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Well our win total is irrelevant. Toronto has 16 games left and 10 of them are against the Twins and Orioles. That’s a huge break for them…

91 wins doesn’t matter if the Yankees and Jays both have 92.

There isn’t a heckuva lot of pitching worth spending on in this FA class or the next. The bigger marquee names include 37yo Max Scherzer, Trevor Bauer and his pending legal battles, Mike Clevinger, who has thrown 160 innings since 2018, and the very uninspiring yet also extremely underrated Joe Musgrove…

I also recall that story. For some context, that occurred when outfielder Guerrero was pressed into duty at third where he was not adapting well and also while Steve Sax was having a widely publicized bout with the Yips…

That’s the problem. Now some of that is attributable to playing in Fenway, where balls can scrape the Monster 35 feet up and no amount of defense was going to prevent a hit, but technically that’s still a ball in play. But still. A BABIP if .324 tells us nearly 1 of every 3 batted balls that stays in the park falls for a hit. And our pitching staff isn’t letting up 1 out of 3 batted balls off the Monster…

He can resume his regular role on the IL…

They make keep Kike at 2b. While he is their best defensive CF, he’s probably also their best defensive 2b. Downs isn’t knocking on the door for 2022. But Duran is already up. I do like a Kike at 2b/Verdugo in CF/Renfroe in RF/Schwarber in LF lineup offensively, but it will have glaring issues preventing runs…

I think this offseason will not be much in the way of position players. I think Bogaerts will stick around and is a very likely opt out candidate. But his 2022 season will be spent in boston as a shortstop. Bloom could deal him, but then he is the the GM who traded Betts, Benintendi and Bogaerts for Verdugo, Franchy Cordero and what? It would need to be a blockbuster. Devers is not moving. Hopefully the Sox flip Renfroe to LF and Verdugo to RF. Maybe they will look into acquiring a CF. Maybe they go with Duran. I am not hopeful that Schwarber will be back, but I do want it to happen...

Sure many teams will want to spend that on a pitcher. But how many available pitchers will teams be willing to spend that kind of money? Even this offseason, there really is not a single pitcher reaching free agency that should get that kind of deal. I doubt Scherzer gets (or even wants) 6 years at 37 years old. Maybe Trevor Bauer can get a deal like that if any team wants to touch him. And the following season is not much different, with the best candidates for a deal like that being Clevinger and Joe Musgrove. Just because teams want to or even needs to spend heavily on a pitcher does not make a worthy pitcher available. Signing Bogaerts and dealing a younger, cheaper shortstop for a good pitcher is certainly one solution teams will explore. Also, Washington is another possible destination for Bogaerts. They really don't have a good shortstop solution and the far is pretty barren, unless Carter Kieboom rediscovers how to hit. And field...

A lot will depend on the carousel of shortstops this winter. I do not buy the argument that all the other teams are all set at shortstop and no one will be interested. Heck, sometimes teams re-arrange positions to fit in a star shortstop. (Semien to 2B in Toronto this season. Baez moving to 2B for the Mets. And of course, ARod moving to 3b.) But if you like, San Francisco is certainly an option, with Crawford leaving this year. Philadephia is another. Possibly Atlanta, as Swanson will also be FA after 2022 (although they do have a prospect named Braden Shewmake who might step in.) The Cubs are another possibility. And Houston, who will be without Correa. I actually think the Yankees will handle shortstop this offseason, probably with Seager...

Well, his OPS does make a very good argument that this year, Crawford certainly is a better hitter than Dalbec. And while the money is always a realisitic concern, the point is it is very possible to make the defene better while also making the offense better. Just because Bogaerts has played SS since 2014 does not make him a good defensive shortstop; it just means a certain attribute of his game - in this case, his bat - made him the best option because he had to be in the lineup. Derek Jeter played shortstop in the Bronx for 20 years. There were no defensive metrics for his first 7 years, at least none that I have access to, but his last 13 seasons were all very poor defensive ones. But does the fact that he played there for 20 years make him a good defensive player? ARod had better defensive metrics at shortstop (and was a better defensive player), but which one did management move to third base? Do you agree with that decision?

