moonslav59

Thanks for telling me they aren't listening. I would never have known. We all complain about what they don't do to fix weak areas. Right now, 3B defense is the talk, since Bregman is the last big man standing. I'm not posting here for JH, Brez or Cora to "listen."

The Sox are 11th in winter spending... https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/12/each-teams-free-agent-spending-thus-far-2.html The Mets spent more on their 3rd and 4th highest paid FA signings than we have on our 4 signings, combined. The Dodgers spent more on their second highest contract than all our 4, together. The Diamondbacks, Yanks, Rangers, Astros and Angels spent more on one FA than our 4. The A's and O's have spent more than us. 11th place. That's who we are.

They know, but they care more about their $313M 3Bman's feelings than building a winner.

Call it a pooch kick.

Breslow and all the non answers... https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/12/craig-breslow-discusses-casas-bregman-devers.html

What were the final results?

Weakest Areas of 2024 team by fangraphs rankings: DRS 27th Catcher Defense 24th 3B Defense (26th in OAA) 26th '22-'24 21st 1B Defense (20th in OAA w Smith, a lot.) 29th '22-'24 OPS 30th 2B .533 (Mostly E Valdez, Grissom and DHam) Our pen was the worst in the second of 2024.

cots has the CBT budget at $210M, now.. Last year's was $226M at the end of the year, counting D Jansen, L Garcia, Sims and paying off guys we cut. Opening day payroll only: $174M, now and $171M in '24. Hard to say.

Loved seeing Alabama lose, today. I could see the argument that they were better than others who made the playoffs. but this loss kinda puts the kibosh on that. Penn St plays tonight.

Their only "interest" is if the guy they want will take millions less to play for the Sox. They think if they kick 50 tires, one will take the kick and like it.

What LAD is doing is not really fair to any other teams, and they get out of paying what they should in taxes. I think the loophole needs to get fixed. The JH issue is totally seperate. If we don't extend Crochet and don't try to open the window wider, I'm done with JH and the whole crew. Time is running out, if it hasn't already.

You did not mention Anthony for CF and or RF. I'd say Catcher is the number one positional need, along with balancing the Lefty overload. It's really more about defense at 3 positions (C, 3B, 1B) and offense at one position (CF) with no position lacking in both areas. Maybe Campbell can play 3B, at some point, but that would indirectly squeeze out Yoshida. At some point, someone will get squeezed, unless all three top prospects flop. Anthony can easily squeeze Rafaela to a jack-of-all-trades utility man and or a platoon w Abreu (as Anthony could alternate between CF and RF, depending on who is playing.) Mayer could play 3B, 2B or squeeze Story to 2B. Campbell could push DHam and Grissom to utility roles or push Devers to 1B/DH. It seems like the easiest way to balance the L-R thing is to trade Abreu and sign someone like Grichuk on a 1 year deal, until we know more about the kids. notin mentioned a Story for Sean Murphy deal that would bring us the RHB we need and a decent catcher, but it would lock us into Mayer at SS with not much depth, unless you think Campbell could do better than Rafaela. I'd rather see Romy sub at SS than DHam or Grissom.

One unspectacular move could be to sign Kyle Finnegan. If anything, he is the model of consistency: 4 year ERA: 3.62 in and average 67 gms/yr. His ERA never went over or under by more than 0.14. His games pitched was always within 2 of 67. In 2024, he had 38 saves in 43 opportunities.

I'm not the driver of that wagon. I'd be fine with going all in, but I'm never a fan of "halfway."

I'm with you on this. The Crochet trade should have meant the window is open, now, and other moves should have/be made to build a team around him, Buehler and the existing core. Signing Buehler, instead of Fried or Burnes is okay, I guess. Signing Chapman, instead of Scott leaves something to be desired, but maybe Hendriks can help. We really made no other major improvements, except Crochet and Buehler. When you look at what we saw walk away, it's not a major improvement. Some could argue it's not one at all. Pivetta may have been average, but he was the horse we've needed. O'Neill was out HR leader and only really good RHB, (okay Ref was, too.) Jansen and Martin were no slouches. Rotation: better. Pen: worse. Line-up: worse. Defense: the same.

