moonslav59

I think the lefty-righty thing is over-used by managers. I can see trying to avoid three straight like-sided batters, especially if they are close in batting skill levels, but the late game relief pitcher match-up is usually just 20-25% of a player's PAs in a given game, it doesn't even come up in many games, and when it does come up, pinch hitters are available, if needed.

I guess, if you don't count pitchers or DHs. Either way, he's not close enough to Betts to be a real "contender".

I agree with you on Koji as our closer, but if JF wants Kimbrel as the closer, he had to say what he said.

Having a great season doesn't automatically make you a top "contender" for MVP. At best, Pedey is the 3rd best player on the Sox, and as JBay pointed out, the 3rd best 2Bman in the AL.

ERA- adjusts ERA for park factors and strength of opponents, and Porcello does lead in that measure. K's are over-rated. Always have been.

Team record in starts (run support): Porcello 25-8 (6.83 and 9 GS'd w 3 or less/ 4 with 2 or less) CKluber 20-12 (5.32 and 13 GS'd w 3 or less/4 w 2 or less) C Sale 18-13 (4.71 and 13 GS'd with 3 or less/9 w 2 or less)

Even though we have clinched, it was nice to see a big comeback win. Going into the playoffs on a higher note is usually a good thing. Here are the updated OPS numbers (50+ PAs): 1.027 Ortiz (3rd best career OPS & only time leading the league) .900 Betts .861 Ramirez .853 Beni .847 Young .846 Leon .844 JBJ .834 Pedey .802 Bogey .744 Hernandez .733 Rutledge .728 Shaw .720 Swihart .717 Holt .690 Brentz .591 Hill .584 Vazquez .500 Holaday .468 Hanigan

To me, it's more of a predictor of how well a pitcher should do based historical data on stats that normally lead to good performance. It's making it more complicated than it has to be. Great pitching is not allowing men to get on base, and when they do, to limit the amount of XBHs (SLG%). One can argue that keeping runners from scoring (having a higher LOB%) shows that a pitcher buckles down when he needs to, but the end result is allowing less runs. Now, playing in different parks, and I'm not just talking home field, and facing different opponents has to be factored in, as it is in ERA-. I'm not saying ERA- is "the stat", but when you couple it with WHIP (maybe we need a WHIP-) and IP ("Bulk"), then I think you get a true sense of who did the best. Had Porcello not let up the HR and maybe lasted another inning to get the win, I think he'd be the slightly better choice. Now, it's a toss up. ERA- 71 Porcello 73 Kluber 75 Sale ERA+ 149 Kluber 145 Porcello 125 Sale WHIP 1.01 Porcello 1.03 Sale 1.06 Kluber OPS Against (OBP/SLG) note: OBP>SLG .631 Kluber (.274/.357) .635 Porcello (.268/.367) .642 Sale (.278/.364) GS% 79% Porcello 74% Sale 69% Kluber GS/IP/IP per GS 33/223.0/ 6.76 Porcello 32/215.0/ 6.72 Kluber 31/221.2/7.15 Sale WAR 5.3 Sale 5.2 Porcello 5.1 Kluber xFIP 3.50 Kluber 3.59 Sale 3.90 Porcello Can't get much closer than this. Perhaps the win-loses will tip the balance, wrongly or rightly, to Porcello.

I've been against almost very prospect trade we've made, but I've always been willing to give up a lot to get a lot. Quintana is an ace with one more year than Sale. Robertson solves our set-up man issue for 2 more years. Owens and Johnson are not much to give up. Basabe might turn out very good, so basically I'm giving up 3.5 top prospects. I'm thinking it might not be enough..

Well, if we had to go longer on Turner, who by the way has had 3 big years in a row, we could plan on moving him or Devers to 1B once hanRam's deal is up, or we move HanRam to DH.

How about signing Justin Turner to a 2 years deal as a bridge to Devers, and then trade Moncada, Swihart, Kopech, Owens, Johnson and Basabe for Quintana and Robertson.

I said, not as good as he used to be- not bad. He clearly is not close to what he used to be on defense, but he used to be phenomenal, so less than phenomenal can still be damn good. He actually had his thrid best UZR/150 year, so I'm not saying he was not very good or great, but 13.1 is pretty far from his best seasons of 20.4 and 19.6. The bigger "decline" has been his base running. From 2007 to 2012, his base running fangraph's rating was always between 0.0 and 2.3, but starting in 2013, he's gone ... -1.1 -1.2 -1.1 -4.3 (this year) Mookie's UZR/150 was +16.9 this year- an awesome number for someone relatively new to the position. His base running numbers has increased from 2.5 to 8.3 to 9.8 this year. Add to that, 31 HRs and 113 RBI, 120 runs, 77 XBHs and half the GIDP's than Pedey, and I really don't see a choice. It's not so much because Pedey hasn't been great, it's more about Betts being unworldly.

