moonslav59

Make room on the roster for a rule 5 player. So long, Henry!

There are always exceptions to every rule or trend/curve, and Papi was certainly one. His last year was one of his all time best! If you had told me the player was 34, I'd have projected a much steeper drop off. I do think a player's last 2-3 years are a better indicators than the career numbers. Of course, if the player was playing hurt for one of the years or had a seemingly outlier year, then adjustments can be included in future projections. No projection system is perfect, but career average is probably nt on of the best stats to use.

We could probably afford Stanton and Cozart and stay under the second tier limit.

Except for the hair.

If he's 28, the age curve numbers say he will decline immediately- maybe slowly at first. I might expect... 2018: .965 2019: .935 2020: .900 2021: .860 2022: .810 2023: .760 That's knowing nothing of injuries or sample sizes of the past 2-3 years. Who are we talking about?

I'd feel good, but I'd want to see his last 2 year numbers to judge better going forward.

Wow.

Youk was a hot head. Pedey's relationship with the current players might be too strained to be a hitting coach for the Sox in the next 5 years or so.

We had tons more deciding games than the Nats. You're just listing our losses in the WS. The Nats have never lost a WS deciding game. If you count all our playoff losses in deciding games, including 2003's heart-breaker, then we are way ahead of the Nats.

Pedey just doesn't seem like a DH type, but with his intensity, maybe he can make it work, if needed. If he could give us 80 games at 2B and 60 at DH, and we acquired a quality player who can play 2B, we should be okay. Problems can arise, such as these... 1) If we sign JD to DH, he'd have to play the OF those 60 games Pedey DHs, and HRam would be the FT 1Bman. 2) If Nunez is the guy we get to cover for Pedey, or IF D will look like this: Devers (3B), Bogey (SS), Nunez (2B) and HRam (1B). That's pretty sickly bad. 3) If Pedey DH's more than 60% of the games, our OF is further squeezed, assuming we sign JD or another OF'er to DH for us.

86 years for the pre-2004 Sox. Less than 50 for the Nats/Expos.

If the scouts think he can do it, it might be worth a look-see. This is who cots has for FA 2bmen: (* means team option) Second Basemen Jose Altuve * Alexi Amarista * Darwin Barney Andres Blanco Asdrubal Cabrera * Daniel Descalso * Stephen Drew Danny Espinosa Ryan Flaherty Logan Forsythe * Howie Kendrick Ian Kinsler * Brett Lawrie Jed Lowrie * Eduardo Nunez Cliff Pennington Brandon Phillips Adam Rosales Neil Walker

Of course, they want to unload it. They are a small market team. I just don't think they will hand him away. I also don't think it will take Beni & Devers. It might not take either one. It might not even take Bogey or JBJ. Maybe we can just offer any two or three from... Groome Mata Flores Chavis Houck Scherff Brannen Beeks Shawaryn Ockimey If we could get them to take HRam as a salary offset, then offer more.

I never thought of Chavis as 2B depth, but he's not good at 3B. I doubt he'd be any better at 2B. I'm thinking Nunez might be too expensive, but he can be used elsewhere and still get 550+ PAs total. Not sure what other FAs are out there. I guess we could pray for Holt's or marco's full recovery and improvement.

Long wait.

Yes you are!

We got a lot younger this year and kept the same record as last year. That's not even counting Devers for a full year. 25 and under: 2016: 1917 PA 2017: 2468 PA 26-30 2016: 1968 2017: 1959 31-35 2016: 1809 2017: 1873 36+ 2016: 626 2017: 38 Rajaj DAvis (36) will not be back. HRam (33) could have a dimished role next year and be gone by 2019. Pedey (33) is the only older guy locked up long term. Fister (33) FA Kendrick (32) FA Wright (32) 6th starter Moreland (31) FA Abad (31) FA Holt (29) Utility and on non-tender bubble Kimbrel and Kelly are 29. Everyone else is 28 or younger. I'm not too worried about signing one 32 year old guy to 4-5 years. I am worried about the budget and how it might affect us keeping our kids 3-4 years from now.

