moonslav59

Kavadas loses all platoon benefits, when Casas returns. (Cooper matches up better as the back-up 1Bman. To me, the time for Kavadas is now or maybe never. It's just my opinion, and I am not going to say Brez is wrong not to do it. He's knows more than I do. The ones closest to Kavadas know best.

Suddenly, a guy is "ready." I trust Brez, too, but he may be close to making the call. Maybe not.

Yup. These types of signings are gambles but less costly than gambles on Story, Yoshida or adding all the one year signings up.

Once a young player proves he can hit, the price goes way up. That is a valid reason, right?

Im not saying I’m happy with the amounts, but it is way to early to know. Your opinion is valid, especially on the dollar amounts, but I like locking up promising young players, knowing some will not work out. I wish we had locked up Casas, Houck and Crawford early, but there were doubts about them, too.

Will he? Why not try to win in the next 3 or more weeks, ?

fWAR -0.2 Cooper -0.4 Smith

In the context of bringing up Kavadas, replacing the LHB Smith makes more sense. Plus she sucks on D. The debate on Cooper is vs Dalbec, and choosing Cooper is a valid choice.

Well stated.

After less than 2 months on Rafaela? lol! Bello is doing worse than I hoped for in his 8 GS sample size. Whoop-Dee- freaking- do

Better than the far and away worst D in the league does not make it fun. I wouldn't say more fun, either. I'd say "less painful."

Can you stop with the 50-60 PA talk? How about his last 1308 PAs? .660 OPS and 84 OPS+ While this is better than Dalbec's last 2 season's, Dalbec's last 1010 (career) PAs is at .723 and 92 OPS+. (I'm not advocating for Dalbec over Smith or Cooper. I'd like to see Kavadas replace Smith.)

...and again, this is not just a one month slump for Smith. I don't get the faith placed in Smith. He hasn't been good since his 199 PA season of 2020. Yes, 2020, for God's sake! .667 in '21 (83 OPS+) Even Dalbec was way, way, way better that year .560 in '22 (62 OPS+) Dalbec was at .652 and 80 OPS+ .692 in '23 (94 OPS+) was an improvement but still really bad for a 1Bman. .556 in '24 (57 OPS+) He sucks on D. He is below replacement value, yet we worry about not being able to replace him, if Kavadas sucks, too? LOL

Worse than Smith cannot make a significant difference, unless he goes 1 for 40. You think there are no more Smith's out there? Hell, Smith himself will likely be available, again in a month or two, assuming Casas is not back by then.

Yes. I also likes Imanga and Seth Lugo more than Gio and others. I also thought a short deal for Sonny Gray made sense. I was not high on Stroman, and I felt he was like Gio, but he'd have been a better pick, in hindsight.

Neither Cooper or Smith have done much for 2-3 years. This not about one bad month with the Sox. They have both sucked for about as long as Dalbec or even longer. Their declines began 3-4 years ago. I'm fine with keeping Dalbec in AAA, or even DFA'ing him, if we need a slot on the 40, but I think Kavadas should get a chance to at least platoon with Copper at 1B. Can we please stop DH'ing Cooper and Smith? I'd rather see DHam, Wong/McGuire or Romy DH, as yucky as that sounds.

The long and sustained success by the Astros followed a similar path. The Sox never hit the rock bottom those two teams did, so we did not get the #1-#3 picks, year after year, like they did. Our farm is not as good as theirs was, which is understandable. Some wise picks by DD & Bloom and a few losing seasons have helped build up the farm and the young/younger core of the 26 man roster, but it does not seem to be enough, even if a lot goes right with the kids. We will almost certainly need some big spending or a massive change in luck or whatever you want to call it on choosing who we spend moderately on. Had Sale gotten hurt, again and Gio returned to 90% of his form or Grissom was at a .780 OPS, which all seemed possible in March, the talk would be much different, right now. We've made some very bad choices, of which number one was not keeping Betts. It seems like that choice jinxed us. You also get what you pay for and trying to strike gold with $10M/1 deals for SP'ers is asking for trouble. The Story and Yoshida signings hurt, badly, and not just because of their failure to produce. The budget space they ate up, prevented gains in other areas. Gio is like Kluber + Richards. It's hard to blame Brez for choosing Gio over someone like maybe Stroman. He got one signing wrong, but it was his biggest signing. His next biggest deal was Sale & $$$ for Grissom. That is not looking good, so far. Like Bloom, his lesser deals seem to be working better. I hope his results don't mirror Bloom's.

This makes sense. I'm not sure about the Bello/Rafaela comment, but time will tell. We bet on their future, not just a couple months.

The 2015 Royals were not "bottom 5," but they spent about half as much as #2 NYY and significantly less than half of the #1 LAD. The spent $25M more than the top of the bottom 5 teams and almost $60M less than the bottom of the top 5 spenders. Nobody is saying money doesn't matter. Spending does improve the odds, most seasons. The vast majority of playoff teams are top 10-15 spenders, over the years. How a team spends seems to be more important than how much, and a healthy mix of low-cost, home-grown players on the team is just about as essential as spending wisely.

...and once in it's a crapshoot, right?

I asked a question. I'm not defending JH. Nobody knows if he will spend bigly, again, and I am not counting on it or expe cting it. I just have not discounted the possibility.

There is a road, no simple highway Between the dawn and the dark of night And if you go, no one may follow That path is for your steps alone

Baseball will improve.

It's not fun watching this D.

Good offensive teams are more fun to watch, too, but I am liking watching our young pitchers grow. We have some nice young pen arms, too. I've always loved watching great defense, something Sox teams are not all that great at. I like the look of our future defense, especially an OF with Rafaela, Abreu, Duran & Anthony. Mayer is a bit of an unknown on D, but word is, he's good. Casas and Grissom need to improve. Devers needs to gain consistency. I'm not sure Teel can match McGuire on D.