moonslav59

Agreed. I don't want to dump Yoshida for another DH.

I'm not thrilled with E Valdez at DH, but if he played vs all RHPs, he'd have more PAs than Ref and many other subs. My point was that even if we step down from Yoshida to an EValdez-Ref platoon, I don't see a big drop-off, and the odds EValdez hits as well as Garver in 2025 are probably close to 50-50. He's much cheaper.

I'd hope for a better defensive "step up," but I think the 28 HR/650 PA power is a big step forward for our RHBs. Also, Wong has hit LHPs worse than RHPs: .727 to .686, so maybe Jeffers could give us a boost vs LHPs that Wong could not.

We have Refsnyder, who is a top 25 batter vs LHPs, and also should never play in the OF, again. Besides the idea of a Casas-Devers DH/1B, I'd almost be as happy with an E Valdez-Ref polatoon at DH than Yoshida or Garver. Maybe a DHam-Ref DH platoon could match a FT Yoshida's numbers.

Blocking: -4 Jeffers and -12 Wong Framing: both -7 Throwing: Jeffers +2 and Wong 0 (Jeffers had better pop time in '24.) DRS (fangraphs) -4 Jeffers -14 Wong

YIKES! That surprises me and makes me wonder, if he should be a target for us.

Yes, I misread the columns. We'd need to offer more, then. Is jeffers any good on D?

If he could still catch, maybe.

I'm thinking I'd prefer a contract I hate as much as Yoshida, but it being for a pitcher with some hope of a redemption. I fully realize other teams prefer pitchers to DHs, and so that is why the pot would need to be sweetened for them by adding more money than to balance it out or by adding a promising player or prospect they like.

Agreed, more likely, they'd only do this deal, if we included someone like Abreu or a non-40man guys like Meidroth, Arias, Cespedes or Dobbins (Rule 5).

Right now, I'm really liking how we might be able to make a deal with MN. Apparently, they are looking to retool, and we have a lot of young players and prospects, some seemingly blocked or bottle-necked to give them. Ober and Ryan were mentioned, but I'm not sure why they would look to deal them, now, when they both have 1 pre-arb year left + 3 arbs, but they would be the prize of any deal with them. They also have Pablo Lopez, who is owed $21.8M per year x 3, but the lux tax hit is just $18.4M/yr. My guess is, they'd prefer to move him over Ober or Ryan, but they'd get a better return for the the cheaper guys. To me, another big prize would be prying Ryan Jeffers from them. He has just one arb year left, so he's not in their long term plans. Jeffers could give us that big RH'd power bat we need. He has a .784 OPS from 2023-2024 and is just 27. He averaged about 29 HRs and 85 RBI per 650 PAs in those two seasons. That's about what O'Neill gave us. A SP'er and Jeffer for _____ ? Would they insist on Mayer or Campbell? Would they take Wong and Abreu plus others, instead of a top prospect? Would Casas, Wong and Dobbins be enough, or would it take Abreu, too? It's hard to know what MN wants.

That's how I see it. Yoshida is owed $54M/3. R Ray is owed $46M/3. The difference is about $12M/3 or $4M a year. Throw in a blocked player like EValdez or Sogard, and maybe SF does it.

