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And Farrell saves his job.

Another big difference has been Porcello. Last year, we'd win his starts, and in all those 3-1 and 4-2 games, the offense scored enough. This year, alot of those have turned around into 5-3 and 6-4 losses, so suddenly we need more offense. The addition of Sale was supposed to offset the loss of offense, but what happened was Sale basically replaced absentee David Price, making him essentially ballast. So we wound up losing our best hitter and a lot from our Cy Young pitcher from last year, and hoped to be just as good...

I think the Yankees take the division based on head-to-head record and thw Sox take the WC. I believe those one game playoffs are only used if both teams have not clinched and the loser's season is over. But with both teams in, don't they use the tie breakers like in 2005?

True. They're aren't horrible. But 6th out of 15 shouldn't be considered too impressive, either...

Benintendi would be the smart choice, as getting Stanton would leave him without a position anyway. What if they wanted both Benintendi and Devers? To get a player like Stanton, you have to figure its going to cost more than you want to pay. Even with his contract...

Another might be lofty expectations. The assumption was the offense that outscored everyone by 100 runs would take a step down but still be good without Ortiz. But if removing Ortiz had a bigger impact than anyone thought, that isn't on Chili Davis. And if Davis was such an inadequate hitting coach capable of destroying the entire lineup at once, how on Earth did this team outscore everyone by 100 runs last year when he was the hitting coach then, too?

The big question now is, if the Sox don't win tomorrow and NY does, do you pitch Sale on Sunday? If you do and he loses, who goes against Minnesota for the WC?

I have to think Porcello is in the playoff rotation ahead of ERod and Fister.

And REPLACE his production. As we have seen, that's only possible if Pedroia is at his worst....

That's certainly one plan. And Dombrowski has signed him before. Another plan might be to sign Cobb and deal ERod for a hitter, but that is less likely and more complicated...

Is Boyer going to pitch again? If so, you have your answer...

We can talk about it al we want. But they talks always devolve into some sort of incredibly lop-sided deal that neither Miami nor Cincy would ever consider. If you were GM of Miami, would you even consider dealing Stanton to the Red Sox without getting Devers or Benintendi back?

I think both managers are just assuming the regular season is unofficially over.

Abad is certainly on the bubble. I doubt Maddox is. Hembree is certainly on the bubble, and probably more likely than Maddox...

And yet he is still the best option for the Sox at 2B, still an overall positive contributor to the team, and not going anywhere despite committing thr cardinal sin of turning 34. Hernandez (who missed more games due to injury than Pedroia recently) should have a place on the MLB roster next year. Just not starting at 2B...

He's not so silly as to realize it would take a miracle, And while miracles do happen, they don't necessarily leave your pitching staff equipped to face Cleveland or Houston. He probably thinks he's better off facing Minnesota for one game at home with Severino and going forward from there. If he burns out his staff and doesn't win the division, he'll be at a disadvantage because Minnesota will be resting theirs. Even Farrell is doing the same thing. How many of those releivers used last night are even going to make the post-season roster? Maybe Barnes. Anyone else?

Except that Pedroia has a much better history, even recently. If you like Hernandez' 2016, who not Pedroia's when he had a 13.8 offensive fWAR?

It is possible Girardi has conceded the division title and is resting relievers and starters. After Tanaka today, the weekend has them starting Jamie Garcia and Jordan Montgomery. No CC, who hasn't pitched since Monday and will see Montgomery start twice in that span. It does line Severino up for the WC game...

Brian Cashman, for example...

His xBABIP is based on his line drive/flyball/groundball rates and if his BABIP exceeds his xBABIP, it's probably too high. Speed can certainly influence it as well, although Hernandez, while not slow, probably won't see a huge boost from his speed unless he starts hitting more groundballs. For nearly every player in MLB, a high BABIP of .376 is usually an indicator a player is just having a great year they are unlikely to repeat. This year, only 3 players in MLB had a BABIP as high as Hernandez over a full season - Avisail Garcia, Jose Altuve and Tommy Pham. And for two of those guys, this year certainly looks like an aberration against the rest of their careers. A lot of other players have come close to his number, but again, many of them, such as Chris Taylor and Tim Beckham, are also having career years. Over the last 3 years, no player has a BABIP as high as Hernandez had last year. DJ LaMahieu comes closest, and he has an obvious advantage. Hernandez has 116 career plate appearances in MLB, and those are spread out over 2 seasons. There is nothing he has done so far that should make anyone think they have an accurate picture of him going forward. But if you are such a large proponent of these small sample sizes, at what point do we acknowledge his offensive fWAR of -2.6 is a negligible improvement of Pedroia's -2.7?

It absolutely is not the worst thing in the world and you're correct about him. He is a fun player when spraying the ball all over. He's a good shortstop who might never develop into a great one. But right now, his biggest problem is everyone expected him to. If he was an unranked prospect, would fans like him more or less? We can compare him to Youkilis, who was never ranked by anyone and not even in MLB when he was Xander's current age. How well would that have helped Youk's rep if he was ranked in the top 20 by BA yet not in MLB by age 24? And how we would we have liked his lack of power as a corner infielder? But since he came up with very little in the way of expectations, we had nothing to weigh Youk against and judged him solely as the player he was...

1. Having a high BABIP in the miniors isn't the same as having a high BABIP in the majors. As minor league pitchers ae usually not as good, it's easier to maintain higher line drive rates against them. 2. Very small sample size. Do you also believe hi 1.7% walk rate and 25% strike out rate are also accurate predictions going forward? 3. Even with his small sample size, his xBABIP is .331. That drop off right there knocks his .276BA last year down to a .255 over 600PA. And there would be corresponding drops in OBP and SLG.

Bogaerts' real biggest problem is expectations. They were crazy high and he hasn't lived up. Xander's career numbers are slightly better than those of Yankee shortstop Didi Gregorious. And while Xander hasn't lived up to his BA ranking hype, Yankee fans are pleasantly surprised since they didn't think Gregorious would hit this well. Yet the Sox fan remain slightly disappointed despite actually having the better player of the two and didn't have to trade a closer to get him...

Yeah that 1.47 ERA I his 3 starts before Toronto was pretty boding. Do you make all your judgements based on one start? Pomeranz has 2.20ERA in September. I am certain this means you also think Severino (2.10ERA in September) is equally suspect...

Based on what? His 60 plate appearances that were carried by an insanely unsustainable .372 BABIP?