moonslav59

Also need to realize that the Sox CAN pay all these players to stay if they want. $31M Price through '22 $22M HRam through '19 $21M Porcello through '19 $19M Pablo through '19 $14M Pedey through '21 $12M Castillo through '19 Assuming you don't mean Pablo, HRam, Porcello & Castillo, we have $45M in Price in Pedey for forever and a day. So, we extend... After 2018 (estimates) $30M+ Sale $18M+ Pomeranz $18M+ Kimbrel ??? J Kelly ??? R Ross After 2019 $18M+ Bogey ??? Thornburg ??? B Holt After 2020 $25M+ Betts $15M+ JBJ ??? Vazquez ??? Smith ??? Wright My head is spinning trying to add all this up! ??? Leon

I'm pre-ripping JF for starting Fister game 3. ERod is better. Even Porcello is better. This is not the last straw. That straw came months or years ago.

Well said. Hopefully, our defense can get even better next year, some of our players improve on offense and a couple key additions will be enough to put us over the top. (BTW, I have not given up on this year despite being an eye witness to the last two losses.

I still think HRam can get healthy for next year and possibly repeat 2016 or better. I'm not betting on it by any means. Unless we acquire 3 or more big bats, I don't see HRam taking a roster spot away from anyone who screams they deserve it. We will not get anything for HRam with that contract, we might as well see how he looks next year before doing something that drastic. I'd like to see us sign JD Martinez and a one-year 1Bman (Duda? Morrison? _____???)

This is one of my biggest beefs with the Sox (and Farrell). I get the philosophy of driving up pitch counts, but we have to be less predictable.

Yes, ultimately, runs scored is the proper measurement of overall offensive ranking. We actually finished 10th in runs scored. We finished 5th in runs allowed. That's not bad when you consider that our top 8 returning players by 2016 PAs declined- many by over 100 points in OPS and we lost Price, Wright, Smith and Ross for most of the season and Thornburg for all of it.

These 5 players will cost us this: 2018: $120M ($106M luxury) 2019: $120M ($106M luxury) or $98M ($84M) if HRam's option does not vest 2020: $64M ($45M) 2021: $46M ($45M) 2022: $32M ($31M)

He played in 12 different playoff series over 5 different seasons. He won a series MVP twice: 1993 NLCS and 2001 WS. He only had 4 series with an ERA above 2.69. three over 3.51 and 2 over 5.39. That's pretty darn amazing! 19 starts. 133 IP. 2.23 ERA 0.968 WHIP To me, he is one of the few players who meet the criteria of doing significantly better than his regular season level (the "rise to the occasion" factor"). His 133 IP might be a large enough sample size for some (or most) people, but I'm not in that group. Certainly, he had many "clutch performances", but I just don't feel we can prove or even come close to proving he consistently "rose to the occasion. To me, we should see it in his regular season numbers as well, and we don't. This is a much larger sample size, too. Career over all OPS against: .673 (an amazing number) and 8.6 K/9. Late & Close (1592 PAs): .702 OPS High Leverage (2163 PAs): .701 OPS While these numbers are very good, they do NOT show he "rose to the occasion". My criteria would be that a player must do significantly better than his career numbers in late & close/high leverage situations as well as playoff opportunities AND have large enough sample sizes. He must also be pretty darn consistently better, and I think we can say Schill was in the playoffs. I think Curt's regular season numbers are pretty close or above a significant sample size designation, and 133 IP in the playoffs are pretty high, but I just don't feel he's proven he's "clutch". I don't think anyone has, and to me, that strengthens my resolve that there is no such thing as a "clutch player" - just clutch moments and performances that happen more with some players than others just like regular non clutch moments and performances show.

Yes, and defense. Team WAR Rankings 1st in fielding 4th in pitching 10th in base running 22nd in batting 5th overall.