That's just silly. It would be true if players could either hit or field but not both. So if the Sox moved Bogaerts to 3B and Devers to 1B, therefore keeping both bats in the lineup, and then replaced Bobby Dalbec (.786) with new shortstop Brandon Crawford (.883), the hitting is now worse? I added .100 OPS points and a Gold Glove caliber defender to the middle infield, but somehow this is worse?

That's not a fact. That's an assumption. We throw metrics and hitting and pitching and can measure when they change. ERA goes up. OPS or whatever goes down. We know something has changed. THe results are now different. But defense seems to live in this netherworld where fans think that because there is no accurate way to track it and measure, it must never change. If a player can play good defense today, then he clearly will tomorrow and every game for the rest of his career. But it is simply flat out not true. Disregarding obvious exceptions, like the Yips, players can simply have defensive slumps. They can have good games, bad games, good stretches, bad stretches. Some of it physical, mental, luck-oriented, and sometimes flat out physical ,like when the wear and team of playing 130 previous games makes an already sore arm throw a little softer. We've seen Devers start out slowly on defense, and gradually get going multiple times. We've all seen other players just have days when they have some flat out issues, like Verdugo dropping a mildly tricky flyball from Nelson Cruz. And then go on to misplay a wall ball from Austin Meadows for 4 innings later. Is Verdugo a bad outfielder? Or did he have a bad game? I've seen him make plenty of catches more difficult than that Cruz flyball. There is no real reason to assume defense just stays the same, just like you don't with hitting and pitching...

The problem is that the two biggest culprits are probably Bogaerts and Devers. And they're also the two most important players in that lineup...

I just don't see most contenders using the late inning defensive replacement outfielder. THe only guy currently using one that I can think of is Tony LaRussa, who brings in Billy Hamilton for Eloy Jimenez late in games to protect a lead. But that's one team, and it's a team managed by the guy who pretty much started the "late inning defensive replacement" strategy some 45 years ago...

Part of the reason the pitching went south is because the Sox lead the league in BABIPA, which is about the defense. Also, as pointed out earlier, the Sox pitching is third in K’s but 21st in K%. That’s an impressive split. A big part of that is the defenses inability to get outs on batted balls. COVID might have weakened the pitching and hitting, but this also exposed that those facets were carrying the team. And once the Kutter Crawford’s and Reynal Espinal’s are pressed into service, it magnifies where the team truly struggles…

He might be helped by batting ninth and not coming up with a runner on first and less than 2 out as often as a lot of other hitters…

So are you arguing defense is not important because they’re winning? With good defense, maybe this team wouldn’t be battling for a WC spot and would instead be trying to distance themselves from Tampa atop the division…

Roberts did play a lot defensively. Berry played 9 games in the field, mostly because he came in as a pinch runner. He started one of those games late in the year after everything was wrapped up. But in two of his other games, the Sox won by a combined score of 35-9. That’s not so much being a late inning defensive replacement as giving starters a rest in a blowout win. Anyway, the initial postulate was “most contenders” have a late inning defensive replacement outfielder. Is that really true? Or does one contending team using one 17 years ago fulfill the requirement of “most”?

Maybe the Sox could flip Verdugo and Refroe? Renfroe is all arm but not much range. Verdugo has a lesser arm, but still very strong, and much better range...

Exactly. And some don't recognize who is doing it...

True. But also 100% irrelevant to the initial question...

Once again, you're going to get a hernia if you keep moving those goal posts. 5Gold wanted the Sox to add a late inning defensive replacement OF, "like most contenders". I asked which ones have one. He made a very specific request, and IMO it was nowhere near as rife as he indicated. The whole "stolen base specialist"/pinch runner is a different matter. (And Kielty was neither a defensive specialist not a stolen base specialist.) Kotsay is the only player you listed who fits what 5Gold was asking about...

And at one point I thought it as supposed to be Benintendi/Renfroe in LF, Verdugo in RF and someone else in CF. Not even sure who it was supposed to be. Bradley? Pillar? Conversations with Bradley did go deep into the offseason. My point is there was a lot of supposition on whatever alignment Bloom envisioned, or if his goal was just to accrue people who played anywhere and let Cora figure it out...

But no matter who you get to play 1B, the biggest defensive hole on the team is at SS. And it's not a position the team can really mess around with mid-season. The Sox could drag Keith Hernandez and his, what 534 Gold Gloves, out of retirement and put him at 1B, and it wasn't going to help Bogaerts go get a grounder in the hole...