moonslav59

Astros give soon-to-be 34 year old Altuve a 5 year deal at $125M, much of it front-loaded. $15M signing bonus, the $30, $30, $30, $10, $10M. If they get tight with their money, and keep letting stars go, maybe this means Bregman, Framber or Tucker will not be extended- maybe 2 of them.

As expected, Kershaw to sign with LAD. Terms unknown. (He will likely be on the IL for months, to start the season.)

I think I'm a bit more high on Cespedes and Abreu than others, but I can certainly see how I might be wrong. Our top 5 look pretty nice. Rafaela might be the one most likely to fizzle, but if the guy can hit despite his approach, he could end up being the best. His D is that great! Bleis dipped due to injury, and was highly regarded, before it. Mayer has dealt with injury, so it's hard to get a read, but he was very highly ranked beforehand. To me, Teel and Anthony look most like "can't miss," but of course, any prospect can "miss." Once you get past the 5 plus Cespedes and Abreu, nobody looks all that great, although some could jump, a lot, this year. This could be the make or break season for Yorke. He is viewed as ML ready, but just might not be good enough to get the call, ahead of EValdez or even DHam. Wikelman and Perales might end up as decent pen arms, but they need to get improve or get promoted to AAA, first. I don't know much about Fitts, and he's already 24, but he may impress in 2024. Hickey is getting to the age, where he needs to show more and be decent at a position. Some young prospects could jump or fall, this year: 17: Asencio 18: Zanetello, A Anderson, Arias 19: Joh Garcia, M Alcantara, Brannon, Yuten, E Soto, F Encarnacion 20: Castro, Romero, E R-C, Paez, Ravelo 21: Monegro, Paulino. Jordan, K Campbell. C Early 22: Meidroth, BastardoSena. Riemer, Judice

lmao.

When you look at the success rate of top 100 prospects, yes, it seems pretty unscientific, but my guess is the success rate of the next 100 or two is even more hit-or-miss. I'd think they would place way more weight to the top 100, 150 or 200. (Maybe we have nobody from 88 to 150 or more.)

Re-treads redux.

I can understand the 2020 roster overhaul, but all those one year deals, trades and DFAs added up to major turnover and turmoil.

I keep seeing ex-Sox player signing with teams, mostly on minor league deals. We've had a lot of turnover!

I think that must be it. I'm not sure how many prospects other have beyond their top 5-6, anyone would get upset over losing, too. I get the pitching point, but I've never heard a rankings dropping someone over unbalanced positional prospects.

Like MLB players, trading 5 two WAR players for 1 ten WAR players is rarely worth it, having top prospects should greatly outweigh the lower depths of a team's farm. While our farm drops off a lot after our top 5, so do most teams after their top 2, 3 or 4. I don't think our next tier is all that bad or scarce: Cespedes, Abreu, Wikelman, Yorke, Perales, Joh Garcia, Zanetello, Castro and others. Since the mid summer rankings, we also added #24 and Slaten, #11 Fitts, plus a few others. We did lose #15 Drohan, who was free-falling and Victor Santos, Nick Robertson & Ryan Fernandez, but I think our farm depth improved after 2023.

Could be. We may not hit better vs bad pitchers, but it sure seems like we do better than expected vs the best pitchers and worse than expected vs the worst ones. Isn't there some site that shows player or teams OPS vs each pitcher?

I know. Did our non top 100 fall in value, that much?

Pham had an OPS+ of 95 from 2020-2022, then shot up to 111 in 2023 at age 35. Expecting anything like 2023, is a bigger stretch than hopes for just about all the other Sox players on the 26.

Many times we hit the better pitchers better than the no-name scubs.

So 2 tp pitchers and 2 top batter is much better than 0 top pitchers and 4 top batters? Yes, if batters matter less, then they should not rank them so highly.

How many pitscher are ranked in their top 50 and 100, all teams?

I knew. I know.

I though Refsnyder fit that role, or we could play Yoshida in LF vs LHPs. Or, we could play Abreu, more often. Maybe the plan is Duran in CF FT. It also forces O'Neill to play RF, more often.

I thought we were showing signes of improving our outfield. 4.7 fWAR in '21 (23rd) 0.7 fWAR in '22 (27th) 8.4 fWAR in '23 (12th) .724 in '21 .676 in '22 .783 in '23 Outs Above Average -1 in '21 (14th) -14th in '22 (24th) -12 in '23 (26th) Our 2023 OF PAs/OPS as OF'er only: 598 Dugo .743 (+1 OAA) 368 Yoshida .832 (-8 OAA) 345 Duran .823 (0 OAA) 331 Duvall .855 (-3 OAA) 206 Refsnyder .697 (-3 OAA)

Another LF'er, but this one can't hit or defend. Other than that, he's okay.

He did for us, too, in small spurts.

BA dropped our system ranking from 5th to 13th. Not sure why.

I never ate an avocado until my late 20's. Same with Indian or Vietnamese food.

They've ranked prospects higher with less games played, so maybe it is the position doubts. If he hits like that to start 2024 and gets promoted to AAA, I'm thinking the mid season rankings will jump him higher. Several rankings have Anthony higher and Rafaela lower. I know every team has recent grads, too, but I'm really liking our young 7: Casas Bello Anthony Mayer Teels Rafaela Bleis (I'm also higher on Abreu than others seem to be.) We have a bunch of other exciting ot promising players in the 24-28 range: Devers Crawford Houck Wink Whitlock Duran Wong EValdez That's a pretty nice 14-15 group of young players and prospects. We just need a couple aces to carry them to glory.

Imagine if the Sox signed Brasier to $9M/2. That seems worse than Diekman's $8M/2, but at least we dumped over half his contract and got a decent back-up catcher in the deal.