The vast majority of our key returning players are pre-prime or prime. That is something to be optimistic about, along with the 3-5 promising prospects beating down the MLB door. By April, only these guys are end of prime or post-prime, and none are really super-key players, except Story and maybe Hendriks, if we don't add top RP'ers: 31 Yoshida 32 Story & Fulmer 34 Refsnyder 36 Hendriks I think it's unrealistic to think we don't get some major boost from Anthony, Campbell, Mayer, Fitts or Guerrero. It might be unrealistic to expect two to be full timers, as well. Yes, we lose Pivetta, Jansen, Martin and O'Neill. We need to add more than Gio, Hendriks and Fulmer to come close to replacing them and adding more value to improve on 81-81. They do offer some hope and some value, and should help, but we need 2-3 major additions to get significantly better. (I'd like 4, but 3 might be the limit.) I'd add a top closer/RP'er and set up man. Add a #2 SP'er. Add a catcher with some RHB pop. (Trade for Jeffers?) That could be enough. I'd like to point out one more thing: while we lose O'Neill's 473 PAs at an .847 OPS and team leading 31 HRs, he did knock in just 61 batters, and we also lose or should see way less PAs from these guys, which is more PAs than O'Neill gave us: .706 Smith (278 PAs) .633 Valdez (223) .575 McGuire (158) .623 Jansen (96) .410 Dalbec (93) + .455 Cooper (75) .451 Reyes (64) + .584 Westbrook (48)+ .650 Sogard (86) How many PAs DHam .697 (317) and Grissom .465 (114) get and how well they do could be a big factor, but the hope is that Story .733 (106) eats up most of the scrub IF PAs from 2024 and some of Rafaela's IF PAs. Campbell and Mayer offer some better hope than many listed above. Romy as the back-up 1Bman may do better than Cooper & Dalbec, but maybe not Dom Smith. Getting a catcher like Jeffers could boost our RHB power and greatly improve on McGuire and jansen's production in 2024. It would also allow Wong to be more of a back-up catcher and 1Bman. If Anthony and Campbell can improve on Rafaela's OF production, on offense, that could be the boost we need to overtake the loss of O'Neill, all by itself. We do have a lot of "ifs," but having so many promising "ifs" is not a bad thing, and it's not like many are long shots. Many have already shown a lot of promise, such as Casas, Abreu and even Wong & DHam, to some extent. Duran, Devers and Ref vs LHPs are proven producers. Rafaela could take a step back, but we have Anthony & Campbell. To me, adding a solid RHB Catcher with pop is all the offense needs to project better production for 2025. That does not mean we get it, but on paper, it should be better. (I hate depending on Story, but having Mayer and the return of DHam, Grissom, Romy and maybe Campbell improves the depth, too.)

Just curious on why you think SFG would be willing to take on Yoshida's contract more than some other team. Robbie Ray is owed $23M x 2, so maybe taking him back would make a deal more balanced, but I'm still not sure why they want Yoshi.

Love this! That 7th one was

Actually, if we do nothing, we will get worse. Jansen > Hendriks Martin > Fulmer Pivetta> Giolito O'Neill> more PAs from Story (Rafaela to CF to replace most of the O'Neill PAs.) Can we expect the returning players to do better? The optimist might say yes, since most of our returnees are pre-prime or prime. The pessimist might say we saw enough career highs in 2024, so maybe a step back can be expected. Here are the ages of our core players: A: 28 Devers, 28 Duran, 28 Houck B: 28 (29 on 4/1) Crawford, 27 Slaten, 32 Story, 25 Bello, 25 Abreu, 30 Giolito, 36 (FEB) Hendriks C: 24 Rafaela, 25 Wong, 34 (in March) Refsnyder, 25 Criswell, 25 Fitts, 32 (MAR) Fulmer Possibles: 20 Anthony, 22 Campbell & Mayer (Teel), 23 Meidroth Only Story and Hendriks are A/B and 32 or older. The other 8 A/B are 30 or under. Only Ref and Fulmer are 32+ Cs. The other 4 are not. (One could argue others are Cs and not Fulmer.) If we just add the bare min of Nick Martinez & Tanner Scott (notin's picks,)... Martinez> Pivetta Giolito> Criswell Scott> Jansen Hendriks > '24 Martin

Would this make most of us happy? Sign: Nick Martinez, Tanner Scott and Aroldis Chapman Trade: Abreu, Wong, Crawford & Dobbins For: RHP Bailey Ober (pre-arb, then 3 arbs) and C Ryan Jeffers (3rd arb of 3.) Jeffers is a good power bat and bats RH's. He can be a bridge to Teel. Jeffer and 4 years of Ober at a low cost is worth giving up Abreu, Crawford, Wong and Dobbins. C: Jeffers & Gasper (Teel in late '25 or '26) 1B: Casas (Romy) 2B: Campbell (DHam-Grissom) SS: Story & Mayer (Romy) 3B: Devers (Meidroth) LF: Abreu/Duran (E Valdez) CF: Duran/Rafaela (Anthony/Campbell) RF: Anthony (Abreu) DH: Yoshida-Refsnyder (Hickey) SP: Houck, Martinez, Ober, Bello, Giolito (Fitts, Criswell, Priester) RP: Scott, Chapman, Hendriks, Slaten, Whitlock, Criswell, Fitts, Fulmer (Wink, Bernardino, Guerrero, Mata, Penrod, Kelly, Weissert, I Campbell, Shugart, Booser

