moonslav59

I'm not a huge fan of WAR, especially for pitching, but my compilation of stats beyond WAR plus WAR was meant to show that our ranking in pitching has been greatly affectedb y our putrid 5th starter numbers and bullpen issues during the injuries to Kimbrel, Smith, Uehara and Tazawa. With Kimbrel and Taz back, and Pomeranz and ERod fighting over the 4/5 slot, maybe our numbers and success will improve. If we reach the playoffs, I like how our top 3-4 SP'ers and 2-3 RP'ers compare to other AL teams.

Here's what Farrell said about the Catcher situation... On Holaday ... "He is a good handler of pitchers and game calling has been a strong suit of his and has some strength in the bat," Farrell said. "A couple guys have had him as a teammate and have good reports on him." On Vazquez... "Defensively he is solid; offensively he still has work to be done. The adjustments and settling in, he's still working to maintain that. He's been inconsistent at times," Farrell said. "The move of Holaday is also to create additional depth."

I'm not sure he will ever be a consistent plus on offense, but if he can just stay near average positionally, then we have our place keeper until either Vaz improves his bat or Swi improves his D.

According to WAR, our weakest positions are C, 3B and LF (no surprises). Luckily, our best young prospects and players can be slotted in those three positions (at least by next season): C: Leon, Vazaquez & Swihart 3B: Moncada LF: Beninetendi & Swihart Good analysis, but you forgot that we have a starting 3B. It's not smart to write Shaw off like that. He's been quite a nice find, well above league average 3B for pennies on the dollar is more than we could have hoped for when we realized the embarrassing state Pablo was in. I'm not writing him off, although I am not as gah gah over him as many here seem to be. I only listed C, 3b and LF, because they were the weak areas in WAR, and I was making a point about our youth matching up well with our weak links. I think Shaw's upside is maybe a .790 guy with 25 HR ability. His floor might be a career platoon player with .800-.825 numbers vs righties. My plan for next year might be for Shaw to play 1B and HanRam to DH and maybe play 1B vs LHPs as Young DHs vs LHPs. Shaw would have every opportuniaty to keep a FT position on tahis team going forward, if he deserves it. Travis Shaw is right exactly at the level I *hoped* he'd perform at, I was hoping for between .750 and .800 OPS with tolerable defense, and he's met or exceeded that, I think both his offense and his defense are solidly above average. I do not like the idea of rushing a prospect into the majors when we have a guy getting the job done in that position, even if there is potentially room for some improvement. I'm not for rushing prospects either, but I was for getting some reps at 3B for Moncada sooner rather than later. I have also mentioned that Moncada may take longer to become even an average fielder at 3B than many might think he will. That is why I mentioned he may DH some for us neext year, assuming we don't sign Encarnacion or another DH type. If Beni struggles and Moncada stuggles to master 3B, we may even move Moncada to LF at some point. There's lots of different scenarios that may play out. The Beni/Swihart LF, Moncada[//Shaw 3B, HanRam/Shaw 1B, HanRam/Young DH, Vaz/Leon/Swi C seems the most plausible to me for 2017-2018. I'm not locked into any of these slots. Catcher and LF are more fluid, since we don't have bona fide starters in either position at the moment, but I think we need to see what we have from Travis Shaw -- given a couple more seasons at this performance level, Shaw would become an asset that's worth real value in trade. I feel very strongly that Moncada will find a way into the lineup no matter what, but that patience with Travis Shaw will be well rewarded. . Like I said, nothing I have said so far keeps Shaw from being a FT'er, if he keeps hitting, especially vs LHPs. I have been impressed by Shaw as well, and his defense has been better than expected as well.

I'm not necessarily against putting Betts up 3rd, but the point about moving him down because his OBP is an issue right now is just not logical. Also, It's not a bad thing having a lead-off hitter with some power. It enables the team to score more easily when the bottom of the order gets on base. With a team that is as balanced as we are, that happens more often than usual. The number 1 hitter also gets 25-40 more PAs than the 3 or 4 slot hitter over the course of a season.

More on Holaday from Farrell.... "He is a good handler of pitchers and game calling has been a strong suit of his and has some strength in the bat," Farrell said. "A couple guys have had him as a teammate and have good reports on him." On Vazquez... "Defensively he is solid; offensively he still has work to be done. The adjustments and settling in, he's still working to maintain that. He's been inconsistent at times," Farrell said. "The move of Holaday is also to create additional depth."

Although Ellsbury was never "5 tool" due to his noodle arm, it took him a while to master his position defensively.

Exactly. There's a point to be made about maybe not leading Betts off in the early season. He's struggled a little on OBP the last two years in April/May, but the kid has our best OBP in the last 28 days: .380 Betts .372 Pedey .341 JBJ .333 Beni .328 Leon & Holt .310 Bogey OBP in July (60+ PAs) .415 Betts .382 HanRam .381 Pedey .375 Leon .359 Bogey .356 Holt .350 JBJ Betts career by month: APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP ......................................405 ................................358 ................349.343 ......,.323 .305

I was totally against this trade- more out of my high expectation for Espinoza than out of any perception of what Pomeranz was going to do for us. I'm never a fan of small sample sizes, and I brought up that fact at the time of the trade. Some posters claimed he "learned a new pitch, so he's not the same pitcher of years past". I never bought that spiel either. I will say that I don't anybody expected him to look this bad regardless of what we viewed him as coming here, but then again, his time here has been a tiny sample size.

