moonslav59

Houck is set to be activated, soon. Who gets demoted? Fitts (as we trade for a solid #2?) Alcala, Murphy, Bernardino? (Trade Hicks?) I'm pulling for Sandoval's return, but who knows?

I'm really falling for Ryan. Probably, too much. My offers may be too much, but as long as we keep Anthony, Mayer, Tolle, Campbell and hopefully Gracia & Arias, I think I may be in. I'd hate to lose Arias & Garcia and even Clarke or Valera, but one might have to go, along with Duran (or Abreu.)

1. Crochet (2.44 in league leading 20 GS and 129 IP) 2. Ryan (2.72 in 18 GS) 3. Giolito (0.70 last 6 starts) 4. Bello (2.33 ERA GS 1-5, then 2.69 in 10 starts from that May 18th bad game.) 5. Fitts>Sandoval

You took out the question mark, why? Why intentionally copy and paste, then remove a key punctuation mark? It's deliberate. I was responding to a post about needing to trade a top prospect for Gallen and offered a suggestion on how we might get him without losing a top prospect. I often suggest more than a site like BTV might accept, because I know I am a homer. I wrote in one post about what we got for Beeks and Aldo vs what we might get for 3 decent prospects and how the 2025 combinations of prospects look better than the ones that got us Garcia & Sims. Here is that quote: What can we get with a... #7 Tibbs & #17 Paez? #13 Bleis & #21 Uberstine? #16 Cespedes, #19 Jordan & #23 Mullins? My point is, we can do better than we did last year, because we have more to offer, and maybe we can find a deal like Schwarber or Nate, with a little luck or Brez magic. I'm not sure I want to do it for a rental, but the offers I suggested are about as high as I'd go for any rental. I'd think long and hard about the 3 I listed, but I might do it. Gallen is not pitching well, now, but he was better than Nate for several years, recently. Mullins is Rule 5. I'm not sold on Jordan. I'm higher on Cespedes than you are, I'd like to see us trade for Ryan.

To PHI: Duran, Mullins & Bernardino To BOS: Ryan & Strahm To MIN: Fitts, Abel, Romero & Sandlin (or maybe Abel, Clarke & Arias)

I'd do it and feel way better, if Brex extends Ryan.

I agree. The only way Abreu goes over Duran is if a team insists on him, and the prize is worth it. This in no way means I dislike Duran or undervalue him. I really hate to trade him, but he's more valuable to a team that does not have an Anthony, Abreu and Rafaela (plus Ref/Masa, KC & Garcia.) I think Duran goes to SD or Philly and a third team sends us a solid #2 who is not a rental. We kick in a few non top 10-12 prospects. As great as Duran is, we may not even see a step down to Anthony, especially looking beyond 2025.

I don't think anyone thinks Devers is better than Jim Ed up to age 30, but you made a great point.

Okay Max, but there is no proof he was ever lied to. Whatever Bloom said or promised, he likely meant it- no lie: no deception. Brez and Cora made no promises, as far as we know, so not only is there no lie, there is no deception, either. Maybe, if Cora did tell him, you will DH for the whole season, situations change, so it's still not a lie, unless Cora knowingly told Devers something he knew to be untrue. I fully understand Devers felt harmed, disrespected and deceived. IMO, he deceived himself, too, as the guy actually still thinks he's a plus defender at 3B, so he was never going to accept the reasoning for moving him. It's too bad, because I loved watching him hit. I would still like to watch him hit in our line-up, but I'm okay with what happened in the end. I'll be more okay if and when JH spends the "savings."

Maybe liverwurst.

His work is not done, for sure. He also extended Crochet. I think we never extended anyone under Bloom but Kikebust and the Martin Perez re-worked option year. The Wilson addition was sweet, too. I hated the fact that he was all they added to the pen with Chapman. Toro did better than Garrett Cooper and started out better than Dom Smith's time with us. The 2024 Gio signing kicked in well for 2025, too.

I liked Brez before the 10 game streak. I have to admit, I like him even more, now, but he's done a lot beyond just a few bold and impactful moves. I'm pumped up over the focus on farm pitching, as well as 26 man and 40 man roster pitching improvements. Okay, the Sale trade backfired spectacularly and horrifically. I won't relitigate on why it had some logic behind the plan. The Buehler and Hendriks deals have sucked, and $31M is $31M not spent elsewhere, but so many other moves have gone very well and insanely well. Brez has rarely traded away pitching for non pitching and even the Priester deal brought us back a decent pitching prospect. The E R-C deal brought us a catcher who has helped so many other pitchers improve, who cares? I love this last draft. Love the extensions given. Loving more, too.

Indeed, and he seems to be carrying over those same qualities you mentioned as a GM, too.

