moonslav59

Story is our highest ranked "Oppo" guy at 33%. Next are... 31% Duran 27% Rafaela 26% Casas 25% Narvaez 24% Abreu ____________ 23.3% League ___________ 23% Devers 20% Romy & KC 13% Bregman & Wong

I'm thrilled at how quickly Brez & Co moved the focus to pitching, built up the rotation, rotation depth and even made a dent on the farm system acquisition and (hopeful) development. I know guys like Gio, Fitts, Criswell, Dobbins and eventually Sandoval may not thrill many posters, but the depth list is about the best I've ever seen on a Sox team. (I'm sure someone will remind me of the team back in 19__... Crochet, Houck and Buehler should be fine. Bello & Crawford are decent 4-5's. On the farm, we still lack many highly ranked pitchers. Perales is ranked #4 on soxprospects, but look hos many are poised to make a move up... 7. Valera 8. Sandlin 10. Early, 11. Fitts, 12. Dobbins 13. Tolle, 16. Paez, 19. Clarke 22. Reyes, 23, Cason, 25. Wehunt 28. Monegro, 29. Mullins, 30. Delzine Tygart, Ingrassia, Aita, Fajardo Then, there are Guerrero, Penrod, Mta, Drohan and Dean Most of these guys may never see the bigs or even reach AAA, but the quantity is high and the quality seems to be improving. The Delzine IFA signing looks nice. We spent more on signing bonuses for pitchers in the last draft than I don't know when. 12 of the top 16 picks were pitchers. When has that happened before? (2 of top 3 and 4 of top 6, too.) Besides the FA signings, Brez has added these pitchers via trade and Rule 5: Fitts, (Priester has since been traded for an OF'er) Slaten, Sandlin, Weissert, Fajardo and Judice . At least on paper, things look better.

I agree. It's still early in the season, and his arm has not pitched a lot of innings in a season.... ever. To have any chance, this year, he has to be healthy, all year.

The contract was absurd, and I'd rather we spent that on Betts, but he seemed like the "last straw."

I'm expecting him to do well.

Nobody said count them all as doubles. Not sure where you got that from. I've seen 5-6 plays that hardly anybody else makes. You chose to bring up Duran. Currently Rafaela is +2 OAA and Duran is -2, so a difference of 4 is not far from 4-5. Add 4 hits to Rafaela and he's 15 for 50, not 11 for 50. That's .220 to .300. All singles.

No, he hasn't saved 5-6 hits?

RAF has saved 5-6 hits, already.... some maybe 2Bs. Add those to his offense, and he looks fine.

I'm not all that worried about pitching match-ups, but surely Vegas looks at the SP'er when setting the odds, so it does count for something. It seems like the Sox go against expectations, too often to think it matters all that much. Just my opinion.

Maybe he felt he could back up 1B, too, but Romy looks like a nice platoon guy for Casas (for now, anyway.) I think Grandal will take Sabol's place on the 40 and 26, soon. Sabol will be DFA'd.

I agree. I think Cora has more patience (or loyalty) to his starters than some of us do. Maybe he does not want to put more pressure on Campbell by moving him up, and BTW- last 8 games: KC is at .510.

I think the rotation will be fine, and if Bello can improve on his last 2 years, we should be okay.

I realize offense matters, and some do not value WAR, but Rafaela is 5th on the team in WAR at +0.3. He's on pace for over 3.5.

I'm not sure that matters. Campbell won a slot after a pretty poor ST'ing. We called up Dobbins after a bad start or two w WOO. We promoted Wink after a 4.50 WOO start. That being said, I think Anthony's call-up is way more likely and helpful. I'm not sure where Mayer plays, unless Campbell moves to FT CF, but then why not just call up Anthony for the OF and put Duran in CF?

We are 8-9 out of the gate and lost to some bad team, so the sky is falling, ax the manager, trade or demote our best two 2024 players and we will surely win. Geeeeesh!

Sometimes a big change can spark a turn-around, but sometimes not. Change just for change's sake is rarely a good idea. I wonder what Cora is doing or not doing that is causing this small sample size near .500 stretch. I can see what Casas, Duran and a few others are doing. I can't see anything Cora is doing that I'd change all that much. He adjusted the line-up, almost exactly as one of my suggested moves. Maybe another adjustment is coming, soon. I think we are close to the time we can call up Mayer and/or Anthony and not lose a year of control. I'm not sure who should get demoted to the bench, but they better start hitting, ASAP. Cora has already benched Casas vs lefties and demoted him to 6th in the line-up- maybe he'll go to 7th, next. I've heard some say we should bench Devers or trade Duran. I'm glad they are not the GM/manager.

Devers has a plus OPS+ (105,) and these guys don't: 69 Duran, 60 Rafaela, 58 Refsnyder & Casas. Plus, I doubt we call up Anthony to DH. LF; Anthony v R/Duran v L CF: Duranv R/ Rafaela v L RF: Abreu v R/Anthony v L

Here is a wild idea..... C: Wong & Narvaez 1B: Casas v R/ Bregman v L 2B: Mayer v R/ Campbell v L SS: Story 3B: Bregman v R/ Mayer v L LF: Duran v R/ Anthony vL CF: Campbell v R/ Duran v L RF: Abreu v R/ Anthony v L DH: Devers Bench: Wong/Narvaez, Rafaela, Refsnyder, Romy

I gotta think the D will come around, but Geeeezzz!

Wow, benching our WAR leader in 2024.

Devers can hit. I see no reason to think that will stop or decline quickly. Not everyone is a Pablito.

OBP Leaders .524 Romy (21 PAs) .468 Abreu .409 Campbell .351 Devers .342 Bregman .328 Story SLG% .611 Romy .600 Abreu .491 Campbell .477 Story .464 Bregman .359 Devers TB 32 Bregman 31 Story 30 Abreu 27 Campbell 23 Devers 21 Duran ERA 1.38 Crochet 3.18 Fitts 3.60 Dobbins 4.41 Houck 4.97 Newcomb 5.74 Buehler Pen 1.29 Chapman 1.69 Bernardino 2.79 Whitlock 2.84 Weissert 3.18 Wink 3.60 Wilson

I'm not worried about Devers. I do see a risk of the contract becoming an issue is 4-6 years, maybe 7-8, but not for a while. The guy was on pace for his career year, in 2024, but the injury stopped that. He's just entering peak prime years for most players.

I totally agree, and from day one thought the trade was sketchy, if there was no extension.

I don't disagree, but fWAR says Rafaela is not our weak point. 1.1 Abreu 0.7 Campbell 0.3 Rafaela, Bregman, Story (before today) 0.2 Devers & Narvaez -0.2 Duran -0.5 Casas If we call up Anthony, he should play FT. We could platoon Rafaela & Abreu and play Rafaela at SS and 2B a few games, so he does not need to be totally phased out, but what about Refsnyder? I'm wonder if we have considered trading Ref or Raf.