moonslav59

That would help. He won't get help for framing via robo umps, this year.

Agreed, but also, Narvaez is going to have to hit- hopefully better than Sandy Leon (except for 2016.)

They already have a budget projected to be higher than ours. Sad.

Just because VTek was a human computer brain, doesn't mean he's the best coach of catchers. He was best at knowing opposing batters, while his blocking, framing and throwing skills took a long time to develop into pluses. I doubt anyone "gets excited" about a team's catching coaches, but this guy does have pretty good track record on improving catcher defense. When I mentioned the new guy, it wasn't out of any sure thing expectation, but you did ask, "what new coaches?"

I doubt Bregman will take a one year deal to try and reset his value by having a big year. I do think Boston and Fenway Park could help him have a very good 2025 season, but he looks to want a longer deal. If the Astros offer him $130M/5, but we offer him $112M/4 with an opt out after 1-2 years, maybe he takes our offer.

Those are three very legitimate concerns, and there are others, too. I'm not trying to lessen the importance of these concerns, since I worry about these things, too. 1. I'm not big on thinking a player or team's most recent production level is who they are and will be, going forward. We have dropped off, late in the season a couple years in a row, so it does make you think about why that happens. 2. Losing O'Neill is a big one, but he did miss about 50 games and was just 5th on the team in PAs w 473. We are also losing more than 473 PAs from these guys: 278 Dom Smith (.706) 223 E Valdez (.633) 158 McGuire (.575) 96 Jansen (.623) 93 Dalbec (.410) and 75 Cooper (.455) This is about double the PAs lost by O'Neill. While there is no certainty Narvaez and other back-up catchers will outhit McGuire and Jansen's 2024 numbers, the bar is pretty damn low. Replacing Smith/Dalbec/Cooper with more PAs from Casas could easily make up for the loss of O'Neill, all by itself. (Casas has good splits vs LHPs, too.) The 2B offense was putrid, until DHam and Romy started playing more often, Replacing EValdez on O and D should be a big boost. If Grissom hits .465, again, he won't get the 114 PAs he got in 2024. Replacing O'Neill's PAs will likely come from more OF PAs from Rafaela, which is not very promising, offensively. We could see a 200 point drop, there. The only current other hopes we have are more OF PAs from Refsnyder vs LHPs or Anthony and Campbell. 3. I'm not sure about Devers and his shoulder. I hope the docs got it right with no surgery. We can't afford losing him, or having him play hurt, again. I guess Campbell could play 3B, but there is no replacing Devers' bat. Another big question is SS, particularly Story's health and how well he may do on offense. It's been a long time since he was a force on O, and we could use a power bat from the right side. It's not likely Wong will keep hitting this well, although he is trying to put on weight. We need to rely on the younger players (Duran, DHam, Abreu, Rafaela, Grissom and others) to do well or improve. A healthy Yoshida could help, too. We have about as many question marks as everyday players on the 40 and off the 40, but we do have a lot of depth and choices, if someone gets hurt or falters. (Guys like Devers and Casas are not easily replaced by the in system depth we have.) Devers, Casas, Duran Story, Abreu, Rafaela Wong, Yoshida/Refsnyder and the 3-headed 2Bmen: DHam/Romy/Grissom Campbell, Anthony and Mayer That's 15 players of 9 slots, plus these 3 for catcher depth: Narvaez, Sabol & Zavala

It is not a certainty that the $156M/6 original deal is still on the table w HOU. Talk shows down here are are saying it is not.

Narvaez is supposed to be good on D. He has shown some power and OB skills in the minors, but who knows.

He may choose HOU, even if some other team beats their price. The Sox have reportedly stuck to their guns, as they do, with a shorter term offer- maybe 4 years, tops. Apparently, there have been multiple long term deals offered, but that could just be Boras bluster. I read somewhere that Devers is still resisting a change of position, but who knows what to believe. Adding Grichuk and Estevez might be the better plan, but I doubt we see that happening, either. We will be counting on 1-2 of our top prospects to fill in the holes, but there is also a decent chance some returning players step up their game. 2B: If DHam can repeat or improve on how he did after his second call-up and just one from Romy & Grissom can do well as his platoon, we may not need Campbell at 2B. SS: IF Story can.... I know.... broken record.... we may not need Mayer in 2025. OF: If Abreu can start hitting lefties, and Rafaela improves on his hitting, we may not need Anthony or Campbell in the OF in 2025. C: We need Narvaez to not be a total bust on O. Maybe the new Yankee catching coach can help Wong's D improve. Corner IF D: Maybe the Bregman talk has lit a fire under Devers to improve his D, so he won't be moved to DH/1B, at least for a while longer. Lots of ifs and maybes, but we don't need all of these to come true to be a serious contender.

If I had to bet, I think I would say yes, due to the fact that I did not see the teams better than us improve or improve by more than we did. It's close, and it shouldn't have had to be this close. I always think the team with better pitching has a chance. I hope our O and D can do well enough to get us there. I think the O can. The D still needs help- mostly via health.

As our closer? (Or make Gio the closer?)

Maybe 2 with team option for 3 and buyout.

We don't need SP'ers.

Trevor Bauer to sign and play in Japan.

HOU is paying $5.5M of Pressley's deal. I'm not sure if thats enough to squeeze in Bregman.

It seems that way, and we know JH will not raise his bid. BTW, HOU is paying part of Pressley's contract. The Cubs may not sign Estevez, now, so maybe we move in on him as a target.

