moonslav59

Crawford had horrible splits with TB, splits that would qualify as a platoon player with a hitting team like Sox. When we signed him, I called him a "glorified platoon player...that woulkd cripple our team's budget for 7 years..." His splits vs LHPs in 9 years with the Rays were... .315/.382/.697 (88 wRC+ and .308 wOBA) (He had the 18th best wRC+ out of 19 Rays'players with 230+ PAs in tha time period.) Yes, he had just had his highest OPS season before coming here at .351, but in the 9 seasons with the Rays, he only had an OPS over .800 four times. There was no reason to think that would change. He had speed. His defense appeared good with the Rays. I'm not saying I foresaw the steep decline he had with us, but there were extreme warning signs.

...Which leaves the problem of what to do when one hitter qualifies for two - or even three - of those spots? And isn't that where we are with Mookie? Not really. If you don't count Lin, and you shouldn't, Betts places 4th in OBP. Although he is just .005 from 2nd, there is no compelling reason to have him lead off, especially when your current 3rd slot hitter (Bogey) is our 5th best SLG % guy! To move Bogey or Pedey to lead off seems obvious, if one can overlook Bogey's recent slump. OBP Leaders .385 Pedey .366 JBJ .362 Bogey .361 Beni .361 Betts .356 Moreland .349 HRam .349 Travis .347 Young .323 Vaz/.291 Leon It's the slugging that is the most compelling argument to move Betts to the 4 slot (or 3 slot for tradionalists): .500 Betts (should bat 4th) .494 JBJ (should bat 5th) .465 Beni (ON THE RISE) .464 Moreland (dipping)' .448 Bogey .445 HRam (on the rise) .396 Young .390 Leon/.383 Vaz .385 Travis .379 Pedey What sticks out is Pedey's lack of slugging and us only having two guys with a SLG over .465. By the numbers.... 1) Pedey 2) Bogey 3) Beni v R/HRam v L 4) Betts 5) JBJ 6) HRam v R/Young v L 7) Moreland v R/Travis v L 8) Vaz v R/Leon v L 9) Lin v R/Marrero v L We're looking at 4 platoons! C, 3B, 1B and LF! Let's look at the small sample size 2017 L-R splits: vs RHP OBP Player SLG .369 Bogey .461 .365 Beni .492 .363 Pedey .367 .362 Betts .498 .357 Moreland .498 .349 Young .458 (varies widely from his career split norm) .343 HRam .450 .341 JBJ .450 (varies widely from his career norm splits) .331 Vaz .362 .204 Marrero .172 vs LHPs .500 Pedey .457 .483 Travis .520 .452 JBJ .648 (big change from career splits) .385 Marrero .750 .377 HRam .419 .353 Betts .508 .346 Moreland .279 .344 Young .283 (WOW! What a chance from his career norm!) .340 Beni .310 .328 Bogey .389 (Maybe move Bogey down vs LH'd starters?) .283 Leon .386 .280 Vaz .500

Amazing how Lin wasn't even on the radar at 3B to start the season. This might have been the opening day 3B depth chart: 1) Panda 2) Rutledge 3) Holt 4) Hernandez 5) Marrero 6) Dominguez 7) Devers (by AUG or SEP-maybe) 8) M Miller 9) J Witte 10) Lin

We are 4th in OBP (.344) just .001 from 3rd and .002 from 2nd. The Astros are .007 ahead of us. We hvae made the top tier in SLG % at #14 (.425). We are .002 from 12th place and .007 from top 10. We are 10th in OPS. We are 3rd in pitching WAR, 3rd in ERA- at 83 and 6th in WHIP at 1.25 (just 0.03 from 2nd). We are #1 in K/BB at 3.63. Only 5 other teams are over 2.95.

We are now 9th in runs scored. We are just... 2 runs from 8th (MIL) 4 runs from 7th (TEX) 10 runs from 6th (COL) We are 18 runs from 5th. I'm back believing we can finish top 5 in scoring this year. I had given up hope earlier. Heck, even the 2 runs needed to catch the Yanks for 3rd seems doable at this pace! (My apologies to Kimmi for jumping off the bandwagon of two so early.)

