moonslav59

Maybe he meant Bloom's was sub mediocre, and Brez is the upgrade.

We are talking 2025's back-up catcher, and I said a "guy like Heineman," so maybe it will still be Gasper. (BTW, our back-up catcher is really Jansen, now.)

Wasn't there a recent game where both DHam and Rafaela messed up a DP or made an error?

O'Neill is hitting .900 and is one of the few good RHBs we have. The other is Ref. Abreu can sit vs LHPs, but we still have 3: Duran Abreu-Ref O'Neill It hurts the O to play Rafaela over any one of these guys, but it is still worth it.

We can easily add a guy like Heineman or just go with Teel, but I think we hold off starting his service clock. I think we do NOT add a RHB, unless we trade a LHB for one. We should spend every penny and trade asset on upgrading and replacing pitching.

Plus, Yohan Ramirez. Brought back Jacques and Joely (and Mills.) There were many players who were added and never made it.

Out hit 7-3 and up 4-0. Damn it!

I still think the odds are better we trade for pitching and not spend more on it. Still, if we just spend equally, the money spent on Jansen, Martin, Pivetta, Paxton, Garcia, Sims and others is enough to get 2-3 nice arms.

While Rafaela did help stop the bleeding at SS for a while, I think we need to stop playing him there. I know that will squeeze out a big bat in the OF, but we need better SS defense, ASAP.

I didn't count no-names and players that did not make the ML roster, but I might have missed a couple of those.

I counted 17-25.

28 HRs allowed is more than Devers has.

I'm no expert on acquiring and developing young pitching prospects. I'm not sure about your "mediocre stuff." You may be right. I'm just looking at how well many of our pitchers on the farm have been doing, this year. I know the numbers do not always tell the whole story, but it seems to me, we have more promising young pitchers than a year ago, 2 years ago, 3 years ago and on and on. Young pitchers can move from mediocre to better stuff as they age and move through the system. Sure, it would be nice to have a few pitchers that start out with electric stuff that most ranking services rate as worthy of being in the top 10, 20, 50 or 150 prospect rankings. Maybe we reach that point, in the next couple years. It was a shame to see Perales join some lists, then need TJS, but that seems to be a more and more common thing for young pitchers ranked highly at a younger age. I'm not sure about the improvement of our acquisition and development systems, and maybe I'm wearing dayglow pink glasses, but I think I see improvement, even if just in quantity. Adding more pitchers with hopes, even if slight, does increase the odds on more pitchers making meaningful impacts at the big league level, at some point. We've seen a few surprises in recent years- more than we saw for over a decade after the Lester-Buch era. I'm going to stay optimistic on this. These are some OPS Against, this year.... .360 Valera (52 IP) #27 is astounding! FCL>SAL .360 D Reyes (16) DSL #34 .506 Y Ruiz (46) DSL .542 Dean (74) SAL>GRE #36 .548 Ingrassia (53) SAL #50 .561 E R-C (76) SAL>GRE #16 .576 Wehunt (78) SAL>GRE #33 .579 Kirwin (59) SAL>GRE .608 Dobbins (99) POR #20 .623 Cohen (84) SAL .624 Sansone (58) SAL .628 Early (85) GRE>POR #24 .631 Perales (34) GRE>POR #7 (TJS) .634 Duffy (84) SAL #60 .638 Penrod (54) POR>WOR #22 .639 Paez (82) SAL>GRE #28 .643 Monegro FCL>>GRE #25 .646 Cellucci (52) POR>WOR .647 Kwiatkowski (64) POR>WOR .653 Sena (48) GRE .658 Brand (49) GRE>POR .665 O'Donnell (52) SAL .665 Fogell (55) SAL>GRE .671 Carlson (59) DAL>GRE #49 .677 Wikelman (65) POR #21 .682 I Coffey (92) POR .682 Stebens (55) SAL>GRE .685 Mullins (74) GRE #29 .692 Guerrero (46) WOR #32 .693 Jackson (69) GRE .706 Rogers (66) GRE #58 .718 Gambrell (84) WOR #39 .725 Shugart (60) WOR .784 Fitts (100) WOR #15 .796 Sandlin (44) GRE>POR #10 47. Mata (IL) 52. Hoppe 56. Drohan Draftees: 14. Tolle 23. Cason (SS/3B too) 30. Neely 44. Clarke 45. Tygart Again, this list does not blow anyone away, but to me, it looks like step in the right direction. One can count 30-45 or more pitchers with promise, here.

At the start of the season, I mentioned how we had such a large amount of players with some serious upside- some already proven: some speculative. One thing I mentioned was the possibility that Devers had yet to have his best season of his career. Afterall, he's the same age as Duran, who we viewed as still learning and growing. I'm not claiming I "called it:" I just suggested it was one of many possible plusses that could boost our offense into a better than 2023 offense, despite the losses of Turner, Dugo and Duvall. We've seen a lot of those what ifs come positive, including our catchers reaching above average status as a group, especially now with Wong and Jansen. As bad as our middle IF D has been, they have hit better than expected while stealing a lot of bases, along the way. We've seen our OF go from near league worst two years ago to one of the best on O and D. We can even afford to lose O'Neill, who is hitting over .900 and not miss a beat. We even saw D Smith and Romy do a decent job covering 1B during the Casas injury. All-in-all, this has been a very exciting offense to watch, including us being a top 5 SB team. It's been a lot of fun for me to watch. The pitching was fun for a while. The D has been scary bad, at times, with a few glimpses of improvement, here and there, but all-i-all not much fun to watch. Devers seems to have settled down. Rafaela and Duran have been amazing in the OF, while Abreu and O'Neill have had mixed defenses. Wong needs to improve in some areas, but we seem to have the opponents running game under control. These days, that is a very good thing. To me, this team is set up very well, going forward, as long as we address our key weaknesses: pitching and defense. The defense may be "fixed" by having a healthy Story and some farm infusions by Mayer, Anthony and Teel. Keeping rafaela in CF would be a big boost. The pitching needs outside help, and in a big way. That will take spending from JH and better choices by Brez and trades and signings in this area.