Over the last few seasons, all we've pretty much had were hopes that just about everything could go right and maybe, just maybe, some magic could happen. For many of us the winter before 2021 was not hopeful, at all. I think I had more hopes going into 2022 than 2021, so I guess anything goes, right? I'm not happy with the totality of our moves, this winter, and maybe something major will still go down, but there are a few things to be more hopeful about than there were, last winter, of the ones before. We had a lot of questions about Houck and Crawford, last winter, and we still do, but I feel better about both, now. I was worried about Wong's bat, last winter, but now I'm not. (I am terrified about his defense, though, while last winter I had hopes he could improve.) I'm about equally concerned about the health of Casas, but I still am pretty sure the guy can rake. I feel way better about 2B than I have since Story was the FT'er there. The health concerns about Story at SS has not gotten any better. Devers at 3B feels the same. I fell way better about the OF, as Duran answered all Qs about him, Abreu looked real good on O & D and Rafaela did okay. The pen looks deeper but more sketchy with our top 2 guys going into 2025. I have to think Buehler should be better than Pivetta, but he has to stay healthy. Adding Giolito to the mix looks good, on paper. Bello looks no better than he did last winter, but having Criswell, Fitts, Priester and Dobbins in AAA helps me think our rotation should be better with quality and quantity in 2025. The pen looks the opposite, to me, but there are so many promising arms that maybe we can cobble together a decent 8 and not take all season to settle on the right one. Catcher looks worse. 1B about the same. 2B better. SS about the same- maybe a bit better. 3B the same. OF much better and the bench looks better than it did, last winter. Overall, this seems to show we should be better, but we needed to get 10-20 games better, not 5-7 better. As always, we must rely on players staying healthy, and the list is long: Story at SS, Buehler at SP, Casas and Devers at corner IF, Giolito & Hendriks, Slaten & Whitlock, Yoshida and others, too. Maybe, by opening day I will feel more optimistic, but I was hoping we could do better than just slightly improving and relying on the same hopes we've seen dashed, year-after-year.

If the plan was to open the window in 2026 or 2027, I wish we'd have kept Teal, Montgomery and Meidroth.

I'm not sure why he'd even be in the running for 3rd or 4th place on the Sox in OPS or OPS+. 2024 OPS+ 139 Devers (at age 27) , 129 Duran (27) , 129 Refsnyder, 120 Casas (age 24), 114 Abreu (at age 25) Bregman was at 122 at age 30 2023-2024 OPS .860 Devers .838 Casas .832 Duran .794 Abreu ,787 BREGMAN .775 Yoshida

I'm not getting the faith in his offense. He is not the guy from 2017-2019. He's gone 5 years showing he is a good to very good hitter, but not great, anymore. Maybe Fenway would be good to him, like it is to many lefties, but it's not like HOU is a pitcher's park. He'll be 31 on opening day. He has a very nice 122 OPS+ over the last 4-5 years and a 118 OPS+ in 2024. That is an improvement over our 2Bman, for sure, but was 2B our biggest need area? Our second biggest? 3rd? 4th? 5th? 6th? (I'd say no to all and beyond.) Just because he is the best FA remaining, doesn't mean we should choose him to be our overpay. I'm barely on board with signing him as our 3Bman. Barely. In a sense, we'd be paying him his salary plus the benched Yoshida's salary to make room for him. That is also reason enough to say no, but at least he'd improve our offesne (Bregman > Yoshida) and 3B Defense (Bregman >>>>>>Devers) and maybe 1B deense (Devers ??>>?? Casas). The DH 1B share by Devers and Casas may keep both healthier, fresher and maybe needing less full days off for rest. It would be 2-3 pluses, not one.

So, of all the FAs signed and unsigned, you think signing Bregman to $25M-$28M a year for 5-6 years to keep our 2B defense maybe the same and bat .795 year one and maybe less, every year afterwards is the solution? We might get .730-.770 from a DHam-Grissom platoon, or much better from Campbell. The D at 3B, 1B and C will still suck. The offense may get slightly better for a year, maybe two. Bregman would provide the option to move him to 3B in a year or two, about the time his defense starts declining. I'd rather sign Santander to less money, then trade Abreu for a catcher and RP'er. He's a better bat, and we'd fix 2-3 needs, not barely one.

Who is saying don't sign Bregman or anyone else? We've all been suggesting ways to upgrade our actual weaker areas, now ones where we are better than others or have great hopes in a ML ready prospect to step in, if the DHam-Grissom 2B platoon implodes.

.729 might be what Breg hits over the next 6 years. DHam brings more than just .729. He is, IMO, a better defensive 2Bman than Breg and steals mega bases. My real confidence lies with Campbell, who am certain will outhit Breg in the next 6 years and is likely a better defensive 2Bman, too. If Mayer wins the SS job, we'll have a RH'd GG 2Bman, as well, in Story. We don't need a 2Bman who may or may not improve the 2B offense.

You act like the first half of 2024 is the outlier. It's not. You don't hit .795 over the last 4-5 years and think he is really the batter he was over the second half of the most recent season. There is no reason to think he'll be better over a full season in 2025. 2023: .726 first half/ .901 second half 2022: .764/.894 He's a streaky hitter, who has had reverse splits over the 2023 and 2024 season. He may not be the savior we need vs LHPs, either. 2023: .696 v L and .712 in 2024. He's a damn good defensive 3Bman who hits well, but not great. He may be a good defensive 2Bman, but we already have that role filled. Who is overthinking this? We need to improve 3B D. We need a good to great RHB. We don't need a good RHB to play 2B.

It's hard to imagine JH saying no to a Jansen contract. These are the types of things that puzzle me.

You know I'm talking about 3B defense. I'm not signing Bregman to bench Devers. His bat stays. Nobody is saying we bench or trade Devers.