moonslav59

I wish someone would go back and identify every blunder and then look and see how many led to our odds of winning going from a plus to a minus. That, aslo, does not prove anything, but I think it might open some eyes as to how many times it has happened. Note, this type of study would not be able to quantify games where several blunders were made in one game. That would likely add to the amount of games where blunders statistically tilted the balance of a game.

The "maybe as much as 5-10" quote was based on mostly fielding blunders plus base running blunders. I said it was likely 4-5 games with the possibility it could be more (5-10) based on the fact that we can never know what might have happened. People are now focusing on my 5-10 game statement and some out of context. I even mentioned that it is possible, though not likely, that we could have lost a game we actually won, if we took away a blunder by us. I know that sounds crazy, but it could happen. A starter might be pulled at a different time, An later inning could be started by a different batter. It's the "butterfly flapping it's wing" argument to an extreme, but really, the possibilities are endless when just one thing changes.

I agree, but I totally disagree with this from you several pages ago... "Our baserunning blunders have not cost us any games. Even with all of the OOBs, our baserunning has been worth about 1 WIN." I'm pretty sure running blunders have lost us at least one game. Yes, our running has won some to make up for that, but those gamesw e lost with blunders still count. We could have been more than +1 without the blunders. -3 +4 = +1 -1 + 4 = +3

What's up with the Cubs? Their getting shelled by the Brewers 14-0. They have 6 guys with 21+ HRs and two with an OPS over .900. Wade Davis as a closer. Arrieta, Lester, Lackey, Quintana and Hendricks as a rotation! All this, and they're 3 games worse than us. Our old friends... Rizzo .280 31 102 (.925 OPS) Lester 10-7 4.35 / 1.30 WHIP Lackey 11-11 4.65/ 1.28 Uehara 3-4 3.98/1.16 (43 IP)

Where would we be without a big budget? Hard to tell, but I'm with you. I'm glad Henry is our owner. It's interesting to llok back at our player payroll budget over the years.... 02 110M 03 100M 04 127M Big rise- ring 05 124M 06 120M 07 143M Big rise- ring 08 133M 09 122M (I didn't realize we went down so much that year) 10 168M Huge rise- no ring 11 164M 12 175M 13 155M Down $20M yet ring -- (one could argue our big spending from '10-'12 helped in 2013.)-- 14 156M 15 184M Big rise- no ring 16 198M 17 197M

True. Also, CC's out of baseball. AGon is looking at riding the bench. Ellsbury is a shell. Lester is over 4.20. Lackey is no longer Lackey, yet Reddick and Lowrie are thriving.

As it turned out, we probably could have signed EE and stayed under the limit had we not signed Moreland, let Abad walk and not brought in Nunez and Reed. At worst, we could have traded Young to clear space. I'm not saying we should have, but the Castillo money costs more than the tax would have been even if we went over the next 3 years.

5-6 in their last 11 is hardly "steam rolling." They are still 4 games away from not making the playoffs. (Note" they are -9 from their Pythagorean projected win-loss record.)

No, let them get this winning thing out of their system early.

It's a sunken cost just like signing bonus and peanlty for Moncada. Did that impact sox signing Price? I don't think so. Did it impact the signing of Moreland instead of EE? Maybe. Maybe a little.

How about for Moustakas this winter?

Maybe Wright can come back strong.

Very nice article. Thanks, Nick. I feel better about our pitching future after reading this article, and I hope we can get beyond the slump we've had with young pitchers recently.

Yeah, maybe the end of May is more likely. Had we not won 6 in a row and 9 out of 10 in July this year, he might have been axed already.

Of course, but it's kind of surprising Beni's OPS as a LF'er has been lower than last year's LF crew. 2017 LF crew .760 Beni (443 OPS as LF'er) .699 Young (131) .679 Holt (31) .397 Davis (13) 2016 .759 Holt (222) .779 Young (190) .856 Beni (102) .615 Brentz (58) .739 Swi (51) .200 LaMarre (5) .000 Castillo (3) 1.000 Shaw (1)

I think the DH comments were meant for the end of his contract or if his knee acts up. He'd certainly be our 3Bman from day 1. Devers would probably be fine at 1B.

Yes, I have noticed! It does look funny, especially with his HR trot.

Maybe not much, but that $11M a year has probably restricted spending a little bit, IMO.

