moonslav59

Well, the 4 slot is more valuable than the 3 slot (and so is the 5 slot,) so Devers or Bregman should bat 4th, IMO. We are hitting well, but not scoring the runs that match our OBP and SLG. Of course, Bregman and devers are doing great, so I get the argument to leave well enough alone. They both have the most PAs with men on base, but I'm not sure that more about playing every game of their slot in the order. Either way, this no the reason we are losing, but I do think we need to shake things up, and the 4 slot has been killing us. .171 BA 7 HRS 23 RBI (.518 OPS)

I've always doubted what people say was said, and the translations of statements made by Devers. Some posters have said Cora told Devers "to retire his glove." I doubt he said it, but if anything like that was said, I think it was wrong, especially with a know shortage of 1B depth and Casas being a China doll.

No, it doesn't mean that's the only reason to call up Mayer, but Mayer's struggles vs LHPs should be weighed vs Story's vs RHPs. Lately, Story hasn't been hitting L's or R's. I don't see why Campbell's recent struggles means Mayer will do worse. Mayer could blast off, if promoted. He could do worse. It's hard to imagine anyone doing worse than Story has for a few weeks, now. My idea is to play Story at 2B, mayer at SS and Campbell at 1B, so Mayer would be replacing Sogard, Toro and eventually Romy's bat in the line-up.

We do have options we have not tried, yet. We could call up a kid or two. We could bat Bregman 2nd and Devers 4th. We could try Criswell as a SP'er, like did so well, last year. We could give Guerrero another look. We could try I Campbell out, but we'd have to add him to the 40 (Casas to 60.) We could try something else and hope a spark ignites a flame.

Ok, well Story is hitting .547 vs RHPs, who we face way more often.

My position is to keep Devers at DH and play Campbell at 1B. That does not change my opinion that Cora should not have told Devers he was the DH for 8 years and to "retire his glove." No manager should ever say that to a player, even if we had 1B depth.

It seems wrong to not foresee an injury to your only 1Bman and think you might need Devers to play there, someday. We just saw the "promise" Bloom made to devers about 3B overturned, and Cora/Brez learned nothing from it.

A decision need to be made on who plays 1B. There is not much we can do, in May, to fix the pitching, except give our starters a start or two more, then try someone else, already in the system. No ace will be traded in May. We've already tried 8 SP'ers and have yet to get a start from Crawford, Criswell or Sandoval. We have a few on the shorter ILs, now: Buehler, Fitts and Houck. I think our only options until June or July are to roll the dice with what we have.

I'm not sure Cora told him he'd be the DH for 8 years, and if he did, it was his mistake, unless Breslow told him that's what he should say.

The idea that casas was going to hit .580 all season is flawed, so thinking that's all we needed to replace to improve is not really the issue. I'd rather have Casas for the next few months than any other option we have, right now, or to trade for one. I could be wrong about casas getting better, but hey...

The Red Sox have played poorly and lost too many games they shoulda/coulda won. Game aren't won "on paper," and we are watching that, first hand. Our rotation finally got the depth we wanted, but we've already reached #10 and #11 on the winter depth chart. The pen was expected to have major issues, and they have not let us down on that projection. The offense has been too sporadic and has lacked timely hitting. The defense should have improved by more than it has shown. It remains to be seen, if we can or will turn things around. Maybe some returning SP'ers will give is a boost. They can't be much worse than Gio & Houck. Maybe moving a SP to the pen will bolster it, but I'm not sure Gio will do any better as a RP'er. We still have over two-thirds of a season left. We've seen very little to be encouraged about, but in baseball, things often change on a dime. I'm hopeful but not very optimistic, as of now.

We all know what Fldg % is. It's as simple an incomplete as BA.

Players do have fielding slumps, but Duran has been all over the map on D... kinda like his offense. Maybe, he'll come around. I'm wondering if he's been distracted, which affects focus.

Thanks for answering the sixth time. 😜

If a tree fell on the range, would fielding percent hear it?

Campbell has been playing some CF, too.