We are basically pinning all our RHB hopes on Campbell and the return of Story and Casas, who has pretty good splits vs LHPs. We will need Ref to keep bashing lefties, too. I'm not so down on our offense as some seem to be. I'm hopeful Story can help improve the D more than be our RHB savior. I see more reason for optimism, than last year, but it could have been better.

fangraphs has the Sox ranked 4th in pitching, based on projected fWAR, and this includes a surprising 2nd ranking for the pen. It's not like the winter has been a total waste of time. For years, we have heard that the focus of our farm has been too heavily on everyday players, and our two biggest free agents signings since 2018 were everyday players, Story and Yoshida. Our big three prospects are everyday players. We lost O'Neill and Jansen/McGuire and gained Narvaez. That is clearly a step down, and once again, we have to rely on hoping for health and bounce back years, most notably from Story and Casas, but also by Devers and 1 or 2 of our 2Bmen. Maybe we can see a big boost from Campbell, Anthony and or Mayer, but counting on them is more about hope than anything solid. When all is said and done, we do look better, on paper, but better than .500 could mean just 82-86 wind, and another playoff miss. We, again, seem to need too much to go right to have a realistic expectation of success in 2025. There is still time to make a meaningful addition, or two, but I'm not thinking that is going down. It's going to come down to Story or Mayer. Campbell or our current 2B mix & match. Improved catcher defense. Our OF to not regress. (Maybe, Anthony gives it a big boost.) Our pen to not have to cycle through 6-10 pitchers to find the 8 that work best. Our rotation to live up to the projections.

It's nice to have such a constantly optimistic poster on this site.

Here is where the Sox rank by fangraph's projections by position: 30th SS (Story 1.0 and 588 PAs) 28th Catcher (Narvaez 0.6 in less PAs than Wong at 0.5 fWAR) 16th CF (Duran 1.6, Rafaela 1.1) 14th LF (Duran at just 1.6 and Anthony at 0.5 in LF) 13th 2B (2.0 Campbell, 0.6 Grissom &0.4 DHam w a big drop) 13th DH (Yoshida 1.2) 11th RF (Abreu 1.6, Anthony 0.4) 11th 1B (Casas 2.4 w Romy, Ref & Wong getting some time) 2nd 3B (Devers 4.1) I think they grossly undervalue our OF, despite the loss of O'Neill. 4th SP (Best in AL) 4.8 Crochet, 2.7 Houck, 2.5 Bello. 1.7 Crawford, 1.4 Buehler, 1.2 Buehler (Only the Rays and Reds also have 6 SP'ers at 1.2 or better.) 2nd RP (Only MIN is ranked higher!) This is the shocker, to me. They list 11 pitchers with a plus fWAR, but nobody above 1.1. 1.1 Hendriks 1.0 Chapman 0.7 Whitlock 0.6 Slaten 0.2 Weissert & Bernardino 0.1 Wilson, Fulmer, Wink, Priester & Penrod TEAM: 13th at 41.3 (just behind TOR 41.7, SEA 42.2) Adding Bregman would likely jump us into 9th or 10th place We are 4th in Pitching and 24th in "Batting," which must include defense.

These are their traditionally conservative OPS projections: 849 Devers 871 in '24 811 Casas .800 in '24 .781 Yoshida .765 .770 Campbell .769 Duran .834 .758 Ref .830 .750 Abreu .781 .725 Grissom .465 .725 Anthony .717 Romy .723 .697 Rafaela .664 .697 Jh Garcia .692 Wong .758 .685 Mayer .666 DHam .697 .666 Story .733 They do have two rookies placed in out top 9.

Do we lose the comp pick, if Pivetta is not signed by opening day? Makes me wonder, if he took the comp pick, do we not sign Buehler or Sandoval?

As of now, spotrac has the Sox payroll ranked 14th. If anything, we are still moving in a downward direction, despite Sam the Scam's statements about the tax line not being an issue. The Dodgers, Phillies, Mets and Yanks have a firm grip on the top 4 slots ($271M to $291M.) I'm not sure how deferrals are counted, but it seems like the Dodgers should be higher. There is an almost $50M drop to the next group: TOR, HOU, TEX and ATL ($200M to $224M.) While my groupings are arbitrary, we could join the third group with a Bregman signing: SDP, LAA< CHC ($177M to $194M) The middle of the pack, or 4th group is 3 deep, too: SFG $163M, BOS $158M and BAL $146M. SEA, MN and STL are $125M to $133M 5 teams fall between $90M and $110M: COL, KC, MIL, DET and CIN. Most of these teams are really not all that bad, either. CLE & WSH are at $77M The bottom 5 are so far removed from the pack, it's not even funny. Soto makes more than the Marlins. $64M PIT, $61M CWS, $60M TBR, $54M Athletics, $43M MIA.

Bad calls have been part of the game and will continue to be, but there is no reason to not try and fix as much as you can. Maybe some fans enjoy yelling at the umps more than watching the game, but not me. We have teams preparing their batters and pitchers for each game, based on who the ump is, and even then, that ump might throw a corkscrew into his MO and mess everything up by calling the game differently than his norm. Batters swinging at pitches they know are a ball, but this ump has been calling them strikes, all game. This should not be part of baseball. It does not have to be this way.

Brutal honesty from a man outspending almost everyone, except maybe the Dodgers is easier to handle.