moonslav59

We did what we could against Skubal, but the rest of the team let us down, again. We can't seem to get all aspects of this team going at the same time, for more than a 2-3 game stretch, and even those are rare. It's mid May, and this team is looking like another .500 club. I still think an Anthony and or Mayer call-up could give us the spark we need, right now. (A decent RP'er, if we had one, would likely help more.)

Earlier in his career, Duran was forever tinkering. I guess he just can't resist. He better start hitting, or he's looking at joining Abreu on the platoon wagon, at best.

I guess the Raffy to 1B thread was getting off topic, so we needed a new one.

Don't look now, but Rafaela is nearing the .700 line. (The league OPS is .710.) Ceddanne is at .679, after being at .577 on May 3rd. .977 last 10 games. Maybe he feels Anthony's breath.

WOW! Cespedes ended up 3-4. Is he finally becoming what we hoped for?

WOO is up 8-4, late and the two wonder kids are at it again. Anthony 2-3 w 2 BB and Mayer 2-4. Hickey with another good day (2-4 w HR & BB.) GRE won 9-6. Valera went 3.2, 4H, 2ER, 0 BB, 2K. Ehrhard exploded by going 5-5 w a dinger. Taylor 2-3 w BB. Arias 1-5 w 2 rbi. Cespedes is 2-3 midway through Salem's game.

It would be really nice, if this guy got it back together.

Ref is back in the line-up vs the lefty... 1. Duran 2. Devers 3. Bregman 4. Refsnyder 5. Campball 6. Story 7. Sogard 8. Narvaez 9. Rafaela

It's games like these where we seem to beat expectations.

At this point, I'd agree on anyone from Campbell, Mayer or Story at 1B over Toto- Sogard-Romy-Wong, If playing Devers at 1B is to make room for Yoshida, I'd prefer all three over him, too.

This is obvious, to me, even if all 10 errors let the runner get to 2B on bad throws.

There are no good choices.

I have been surprised by all the errors, but defense is not just about reducing errors. It's about making plays others make or don't make, turning DPs and blocking potential WPs. I think our D is better, and I hope we start seeing less errors. It is very surprising that Bregman & Story have 5 errors each and Duran 3. Those are our error leaders. Our team is currently 17th in DRS and 14th in OAA. We are 6th in fangraph's rankings. In 2024, they had us ranked 26th. In DRS, we were 6th, and I don't know how. We were 25th in OAA. Only DRS shows we got worse.

So far, they have done better than the 2024 Jansen & Martin, but we needed much more pen help, last winter. Granted, we needed SP'ers, too and a RHB, so maybe Brez robbed from Peter to pay Paul.

One of my dogs patrols our back yard. Even birds dare not fly to low over our yard. The do catch an occasional Possum or skunk, but other than snakes, there is not much adventure in our yard. The most entertaining thing we saw was a big German Shepherd from the house behind us, walking on top of a 5 foot stockade fence. He'd jump up and get to neighbors yards by walking along a 2 x 4 holding the fence together.

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.