I'm not against dumping him, if we can save $10M or so. BTW, I said (if healthy) "a significant chance" not "good chance". To me, 33% chance is significant and that might be worth a $10M gamble, assuming we could trade him and "save" $10M. HRam's career has been very up and down, almost year to year. He's been hurt many of his down years have been while playing hurt. Who expected a 150 point gain from 2015 to 2016 at age 31 and 32? I'm not expecting an improvement, but I do feel he has been playing hurt and could be better next year. HRam's OPS in recent years going backwards from this year: .759 (not horrible) .866 .717 (clearly playing hurt) .817 1.040 (half season due to injury) .759 .712 (missed half the season) .853 .954 (2009)

Preaching to the choir. Many of our shorter deals have done much better: Cody Ross, Adrian Beltre, early Vic and Naps. Many have flopped (Masterson, AJ P...) but the percent of success has clearly been better with short term deals. You'd think all the failure would be enough to deter future mistakes. Even the two "successes", Manny & Lackey, ended up being dumped, and had serious issues along the way. I counted 3 year deals, but they really aren't "long term". In the past, I have posted a list of all the biggest FA signings since the late 90's. Almost all of them were busts, big disappointments or mediocre at best- several right from day 1. Here's a look at just the largest Sox signings since Jose Offerman. 1999: Jose Offerman (4)- Total bust, except for maybe year 1. 2001: Manny (8)- Great signing. Even with the eventful ending, we ended up getting Jason Bay in trade. 2002: Johnny Damon (4): Great signing. 2003: Foulke (3): He had one great year and it helped us win our first long-awaited ring. 2005: Renteria (4): He was not anywhere near what we expected, and ended up essentially paying him $40M for one year when factoring in the trade. Matt Clement (3)- Injury surely played a role in this disappointment, but nevertheless, it was a let down. 2007: Dice-K (6)- Had a couple decent years, but was a bust afterfwards. Julio Lugo (4)- Total bust. JD Drew (5)- Much debate over the value of this signing. 2008: Lowell (Re-sign 3)- Did not end well. 2010: Lackey (5)- 2 bad/2 good/1 traded 2011: Crawford (7)- IMO, the worst Sox signing of all time. Beckett (Re-sign 4)- Big mistake. Lucky we could dump him. 2012: AGon (Re-sign 7)- Traded to LAD in order to dump CC & Beckett. 2013: Vic (3)- One great year 9ring) then kaput.. 2014: Pablo (5)- Easily one of the worst 2 signings in Sox history. HRam (4-5)- Not good. R Castillo (7)- Yuck! 2016: Price (7)- So far, so bad. Porcello (Re-sign 4)- Won a Cy Young, but jury still out. I might have missed a few signings.

Agreed, but waiting for Moustakas ticks one more year off the "window" clock.

As much as I hate to agree, I do.

I like the win-loss column. He has had to deal with some players struggling for lengths of time this year. I do think that when looking at the sheer magnitude of the declines in performance from last year, our win-loss record is good. The acquisition of Sale and fine pitching by Pom, of course, has a lot to do with it. That being said, isn't all those declines a mark against JF? Couldn't one claim he has failed to get the most out of his everyday players? The lack of fundamentals is one thing managers are usually held responsible for- right or wrong. I like what you wrote, but I do think Jf was a little slow adjusting the line-ups, but at least he eventually did. Although this is just one example, it it might not have made much of a difference anyways, to me, starting Holt in the one or two batting slots 8 times this year was sheer insanity. Many were after he had shown he was a sub .600 or even .500 hitter this year.

Bogey's gotten worse and worse on defense over the years. I'm not sure a manager could do anything about that, and maybe JF has tried. I'm not really holding JF responsible for 9 out 10 of our returning players doing worse or much worse than last year, but I suppose he might be partially to blame. To me, wins and losses do matter when evaluating a manager's skill, but it's not the only thing. I do think JF has, and I've given him credit for this, gotten the most out of the pen anyone could expect. I have no issues with how he handles the rotation or the staff as a whole. I rarely criticize his in-game decisions like many do, but to me, JF's ture value is that he's a great pitching coach trying to manage a whole team. He has not gotten the most out of his everyday players, he has not stressed the fundamentals of defense and base running- maybe because he doesn't even know them himself. After all, he barely knows the actual rules of the game. Yes, we lost Papi, but he was never known for defense or base running skills, yet we got worse in many areas of defense and running fundamentals after Papi left. I'm fine, if you don't think those negative aspects of JF's portfolio isn't enough to want him gone, but to me, you seem to not even think those issues exist, and if they do, it's not JF's fault in any way, because we are in first place. Just for argument's sake, do you think it's possible that a manager can turn a 95 to 100 win team into a 90 win team? If yes, do you think that manager should be brought back year after year just because the team keeps winning despite his negative influence? I realize it's hard to quantify "negative influence" and what the net value is for a manager other than wins and losses, but that doesn't mean he can't have a negative influence despite the team winning and winning- not that the Sox have been doing that every year under JF's watch.

Pedey will, too.