moonslav59

There is the Buehler we know.

Oh, I hate em as much as ever, but I don't really identify with individual players, so much, this year.

We've seen bottom of the order magic, before, but this does not have the feel of a comeback win. I guess going 3-1, on the road is very nice, but I was really hoping for a sweep and passing HOU in the AL standings. It's gotta hurt being a Yankee fan, knowing you singlehandedly put the Sox ahead of you and in the top WC seat in the playoff hunt.

I had doubts until the last out.

When you're 8-1 vs a team, it's kinda hard to build up a big dislike for anybody.

Words we doubted we'd hear.

I had a feeling we should have saved some Saturday runs for Sunday.

All three pitches looked like balls. He really should be a strict platoon, and even vs lefties, he's been struggling. Too many Sox batters are hitting a rough patch, at the same time. Hopefully, it's just that- a patch, because we need a group effort over the next 6+ weeks. Last 28 Days, before tonight: .503 Narvaez (but .868 in last 14 days) .518 Rafaela (.422 in last 14) .677 Yoshida (.520) .694 Wong (but .778 in last 14) Last 14: .456 Romy .608 Duran

Woo won 8-5. Murphy pitched the first 3 and only walked one. (2H 0ER) Slaten pitched a scoreless IP- oH, oBB, oKs. Campbell, Romero and Sikes homered. Campbell & Sogard had 2 hits. POR last 12-10 as Wehunt and others got lit up. Miller & Brannon homered. Miller had 3 hits & Bleis 2. GRE lost 9-8. I'm not sure what happened to Ehrlicher but he started and went 0.0 IP w no hits or BBs. Arias went 1-3 w 2BBs and 3 runs scored (.703) Taylor has 2 hits & BB. Martin 1-2 w 3BB. SAL won 3-2 as Fajardo (2.84 ERA) continues to impress. 6IP 2H 0ER 0BB 8K. J Bello pitched poorly. Nunez had 2 hits, including a 2B. J Gonzales went 0-4.

Okay, but you also said more than half our players "suck," and we easily have more than 13 above average players, even if you don't count defense and runnings as highly as I do or bWAR/fWAR do. While Romy & Ref fall short of the 250 cutoff for the top 270 players in MLB by playing time, both are way above average in hitting. They are even top 30 vs LHPs. Of the 9 guys above 250 PAs, 6 are above ,735. Rafaela is at .714 and Toro & Campbell ar not on the 26 anymore. The Lowe/Romy and Abreu/Ref platoons are clearly way above average, as are Bregman, Story, Duran and Narvaez. That's 6 slost better than average and Rafaela above for me but not you. I can't see anyone saying "He sucks." That leaves maybe 2 slots out of 9 that could be called "Suck" DH and 2B. Our bench has carried us, including Romy, Ref, Anthony and others. #135 in fWAR is at 1.5. The bottom 1/3 would be at 0.8 and lower. The Sox have 7 guys over 2.0 with Romy at 1.1 and Ref at 0.8. The pitching side has more players that could be called bottom 1/3 or close to it, but we do have 5 guys at 1.0 fWAR or more. #135 among pitchers is about 1.0 to 1.1. The bottom 1/3 starts at about 0.6 or 0.7 and below. We have 6 above that, but one is Dobbins. We also have Bernardino and Weissert at 0.5 and 0.3, but one can say with merit, they are both below average, I guess. I see these guys as easily above average: Crochet, Chapman, Bello, Giolito Whitlock with Weissert & Bernardino as not "sucking." That's 5-7 pitchers out of 13 and not counting Dobbins and other injured players. Bregman, Duran, Story, Rafaela, Abreu, Narvaez, Anthony, Refsnyder & Romy with Mayer as "not sucking". That's 9-10 out of 13. Combined, I see 14 minimum as being above average and 17-18 out of 26 as clearly not sucking... maybe more.

Well, there you go. Once in what 15 seasons?

I admit. I still treasure my sports memories more than anything else- even family and travel adventures. (Just don't tell my current wife I said this!) LOL

I was a very aggressive player who always went all out. I was a bit of a hothead, at times, but the weed mellowed me out. I was a little overweight in HS, but dropped 30 pounds my freshman year and somehow I got way better at everything. I'm not trying to brag, but I figured I was pretty good when I once asked to be subbed out in that championship b-ball game and the guy on the bench said, "Are you crazy? I'm not going in for YOU!"

The glove was really beat up and looked useless, but I hate defending her. She knew it had sentimental value and I'd never have done anything like that to her.

I'm not sure there has ever been a team with above average offense at all 9 positions, but I can see wanting that as a goal. I think SS, Catcher and CF are positions where defense matters so much, that average or slightly below average is not a bad thing, if the D is near GG quality. Baserunning can add some value, too. To me, Story, Narvaez and Rafaela all fit the near GG label. Story and Rafaela are plus base runners, so being near average or even a little worse is fine, as long as the other slots have no black holes, To me, a black hole is below .650 for a below average defender and .600 for an average one. .700 is no longer a black hole. This season the cut off for 270 players (9 players x 30 teams) is 250 PAs. Number 135 is at .733, and this excludes att subs and replacement level players that play a lot. The 5th best player (4 better and 4 worse on each team) ranges from .720 to .740, but of course there are positional variances. The 6th best batter's range is .702 to .720. 7th best:.677 to .702 8th best: .649 to .677 9th best is .542 to .648 with 10 under .600. Maybe our differences are based on semantics. What "sucks" for you is an average player. For me, it's a bottom 1/3 or 1/4th batter- relative to others.