I think you're minimizing the scope of decline. By the quantity: our 8 highest returning players by 2016 PAs declined. ALL EIGHT! That's like flipping heads 8 times in a row. 9 of 10 declined. Only Vaz improved. By the quality: -201 Leon -157 Holt -141 Young -116 HRam -109 JBJ -94 Betts -65 Pedey -59 Beni -56 Bogey +150 Vaz Again, yes HRam, Pedey and Leon were expected to decline, but even with those three, it wouldn't have been unheard of for one out of 3 could have at least stayed even. 6 out of the top 8 declined by more 94 points! That's not "reasonable". Speaking of staying even, yes, maybe our expectations were too high, but even the expectation that all 8 stayed even would have come up way short. All 8 declined by over 55 points. That's a pretty significant number. Not one came even 55 points within staying even. I'm fine with blaming Papi's departure, poor coaching, injuries, and whatever, but the fact is, the decline was major and deep.

Oh, I get it. I was never for the plan of the 3-4 year window, but now that we're in it, we better win at least one freakin' championship to justify the sacrifice. I'd certainly prefer shorter term deals, but we only have a few openings on the roster, and signing mediocre 1 year guys isn't likely to help much.

I wouldn't be surprised if we go over the limit by $39.9M. Is that "drunken" in your opinion?

We're talking... Giancarlo Freakin' Stanton! I think bringing up Beni's name is the same breath is honoring Beni's value not diminishing or dismissing it.

I'd be curious to see what percentage of players decline two years in row between ages 22 and 27, the normal up stage on the way to the "peak prime" years of 26 & 27. (Only seasons with 100 PAs listed. If under 400, it is noted.) Bogaerts 21 .660 22 .776 23 .802 24 .746 JBJ 23 .617 (107 PAs) 24 .531 25 .832 (255) 26 .835 27 .726 Betts 21 .812 (213 PAs) 22 .820 23 .897 24 .803 Beni 21 .835 (118) 22 .776 Vaz 23 .617 (201 PAs) 24 DNP 25 .585 (184) 26 .735 (345) Leon 26 .439 (128) 27 .845 (283) 28 .644 (301) When looking at this age group of Sox players, it doesn't look horribly our of wack. At least Vaz showed some improvement. However, to see this and then see just about every player from 29-33 decline at the same time as well, I can't help but think it was terrible luck or a bunch of circumstances all occurred at the same time. I doubt there's a single explanation for it all.

I didn't take it that way. I'm not blind or getting worse, but the bold makes it easier for me.

Yes, and that's why I said the first 2 years should not count as much as the end up doing with players only in the league for 3-5 years. It's a disproportional influence that rarely bares out over a players middle 5-7 years or even their career. Players in the league 8-9 years have career numbers which have large enough sample sizes to not be greatly influenced by their first 2 years. Of course a player might end up being closer to their first 2 years than the immediate following 2-3 years, but I'm pretty sure a player's 3-4 year average is closer to what their career average ends up than their first 2 years. The bell curve is a pretty strong indicator for most players who play over 9 or 10 years. It's not perfect. There are often blips and outliers, but all I'm saying is that, if you randomly took any 5-6 players in the the league who have 3-5 years experience, it would be very rare to see just about all of them decline 2 years in a row and see a major decline in the 2nd of those two years. My guess is it was just bad luck (possibly with some bad influences like poor coaching and losing Papi's influence) and some or most will "right the ship", but sure there is a chance that the 2017 numbers are what all these guys truly are and will be. .

Probably the best indicator of norm would include dropping the best and worst years, but I'm talking specifically about players only in the league 2-5 years. Often, their first season or two influences their career number too much. Some players take a while to adjust. I'm not saying career numbers are useless. Maybe taking the career average and averaging it with the past 2 year sample size might be best. There are all kinds of "what ifs" like injuries in the past two years. A guy like JBJ is a tough one to figure out. Not only is he so streaky within a season, he's had two very long slumps before and after the 10 months from Aug '15 to May '17, where he was over .800. What's the real JBJ? What's his norm? Nobody knows. My point was that most players follow some sort of bell curve with blips and outliers here and there. I found it strange that all of our younger players, with the exception of Vaz went down at a time most are going up. Maybe their most recent "up" were all outliers at the same time- certainly that is possible, but it is not probable. My guess is some or most will bounce back and maybe 1 or 2 will do better than even 2016.