The "Me" and the "Meat" (of the lineup)

Agreed. I think it was the plan, all along- to ease him into FT play. Anthony started off slowly, but it was also the result of some bad luck on hard hit balls. He needs to play FT, NOW! I'm fine with Yoshida being benched, but Cora and maybe Brez are not. I'm not a Masa hater. I think he can hit .800. I just think all the others can, too.

Yes, indeed. Rafaela in CF is a no brainer, The data shows he is farsuperior. Abreu is a fantastic defender in an extremely difficult Fenway RF. He barely gets a chance to hit lefties, unless as RP'ers. He still needs to prove he can hit them to become a FT'er, but it's not like Duran has done well vs lefties in a far larger sample size. He's looked better than Abreu v L, but got worse, this year as Abreu seems to be improving. Since we have Ref, Abreu's weak area is covered, and it's not like we'd cut or bench Ref, if Anthony caused Abreu to be traded away. To me, vs RHPs: Abreu is our best OF'er (O+D) Duran is second and Rafaela looks 3rd, right now, but Anthony needs to be playing FT. I have no idea who to sit to get Anthony playing v R, but it's not Abreu. vs LHPs, assuming Ref DHs vs lefties... Rafaela is probably our best, followed by Anthony, then Duran slightly over the better defender in Abreu. When you consider we face RHPs about 70%, this looks like a very close call, all around, with Anthony's ceiling carrying a lot of weight. Tough call, but someone needs to go, if Yoshida-Ref DH.

Here are some numbers to ponder: DSL (small sample sizes) 1.154 Josue Brito .875 Dorian Soto .871 Franklin Primera 0.00 Wascar Berroa (9IP) FCL .963 Alexander Mambel .837 Anderson Fermin 1.20 ERA Jose Bello (8IP), Jackson Gamboa 1.26 (14 IP), 1.57 Cordero (23 IP)

Agree 100%, but I'll add, it's more ludicous to have Mayer on the 26 and riding the Bench, probably close to the same level if just vs LHPs (30% missed starts.)

I'm as guilty as anybody on that. "One game at a time!"

Seriously? I bet Albert Belle and Reggie Jackson teammates said the same thing. My point is about not hearing many quotes, not one quote from a guy like Duran.

Where is the "repeatedly" coming from? As far as I know, Bloom promised him once- maybe more. Cora rarely says things like, "That was the last guy" who said that, so I assume Cora and Brez never promised Devers 3B. Those are his two major bosses. No promises. No promises broken. You keep saying this over and over. It's not a lie or broken promise.

It's not clear with me. My point all along, in general is that I and nobody know jack about almost everything. I have no idea what the players feel and many other points argued, here. I do feel like when a big star is traded from a competitive team, I'm used to hearing more. I may be thinking it shows something not very supportive of Devers, but I will readily admit, I have no idea how many or some feel. I bet they miss his bat.

Masa and Ref are okay in LF and not net (O+D) negatives as a platoon. Buehler is proven to suck. Fitts is proven to be unproven, too. Are we sure Gio is going to stay like this? We can roll the dice on Sandoval, Houck and Fitts or roll the dice that after we trade an OF'er, another does not get hurt. Again, I'm not for trading any OF'er for even the best rental SP'er. I want to improve our rotation for 2025 and beyond, which would also add depth to the rotation. We have spent years building up our everyday player roster and farm. We lack depth at Catcher and corner IF, unless you count on Casas & Toro. Gonzales is too far away. Jordan is too unknown. We now look okay at MI, even if KC never plays another MLB game at 2B, again. We look extra strong at OF AND extra deep. for years, we've been saying, "keep drafting better odds everyday players, so we can trade some, when we need pitching." I still feel this way.

Throwing "IT ALL" away? LOL. BTW, you do know that adding a Joe Ryan type would add depth to the rotation, as a Fitts or Crawford would move down a notch into the 6th or 7th rotation slot. We have depth 3-4 deep at some slots, and if some don't pan out or some vets get hurt, we'll still 1-2 deep. It's nice to have 2-3 deep, but when you have a guy like Buehler pitching every 5 days, and a back to earth Toro playing a bunch, we could use some more quality, at the expense of a fraction of the quantity or depth. OF: Duran, Rafaela, Abreu Campbell, Garcia, Anthony Yoshida & Refsnyder (emergency) That's 8 guys with one DH'ing every game. If you count Arias as depth, so is Garcia, if not more MLB ready so. I love depth. I love a legit 4/5 SP'er more. We could also use a solid pen arm. Talk about lack of depth. We have depth there, but most are sub mediocre or borderline.

I'm fully aware of all this. (My offer was Cespedes, Jordan & Mullins, and I did not say for Gallen. My point was we could make better offers than the ones we made for Luis Garcia, Lucas Sims and Schwarber-Nate, without losing a top 10-12 prospect. I'm okay with going large on these kind of deals, even if for a rental. I'm not for making all 3 of my suggested groupings for 3 rentals. We don't even have roster room for 3, unless one if fo the unlikely back-up catcher.