Mayer went 0-5, today. Anthony 2-4 w BB. Early went 5.1 of shutout pitching: 2H, 0BB, 8K. Jordan homered and Romero went 1-3 w 2B & SF. Clarke walked 5 in 3 IP. Arias went 1-4 w BB. K Diaz homered twice for SAL. Encarnacion 2-5 w 2B. J Gonzalez 3-5

He really has had that issue. Before today: 1.110 OPS in first (BR says 2 runs scored)

Correct. Darren Lewis ran for DH Manny Ramirez with 2 outs in the 8th. He scored as the team had 9 straight hits, including his HR! 1 PA, 2 Runs scores, 1 HR- no time in the field, as he was the DH on the bench for the 9th inning. April 18, 2001 vs the Rays

Here is a 2 part trivia question: 1. How can a player get up to bat for the first time in the 8th inning without being a pinch hitter or defensive substitute? 2. Who was the Sox player who did this, while scoring 2 runs in that inning with just 1 PA (a HR?) That is a hint for Q #1. (This player was not removed for the 9th inning, yet never took the field on defense. He was not a pitcher.)

They were good enough for me, too. Rico was a very good hitter. Burleson was my favorite player after Tommy Harper's days with the Sox ended. Burleson was a good defender, IMO. Rico was good at 3B.

Kind of a weird obsession with my types of postings.

We have Abreu back in the 4 slot, today. Toro is at 1B and batting 6th (YUCK!) Wong 7th DHam 8th at 2B Gotta hope Bello has his stuff or the great run support he's been getting, so far.

Jeter is the poster boy for a s***** SS with a great FLG%. I thought the choice was obvious, and SS is the position where range and error rates probably matter more than any other measurable position. (The catcher position is harder to measure and involves other aspects that no other position has.) I could have used Bogey, who did not have real bad range, especially earlier in his career, but had pretty good FLG%s over the years. He was poorly rated by DRS and OAA due to less than average range. My point was that either by just using the eye test or metrics (or both,) it is clear some SSs make at least 81 more plays a year than others, based on similarly hit balls in their direction. Does your eye test results agree with this? Other positions, especially OF have much lore differentials on range influence.

I should not have said "all you judge GMs by," I was wrong. On the trade deadline moves, last year. I think we all thought they were half-hearted moves (or worse,) but I will say that Luis Garcia and Lucas Sims were not bad RP'ers, but they both sucked worse than what we had before. This is an example where the GM gets blamed for the players doing way worse than what just about anyone would have expected. There were better pitchers traded at the deadline, and all Brez gave up were players that either looked destines to be AAAA types or who were Rule 5 eligible and were borderline on wanting to protect or lose. Lucas Sims had a very decent 2023 season with Cincy (3.107 ERA in 61 IP, but a very nice ,622 OPS Against and 1.18 WHIP) He had a 3.57 ERA to start 2024, but with BOS jumped to 6.43. Is that really Brez's fault? Yes, he could have given up more prospect capital for a better RP'er, but if Sims gave us 3.10 to 3.57, it would have been helpful. Luis Garcia was an aging RP'er who had shown signs of decline in 2023, but still had a 4.07 ERA and a 3.71 ERA to start 2024 (1.17 WHIP.) From '21 to '22, he had a 3.34 ERA and 1.13 WHIP) Nobody expected an 8.22 ERA with BOS. Like Sims, we could have/should have gotten better, but both underperformed, greatly. Brez deserves some blame, for sure, but these two imploded. The Paxton deal was bad. He did not do real badly in his 3 GS, but we all knew he'd never last the season. Gotta give Brez props for the winter moves that brought us Slaten (2.93 in 55 IP) and Weissert (3.13 in 63 IP.) The Criswell addition was the type of move I expected Bloom to make, every winter. Not all of Brez's moves worked, like Chase Anderson, Bailey Horn, Joely, Rich Hill and few others who did not last long. On O, the O'Neill trade was a big plus, but of course, the Grissom for Sale trade overshadowed everything else, combined. Bad GM'ing? Maybe. Bad luck? Maybe.