Let the miracle continue. I will say that even if Lin is still over .900 at the deadline, I'm not putting all my eggs in his (or Marrero and his) basket. Unless Sox management views Devers' MLB arrival in 2017, I'm thinking we need to make a trade for a 3Bman and maybe a RP'er as well.

I've agreed with your analysis and now want Betts 4th, but I'd still rather have him 3rd than 1st. The 1st inning only happens once a game, and even then, we often have a man on base for our 3rd guy. The 3rd guy gets more chances with men on base than the 1 guy. I'd like to see: 1) Bogey (assuming he breaks out of his slump) 2) Pedey 3) HRam or Young vs LHPs 4) Betts 5) JBJ 6) Beni or HRam 7) Moreland, Travis or Beni 8) Vaz or Leon 9) Lin or Marrero (Note: I have HRam or Young as our 5th best hitter, so batting one 3rd conforms to the data you present.)

I'm not sure about this website, but the one I was on when CC was signed was almost totally on board with the CC signing. The majority loved it. Many others knew it was an overpay, but they still liked it. Only a few of us saw it for what it was: a gross overpay for a player about to decline who had numbers that fit the profile of a platoon player on a team like the Sox. Nobody expected an immediate cliff dive, but we were so lucky to find a fool of a GM to take him and others off our hands. (BTW, I just read AGon may be thinking of retiring due to re-occuring back troubles.)

He is on the 40 man. My list was of possible players who could be traded or DFA'd (removed from the 40 man roster) if we had to add someone to the 40 man roster, like with a trade or wanting to add Devers before September.

I gave up on Pablito weeks ago. I agree. Ride the hot horses as long as we can, but by the deadline, we should either make a trade or prepare for the arrival of Devers.

Lin for Beltre- straight up! LOL

Velazquez was already ahead of Owens.

Beni passes HRam, Moreland and Bogey in OPS with tonight's huge game.

Maybe we'll find out the Brewers knew Thornburg was damaged goods, and we can get Shaw, Pennington & Dubon back.

Price hits his stride.

Beni comes of age!

Budda Bing- Budda Bang!

But, wat abowt street smartes? Their's no boke four dat!

If the Red Sox need to open a spot on the 40 man roster, Owens could be the guy that is removed. What a sad story for Owens. We may want to add Brentz back to the 40 man roster, if an OF'er or DH goes on the DL. If we make a trade that does not involve a 40 man roster player, here is who might be on the trade or DFA bubble: Henry Owens Hector Velazquez Doug Fister Blaine Boyer Pablo Sandoval Steve Selsky (Brentz may be ahead of him now) Luis Ysla Kyle Martin Fernando Abad Roenis Elias Josh Rutledge or Robbie Ross: move to 60-day DL (retroactive)? Depending on who we want to add and what position they play, there are quite a few options to choose from the above list.

I just hate trying to improve a team by upgrading from a crappy 5 starter to an okay one. 1) An okay starter is usually unpredictable, injury prone or both. 2) The differential is minor. 3) I prefer to pay more or trade more prospects for a 1 or 2 starter. For example, getting Chris Freakin' Sale, in effect, caused this to happen.... Price became our #2 not our #1. Porcello became our #3 not our #2. ERod became our #4. Pom or Wright became our #5. The other became depth, which we really needed this year. I know we only gained one pitcher, but I think the ripple effect is real.

Thanks. I'll get the book soon. I need some good summer reading while lakeside in Maine.

Agreed. We'd get more RBIs from the 3 or 4 slot and maybe a little less from the 1 slot, but overall, we should get more in the long run (assuming the one slot keeps a constant OBP as Betts gave us.

I chose Shaw as my sleeper prospect of the year way way back. I'm not patting myself on the back, because I gave up on him afterwards. (And, I liked the Thornburg trade.)

You said it much shorter than I could. I agree 100%. I guess there can be debate over when a GM needs to make a deal or not, as well as what other options were available instead of the deal being made. Most of us are not privy to much of this sort of information.

That's why I hated the Masterson signing and disliked the Dempster one. Penny/Smoltz... I actually liked our trade for Miley at the time. We didn't give up much, and he had good road splits before coming here.