moonslav59

Here are the FO major moves since Ben was squeezed out by DD after the 2015 season (Arb signings not listed): 8/31/15 Traded: de Aza for Luis Ysla (Ben still "GM") 11/6/15 Exercised Clay Buchholz option 11/13/15 Traded: Margot, Guerra, Asuaje & Allen for Kimbrel 12/2/15 Signed Chris Young ($13M/2) 12/4/15 Signed David Price ($217M/3) 12/7/15 Traded Miley & J Aro for Carson Smith & R Elias 1/27/16 Signed Bryan Mata as Int'l FA June '16 Drafted Jason Groome (12), CJ Chatham (51), S Anderson (88), Bobby Dalbec (118), M Shawaryn (148), S Nogosek (178), Robby Scott (208) and others. 7/7/16 Traded W Rijo & A Wilkerson for Aaron Hill 7/9/16 Traded Basabe (the "other one")& J Almonte for B Ziegler 7/14/16 Traded A Espinoza for Drew Pomeranz 8/1/16 Traded Pat Light for Fernando Abad 11/3/16 Exercised option on Clay Buchholz (later traded him) 12/6/16 Traded T Shaw, M Dubon & J Pennington for Tyler Thornburg 12/8/16 Selected Josh Rutledge (Rule 5) 12/20/16 Traded Buchholz for Josh Tobias FEb '17: Signed Hector Velazquez as Int'l FA June '17: Drafted Tanner Houck (24), Cole Brennen (63), B Netzer (101), J Thompson (131), Alex Scherff (161) and others 7/2/17 Traded Nick Longhi & Imeldo Diaz for Int'l signing bonus pool space July '17: Signed Daniel Flores, Danny Diaz, Antoni Flores and others as Int'l FAs 7/26/17 Traded S Anderson & G Santos for Eduardo Nunez

Some possible ideas to get this team on track: 1) DL Bogey and play Nunez at SS for 10+ days, and add Brentz to the 40 man and call him up.. 2) DL Moreland and call up Travis 3) Platoon Young with Beni as the Moreland platoon vanishes. 4) Send Vaz to AAA and call up Dan Butler (.752 OPS in AAA) 5) Replace JF 6) Change the line-up (assuming no Bogey or Moreland for the next 10 days): vs RHP 1. Nunez SS 2. Pedey 2B 3. JBJ CF 4. Betts RF 5. HRam 1B 6. Beni LF 7. Devers 3B 8. Brentz DH 9) Leon C vs LHPs 1) Nunez SS 2) Brentz or Young LF 3) Pedey 2B 4) Betts RF 5) HRam DH 6) JBJ CF 7) Travis 1B 8) Devers 3B 9) Butler C

Small sample sizes, but here are the last 28 day numbers: OPS (30+ PAs unless noted) .940 Devers (14 PAs) .903 Pedey .787 HRam .760 Lin (AAA) .723 Betts .694 Beni .626 JBJ .609 Young .599 Marrero .555 Leon .479 Holt .403 Bogey .395 Moreland .374 Vaz OPS Against (30+ PAs unless noted) .399 Abad (28 PAS) .377 Barnes .512 Sale .572 Workman .639 Price .669 Pom .718 Porcello .802 Johnson (29) .810 Kimbrel (29) .850 Hembree .918 ERod .992 Fister

The Rays have made some trades and pick-ups to strengthen their roster. They have some very good SP'ers. I would not count them out.

Now that we have Nunez, the equation has changed. While Young has been disappointing vs LHPs this year, he was a top 10 batter vs LHPs for a the previous 3 year window- a large enough sample size to think there is more hope he can regains his touch than a hope that Beni can grow, adjust or develop suddenly into a decent hitter vs LHPs. I realize Beni was OK vs lefties on the farm, but Young and Nunez have shown they can hit lefties better over a much larger sample size. Plus, as bad as Young has been vs LHPs, he's still been better than Beni this year with that split. 2014-2017 vs LHPs .834 Young .698 Nunez .525 Beni (.783 Castillo in more PAs vs LHPs than Beni) Only 23 players out of 518 MLB players have more PAs and a worse OPS vs LHPs than Beni since 2014. Yes, it would be nice to "let him develop", but we can't afford that right now. We have better hitters vs LHPs and we need to get our best batters in the line-up everyday we can.

