people who don't understand the human side of the game, or have never played the game. Like it has to be one side or the other with not gray area or in betweens. I've played the game for many many years. I didn't make my college team, but I continued playing some pretty high level ball through college. I feel like I do understand the human and emotional side of the game. I've played on teams that weren't playing like a "team" and hated it. I've played on teams where we had each other's backs and were very supportive. I've played with some great players who were total selfish *******s and some that were great teammates. I've played high level football and basketball with and against players that went pro. I'm not Steve Urkel. I realize other have played and/or coached at higher levels than I have, and I'm not the most knowledgeable poster on this site, especially about players on other teams, and I respect a lot of posters on this site, including many I disagree with often. Sorry for rambling on, here, but I wanted to let you guys know where I'm coming from. We all love the Sox, many in differing ways. I still have very high hopes for this team, and I am truly pulling for Swihart to do better than Leon ever did with us.

The comment about me implying it is "all about Leon." was off base and untrue, and I over-reacted. I apologize. I've gone out of my way to say this couldn't possibly be all about Leon of even mostly about Leon. My one sarcastic and mocking post towards Swihart's great offensive start was in poor taste, and I can see how that one post could be taken out of context. Yes, at time I and others bombard posters with stats and data to try and support our position, but I think I try not to be condescending or act superior. I can see how it can be taken that way in the heat of a deep or spirited debate. Maybe I'm being overly sensitive, and BW probably had something to do with it, but when you say something like this... Once again anyone who knows one goddam thing about baseball understands the importance of the catcher pitcher relationship. if you feel that Leon's presence made that much of a difference last year then great. I don't share your thoughts. I get the impression that you think I am implying you don't know a goddamn thing about baseball, because you don't agree or don't "get my point." I know you understand my points, unlike BW, except for that post that said I have implied it's "all about Leon." I'm fine with others having different views, in fact I enjoy it. I know you know a lot about baseball and respect the importance of a great relationship between a catcher and his staff. We disagree on the magnitude of the aspect of the game, and I'm hopeful Swihart can quickly build a rapport withe the starters he has been assigned to catch. I know I might give too much credence to the whole CERA-related skill set argument, and I feel like I have tried to not give full weight to the CERA numbers by projecting the wide differentials the past data has shown would not continue in full. I projected something like half of the differential going forward. In this tiny sample size of our first few games, it has been 3 to 4 times the past differential, and I have not jumped all over the numbers to call for the return of Leon or the demotion of Vaz or Swihart. Never once. I'm not blaming Swihart or Vaz for anything. Maybe they made a half run difference, but that would not have changed our record by more than 1 game, at best, if any. I'm going to continue to not respond to BW and his countless lies about my positions, like his recent false rants on sequencing, and I wish there was a way to put him on ignore, so his posts would not be visible to me. Again, I'm sorry for jumping at you. You deserve better.

True. I shouldn't have vented my frustration towards the poor Sox start and BW's continued misrepresentation of my views on cp. I respect CP a lot, even when we disagree.

I asked my first grade nephew, if he knew what it meant. He nailed it after two seconds of thought. I rest my case on the reading comprehension skills (or lack there of) of Billy the Clown.

Speechless.

Come on Mookie!

4 Sox players have 3 Ks tonight... WTF? The change from last year is striking.

We got what we wanted! Our .830 catcher OPS (before tonight's game) leads all Sox positions, so far! Isn't it wonderful?

I never came close to saying this is all about Leon, except for the statement I made immediately followed by this... "(Sarcasm alert)" You keep acting like anyone who sees things differently than you is somehow disparaging you or claiming intellectual superiority. Over the winter, I showed the differentials between Leon vs Vaz & Leon vs Swihart over the last few years with each of our starters and was very clear that I did not think the full differentials could be chalked up to Leon being that much better than the others with 2-3 of our starters. There were some pretty massive swings, and I have said maybe he makes a 0.50 or so difference with a couple of our pitchers. When we got off to this horrible start, I went out of my way to say the sample size was "way way too small," yes I said "way" twice. I then made a sarcastic statement and includes the alert. I followed that with a post about Swihart getting two hits and how some might be thinking what a wonderful thing it is to have a hitting catcher. That's probably the only post I made that hints at any sort of blame on our woes due to Leon not being here. Look, everyone knows I wanted Leon over Swihart. Everyone knows I spoke of learning curves and messing with something that was working, but I have not come close to blaming our poor start on us not having Leon. Do I wish we still had him? Yes, of course. Do I think Swihart and more of Vaz is the reason for a 6 run jump in starter ERA? Hell no. Not even close. I expected maybe a 0.50 to 1.00 jump in starter ERA during an indefinite learning curve period before settling somewhere between 0.30 and 0.80 with Sale & Price. That's not earth-shattering. That's not close to blaming all this on the catcher choice DD & Cora made. I'm not flipping my position, and quite frankly, I'm getting tired of having to explain myself over and over, when I thought I was being pretty clear allalong, except for maybe the Swihart 2 hit post, which I made while pissed off at that lost game.

lmao!

No Kimbrel makes a difference. No Leon might make a difference, except for the .511 OPS in 288 PAs. No Kelly probably doesn't matter much. No these guys, based on their 2018 numbers only, looked like addition by subtraction: OPS .708 HRam (195 PAs) .604 Kinsler (143) .520 B Phillips (27) ERA 6.08 Pomeranz (74 IP) 7.41 Cuevas (17) 8.10 Scott (7) 12.79 Beeks (6)

I love our schedule. We got the tough part done first. We avoided cold Fenway for a couple weeks. It only gets easier...

Just ignore him. He lacks basic comprehension, understanding and logic skills.

I've never tried to claim I know more than you or others, and I have said over and over that our poor start is NOT because Leon is not here. I do think catcher defense and pitcher comfort level is more important than many here do, and perhaps I "rant" about it more than it deserves to be discussed, but that's because I think the concept is "under blown."

I expected a possible 0.30 to 0.80 ERA differential between Leon and Swihart & Leon and Vaz with maybe a high of 1.00- maybe a little more during the learning curve period. To be clear, in no way do I blame not having Leon for 7 to 12 run differentials. That being said, I wish we never messed with what we had going.

I'm done responding to you. You keep putting words in my mouth I never said or even came close to hinting at. Bye.

...but somewhere in Red Sox Nation someone is happy to see how well Swihart is doing, and saying, "I told you so..."

No. Note even close. I've already said the sample size is way too small a half dozen times. I did expect a learning curve, however, but this is way beyond that. We almost certainly wouldn't have one more win had Leon been here instead of Swihart.

I think Nunez has a better ERA than all our starters!

Isn't it GREAT getting 2 hits from our catcher? It was the only reason we couldn't win 112 games last year!

How long can we expect the learning curve between our SP'ers and new catchers to last? I am pretty sure this is not all about, or even mostly about, demoting Leon, but this is getting ridiculous.

If this gives you the jollies, you must be pretty shallow.

No. I think mistakes were made.