I've always thought I have been close to as realistic as any Sox fan can be. I know I have some "homer" in me, but I have recently been wondering, if I did over-value just about all our players this spring. I thought Chris Sale was going to lead us to the promise land. I wasn't aware of apparent end of season endurance issues with him. I'm still optimistic about this year, despite my down moment yesterday, and I'm hopeful next year will be even better as I believe Henry will open up his wallet to fix the missing clean-up hitter issue.

I went to the game. I was pissed and down and out. Forgive me. I still have a lot of confidence in this team and think we will claw back and win this series. (I do think we need a big bat(s) for next year to be a very top contender.)

Makes you wonder, if even acquiring JD Martinez and Votto would be enough for 2018.

Deadwood and Broken Limbs... Pablo: 2018: $18.1M, 2019: $18.1M, 2010: $5M buyout --Luxury tax cost: $19M for 2018 & 2019 Castillo: 2018: $11.8M, 2019: $11.8M, 2020: $14.3M -- Luxury tax cost: $0.0 Ramirez: 2018: $22.8M, 2019: $22M vesting option Bending Branches... Price: 2018: $30M (opt out before 2019), 2019: $31M, 2020-2022 $32M --Luxury cost: $31M x4 Porcello: 2018: $21M, 2019: $21M --Luxury cost: $20.6M x 2 Pedroia: 2018: $16M, 2019: $15M, 2020: $13M, 2021: $12M -- Luxury cost: $13.8M x 4

Sucky game today. I'm not giving up hope. For those who believe in clutch and choke, the 'Stros have a long history of coming up short when it counts. I'm think we might want to think about limiting Sale's pitches next year. Maybe next game, he'll prove me wrong. Our season has come down to Pom & Fister. Who'da thunk dat?

Judge's is a roid-induced shriveled up worm.

5th counting pitching. We are 15th in everyday player WAR and 4th in pitching.

5th 58.3 LAD 56.3 CLE 54.7 HOU 52.1 WSH 51.5 BOS 51.5 Cubs 50.2 NYY 39.5 AZ 38.5 COL 37.8 STL 35.0 MN It seems strange that with 7 out of our 9 positions ranked below #15, that our everyday players rank 15th at +17.8. That's in large part to our defense: 1st in fielding 10th in base running 22nd in batting We ranked 4th in overall pitching WAR at 23.9.

I did provide the 2nd half numbers specifically to see how Devers improved our 3B ranking. It wasn't by as much as I expected, due largely to his defensive struggles out of the gate. 7 out of 9 positional rankings below average is worse than horrendous.

The dweebs that lament all this cliff stuff are worry warts and have been missing the real joy of the game in my opinion. I enjoy "the game" as much as anyone in the whole world... probably more than any human should.

Fair points. I didn't mean to imply it just happened for the first time, and it's all one-sided.

I got SRO tix for the first 2 games here in Houston. GO SOX!!!!

Look at Judge's massive and malformed head!

I've long suspected there's something fishy in the Yankee clubhouse water fountain.

Here's the final regular season Sox positional WAR rankings... 4th SP 17.0 (4th 2nd half: 7.3) 4th RP 6.9 (5th in 2nd half: 3.4) 4th RF 5.2 11th SS 3.1 16th 2B 2.3 17th C 1.8 18th LF 1.9 21st CF 2.2 11th out of 15 DH -0.7 24th 1B 0.9 28th 3B 0.5 2nd Half 6th RF 1.7 14th C 1.2 18th 2B 0.7 18th LF 0.5 20th SS 0.8 21st 3B 0.7 12th out 15 DH -0.9 25th 1B 0.0 28th CF -0.2

zOut of the 33 catchers with over 300 PAs this year, Vaz and Leon placed: OPS 20th Vaz .735 32nd Leon .644 wOBA 18th Vaz .317 30th Leon .279 wRC+ 20th Vaz 93 32nd Leon 67 On a more positive note, if you gave Vaz 10% of his PAs to bring him near the leaders in catcher PAs and took 10% of his WAR, he'd be at about 2.5, which would tie him for 8th in catcher WAR with Castillo, Grandal and Avila.