moonslav59

I don't know what to think about Brez,

We seem so dedicated to the likes of Brasier, Dalbec and Jacquez, yet let our studs go.

Pretty much what most of us expected, except the way we got here has been a bit surprising. Top Rotation in MLB Middle of the road pen Bottom of the middle on O. One of the worst 5 on D.

I thought we lost a lot of games on defense, last year, but this team might be ahead of Kike & Co's April pace.

He's had one major injury. It's not like he's Whitlock.

Just the tip of the iceberg.

I thought you paid Talksox $65K per year for the privilege to post.

One of the rare things we might all agree on, except maybe notin.

Bernardino will be the opener. I like the idea of starting a lefty. Line-up not in, yet, and we face a RHP in Carrasco (3.55 ERA) 1:35 start time Let's make it 11-9, and keep our 3rd place position.

Team Pitching Leaders fWAR 3.4 PHI 3.1 BOS 2.8 WSH 2.7 KCR, BAL 2.6 PIT 2.5 OAK, NYM ERA 2.79 BOS & KCR 3.07 DET 3.09 CLE 3.11 NYY 3.15 NYM ERA- 68 BOS 1.85 ERA 69 KCR 2.39 ERA 78 NYM 3.29 ERA 79 DET 3.90 ERA 82 CLE, NYY xFIP 3.29 PHI (.294 BAbip 3.48 BOS (.279) 3.50 BAL (.290) 3.58 SEA (2.74) 3.59 MN (3.05) WHIP 1.08 DET 1.11 SEA 1.14 BOS 1.15 BAL 1.17 PIT 1.18 LAD SP'er ERA- 45 BOS 59 KCR 60 PHI xFIP- 77 PHI 80 BOS 81 TBR WHIP 1.00 BOS (.261 BAbip) 1.04 KCR (.261) 1.06 PHI (.265) fWAR 2.8 BOS (102 IP) 2.7 PHI (110 IP) 2.5 KCR (113 IP) 2.0 PIT (109 IP)

Like paid guys are any better at this.

Farm Leaders OPS (30+ PAs) 1.196 Romy G 1.135 Jo. Garcia 1.074 B Gonzo .998 Jho Garcia .972 Kavadas .884 Paulino .862 E Alvarez .855 N Yuten .831 Mayer .801 Anthony .796 Ravelo .788 Hickey OPS Against (8+ IP) .365 Z Kelly AAA .392 Benitez AAA .407 Bolden A+ .408 Early A+ .444 Bastardo AA .468 Alexander AAA .555 Stebens A- .590 Fogel A-/A+ .599 Criswell AAA

It's more than just one good start, but yes. You always wanted Crawford in the starting 5. I was fine with Houck in the 5, as long as we had a couple really good long men, in case he struggled after 18 batters. (That would be Whitlock plus one from Crawford or Pivetta.) Nobody in the whole world was happy with our choice of this starting 5, unless it was fans of our opponents. BTW, who was the poster who wanted Seth Lugo and or Imanaga? True, that poster suggested many others that are now on the IL or looking bad, but most of us wanted an attempt beyond Gio. (I was never high on Gio, but not because of any injury risk.) Here is a look at some selected SP'ers with 10+ IP in 2024: 1. Crawford 0.9 T2. Bieber 0.8 (trade talk, but is out for the season) T9. Imanaga 0.7 T12. Seth Lugo 0.6 T12. Cease 0.6 (trade talk) T12. Burnes 0.6 (trade talk) T12. Houck 0.6 T12. Blackburn 0.6 (trade talk) T23. Wacha 0.5 T23. S Gray 0.5 T23. M Perez 0.5 T23. Glasnow 0.5 (traded) T23. Javier 0.5 (trade talk) T41. M Keller (trade talk) T41. Whitlock 0.4 (on IL) T41. Pivetta 0.4 (on IL) T41. T Rogers (trade talk) T41 Yamamoto 0.4 T56. Nate, Matz, Stroman, Sale, T Anderson fWAR

Our pen does not suck. It is about middle of the pack in every category and 7th in xFIP-. Our O is 21st w fangraphs. 16th in runs (1 from top 15.) 20th in wRC+ and OPS puts in the middle tier on O, although borderline bottom tier. Our D sucks, bigtime!

Not to take anything away from Houck, but he and Crawford are the best 1-2 punch in MLB after 8 starts. 48 IP (6 IP/GS) 31 Hits 10 BB 52 Ks 0.94 ERA 0.854 WHIP Crawford leads MLB in ERA at 0.42. Houck is 8th at 1.35. (Pivetta and Whitlock would be up on the list, if they had more IP.)

He didn't give the defense too many difficult plays, either. Maybe this is the new strategy.

WOW! Houck da man!

Houck's only issue was getting past batter #18. These days, that's all most starters get to, anyway. It's also not something a pitcher can never get over. There is nothing WONG with Houck as a SP'er.

Who can now balk at the idea of Houck as a SP'er?

Hell, some felt like I did, and didn't want Whitlock, Houck or Crawford in the rotation, the latter might have been just me. There were even arguments to be made for Pivetta to be in the pen, if 2-3 of the other guys were not there.

