moonslav59

They could both be all stars, but we still fell short of what we needed. We needed to impove- not hope to stay even.

Apparently, Cora's best move was to bring in a RP'er not on the roster. I think hendriks was the only other real option. Had he blown the save, we'd be hearing about why he didn't bring in Weissert (or Guerrero) instead.

I agree. Cora is so anti-rocking the boat, that it hurts the team.

I think they were counting on 6-8 arms out of the 15-18 mediocre arms in the system would rise to the top. The Chapman signing has worked out better than I expected. The probably counted on Hendriks, too much. I don't blame them for thinking Whitlock and Slaten would be good pen arms in 2025. Chapman, Whitlock and Slaten are only 3 arms, and even they all had questions going into 2025. The rest were and still are hopes and prayers: Hendriks, Wilson & Bernardino Wink, Criswell & Newcomb Weissert, Kelly & Guerrero I Campbell, Penrod & Mata Adames, Adams & Burdi

The pen was our obvious biggest weakness. Chapman & Wilson fell woefully short of what we needed.

That was a real tough loss, last night. We simply cannot keep losing winnable games like that. While we do have a few wins we could have/should have lost, to me, it seems like we have many more we should have won. The vibes seem to be going in the wrong direction. Maybe a jolt is needed. Call up the kids.

Sometimes, and more often than we wish, Cora has no "right choices" at his disposal.

It looks like Story's defense has slipped, but that is a close call at SS between Mayer and Story. I happen to think Story would play 2B way better than Mayer, so that is why I chose the way I did. The scouting reports say Mayer has a good arm: Story no longer does. Story is likely better with the glove and range, so I can see thinking Story > Mayer at SS D. My second choice is SS Story, 2B Mayer and 1B Campbell. It's a close second. I don't know if Mayer (or Anthony) will dow ell or not. I do know we won't know until we find out. They are ML ready, now, and they will get a look, at some point. At some point, we should and will bite the bullet. Right now, we have a newly created slot in the infield. We can wait, until the ideal situationa rises for Mayer- like a middle IF injury, but will we feel any more confident then? Just rip the bandaid off. This team needs an infusion of something. Story and others are slumping, and Rafaela is in the midsts of a 2 season "slump," so let's give it a whirl. Just my opinion. I have no idea if it will work, but these kids are as ready as ever. Mayer is healthy and doing pretty well at AAA. It was always about his health. Anthony has nothing more to prove at AAA. When you say it's gonna happen now Well, when exactly do you mean? See, I've already waited too long And all my hope is gone

The pen is weak: that's on Brez not Cora. We finally spent on SP'ers- both in trade and financial capital, but so far that has not worked, except Crochet. We seemed to have found a decent defensive catcher who is even starting to hit. We improved the defense with the Bregman addition and the Rafaela to CF FT choices made. The pen got worse. Jansen & Martin > Chapman & Wilson, and the '24 pen was no strength to begin with.

Whoever gets the loss, there is always someone better we could have brought in. That is one constant on these game threads.

No redemption. We got shanked.

6th pitcher of the night for the Sox. We better win, cause we'll have nobody for tomorrow night's game.

With 2 dogs, we've never had a critter come in. We started closing it at night, and when I get up to go pee around 6 am, I open the door and go back to bed- sometimes to 11 or 12 on SAT. That's when the dogs wake us for feeding time is overdue. What kind of dog do you have? We have two rescue mixes. One has Blue Lacy and maybe some pitbull. The other looks like a Dalmatian-greyhound mix. We lost our 19 1/2 year old Shpepherd-Yello Lab mix a couple years back. Best dog ever.

WOO was down 7-1 going into the 8th and scored 4 and 5 runs to win 10-7. Mayer had a big 8th inning 3 run blast. POR keeps getting rained out. GRE is up 4-2, late. Ed Rivera pitched 5 innings of no hit ball (2 BB- 6Ks) Y Rod 2-3 w BB and Arias 1-4. SAL lost 5-0, as Aita struggled (5.2, 4, 4, 0, 6) The FCL Sox fell to 0-7.

At one time, Houck and Whitlock looked to have the nastiest stuff on the staff and appeared unhittable for some pretty long stretches. Now this...

It was weird how he had looked awful at SS, then looked very good at 2B, last year, and then this year like a different player. The guy has shown some power, but speed is his strength. I think he averages about 15 HRs per 650, career. Not great, but not awful.

I have to agree.... at least top 10.

Dee Ham Da Man!

Depends how you look at what year 2 is. This is not Wink's 2nd year. Casas came up in '22 and improved in '23, then got worse. Wong came up briefly in '21 and '22 and played 126 gms in '23. He did better in 126 games in '24- much better. DHam played a little in '23 and did better in '24. Duran sucked in '21 and '22 (335 PAs combined) then did well in '23 and '24. Rafaela played a tiny bit in '23. He's got about the same OPS now as '24. Abreu is doing better, and he too played a tiny bit in '23. Wink pitched 70 innings in '22 and 84 in '23 (better than '22) and then did worse, last year. he's hardly pitched in '25 but has a better ERA. Slaten is worse, and this is truly year 2. Kelly pitched a tiny bit in '22 and '23 and 57 IP in '24. He has sucked, this year, but is this year 2?

Just get that sneaky feeling, we will look back at this bases loaded- no runs scored time of the game and shake our heads.

No win for Bello, tonight.

I'm sure you are against a suspect foundation. LOL.

I like Mayer at SS, Story at 2B and Campbell at 1B. Don't mess with Mayer. Story is our best defensive 2Bman. Campbell has yet to win any position, so it makes sense to switch him. (He's taller than Story.) Mayer would be my last choice for 1B, of the three. (I'd almost rather have Bregman at 1B and Mayer at 3B.... ALMOST.)

Just get a dog door & a fenced in yard and sleep as long as you wish.

I think Brez has done a very good job trying to fix the issues he inherited, but the Bregman signing did muddle things up for Cora, who had different ideas than Brez. It squeezed Yoshida, once Devers went to DH, so in that sense, it didn't ease the roster construction issue, at all, but building up rotation depth was a good idea, as we have already started our 10th or 11th SP'er on the winter depth chart. I still think the pen construction was rather weak, and once again, we left our 1B depth thin by trading away Meidroth and Gasper, while seemingly being a bit overloaded in the OF and middle infield, if you count Anthony and Mayer as 2025 pieces. It's not easy getting everything just right, and most teams will start the season with a few positions that are weak and or have weak looking depth. If by "3rd option" you mean trading for a 1Bman, I'm not sure what is out there in mid May- maybe not much. Only 1 AL team is more than 5 games out of the WC. (4 NL teams are 7+ games back.)