We don't need another double header with our lack of pitching depth. We already have a 5 games in 4 days series with TOR coming up, soon. We need a win, today and get this team into a winning mode.

Nobody disputes the fact that the trade has been a complete blowout steal for the Braves, so far, with little hope it can ever be completely balanced out by a Grissom revival. The dispute or debate has been about the idea that there was no logic involved in the trade and that somehow we should have trusted in Sale to come through after 5 straight disappointing seasons in a row. I credit Brez for trying to move towards durability, despite it backfiring spectacularly. I credit Brez for trying to fix the 2B situation that had been a disaster for about 5 years. I credit Brez for the O'Neill, Slaten, Romy, DSmith and Criswell additions. I credit Brez for building up our farm and depth with more focus on pitching (Sandlin, Priester, Weissert, Fitts, Judice and more pitchers drafted than recently) I credit Brez for at least attempting to fix problems within the season (like Dom Smith and the deadline attempts at fixing the pen.) Yes, I also credit Brez for the Bailey addition. He also did NOT trade Duran and others. He swung and missed badly on the Sale trade and Gio signing. Nobody thinks otherwise.

For sure. Mixed messaging and back-tracking. Lots of rumors of the Sox being "in on ___ and ___." That's nothing new. Of the deal we made, the headliners stunk up the place, but some of the mid and lower tier additions have done well. (Same with Bloom, right?) The Gio signing The Sale & cash-Grissom trade The Dugo for Weissert, Fitts and Judice trade The Ammons for Slaten trade The Robertson & Santos for O'Neill trade The Urias for Isaiah Campbell trade The Schreiber for Sandlin trade The Criswell, Anderson, Alexander, Luetge and Uwasawa minor signings Westbrook signed Mickey Gasper minor league Rule 5 The Hendriks and Fulmer signings Cash for Heineman Romy Gonzalez off waivers Extended Bello & Rafaela In season additions: Luis Garcia for Lugo, Kavadas, Zeferjahn & Vargas Lucas Sims for Ovis Portes Quinn Priester for Nick Yorke Danny Jansen for Paulino, C Coffey & Batista James Paxton for Bolivar Dominic Smith signed "Rented" Zack Short for 8 days Bailey Horn for cash Garrett Cooper for cash The list is longer than I imagined it would be, and many are under-the-radar type deals, but Brez has been very active.

2024 163 Devers 145 O'Neill (good job, Brez!) 133 Ref (TY Bloom) 131 Duran (Glad we never traded him) 129 Abreu (Vaz who?) 122 Yoshida (Overpay?) 116 Wong (Let's forget Jeter Downs.) Back to Devers: career high OPS+ 163 2024, blows all other seasons away! 141 2022 134 2021 132 2019, generally considered his best career year 126 2023

He may not get another look in 2024, but he's done okay in August: 5.1 IP 3 hits 4 BB + 1 HBP (1.5 batters on base per IP is not good) 5 K

A three game sweep within a 4 game series. Sure, why not? I'll take it!

His transformation into a plus defender is about as stark as the one to a plus hitter. He's been real fun to watch, as has Devers, Abreu, Rafaela, Ref, O'Neill, Wong and to some extent our scrubs filling in at middle infield (DHam & Romy) and 1B (Smith.) The thing is, none of these performances look like flukes or one and dones. The pitching and defense has not always been so "fun" to watch. We' ve had numerous pitchers do well for some pretty long stretches- just enough to keep us in this race, but right now, the pen needs a few guys to step up and get the job done on a consistent basis. For a long while, Slaten and Bernardino carried the load. Kelly and Booser did for shorter stretches. Jansen has had a couple mini-meltdowns, but has been solid. Martin has not looked close to the 2023 Martin, so maybe he can be "that guy." I'm not sure we can count on getting anything from Slaten's return or hendrik's arrival, but who knows. We'll probably give Weissert or even I Campbell or Joely another look, but they seem like long shots, right now.

Agreed. Maybe ICampbell or Joely get another looksee, too. Keller looked good.

Valera is just 18, and all they are saying is he starts the season at Salem, which is pretty nice for his age. I'm liking how our minor league pitching is improving in quantity and quality with every week that passes, and the draft helped.

Not only do we just add one SP'er, we are actually replacing 1 or 2 with just one, each year. 2020: Lost Price & Porcello- added Perez (lost Sale to injury and ERod to Covid) 2021: Lost Sale to injury- added Richards 2022: Lost ERod & Richards- added Wacha and Hill 2023: Lost Wacha and Hill- added Kluber 2024: Lost Kluber & Sale- added Gio. We've been going backwards and not even staying even in numbers, let alone quality. Even if you don't count losing Sale to injury, we still lost 7 and added 6.

Garcia and Sims have a long way to go to lose the "bomb" label, but yes...