I'm not completely convinced the spending continues to decline or hold even. I'm not saying they will spend more or much more, especially for 2025, but I would not be shocked, if they do. JH has a pretty long history of spending very big, sometimes, seemingly out of the blue, and then suddenly putting on the brakes. If you look at his entire couple of decades with the Sox, one could point to the Dodger dump trade or the Mookie trade/2020 fiasco as JH's boldest slash and burn moments, not the 2024 season. Just because a few owners decided to start spending bigly, all at once, and passed JH in the rankings, doesn't mean JH changed his strategy radically. As for the 2025, your point is eye-opening. Only 4 contracts of $6M per or more on the books, and all are $18M or more. Nothing between Rafaela's $6M and Yoshida's $18M, except Bello at about $9M. Very strange. (Hendriks at $5M and Whitlock at $4.7M are the only other non-option deals. There are more arbs than just McGuire & Joely, as several players reach arb 1 year. These will not be expensive, but are still slight raises coming: Houck, Crawford, Duran, Reyes and Dalbec. (Joely and Ref have options.) I can't speak for Sox Nation, but I think many are already at the end of their patience. I'm not sure JH & Co. know this or care about it, but if they go one more winter in punt mode, they may irreversibly lose a sizeable chunk of their fan base. AAV lost this winter: $16M Jansen $7.5M Martin $7.5M Pivetta $5.9M O'Neill These guys might be traded, this summer, and their lost contracts are about $37M. If we fail to even just replace that $37M, let alone spend significantly more, all hell might break out. I suppose they may look at the chances all the up and coming prospects and players can gel in 2025 are slim, and waiting until 2026 makes more sense, I'm not sure they can sell that idea, too easily. Let's be honest. soxprospects projects Anthony, Mayer and Teel starting 2025 in AAA, but even if they rake, this summer and all start the 202 season in the bigs, can we really expect a Lynn and Rice situation? Here is what soxprospects projects for 2025, but I added the big 3 and left ___ blanks___ where I think we'd need to make essential additions to be a serious contender: SP1 _____ SP2 _____ SP3 Bello SP4 Crawford SP5 Houck SP6 Fitts/ Criswell Closer ______ RP2 Hendriks RP3 Whitlock RP4 ______ RP5 Slaten RP6 Winckowski RP7 Bernardino RP8 Weissert, Campbell, Fulmer, Guerrero, Kelly C: Teel, McGuire/Wong 1B: Casas 2B: Grissom SS: Story 3B: Devers LF: Duran/Abreu CF: Rafaela/Anthony RF: Anthony/Abreu DH: Yoshida (Abreu/Valdez) Utility IF _____ (Reyes) Would JH & Co. view this roster as 3-4 major additions away from being serious?

I can understand why many people see it that way. He was the guy who pulled the trigger, so it is what it is. It does make me wonder, how the views of DD and Bloom might be very different, now, if DD had pulled that trigger in the summer of '19. In my view, they hired Bloom to try and build a winner without spending much. They hoped he could repeat what the rays had done, but with a higher budget, maybe win a ring, unlike TBR. He failed at that task, pretty spectacularly, 2021 notwithstanding. I do think Bloom had some spending limits no other Sox GM had, in terms of a full 4 year stretch, although we often heard there was not a limit. (Like we should believe that crap.) Bloom did spend some money, and he swung and missed on most of his bigger deals. He failed to get every pitcher he made offers to and signed for more than $10M. That was the worst mistake, IMO. (Nate or Eflin would have helped his legacy, but likely was not enough to save his ass.) Story, Yoshida, Barnes, Richards, Kluber and Kike II were 5 of his largest contracts given out, and now the Jansen one is looking sketchy, too. His lower to mid level deals were not so bad, but you rarely win rings on those guys, and we didn't.

It was bound to happen. He last longer than most. He had a very long run at greatness or near greatness. Who knows, maybe he can regain some magic before retiring. He did miss some ST'ing, so maybe he is still trying to find the "lost groove." Maybe it can never be brought back. A subjective breakdown of his years: First 284 games (6 seasons) 2.25 ERA/ 2.00 FIP (0.966 WHIP) 4.5 K/BB Middle 324 games (5 seasons) 2.44 ERA/2.50 FIP (0.852 WHIP) 7.7 K/BB Last 219 games (4+ seasons) 3.02 ERA/3.29 FIP (1.131 WHIP) 2.9 K/BB That last era was a step down from the previous ones, but it is still damn good. It is also heavily weighed down by his numbers with the Sox: 3.51 ERA/3.78 FIP (1.344 WHIP) 2.4 K/BB Those numbers with BOS were greatly weighed down from the end of July to now. July 29 to end of 2023 (14 games): 6.10 ERA/6.06 FIP 2024 (7 games:) 2.70 ERA/4.60 FIP (9Ks, 8 BB, 1 HBP) Only 4 hits July 29 to now (17 IP): 4.76 ERA 5.76 FIP -0.2 fWAR (Only jacques has worse numbers than this, since last July) Note: 17 IP is a small sample size, so we cannot know for sure, that this is the new Jansen.

He was not hired to win a ring, if that matters.

I don't think it was a reason to hire him, and I'm not even sure he told him before hiring him, but he probably did. Bloom was hired, IMO, to try and be the next Billy Beene with a bigger budget.