moonslav59

The Never Ending Story!

He's been basically a full platoon guy, so far- like Refsnyder, who also saw his OPS jump to respectability. Good to see some long ball action. Keep the jad mojo going!

Indeed, as well as the Never Ending Story.

I get how people get upset and say things out of anger and frustration, many times over tiny sample sizes, but I'd like to think there are not many true Sox fans that want a tear down- start over plan put in place. We may still have many questions to be answered and young players that have shown promise, recently but are struggling to start 2025, but the season is 162 games for a reason. Okay, so Devers is overpaid, and contracts like Yoshida's look awful, but to me, our roster construction has been steadily improving, along with the farm system. We have a lot of young, pre-prime and early prime players with many years of team control, at relatively low cost. We have ML ready top prospects and some damn good looking ones that are 2-3 years away. We seemed to have turned the corner on pitching acquisition and development, but admittedly, that has yet to be proven. I'd rather see us look better on paper than worse on paper. The depth we have seems strong enough to offer hope, in case some of our current players don't pan out or get hurt. On the everyday side of things, only the catching position looks weak and shallow. 1B depth looks sketchy, unless we can get Devers to pick up a 1Bman's mitt. Everywhere else, has ML depth and or top prospect talent waiting in the wings. If Rafaela becomes the most expensive utility man in MLB- he starts making over $5.5M in 2029- it wouldn't be a bad thing. I really like our roster. The pitching side is a bit more speculative and many come off the books this winter or next, but longer term deals for pitchers often backfire, so this is not a bad thing, as longs as JH keeps spending, where and when needed. I'm optimistic, and I don't think it's because my expectations were lower over the last 5 years. I think we have a good shot at winning the AL pennant. Call me a homer or a dreamer, if you wish.

He has options remaining, so AAA is an option. We are not squeezed on the 40 man, as we just DFA'd Fulmer, and Sogard is no wonder player. We could probably 60 Day IL Crawford or Wong, or DFA Sabol to add Grandal. Once we hit the wall on other options, we will keep Yoshida in AAA. That day might not even come, this year.

The 5 slot has high value in modern line-up theory. I'd be okay with Devers up 5th, but I might flip him and Bregman vs RHP and LHPs.

He's the same Ceddanne. The question is, will he have a 90 game good hitting stretch in 2025? The guy is a great defensive CF'er. He has the 5th best fWAR (+0.2) on the team. He's 5th best in bWAR (+0.4.) he's not our biggest early season problem.

Devers has been our best offensive player since Betts was traded. If you believe in clutch, and often complain about the Sox lack of timely hitting, then consider this... Devers has a career .852 OPS. .859 High Leverage .868 Men on Base .879 2 outs RISP .891 RISP He was on pace for a career high OPS in 2024- yes, way back 9 months ago, before an injury set him back. I'm not against trading anybody for a better return, but I would not single him out as the guy I'm kicking tires on. Listen to offers, sure, but I'm not going out of my way to find a way to get rid of our best hitter.

We all heard of the Casas for Castillo trade, and apparently wanting SEA to take Yoshida held up the deal, but I also wonder what other Casas deals were discussed. I am far from giving up on Tristan. The guy can hit, and I think he will again. His defense looks permanently flawed, but 1B can be easy to hide, if the rest of the D is good.

The thing is, how much does Yoshida's trade value rise, if he's hitting .950 in AAA for 6-8 weeks? Unless someone gets hurt, he won't get a real look on the big team, IMO. Keeping him as DH insurance does have some value, but DH is the easiest position to fill or refill. Ref, Casas and Romy could be about as good a DH as Yoshi, anyway.

You can probably count on one hand how many catchers there are that are plus defenders and hit over .775 or .800. To get one via trade would be costly. We traded away a hopeful, in Teel, but to get an ace, it was worth the gamble. notin suggested a Story for Murphy trade that looks pretty good, to me. I'd even throw in some cash and a moderate prospect, but I'm not sure ATL is up to the idea. It would also mean promoting the sub .600 Mayer or try Campbell at SS (DHam/Romy/Grissom at 2B) or go back to Rafaela at SS and call up Anthony. I think OAA had Murphy at zero. Not good- not bad.

Betts was the singular "mistake." I have no issue with not signing Schwarber, when you look at the winter budgets handed to Bloom. I wouldn't even call it a minor mistake. In hindsight, Schwarber > Story, for sure, but the Story signing made sense, to me, even with the one injury known. $7M Wacha + $5M Hill + $3M Strahm or $20M x 4 Schwarber would have made no difference in win totals.