A Yoshida-Refsnyder platoon might be the plan for 2025. Ref is no good in the OF, and we will likely be adding Anthony and maybe Campbell to the OF mix, while losing O'Neill. We could see... LF: Duran CF: Anthony v R/ Rafaela v L RF: Anthony v L/ Abreu v R or LF: Duran v R/ Abreu v L CF: Duran v L/ Rafaela v R RF: Anthony

Sale was great in 2017, too. He even led the league in IP and Ks. (FIP, too.) Remember, Schilling got an extension, and barely pitched that year. Beckett got an extension and was later traded.

I think we are stuck with hoping Yoshida does better.

Pretty close to my estimate of $3-6M x 3 years

The word was Houck replaced Gio. (He was likely the odd man out.) That would mean Criswell (the team went 12-6 in his 18 starts and Fitts (team went 0-4, despite his 1.74 ERA.) The pitching depth of Houck, Criswell and Fitts were not the main issue: it was defense, the pen (including Martin's minor meltdown) and the other 3-4 SP'ers (Bello, Crawford and Pivetta.) My point is, we don't have great pen depth, as we sit now, unless we add 3 solid RP'ers, then our 6-7-8 guys get pushed to AAA depth, and our AAA depth becomes farther away AAA depth. I'm also fine with Fitts, Criswell, Priester and Dobbings as our AAA depth, but not our 5th SP'er going into 2025. If I had my way, they be our 7-8-9-10 starters with Crawford as our #6/ long man.

soxprospects.com projects these guys will start the year here: 1. Ingrassia A+ 2. Dobbins AAA 3. Duffy A+ 4. Monegro AA I Coffey AAA Paez A+ Wehunt AA Early AA E Rodriguez A+ Cohen A- (Pen) Fitts MLB It's interesting to note, that we have several other pitchers on the farm that may be better that these guys or will pass them, next summer. Maybe some will end up in the pen, as will a few from this awarded group of young pitchers. Priester is not a prospect, but he could be a force, as soon as 2025. Here are the highest ranked pitchers not listed above: 6. Perales 21 IL (AA/AAA) - Probably our best minor league pitcher. 11. Sandlin 23 AA- may end up in the pen. Has serious upside. 13. Tolle 21 A+ mostly unkown 19. Penrod 27 AAA/MLB (Pen) up their in age. 20. Wikelman 22 AAA- make or break year & may be bubble on 40 man 23. Cason 18 A- mostly unknown 24. Valera 18 A- could have made the top list for 2024. 26. Mullins 24 AA- let's see how he does in '25. 27. Guerrero 24 MLB (Pen)- could be a force in the '25 MLB pen. 31. Reyes FCL (Pen)- hope to see him shine in '25 33. Neely A+ mostly unknown 35. Bastardo, 39. B Clarke A- 40. Tygart A-, 41. Dean A+ (Pen), 42, Carlson A+ (Pen), 46. Gambrell AAA, 48. Bonnin AA (Pen), 49. G Jackson AA (Pen), 51. Mata (out of options), 56. Hoppe AA (Pen), 59. Rogers A+ (Pen), 60. Sena AA (Pen) Not Ranked: S Drohan AAA, Uberstine AA, Ehrlicher A-, Judice A-

Big win for the PACK! Great game, too. Heard this was the first time the Lions beat an undefeated team, this late in a season in over 50 years. (DET>MIN) No NFC North team is worse than 4-2! No NFC West team is better than 4-3. 6 teams have 5 wins: 3 are in the NFC North.

The old conference system has been shattered. It's hard to know what is to come. Maybe 4 or 5 mega 16 team conferences.