moonslav59

2014-2016 Ranking Staring Pitchers (250+ IP: sample size 138) WAR 22.7 Kershaw 18.0 Kluber 17.3 Scherzer 17.0 D Price 16.6 C Sale 16.1 Arrieta 14.9 Lester 14.6 Quintana 14.2 Cueto 14.1 Bumgarner #24 Porcello 9.8 #88 Pomeranz 4.1 ERA- #9 Sale 74 #19 Price 80 #28 Pomeranz 84 #37 Porcello 90 WHIP #4 Sale 1.03 #18 Price 1.12 #30 Porcello 1.18 #37 Pomeranz 1.20

soxprospects.com notes on winter ball highlights: Roenis Elias started one game, striking out seven and walking four over five innings of one-run ball. Fernando Abad did not give up a run in his two appearances, recording four outs while allowing two hits. Hanley Ramirez started every game this week, going 7 for 21 with all of the hits being singles. Marco Hernandez went 0 for 9 in his three games. Sandy Leon, who made his debut on Monday for Aragua as he warms up for the World Baseball Classic,was not effective after his long layoff, going 1 for 14 with a double and two walks as Aragua was swept by Zulia in four games. Christian Vazquez has been a key contributor in the series, starting all four games and going 5 for 15 with a double and a walk. Rusney Castillo after four games he is at 4 for 19.

I think people are okay if someone doesn't believe an activity is a sport, so long that belief doesn't carry with it the belief that the participants of that activity are somehow lesser 'athletes'. I'm not saying that you or anyone here is doing that, but I get the feeling that this is what the defenders of a certain activity/sport take issue with. True, and I suppose the way I introduced the car racing thing was rather trollish. I did not mean to offend.

Sure, ideally we'd pick up another 8th inning guy. Realistically, that's not going to happen, especially with the way the price of back end relievers has gone out of control. We have our 8th and 9th inning guys. We have a couple of other guys who could step into the 8th inning role if needed. I would still like to pick up another reliever or 2, but I think our pen will be okay. That's the problem. We've seriously drained the farm to get where we are now- a top contender. Two forces are at work though... We really don't want to have to trade the last vestiges of prospects for yet another quality RP'er. We really don't want to go over the luxury tax limit. Keeping at least some flex space for the deadline seems essential. My guess is the most realistic options to wait until the deadline. Contract prices will only be a third of their season value, and we may be able to find values like Ziegler again, or take some hefty contract off some out-of-contention team's hands for scraps. Of course, I'd love to have an 8th inning RP'er added to start the season, but I'm not willing to use all the luxury tax space or trade more of our best prospects away, so I realize this is probably pretty close to what we'll have to start the season... maybe a few minor league depth pieces added, cross our fingers and hope Smith comes to the rescue at least until the deadline.

It's hard to define without someone finding an activity that fits the definition but just doesn't pass the smell test. I guess my definition is that a "sport" is what I think a sport is. This might be how each of us define it. I don't know, maybe... No machines involved. Physical activity. Physical skill involved. An opponent(s) is needed. I'm not sure if a ball or puck is needed, but just about all the activities I call sports do. I really have no beef with people who call driving a car in circles a sport, but I don't see it as one.

I have never denied the incredible amount of stresses and physical demands a race car driver has. Not many sports put you so close to death, if you screw up. It is a feat of athleticism to compete in a race. I just don't see it as a sport. My opinion is narrow. I think we are just arguing semantics.

He's a big hope; I agree. But the emphasis is on "hope". He fooled us at the end of 2015 as well.

I disagree. Taz was better last year than most of the guys we are asking to replace him. They have to get better to be an improvement over Taz. Our pen had a WHIP of 1.284 and Taz was at 1.228. That might seem pretty close to average, but the guys we are asking to replace him were below or well below the team average. Also, I has earlier mentioned how we may be remembering how our pen was to end the season and projecting continued glory. Taz ended the season with 7 straight scoreless outings (7.1 IP 5H 1 BB 7K). RP'er WHIP 0.96 Uehara 1.02 Kelly 1.09 Kimbrel 1.10 Buch 1.23 Taz 1.25 Ross 1.25 Zieg 1.33 Hemb 1.33 Scott 1.40 Barnes 1.66 Abad Only Kelly is returning, and how much can we expect him to be better than 1.23? Thornburg can hopefully replace Uehara, and maybe Smith can replace Ziegler's half season with us, but if Kelly does well replacing Taz, who replaces 2016's Kelly? Then, there's Buch's innings in relief to replace.... IP 49.2 Taz 47.0 Ueh 29.2 Taz 28.2 Layne (1.43) 22.2 Buch Total: 178 IP Thornburg maybe 60 C Smith maybe 35 Kelly maybe 33 more We're still 50 short... Hembree 51>??? Barnes 67>??? Ross 55> ??? Scott 6 > ???

Barring injury, I agree, but I'd still like to replace Uehara, Ziegler and Taz with more than Thornburg and hopes of a healthy productive Smith returning sooner rather than later.

