moonslav59

How is Price a concern but not Sonny Gray? Or, other Yankee DL wonders? Our pen turned into a strength last year, and now we have Smith and Thornburg returning and Workman & Maddox all year. Kelly & Barnes are not bad and will now be our 4-7 RP'ers instead of 2-3.

Lin is pretty good on D as well.

Until JBJ gets hot.

Makes one wonder, if we are the only MLB team like this. BTW, great point, but here are other SP'ers from the Sox system that had 450+ IP after 2006 (maybe he meant logged 450+ with the Sox): Anibal Sanchez 1593 IP after 20016 Derek Lowe (1319 IP) Jorge de la Rosa (1311 IP) Justin Masterson (1083) Carl Pavano (751 IP) There may be more.

A look at one possible way to swap out the 2017 PAs with 2018 PAs. + 550-650 JD Martinez (over .879 since 2014 and 1.066 in 2017) Swap with... -276 Young (.709) LF/DH -100 to 200 from HRam (.750) -100 to 200 from Moreland (.769) -38 R Davis (.595) OF -9 S Selsky (.333) OF +300-400 Devers (.819 in 2017) Swap with.... 75- 188 Marrero (.593) 118 Rutledge (558) 108 Sandoval (.622) When you look at the numbers from Marrero, Rutledge & Pablo, we could see a bigger gain here than by JDM over HRam & Young. +350-450 Nunez (.892 with the Sox in 2017) 100-150 Pedey (.760) 50-113 Marrero (.593) 50 HRam (.750) 50 Moreland (.769) 66 Lin (.709)

It had to be Brentz. He's out of options. He'd never play unless 2 OF'ers got hurt. OF depth chart: starters: Beni, JBJ & Betts 4th OF'er: JDM (HRam or Nunez DHs-- not Brentz) 5th OF'er: Nunez (We'll be scrambling to get him PAs once Pedey comes back.) Even Moreland or Swihart might start in LF over Brentz. I can see why Marrero could be DFA'd since we are loaded with IF depth, but with Pedey out, Marco talking about needing more time and Nunez coming off a knee injury, keeping Deven through ST'ing makes more sense. One other option could have been to put Pedey on the 60 day DL, watch Brentz hit 8 HRs in ST'ing, and then trade Brentz for more than we got.

Just a week ago, DD was getting roasted. Now look.

The worst part about the 11 in need of playing time is that 2 basically play only 1B/DH (Moreland & HRam) and JD should only DH to maximize his PAs and minimize his injury chances. HRam & Moreland might be the two guys I'd rather have Nunez, Beni and JBJ play instead of. Of course, Vaz is likely the worst bat of the 11, but who is 10th? It's probably best to look at the splits and think about platoons or pseudo platoons. Career numbers by Sox players (2015-2017 in parenthesis): vs RHPs .838 Beni .838 (.767) HRam .836 (.920) JDM .833 (.836) Betts .792 (.787) Pedroia .779 (.782) Moreland .747 (.790) Nunez .743 Devers (only 183 PAs) .736 (.808) JBJ .726 (.754) Bogey 1) Devers should not be platooned, and his 2017 reverse splits were probably a fluke. 2) Bogey should be moved down in the order vs RHPs and rest only vs RHPs. 3) HRam has been worse than Moreland vs RHPs since 2015, but it's close, so we could see HRam vs LH'd starters and some RH'd starters- enough to be close to a 50-50 split with Moreland, but since HRam can DH when JDM plays the OF, they should both get over 400 PAs. vs LHPs: 1.074 Devers(57 PAs) .921 (1.021) JDM .897 (.843) HRam .859 (.862) Betts .850 (.847) Pedroia .826 (.853) Bogey .723 (.754) JBJ .710 (.732) Nunez .625 (.716) Moreland .583 Beni(needs to be watched closely) 1) I do not want Beni to platoon. He's too young to not give a chance with LHPs, but we need to watch closely and act accordingly, if necessary. 2) Moreland should never start vs LHPs. 3) Nunez should siut vs LHPs. 4) JBJ should only rest vs LHP and maybe could sit more than just when needing rest. So, vs RHPs, I'd rest players this often: (Assuming we face 5 RH'd starters and 2 LH'd starters per week) HRam 2 of 7 days (vs RHPs) Nunez 2 of 7 (v L or R) Bogey 1 of 7 (v R) Moreland 2 of 7 (v L)

For cash considerations. The JDM & Nunez signings have further squeezed our bench candidates, especially those out of options. Everyday player locks: DL: Pedey Vaz Moreland HRam (unless traded) JDM Nunez Bogey Devers Beni JBJ Betts Likely: Leon (unless we go with Swihart) Bubble (likely 2 from this list): Swihart (out of options) Holt Hernandez (DL?) Marrero (out of options) Lin, Quiroz, Travis, Butler, Chavis (AAA) Pitchers: DL: ERod, Thornburg? SP: Sale, Price, Pom, Porcello, Wright, Johnson (out of options) RP: Kimbrel, Smith, Kelly, Barnes, Scott, Hembree (out of options) SP (AAA): Velazquez, Beeks, Elias, Haley, Shepherd RP (AAA): Workman, Maddox, Buttrey, Martin, Jerez

My guess is they will try to keep Nunez in the line-up. They will start with a resting rotation. I'd mlike to see them settle on HRam/Moreland getting less PAs, but Nunez doesn't play 1B, and neither does JD (Nunez to DH?). We might see JBj sit more. If he's struggling, he might be benched. Beni might sit vs LHPs. I don't want Nunez playing SS FT, but it's not like Bogey is a great defensive SS. Maybe something like this... JBJ sits 2-3 out of 10 games Pedey 2-3 out of 10 Beni sits 1 out of 10 (vs tough lefty) Bogey sits 1/10 vs tough righty Devers sits 1/10 Nunez 2/10 If JD can learn 1B without hurting himself, we could cut into HRam/Moreland's PAs.

