moonslav59

Kelly had some very good numbers as a starter for the Cards, too. It wasn't "hype". It's not easy knowing if and when to convert a starter to a RP'er, but with Kelly, it sure worked out well, so far. Last 365 days (50+ IP or 200+ PAs) Sox Leaders: OPS against : .412 Kimbrel .525 Kelly .554 Sale .655 ERod .673 Barnes .715 Price .716 Porcello .763 Pomeranz .786 Hembree WHIP 0.794 Kimbrel 0.906 Sale 1.071 Kelly 1.139 ERod 1.184 Porcello 1.199 Price 1.350 Pomeranz 1.354 Barnes 1.428 Hembree ERA (not a good stat for judging RP'ers) 1.05 Kelly 2.38 Kimbrel 2.77 Sale 3.38 ERod 3.58 Hembree 3.65 Price 3.75 Porcello 4.17 Pomeranz 4.43 Barnes Craig had a recent three year stretch that was excellent before the trade. I'm not sure anyone or any GM could have known how badly he'd decline. With pablo and HRam there were signs, but with Craig, there was just the foot injury.

14 walks. That will boost our OBP. Nice to see Marrero get on base 4 of 6 times. I'm glad they finally moved JBJ up in the line-up. I'm wondering, if he should be moved to 4th. He's a beast! 3 hits tonight.

I know you don't put much stock in Sox budget restraint talk or luxury tax implications, but taking on Verlander's salary would have a major impact on the budget for 2.5 years. We might even exceed the $20M over the luxury limit penalty that involves more than just monetary penalties. I doubt it will happen without the Tigers paying part of his salary. My guess is some other team might not demand as much money payments as we might. I'd love to have Verlander on our team. I'm almost always for adding top level pitchers, but this would be too much to handle, plus, we'd be paying for the highest risk years of his contract as he moves way beyond his prime years. If they want to take Pablo and $10M a year as part of the deal, I'll listen.

He had an injury. It could mean he's fragile or lacks endurance, so he could decline as the year progresses. It could just mean he had an injury, is over it, and has no durability issues.

Top 3Bmen by WAR since 2015: 17.7 Bryant 17.5 Donaldson 14.8 Machado 12.9 Turner 12.2 Arenado 11.6 Beltre 10.6 Seager 10.1 Longoria 9.4 Carpenter 9.1 Rendon 8.4 Ramirez 7.7 Frazier 6.7 Lamb 6.4 Prado 6.2 Kang 6.0 Duffy 5.9 Moustakas (#17) (In fairness, fangraphs has Mouse listed as 31st in PAs by 3Bmen, so being 17th in WAR is better than it looks.) While I think Mouse is better than an average 3Bman, I would not overpay for 2 months of his services.

2017: 39-10 (.796) when scoring 4 or more (15-9 /.625 when scoring 4-5 runs) 4-25 (.138) when they score 3 or less (4-13 /.235 when scoring 2-3 runs) 2016: 84-23 (.785) when scoring 4 of more (26-12/.684 when scoring 4-5 runs) 9-40 (.184) when scoring 3 or less (8-27/.229 when scoring 2-3 runs) It's really about the amount of games we score 0-1 runs: 2016: 1-19 (20 games is 12.3% of our games) 2017: 0-12 (12 games is 15.1% of our games) Games scoring 2-3 runs: 2016: 8-21 (.276) 2017: 4-13 (.235) There's not a big difference here in winning percentage.

Kelly could turn into a great RP'er. He's off to a great start this year, and he had a great ending to 2016.

I never believed Lackey would sit out a year either, but maybe the Sox and other GMs knew otherwise. I did not like the trade at the time, but I did think trading Lackey was totally understandable. I liked Kelly at the time- as a starter, and I felt Craig had a good chance at winning the 1B job. The season we traded Lackey was lost, so we basically ended up trading one year of Lackey, in which he would not have been enough to help to make the playoffs that year, for 5 years of Kelly and Craig's awful contract. It was a bad trade, but I can see why they did it. I was actually more upset with the Lester trade return.

I certainly prefer keeping Devers and Groome over Travis, but with Moreland and Young's contracts up after this season, we'll need a cheap bat to join the 25 man roster next year. I see Devers, Travis and maybe Holt (if healthy) or Brentz (if Holt is not healthy), or maybe even Swihart taking the roster places of Moreland, Young and Marrero/Lin. We may sign a cheap FA corner IF'er or someone who can play 3B, 1B and LF, but I'd love to see us be able to get by without spending any money on corner IF'ers this winter. Use all the available money to keep our pitching staff strong. Next years projected 25 man roster: SP (6): Sale, Price, ERod, Porcello, Pom, Wright RP (6): Kimbrel, Kelly, Smith, Thornburg, Barnes, Hembree C (2): Vazquez, Leon (or Swihart) 1B (2): Travis, HRam (DH) 2B : Pedroia 3B: Devers SS: Bogaerts IF: Hernandez (or Holt/Rutledge/Pablo or Lin/Marrero) OF: Holt (or Brentz or FA pick-up that might also play 3B/1B) LF: Benintendi CF: Bradley RF: Betts Let's assume bold are the 25, this is what's on the farm (Gone: Pablo & Rutledge) SP: Groome, Johnson, Velazquez, Owens, Beeks, Stanki, Lakins, Raudes, TBall, Buttrey, Cosart RP: Ross, Scott, Elias, N Ramirez, Taylor, Maddox, Workman, Martin, Anderson, Mata, Hernandezz, Callahan, Nogosek, Shepherd, Ysla C: Swihart, Romanski, A Rei 1B: Longhi, Ockimey 2B: Lin 3B: Marrero, Dalbec SS: Hernandez, Chatham LF: Brentz, kemp, T Hill RF: Taverez, Washington, Mars DH: Witte, Chavis

We still have Kelly as part of that deal, and we will still have Kelly for two more years. I'm not saying it was a good deal, but Lackey might not have been with us for his "free year", and probably would not have re-signed with us afterwards.