Well, we also won a couple maybe we "could have lost".

Makes you wonder about the Padres knowing they were in the wrong to agree to a change. If they had squeaky clean meds, they would have refused to the shuffle.

I don't disagree, but Pomeranz did have "ace" like stats while with the Padres before the deal. He's looked more like Price, errrrr I mean, Buchholz since coming to the Sox.

...or the medical reports they received were fairly accurate, but maybe not totally complete. They may have known an injury issue or risk was there, but maybe not quite to the extent they could have known. Therefore, the risk may have been just incrementally higher and no "big deal".

I'll still take Beni near FT over any platoon not involving a healthy Young.

Sox WAR 17.2 Cubs 16.0 Dodgers 15.3 Red Sox 15.1 Nats 14.9 Guardians 14.5 Blue Jays 13.5 Giants & Astros 13.3 Orioles 13.0 Cardinals Offense 8.8 Red Sox 8.8 Cubs 8.7 Jays 7.7 Dodgers 7.6 Orioles 7.3 Guardians 7.1 Giants & Pirates 7.0 Nats Pitching 8.8 Cubs 8.3 Dodgers (thanks mainly to Kershaw) 8.1 Nats 7.6 Guardians 7.2 Mets 6.9 Astros 6.8 Yanks 6.5 Red Sox, White Sox & Cards SP'ing: the Sox place 11th at 5.2. RP'ing: the sox place 10th at 1.3. By position: C: 17th at 0.6 1B: 11th at 0.7 2B: 2nd at 1.3 3B: 16th at 0.7 SS: 4th at 1.3 LF: 10th at 0.6 CF: 4th at 1.2 RF: 2nd at 1.5 DH: 2nd at 1.0 According to WAR, our weakest positions are C, 3B and LF (no surprises). Luckily, our best young prospects and players can be slotted in those three positions (at least by next season): C: Leon, Vazaquez & Swihart 3B: Moncada LF: Beninetendi & Swihart Although our pitching might only be ranked 8th, certain factors have dragged us down considerably. 1) The 7.00+ ERA from our 5 slot is the major culprit, and maybe ERod will put an end to that. 2) The injuries to Kimbrel, C Smith, Uehara and Tazawa really lowered our RP'ing ranking a lot. 3) Starters not meeting expectations. Even with all this going on, we still look pretty good for a playoff staff, where only 3-4 good starters are needed, and deep RP'ing depth is often not a factor. Out of 144 starting pitchers with 60+ IP, here's how Sox individual starters rank by WAR: 12) Price 3.3 15) Wright 3.2 27) Porcello 2.5 34) Pomeranz 2.4 If you go by top 30 are "aces" or "number ones", then the Sox have three number ones and a top tier number 2 as their best 4 SP'ers! If you go by ERA minus: 12) Wright 68 34) Pomeranz 75 36) Porcello 78 69) Price 97 This shows we have an ace (Wright), two solid number 2's (Pomeranz & Porcello) and one good number 3 (Price). How about WHIP? 19) Porcello 34) Pomeranz (wow, number 34 at all three criteria) 42) Wright 52) Price Let's average out all three rankings: AVG Rank 23) Wright: 15/12/42 27) Porcello:27/36/19 34) Pomernaz: 34/34/34 44) Price: 12/69/52 This shows two lower tier one slot pitchers (Wright & Porcello) , a solid number 2 slot (Pomeranz), and an average number 2 slot (Price). If Kimbrel stays healthy and Uehara can come back to near 2014 form, our staff should stack up against anyone else pretty well in the playoffs.

I think the annoyance is more with Sox management for calling him up and/or not playing him more often. I agree, if they aren't going to play him nearly every day, then they should have left him on the farm.

The chance is Holt returns to his career norm or late season norm. The chance is Beni should outhit Holt, at least as a platoon. The known is, Beni is a better defensive LF'er and base runner than Holt and Brentz.

Yes, Swihart was moved to the 60 day DL weeks ago. Others on the 60 man: Workman, Pablo, C Smith & Rutledge. soxprospect.com has us listed with 39 players, not counting Holaday, so the 40 man roster was not the issue. With Hanigan to the 15 day DL, the 24 man roster is settled for the time being, and the September call-up day is getting closer. They'll probably put Hanigan on a "rehab assignment" that will take him to September 1st.

Let's hope this is a sign that Wright has found his groove again. We could sure use a consistent ace down the stretch.

Yeah, Like their first pick next spring. It may be a doozie.

Bigger package--better SP'er. That's what I'd prefer, in theory.

Hanigan did have one good trait last year, besides being a decent defensive catcher: Sox hitters vs LHPs in 2015 (50+ PAs) .975 Shaw (surprise) .918 JBJ (kindof a surprise) .895 Hanigan .892 Bogaerts .845 Napoli .843 Betts .834 Pedey .817 Castillo .807 Holt .710 HanRam .703 Ortiz .590 Pablo as a LHB .142 Paplo as a RHB

They should make the Padres give us Espi back and let us keep Pomeranz.

Give us Espi back and allow us to keep Pomeraanz might be a good punishment.

They do have a thing called practice before and after games. I admit it's not an ideal set-up, but playing an inferior fielder isn't ideal either. Having an A+ bat at AAA while we struggle offensively on the big club is not ideal either. Trading Moncada would piss me off to no end. Yes, the ideal is Moncada learns to field well enough to be our FT 3Bman next year. This whole scenario is based on what if he's not.