Our guys are doomed before they even get a start. No wonder some players avoid Boston like the plague.

Well said, cp. I agree 100%. Our brush fire could become a full blown forest fire, if we don't get are act together very soon.

Well, I also want Morrland benched vs LHPs and Youngcan only platoon with one guy. If we won't DL bogey, then Nunez will allow the 2 platoons.

I'd DL Bogey and play Devers & Nunez FT.

Yes, I know. I posted it on another thread.

Small sample size. LOL!

He had okay splits. In the minors but not great. He looks way overmatched vs lefties and we can't afford to let him "adjust & develop" and see if his first -100 are a fluke.

Same with JBJ. I don't get why those early at bats are held against young players.

I'd rather reset this year. I never said it would be easy next year. The big advantage with next year would be that the big tax step would be delayed one extra year as we hit all the big arb and re-sign years. I said it would be easier to reset this year.

David Price Again Dealing With Elbow Problems\\ https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2017/07/david-price-again-dealing-with-elbow-problems.html

We don't pay a tax on the $11M. We will, if we add him to the 40 man roster. It might still be worth adding him rather than sign a player like Young again. Young got $6.5M, which is way more than the tax would be on Castillo.

4-2

There is a way we could reset the luxury tax next year instead of this year by replacing Young and Moreland with Devers and Travis or some cheap FA corner IF'er. Let Abad walk. If we have to, we could trade another contract. Personally, it would make more sense next year, so we would be one step lower on the tax scale into the future, but I think it's probably easier this year. I doubt there would be any takers for Young or Moreland. Trading both would free up about $4M to spend elsewhere this year.

There will be plenty of good RP'ers available at the deadline.

Just let it go. Man, this town is tough. Everyone and everything is under a million microscopes.

I'd love Votto here in Boston, but his contract is large and long, still. $$157M/6 or $170M/7. 18-23:$25M annually, 24:$20M club option ($7M buyout) He's worth the money now, but he may start declining soon, and he will be costly.

He has been taking them away from Moreland, but now that we have Nunez, I think Young will start playing LF vs LHPs. (I guess they could play Nunez in LF and Young at DH.) As bad as Young has been vs LHPs, he's still better than Beni vs lefties.

HRam is fine. Lin is a dream not reality. Nunez should play SS while we give Bogey 10 days on the DL. After that, he can rotate between 3B, DH and LF.

Young is struggling vs LHPs this year. I know that's what we have him on the roster for. I get the frustration. I'm not against trading him or finding a better player to spell Beni. He does have a .708 overall OPS, which isn't horrible. I'd still prefer him over Brentz, but his leash is getting shorter and shorter. It would be nice, if we could trade Moreland and Young and free up $4M (1/3 of their contract cost for 2017). Then, we could trade for Alonso or some other 1Bman/DH type or someone to platoon with Beni. People are ragging on Young, but there are plenty other hitters with worse splits than Young. vs LHPs .621 Young (surprisingly, he's .759 vs RHPs, which is better than many on our team) .620 Rutledge (28 PAs) .577 Moreland (has 56 PAs vs LHPs) .574 Beni (has 62 PAs vs LHPs) vs RHPs .656 Leon .600 Vaz (174 PAs) .426 Holt .412 Marrero (116 PAs) To me, our biggest issues are not HRam, Young and our catchers' overall value, they are... 1) Beni vs LHPs. 2) Moreland vs anybody 3) Bogey's slump 4) Lack of a power hitter 5) Our catcher offense