Beni doesn't get on base enough at this point in his career. I had hoped he'd have won a 1-2 slot by now, and maybe he will be someday, but HRam is close to passing Beni for 6th in OBP on the team.

I'd keep Pedey 1 or 2, because he still has the best OBP on the team (.371). I've always thought Bogey should be 1 or 2 due to his lack of HR power. He has the second best OBP on the team (.366). Personally, I'd go Bogey 1/ Pedey 2, but flip flopping them may avoid DPs. Pedey seems to like the two slot, so let's start with 1. Bogey 2. Pedey I've always liked putting our best overall hitter (OBP+SLG) up 3rd, despite all the evidence that kimmi has presented against that idea. JBJ actually has a better OBP than Betts, and he's just .001 from Betts in SLG. Since Betts is a career 2nd half hitter, I'd go: 3. Betts 4. JBJ 5. Moreland HRam seems to be heating up, so maybe he takes the 5 slot from Moreland before too long, and he's probably a better choice than Beni for the 6 slot. That could also change as the season progresses: 6. HRam 7. Beni Until we make a chance at 3B, our catcher should bat 8th and our 3Bman 9th: 8. Vaz/Leon 9. Lin/Marrero/Pablo/Rutledge (Devers?) Maybe flip a player or two here and there based on L-R splits. Find a way to get Young in vs LHPs (rest Beni/Moreland?).

Although this team lacks power, I think Chavis might be the guy we end up trading for a 3B rental. We may add a mid tier pitching prospect or two to get somone better, but I don't see (want) us trading Devers, Travis or Groome. Whether we reset the luxury tax this year or next, and it almost certainly has to be this year or next, we will need Travis to replace Moreland's contract with a minimum one and Devers to replace Young's. Either Holt or Brentz might be our 4th OF'er, but I don't see us doing anything significant with free agency next winter, possibly even if we reset the tax this year.

Maybe you were thinking of Chatham.

I agree with everything you say here, but I do think staying under the limit is a high priority--very high. They could go over, but it looks like it will be much harder to stay under next year to reset the numbers. It would mean we'd have to not replace Young and Moreland with free agents. We could not sign anybody to any significant contract. Pretty much all of Young and Moreland's money will go to arb raises and option year raises.

Nice to have 9 guys over .720. Too bad none play 3B. No players over .845 is shocking for a Sox team near the luxury spending limit. Too shocking to believe, but there's still time for one or two to get over .900. The bottom three all play 3B. Just a good fielding/.720 rental would be a huge upgrade for our weakest link.

New leader on top of the Sox OPS board: 100+ PAs .845 JBJ .836 Moreland .834 Betts .823 Bogey .776 Beni .762 HRam .738 Pedey .730 Young .720 Vaz .695 Leon .622 Pablo .558 Rutledge .521 Marrero

Who is Chris "Soupy" Sales?

Yeah, too bad we didn't trade Betts, Bogey and Bradley long before their first start. Maybe we could have gotten 3 more Pom Poms.

The possibly weaker division may help some. The AL East has a better winning percentage from their 2nd 3rd 4th 5th place teams. The Sox are 13-15 vs the AL East, so that helped them some. We are 9-7 vs the AL West.

The Dodgers have a better pitching WAR and way better ERA- (79 to 85).

Houston has way better hitting than us, so far. They have 7 guys with 11 or more HRs, including a guy who is 12th on the most PAs list. They have 10 guys with 8 or more HRs. They have 12 guys with over a 133 PAs, and out of those 12 guys... 4 are over .900 7 are over .800 10 are over .740 While are pitching has been better (118 ERA+), Houston still has a respectable 108 ERA+ despite having used 9 different starters and currently have 4 starters on the DL. We have 13 guys with over 108 PAs, and out of those 13 guys, we have.... 0 over .900 4 over .800 9 over .740

I suggested we sign Cody, too, way before it happened. I liked the Cespedes-Porcello trade but liked the extension more. I thought that went in the win column, but now I'm not so sure. I hated the Masterson signing like I did the Penny-Smoltz fiasco. Build the rotation from the 1 or 2 slot NOt the 4/5 slot! I liked the trade for Miley. I once thought Owens was under-rated.

And the one guy who actually thought giving a 32 year old future Hall of Famer an 8 year $240mill contract was a good idea is currently running y he Sox. Makes it seem like maybe acquiring Verlander might be on DD's radar.

Pretty bad when taking on $41M for Pablo barely puts a dent in what's owed Miggy up to what? Age 55? Pablo, Porcello, Castillo, Travis, Chavis and Lakins for Verlander and Miggy would still put us way over the luxury tax (for many years to come). Just say NO! to the large and long deals with most years post-prime.