moonslav59

It's early, still, but if he keeps going like this, I agree.

Agreed: Pom for prospects to flip for Machado would be great, but we'd have to add Groome and maybe more.

He's still making base running blunders as well. One could somewhat overlook those last year, but not with a .712 hitter.

Right now, we could play Moreland over JBJ and improve the offense (and defense at 1B)- not my idea of a good move. If we do plan on upgrading at 3B, we'd trade JBJ. One wonders what we could get for Pom & JBJ. With those prospects plus maybe a couple more from our farm, maybe we could get something very special, but who? I would not do this for a half season wonder like Machado.

Price's contract is going to make it hard to spend $65M+ on 2 players. That's about 30% of the payroll budget on just 2 players! Still, we have to keep Betts.

Most innings played on defense in 2018: 278 Devers 262 JBJ 247 Beni 246 Nunez 229 Betts 205 Vaz 150 Moreland 149 Bogey (was on DL) 141 HRam 129 JMart 123 Holt (on DL) 96 Lin 89 Leon 2 of our top 4 innings player are awful on defense, so far. Once Pedey returns, that may change. JMart is currently not in the top 8 innings players and neither is HRam. 2017 1389 Betts 1319 Beni 1310 Bogey 1204 Bradley (The killer Bs held the top 4 slots) 1171 Moreland 834 Pedey 773 Vaz 699 Leon (big change at the C position distribution) 508 Devers 471 marrero 363 Young 356 Holt 294 Nunez 253 Rutledge 214 Pablo 156 Lin 151 Hernandez 146 HRam 140 Travis 83 R Davis

I'm not so sure anone else can "get uo to speed" all that quickly. The catcher-pitcher dynamic is not something to mess with. If, and this might be a big if, Leon is the reason Porcello becomes Cy Young material again this year, then he could bat .000 the rest of the way and still be worth it.

If Joe keeps doing what he's been doing keeping him is a no-brainer. He found his stride ever since he plunked Austin.... Actually, he found his stride right after game 1. 12 straight games with no ERs allowed. 13 IP 6 Hits 1 BB 13 Ks That's a WHIP of .538-- better than Uehara's record shattering .565 WHIP in 2013. Granted, the sample size is small, but he's been on a great roll.

Very true. Last year, JBJ was involved in 310 plays in 132 games, which is about 2.34 per game or 7 every 3 games. For argument's sake, let's say one of those 7 plays would fall for a single or double had we had JMart in LF and Beni in CF all last year. Last year he got just over 6 hits every 7 games played. If you made it 7 hits, his BA would have gone up by about 140 points. If some were doubles, his SLG would go up by more. That would have turned his .245 BA into .385. Maybe my math is wrong, but nobody would complain about a .385 hitter thaat was average or slightly below average on defense. If you give JBJ one play every 4 games, then his BA could be converted to .315 by adding just 70 points.

Yes, JBJ's hot streaks have carried his OPS in a few seasons moree than other players' hot streaks do theirs, but the guy had a pretty long stretch of being over .800. I guess I take issue with the comment about him having to "suddenly become a hitter," when he already has been one for extended times, streaks not with standing. For most players, if you took away their best 3 streaks over their last 3 seasons, their numbers would suffer greatlly. Certainly, JBJ's more than others, but my point is that most players rely on a few hot streaks to bring their numbers up to normalcy or greatness. Here are JBJ's recent monthly OPS numbers. I know they can be a bit deceiving as some hot streaks overlapped 2 months and made both look good, but here they are: 1.163 Aug '15 .604 SEP '15 .807 APR '16 1.175 May '16 .805 June '16 .839 July '16 (4 in a row and 5 of 6 at .800+) .651 AUG '16 .731 SEP '16 (not that bad) .596 APR '17 (his first truly horrible month in 9 months) .808 May '17 1.009 June '17 (at this point, 7 of 11 months over .800 and 2 of the 4 below .800 being over .650) .596 July .770 AUG (decent) .517 SEP .600 APR '18 3 of his last 4 months have been putrid. No doubt, this is very concerning, but let's not pretend that JBJ has not shown he can hit for long stretches despite those stretches being largely carried just a few isolated and all-too-short hot streaks. I still have faith he can find that stride again and get his offense back to respectability, and perhaps even more. Certainly, I worry about him being sub .600 for 3 of his last 4 months, but to me, he deserves a much longer look that it appears some hear might not be willing to give him.

Me, too. I'd go long past June 1st to even think about benching him.

He must be doing something right to K close to 2 per inning.

Great win. Porcello is the man right now. Betts is a god. Good to see Devers heating up in a big way. What a difference in team HRs over last year.

Scouts and prospects are often wrong about some players. Is it possible you've been wrong about this kid? 46Ks and 7 BBs in 26.1 IP is getting the job done and then some. I admit, I did not have much hope for him before this small sample size to start 2018, but I'm beginning to think maybe we'll finally have a pleasant surprise instead of another in the long line of Sox pitching prospect disapointments.

Are you forgetting he's one of our best base runners... the few times he gets on base? Base Running index 2017-2018 9.5 Betts 8.7 Bogey 5.8 JBJ 2.4 Beni -3.0 Moreland -5.0 HRam

Yes, Brnie's HR and Fisk willing the ball to stay fair. Of course, I remember hits... big hits. Personally, I enjoy great defensive plays more- day to day. Maybe it's because I was never a good hitter but was pretty darn good on defense, if can say so myself.

Stunning!

I remember Dwight Evans' catch in the '75 World Series.

None of this means many fans prefer to watch HRs over great defensive plays. Look at the top plays of the night on ESPN. How many are hits?

If anything, I'd move Devers to DH this year not 1B, but even that is not likely to ever be the best way to set things up. We have to hope Devers can improve on the fly and get to a point of near respectability by October.

Think of it this way, how many more singles and doubles would JBJ need to have every week to make him a plus on offense? Let's say he gets 30 PAs a week. Right now, he gets about 5 hits and 2 walks every 20 PAs. If he got 2 more singles, he's have an OBP of .272. 5 more singles is .364. Does JBJ make 2-5 more defensive players more than the average CF'er per week? Maybe 2 but not likely 3. Now, change a single to a double or HR, and the choice is not so clear.

He's been worth the $13M a year he's made with us. One can argue he wasn't worth the $13M plus 4 prospects, but the next question is this? Is he worth paying $90M/5 as he ages? Would the money saved on the budget being used elsewhere plus the draft compensation be a better choice?

That pretty much says it all. The fact that Swihart has not even caught one inning in a blow-out game shows me they aren't even trying to have him ready to be used, if needed. That's how badly they think of his defense.pitcher handling skills.

I get your point, but Velazquez looked good as a starter too--at the MLB level!

The time to move Devers was before we signed Moreland- not now.