That's not a hope I dream of.

Worse. Better defense, though.

.921 vs LHPs .836 vs RHPs Almost identical 1st half vs 2nd half. Last year, he had an awesome .985 OPS vs RHPs, but his split vs LHPs was off-the-charts at 1.356 2017 HRs per 650 PAs? 70 vs LHPs (+64 2B+3B) 128 RBI 56 vs RHPs (+30 2B+3B) 171 RBI

Young Sox career OPS Betts .839 Devers .819 Beni .785 Bogey .750 JBJ .732 Some young Sox splits vs RHPs/LHPs: vs RHPs Beni .838 Betts: .833 Devers .743 (only 183 PAs) JBJ .736 Bogey .726 vs LHPs: Devers 1.074 (57 PAs) Betts .859 Bogey .826 JBJ .723 Beni .583 (needs to be watched closely) If Beni turns into a platoon LF'er, it could get JD some more time in the OF and Nunez & HRam more time at DH. I can, at least, see us flipping Bogey and Beni in the order vs RHPs and LHPs. Maybe Beni bats 2nd vs RHP and 6th vs LHPs, and Bogey bats 2ns vs LHPs and 6th vs RHPs.

He's .833 vs LHPs career, and they say your best hitters should bat 2nd, 4th and 1st. I'm fine with Beni 3rd (or a healthy HRam). Devers may move up as the year goes on.

That would save the day! With our history of developing starters in the dump, I'm not too optimistic. Our best hope is Groome. Wright or Johnson could be pretty good. Beeks & Houck? Mata might be 3-4 years away.

The asking price for JBJ is big as well, and reports were the Guardians have inquired on JBJ several times over the last few years.

Assuming we stay under the $40m limit, here's what our tax might be.... Year 1 (2018): $33M over 20% tax= $6.6M 12% tax on 20-33M= $1.6M We're at a tax of $8.2M this year. Let's assume we stay at about $33M over next year: 30% tax= 9.9M 12% tax on $13M= $1.6M Total 2019 tax: $11.5M Same in 2020? Tax would be $16.5M + $1.6M= $18.1M

How is Brentz going to get any time, unless we trade JBJ or someone gets hurt? Even if somebody gets hurt, we have JDM & Nunez to play LF over Brentz. I might even prefer Swihart or Moreland in LF over BB. Maybe we can trade Brentz & Johnson for a better 6th starter.

Again, I'm not for trading JBJ, but if it improves our offense and adds a quality SP'er like Salazar, I can see giving up some defense to do it. I'd definitely do this.... JBJ, Hembree & Johnson for Carrasco, but I doubt CLE does it.

I don't see us making a big splash next winter. I think we'll try to keep under the $40M limit again. Assuming HRam does not vest and we have the $9M bump plus the $7M we are under now, we're at... Sale's option adds $1M Subtract: $22M HRam $13M Kimbrel $9M CB bump $8.5M Pomeranz $7M under now $3.8M Kelly ~$62M Arb raises will eat up a big chunk. We have to re-sign or replace in kind, Pom, Kimbrel & Kelly. Maybe we can do without Kelly, but we need to replace Kimbrel and Pom. I doubt they'll be much money left over for anybody else. They both will get hefty raises. If Smith and Thornburg step it up this year, we may get by without Kimbrel. I can't see Wright or Johnson taking Pom's place without a significant drop off.

Trading JBJ does give 500+ more PAs to HRam & Nunez and possibly Brentz. My guess is, HRam + Nunez can outhit JBJ. We'd lose big on defense by playing JD in LF and Beni in CF, but that might be offset by adding a pitcher like Salazar to the rotation. (Note: Salazar gets paid $5M this year and has 2 arb years left.) Salazar by the numbers: 2015-2017 18th in xFIP at 3.50 (same as Price and just worse than Bumgarner, Lester & Greinke 29th in WAR at 7.8 30th in ERA- at 89 (Same as Duffy- better than S Gray & Archer) 35th in WHIP at 1.25 (just better than Duffy & Pom) The killer: 73rd in IP (67th in GS'd)

Salazar is a big injury risk. We might not need to add more. If so, maybe add Johnson or Swihart (both out of options). Hembree is also out of options, but I think adding him makes the cost way too high. I might not even give up JBJ for Salazar straight up, but I might be biased. I'm a huge JBJ fan.

I'm not for trading JBJ either, but if we traded JBJ and Holt for Salazar, we'd save almost $3.4M.

https://www.rosterresource.com/mlb-boston-red-sox/ This site has the Sox with 10 players in the top 200 power rankings: 1 Sale 18 JDM 19 Kimbrel 21 Betts 66 Beni 113 Bogey 122 Moreland 143 Nunez 167 HRam 193 JBJ (JD not listed yet on this list but on the depth charts) They have Leon starting in AAA with Swihart, HRam, Holt and Brentz on the bench. I guess they don't pay attention to options remaining, as they have Leon and Marrero in AAA.