moonslav59

In theory, yes, but pulling a pitcher who is doing well after 4 IP might be hard, especially after you might not have much confidence in the next guy. Also, one has to expect the second guy might do poorly and need to be yanked after .1 to 2 IP putting a big strain on the 4 short guys.

I doubt we sign any RP'ers beyond the Boyer types. Maybe I'm being too hopeful with pitchers returning from injuries. We could be deeper than this year: Closer: Kimbrel RP2: Smith RP3: Thornburg RP4: Kelly RP5: Barnes RP6:Workman RP7: Hembree (out of options) RP8: R Ross RP9: Wright (if Price is starting) RP10: R Scott RP11: B Taylor RP12: A Maddox RP13: K Martin Others: Johnson, Beeks, Velazquez, Cosart, Haley, Elias, Owens, Poyner

Interesting concept. Finding 8 decent SP'ers might be tough, and having just 4 short guys could be highly problematic.

Hot & Cold are hard to project. I'm worried mostly about our health. Pedey JBJ Nunez Price Barnes (C Smith)

Our bullpen is over worked... We've been overworked at times, but our starters are 3rd in MLB in IP'd and 2 IP from the 2nd most. Our pen has pitched 34% or all out IP'd- one more percent than last year. Nobody hoped or expected Barnes and Hembree to have to pitch so much. 3-4 pitchers seem to be taking most of the IP (see 2016 below). Pen IP 60 Barnes 54 Hembree 54 Kimbrel 42 Kelly 36 Abad 30 Scott 28 Boyer 27 Workman 17 Taylor 9 Reed 9 Ross 7 Velazquez 6 Fister 5 N Ramirez 2 Martin 1 ERod In 2016, our pen pitched 33% of all the IP'd, but it was more spread out at the top: 6 guys from 47 IP to 67 IP 67 Barnes 55 Ross 53 Kimbrel 51 Hembree 50 Tazawa 47 Uehara 30 Ziegler 29 Layne 23 Buch 18 Kelly 13 Ramirez 13 Abad 24 Others

I smell trouble, too, but with so many injuries to the pen, the "mirage" did occur, and I'm giving JF some credit for that part of his job. Considering our #2 (Smith), #3 (Thornburg) and #5 (Ross) RP'ers have been out all year, our pen has done way better than expected.

Last 28 Days OPS 1.082 Vaz 1.019 Moreland .965 Devers .962 Beni .928 Nunez .892 Young .749 Bogey .705 JBJ .700 Leon .674 HRam .610 Betts .581 Holt OPS Against-- 30+ PAs unless indicated otherwise: .485 Abad (20 PAs) .507 Kimbrel .604 Fister .665 Pom .673 ERod .684 Sale .704 Barnes .714 Workman .728 Porcello .778 Reed .823 Hembree .838 Kelly (29 PAs) .892 Scott (24 PAs) 1.548 Boyer (17 PAs)

Looks like Bogey may have snapped out of it on his own.

It's hard to complain about how JF has handled the staff, particularly the pen.

How about, We won't get fooled again!"

9 unearned runs!

Maybe we just found our next set-up man! LOL

Two awful games in a row. Hope we got it out of our system.

Career stats do often give unclear pictures. Players who had good to great careers but are post prime are sometimes regarded as better than maybe they really are at the point in their career. Its' maybe one reason 30-32 year old free agents get overpaid. In HRam's case, he's just approaching traditional post prime years. There's still a significant chance he has another very good season or two. There's also a significant chance he'll never come close to h s 2016 season again. The other area where the picture often becomes "unclear" is with players in the early part of their career who either started off very slowly (like JBJ) or very well and then went on to have better or worse careers than their "career numbers" seem to indicate they should be doing (to some). I think one needs to look at what point a player is in his career, weigh his career numbers against his most recent 2-3 year numbers and trends, and then consider that not all players follow traditional bell curve careers. In short, going forward, I would expect JBJ to do better than his career numbers over the next few years, and HRam to do worse than his career numbers over the next few years.

I've never been a HRam fan, and his numbers are padded by early career successes, but he has been over .810 in 3 of his last 5 seasons. This after a couple of down years from 2011 to 2012. He hit 30 HRs last year- something he'd only done once before. That wasn't that long ago. He had his best OPS season in 2013 (year 8 out of 13), albeit a shortened season. Maybe I'm just being an optimist. Maybe I am just feeling we need HRam to be that middle order bat that's been missing this year. Maybe HRam is toast. I just don't see anyone else on the roster I'd rather have DH right now. Next year might be another story, but at $22M, I'm not sure how many of these contracts we can just piss away.

I'm agreeing with you that Moreland returning is possible. There are not many better 1Bmen out there this coming winter, and some might demand 3+ years. I'd prefer someone better than Moreland, but I am not for making another Pablo/HRam type mistake.

I think we'll try and get the best 1Bman we can find who is willing to sign for 1 or maybe 2 years.

Agreed, "proven" was a poor choice of words.

Interesting... https://bosoxinjection.com/2017/08/25/red-sox-gearing-run-shohei-otani/

All it takes is to open a slot on the 40 man roster (Owens).

I've never been a Brentz fan, but I'm leaning "why not" for September call-ups. He's certainly more likely to ever be a current or future plus than Henry Owens.

Last year's team also went on a 10-8 run after game 127 and before the 11 game winning streak and then lost 4 of the last 5 games before getting swept by the Guardians (7 of 8 games total). They went 22-16 after game 127 (including the playoffs), and we highly in consistent in the last 38 games of 2016. Basically, they were 11-15 sandwiched around an 11 game winning streak.

No. Miranda is nearly 29. He's been in professional baseball for 10 years. He had a 1.36 WHIP in 7 years of foreign ball. He's been a starter pretty much his whole career and yet never pitched more than 20 starts until this year's 25 starts, 4.90 ERA and 1.20 WHIP. Are you taking the position that Miranda has less questions than Carson Smith, who as already proven he can pitch very well at the ML level? I'm not saying Smith is a sure bet to return to form, but he looks healthy now, and to me, there are less questions about him.

True enough, but there are more questions about Miranda, and the book is pretty much closed on Miley.

Good read on Beeks and Brentz and September call-ups... http://news.soxprospects.com/2017/08/scouting-scratch-potential-sept-call.html Both need to be added to the 40 man roster, but since Beeks is a rule 5 candidate and Brentz can become a FA after this seasin, if he is not added to the 40 man roster, maybe it could happen. Since Brentz made a mechanical adjustment, he "has hit .318/.387/.637 with 26 home runs, 19 doubles and 34 walks compared to 71 strikeouts in 346 plate appearances." That's a 1.024 OPS! Double those numbers to about 700 PAs, and his numbers would be: .318 52 HRs 38 DBLs