I like the idea of Campbell up 2nd and Devers 4th (more RBIs.) 1. L Duran 2. R Campbell 3. L Abreu/ R Bregman 4. L Devers 5. R Bregman/R Story 6. R Story/ R Refnsyder 7. L Casas/ R Romy 8. R Narvaez 9. R Rafaela (Anthony?)

It's beyond bailing. We're talking a "bucket of balls" trade.

Narvaez was touted as a good defender. I'm fine with good D and bad O from our catchers, but it would be nice to have both.

6 crooked number innings! This, after Anthony's 2 dingers, last night. Stock pitched one hit ball over 5 IP, but Guerrero got lit up like a Christmas tree. Grissom homer in the 9th, so 5 XBHs in one game! (1.023 OPS) Anthony 2-5 (1.000) Binelas 2-2 (1.158) Mayer w 7 RBI (.583) Toro 3-4 2 2BB (1.109) McDonough 5-6 (.881)

With the day off, one would think we could do better than Dobbins, but WTH. Before the season started, we knew a few guys were out injured, but I still had Dobbins pretty far down the list: 1. Crochet 2. Houck (struggling) 3. Buehler (maybe improving) 4. Bello (IL) 5. Crawford (IL) 6. Giolito (IL) 7. Sandoval (60 day IL) 8. Newcomb (surprise rise in ST'ing) 9. Fitts (newly placed on IL) 10. Priester (traded away) 11. Criswell (used in pen, only) 12. Dobbins (looking at 2nd start, already) or Fulmer (using in pen) Wink & Whitlock are pen only, now. Nobody had Newcomb in teh top 10 before ST'ing, so in a sense we have used 3 SP'ers that were ranked no higher than 8th or 9th on the December rotation depth chart. 1.38 Crochet 3.18 Fitts 3GS 3.60 Dobbins 1GS 3.63 Newcomb 4GS 5.23 Buehler 9.16 Houck N/A Bello, Crawford, Giolito, Sandoval (Criswell as SP & Priester) 8 Games started by these depth starters with an ERA in the mid 3.00's! Not bad, so far.

I can't believe people have bailed, so quickly, on Devers.

Is that a separate concerns? 1. It takes longer to regain form than many think it does. 2. One never comes fully back to form? 3. The risk of a second or third major injury is too high. (All three can be true.)

I'm not claiming they fixed Rafaela's approach for good. I just pointed out that it seemed like someone finally got through to him, and agreed with you that it doesn't necessarily mean for the good of is production. His best extended MLB stretch was 90 games long (.779 from 4/27/24 to 8/13/24) where he still had 84Ks in 347 PAs. Before 4/27/24: .560 OPS (54Ks and 8 BB in 173 PAs) After 8/13/24: .506 OPS (40Ks and ZERO BBs in 127 PAs) 2025: .520 OPS (12Ks & 4BB in 62 PAs) His career stats are carried by that one 90 games stretch. The rest of the time, he has been a .500 to .560 OPS guy with varying K rates.

Certainly mistakes were made, most omissions. IMO, there were less that winter than others, where we swung and missed wildly on rotation additions. Wacha and Hill blew away Richards, Martin Perez I & II, Kluber, Paxton.... Had we had Jansen & Martin (or the like) in 2022, we'd have done much better. Bloom's whack-A-Mole approach failed, but with a limited budget, he could never address every/most needs at a time.

and Romy v LHPs

Who is bucking the high K and K/BB trend? K/BB 4/8 Y Rod 5/6 Jordan 8/9 Asencio 5/5 Sabol 17/14 Anthony 11/7 Jh Garcia & Ehrhard 15/10 Ferguson (6 SBs leads system) In Zanetello's defense, he is 2nd in BB on the farm with 10. (.356 OBP) Speaking of OBP: .474 Alcantara .472 Arias .469 Y Rod .455 Asencio .433 Anthony .422 Anderson .417 Toro .415 Jh Garcia .400 Sabol .395 Ferguson .372 Romero .365 Grissom .356 Zanetello

I think the lower expectation were real from 2020 to 2024, as we seemed to be losing more talent than we added, each year. The weird thing was that I felt the pre-2022 season was the best all, but we did way better in 2021. Returning from injury players helped in '21, of course. I have much higher expectations, this year. I don't think lower expectations for the 5 years prior have affected the ones I have, this year. If anything, I feel more strongly about meeting my expectations, now than in many other years, where we looked pretty good, on paper. The pressure for a big(ger) season is high in Sox Nation, IMO. It's time to put up (team) and shut up (Kennedy.)

Our bats did okay v BAL: 16 runs in 3 games (105 OPS+) but yes, otherwise. No better than a 96 OPS+ vs all others.