It was amazing how price and Porcello stayed back-to-back virtually all season long. Makes me wonder if starting one of them the 4th game of the year might make sense. Avoid back-to-back games with our 4-5 starters. Note: Wright's 6.5 IP per start was nearly a full inning above the league average, but the rest were horrible. 6.8 Porcello 6.6 Price 6.5 Wright 5.7 LEAGUE AVG 5.6 Buch 5.4 ERod 5.2 Pom with BOS 5.1 O'Sull 4.4 Owens 3.7 Kelly

Ideally, picking up an 8th inning guy to pair with Thornburg would be nice, but with luxury tax issues looming and a strong need to keep some flex budget space, I can see why it hasn't happened. We already traded more youth to get Thornburgh. We traded 4 prospects for Kimbrel the previous winter. As much as I feel a strong need to acquire a top quality RP'er, I doubt we can pull it off right now. Maybe we can find another Ziegler this summer. We also found Uehara for pretty cheap years ago. It's the Andrew Bailey and Hanrahan type deals that have failed us. One could argue the Kimbrel deal may follow suit.

Agreed, but last year our starters finished 5th in IP, so I don't think we can lay blame on them for how our pen was average and below for a big stretch of 2016.

Ross has never been viewed as the "go to lefty vs lefties", so I think this article was mistaken there. Another thing they missed is that Thornburg has a .201 reverse split. Although he's a RHP'er, he is much better vs LHBs. I agree that Pom is better suited for the pen than Wright, but not because he's a lefty. After earlier assurances that ERod was going to be in the rotation, it seems there's a mixed message now.

I expected two quality pen arms added to take the place of the 3 we lost. That was counting on Smith being ready by opening day. That doesn't seem likely now, so I'm still waiting for the 40th man to be added to our 39 man roster to be a decent RP'er.

Okay, call me "pollito".

I brought up G forces. You responded to it. I brought up flying an AF jet as an analogy to the dangers and stresses (G force and otherwise). I never meant to link you to any claim of G force as a stress, but it is often used by those claiming race car driving is a difficult physical activity or achievement.

Pretty spot on.

Same age, but there seems to be more raw potential to Ockimey's future. (Perhaps a lower floor as well.)

Even by 2018 as I suggested he might be?

Yeah, one pitcher RP'ers suck... like Mo. I prefer Pom in the pen over Wright for several reasons that I've gone into detail to support. Here's the summary: 1) Wright has allowed 3 or less runs in 80% of his MLB starts. He's allowed 4 or less runs in 86% of his starts. Pom has a worse percent in both categories. 2) Pom has a much better record as a RP'er than Wright, and has multiple seasons where he jumped back and forth between RP'er and SP'er. 3) A knuckle ball pitcher is probably best used coming into an inning with no men on. 4) A knuckle ball pitcher often messes with opposing batters' timing to the point where the next starter benefits from following a knuckleballer.

Wright is out of options, and he shouldn't be in AAA even if he had some. The guy has been very good for 2 years. Our pen is too weak (or lacking in depth) to have the luxury of putting highly skilled pitchers in AAA.

Middle and long relief need not be blow-out innings. With a guy like Pom or Wright in the pen, a manager can afford to yank a struggling starter before it reaches blow-out proportions. I'm not going to try and compare either of these two to Andrew Miller, but Miller got over 75 IP last year in high leverage situations. With only Kimbrel and Thornburg looking like solid late inning RP'ers, we could use Pom or Wright to pitch from the 6th inning to the doorstep of our closer.

Our pen finished strongly last year, but it could all be a mirage. We lost 3 of our top RP'ers (Uehara, Ziegler and Tazawa) and replaced them with Thornburg and hopes of an early return to form by Smith. Kimbrel showed regression last year-- his 4th straight significant jump in WHIP (.088> .091> 1.06> 1.09). We may need a closer this year. Thornburg & Smith have had one very good year in the bigs each--just one. Kelly has fooled us with late season heroics before. Ross has been steady as can be, but for some reason has never been promoted to 8th inning status. Barnes showed signs of growth and glimpses of greatness last year, but he's still just a promise. The rest are big question marks: Elias, Hembree, Abad, Scott, Workman, N Ramirez, Martin, Ysla, Olmos or a starter turned RP'er like Owens or Johnson. This pen is not as good as some seem to think it is. We were somewhere between 8th and 12th last year in many major RP'er stats or metrics, but we were also very close to being number 16 in several categories of measurement. Losing 3 key RP'ers and replacing them with one is not encouraging. Adding Pom or Wright to the pen, if possible, could go a long way towards improving the pen. Either can eat a lot of innings in the middle of a game and keep us competitive after a starter struggles. Who is our big middle inning/long relief guy now? Barnes? Kelly? We may need Kelly for the 8th as a set-up man. I'd feel much better limiting Kelly and Barnes exposure this year. Assuming a healthy rotation, we could get 100+ IP from Pom or Wright out of the pen. With our rotation expected to go deeper into games this year over last, thos 100 IP would take a lot of stress off the others.

Our pen cannot afford the luxury of not accepting Wright or Pom into the fold. ERod is another story. I don't think we should mess with his routine.

There was talk of moving Devers to 1B before last year. He took a massive step forward improving his defense. Maybe that took away from his work on hitting early on, but this kid just keeps finding a way to bring his offensive numbers up by season's end. I do think hoping for a 2017 appearance is a bit unrealistic, but 2018 is a reasonable goal. It would work out perfectly, if we could move an in shape Pablo to 1B and HanRam to DH full time in 2018.