I'm looking for accurate evaluation of this season for the cy young not some system that says what someone will do or should have done.

I'm hoping for pre-2014 numbers and don't think it's too unrealistic to think it might happen.

Pedey is great. He's having a fantastic season. However, he's not the fielder or runner he used to be. I know he adds value through intangibles, but so does betts. We'd be sunk without Mookie. I know the same could be said about Pedey, but I don't thinks it's even close. I'm fine with your position, but I guess I see value differently.

Mookie is way more valuable in just about every way I can think of.

Interesting, Papi is 7th on the team in WAR: 7.7 Betts 5.2 Pedey 5.1 JBJ 5.1 Porcello 4.6 Bogey 4.5 Price 4.3 Ortiz Take away the defense, and he's still 2nd to Betts: 41.o Betts 36.4 Ortiz 21.3 JBJ 17.9 Ramirez 16.8 Bogey 13.3 Pedey 7.2 Young 7.0 Leon 3.4 Beni -0.2 Holt -7.3 Hill -9.3 Shaw -11.0 Hanigan -11.7 Vazquez

Yes, very key, but not close to the MVP of the team, let alone the league.

Betts has hit and fielded and run better than Pedey. It's not close there. I can see the Papi argument, and maybe a DH should win once. I wonder if Papi's retirement will lead some to vote for him out of some sort of "lifetime achievement" sentiment.

HFA is probably more important than giving players an extra day of rest. We will get several days off between the end of the season and game 1 of the playoffs anyway, plus another day off after game 2.

2013: Runs scored/runs allowed per game Home: 5.17 to 3.95= +1.22 Away: 5.35 to 4.14= +1.21 2007: Home: 5.83 to 4.35= +1.48 Away: 4.88 to 3.77= +1.11 2004: Home: 6.38 to 4.81= +1.57 Away: 5.33 to 4.67= +0.66 As you can see, the 2007 and 2004 seasons showed greater Home-Away disparities.

Home OPS: .867 (6.0 R/Gm) Away OPS: .762 (4.95 R/Gm) Differential 1.05 (1 run a game) Pitching: Home OPS against: .752 (4.76 R/Gm) Away OPS against: .669 (3.88 R/Gm) Differential .083 (0.9 runs a game) All in all, the run differentials are pretty close: Home: +1.24 Away: +1.07

It's scary bad. The Sox have 8 guys with 190+ 2nd half PAs: OPS in 2nd half .622 Shaw .722 Bogey .756 JBJ .760 Leon .859 Pedey .916 Ortiz .947 Ramirez .950 Betts (Holt .716, Beni .837, and Young .849 have less PAs but higher OPS) Last 28 days (over 35 PAs) .485 Shaw .485 Leon .713 Bogey (most PAs on team in 28 days) .758 Holt .759 Pedey .804 Betts .810 Beni .834 JBJ .885 Young .999 Ortiz 1.047 Ramirez

The Cubs essentially clinched in early August. They only have 2 players with 152 games played (Rizzo & Bryant), one at 148 (Russell), one at 144 (Zobrist) and two at 139 (Heyward & Baez). The rest are all under 122. The Sox have 5 guys over 148 games played: 155 Betts, 154 Bogey, 153 JBJ, 151 Pedey, 148 Ortiz We also have two at 144: HanRam & Shaw. That's 7 over 144 to the Cubs 4. No wonder they are less tired looking. We also score more runs and let up more runs, so our innings are "longer". Rizzo is 21st in innings played. Russell is 53rd. Heyward is 108th Fowler is 110th Zobrist is 118th Bryant is 151st. (I think fangraphs messed up here) Conversely, the Sox have this.... Innings played in the field: 8th Betts 9th Bogey 10th JBJ 45th Pedey 79th HanRam 149th Shaw Leaders in PAs: 2 Betts 3 Bogey 11 Pedey 61 JBJ 69 Ortiz 76 HanRam Cubs: 9 Bryant 29 Rizzo 64 Zobrist 91 Russell 96 Heyward Heyward is 26th in OF innings.

I read it too, and some of it makes sense, but I agree, it still seems to weight high K pitchers more favorably. On BABip, I get the reasons this can be a factor, but sometimes a BABip might be low, because the types of hit balls are weaker than someone with a higher BABip.