My ex threw out my glove, but it's not like I was ever going to play again, at that point.

I improved a lot after high school, but going to Notre Dame made it impossible to ever come close to making a team. They did have a very competitive interhall league, including football with pads and basketball that included all state players left and right, including some foot ball players. My hall won the Football championship my freshman year (I played WR and DB) and my senior year (I was the QB.) We won the B-ball championship my freshman year and I led the team in scoring in the championship game. (The highlight of my sports career.) At baseball, we were not good. My only shining moments were on defense. I remember making an ungodly throw to home plate in the bottom of the ninth (1 run game), just in time to nail the runner, but the catcher dropped it. Such is life. Another time, I was in CF and a ball wa s*** over my head and to my right. I turned and ran to the exact spot and turned just in time to see the ball like right next to me, and I stabbed my glove out in a downward motion and somehow caught it on the down swoop. I'm still not sure how that was humanly possible. I played a lot of basketball and baseball after college, but after I blew out my knee, it was softball only. I used to watch all sports and dabbled in fantasy football, but now I watch only baseball, a lot.

I sucked at hitting but was very good on D and baserunning. I walked enough to help me stay a starter. I've always loved defense, so maybe I'm biased.

It stems from my OCD, but numbers don't crowd my enjoyment of the game on a personal level. I played the game, a lot. Later, I played softball for many years, which is not the same, but some of the basics apply to both. I love the game. I was much better at basketball and football, but my love is baseball.

It's kinda early to know, but he has been out, too much. Slaten finished 2nd in RP IP in '24 w 55. I'm not sure Paxton ever finished 2nd in IP on any team in any season.

Fangraphs says 16 runs saved and 16 Outs Above Average in just 907 innings. He might be at 20 had he played CF full time. If you count those as RBIs, he'd be second on the team in RBIs. If you counted them as runs scored, he'd be our runs leader by a lot.

But he has changed it, and is just 24. When the league OPS is about .719, why would .720 w GG defense and plus baserunning be the cut off or called a "black hole." I was a JBJ fan, so I guess we'll never come to a compromise, but average offense, great D and plus running is not a bad thing. I get the idea of wanting more than mediocre or slightly above mediocre, but I just do not think Rafaela is even close to our weakest link. At 24, I also see a chance to get better, as most players do as they reach 25-29. I also see the whole league moving towards higher K rates, lower OBPs and not-so-great D or running skills. There should be some context. I guess WAR does not carry much weight with you, but even if you think it is flawed and gives too much value to defense and running, you have to think it is very wrong to not notice how he ranks with other Sox players and MLB CF'ers. His WAR would be even higher, if they kept him in CF every game played. He has the 3rd best fWAR in MLB in CF. He's -0.7 at 2B. Do the math. You ask how low I would go, and I'd say .650 to .675, as long as the league OPS stays around .720. BTW, MLB CF'ers have a .682 OPS, this year. There are 29 CF'ers with 180+ PAs in CF. The 15th highest OPS is .720. You think average sucks. It may not be great, but it doesn't suck, when your D is great at a difficult position. (BTW, Rafaela is batting .790 as a CF'er, but I'm going to claim he will hit that as a FT CF'er.) 7 of the top 30 OF'ers by PAs are batting under .675. There is some context.

I had Jh Garcia higher, but maybe he wanted to take some pressure off him. Cora went with a RRL-RRL-RRR pattern. Watch Eaton be the hero and shut us both up.

Here are the WAR leaders on the Sox (avg bWAR & fWAR- rounding up) 5.3 Crochet (5.2, 5.3) 3.8 Bregman (4.1, 3.5) 3.4 Duran (3.7, 3.1) 3.3 Rafaela (3.6, 2.9) 3.0 Story (3.3, 2.6) 3.0 Abreu (3.3, 2.7) 2.9 Narvaez (3.0, 2.7) 2.5 Chapman (2.9, 2.0) 2.5 Anthony (2.6, 2.3) 1.9 Bello (2.3, 1.5) 1.5 Whitlock (1.4, 1.5) 1.2 Giolito (1.1, 1.3) 1.1 Romy (1.1, 1.1) 1.0 Refsnyder (1.2, 0.8) 0.6 Wilson (0.4, 0.6) 0.5 Weissert (0.6, 0.3)

Agreed, but look at the Sox player's OPS vs RHPs: 1.285 Lowe 1B .897 Bregman 3B .892 Anthony OF .881 Duran OF .828 Abreu OF .728 Story SS .718 Rafaela 2B v RHPs, but he could play CF and DH an OF'er, but then we have Romy or DHam at 2B. .676 Romy 2B or DH? (see Rafaela) .650 Yoshida DH .646 Refsnyder DH/OF (should not start v R) ,556 DHam 2B only The only real options to benching Yoshida vs RHPs involves 2B (Rafaela, DHam/Romy) or the OF (Rafaela to CF and an OF;er to DH) or just DH Romy and go with Rafaela at 2B, because we won't bench a LHB OF'er vs a R. So, it's basically... Yoshida .650 v Romy .676 at DH v R or Yoshida v DHam .556 (better D at 2B and CF w an OF'er at DH.) There is no clearly better batter vs RHPs to take his place. On paper, Romy looks better, but... last 14 days: 1.350 DHam .520 Yoshida .456 Romy .422 Rafaela Last 28 days .812 DHam .778 Romy .677 Yoshida .518 Rafaela If you go by recent O, alone, maybe Yoshida> Rafaela, w DHam at 2B or maybe Romy at DH..)