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Yes the list of players he kept was better. But what happened was he also let the sox with no minimum wage talent coming up from 2018 and 2019. With no minimum wage talent, it makes it harder to keep his existing players. For example, he could have dealt Bradley instad of paying him $25mill from 2017-2020 and kept Margot, who made about $1.6 mill in that stretch. Probably not enough to make sure the Sox kept Betts, but certainly gives them more to work with towards that goal. And before you go determine this means i think keeping Bradley was the sole reaon they let Betts go, I am not. But I am saying not having any minimum wage players come up at all during those years made it more difficult to keep Betts. Agree?

Not what I asked for. And the notion that “he knew who to keep” list gets presumptuous when you include Bello, Crawford and Rafaela. Did he know to keep them or were these just 3 names that weren’t worth anything at the time. Unlike Devers and Benintendi, who were all over top 100 lists, none of these three were mentioned in Fangraphs top 29 prospects within the Sox system. https://blogs.fangraphs.com/evaluating-the-2016-prospects-boston-red-sox/ Not even in the quick hits below that list other notable omissions…

I suppose a big reason is after the first round, the CBO doesn’t always know who will be available to him. Heck, he may not know it even for the first round…

If the NFL wants to get more exciting, do the following. 1. No more PATs. Waste of time. Consider it automatic unless the team tries for a 2 pt conversion. (Failure to get two pts and the TD is only worth 6.) 2. Three downs instead of four. This is one thing the Canadians got right. 3. Get rid of all those useless time-wasting penalties, like illegal formation, illegal motion. You know, the ones that happen while no one is actually playing. If you’re on your side of the ball, it’s good. Start the play…

Dan Duquette in 1997 with Brian Rose, Jeff Suppan and Robinson Checo…

We’d be doing DD a favor to not give him credit for Dalbec…

Baseball could go back to pre-1884 rules where the pitcher threw underhand to a location the batter specified. Back then, his role wasn’t to get hitters out but rather to get each player started. That would all but eliminate TJ surgery for pitchers…

He did tear down the farm, but there was some replenishment. He did leave the Sox with a mess of bad contracts…

Ben’s drafting was much to be desired. DD did draft/sign 5 major leaguers in his Boston tenure (Duran, Houck, Crawford, Bello, Rafaela, anyone else? I’m not counting Dalbec as a success story, although an argument does exist for it.). That’s not a bad amount for 4 years, but certainly not exemplary…

Not what was asked. The talk was he decimated the highly-rated farm he inherited…

But who were the top 20 DD inherited? That’s the farm he is accused of decimating…

I am still not sold on him as a starter. I’m sold on him being a better option to start than any of the other available options. and he only has 2 years of service time, which helps. But so far he’s never thrown that many IP at this level. If the Sox had a more reliable bullpen, it would help Houck out immensely. Either way, this Oakland team is coming off a 50 win season and somehow managed to get even worse. They might not be the best barometer…

It really wasn’t “keeping the right guys”; none of those guys were there to keep…

You seem to like shooting people into the sun. What do you have against the sun?

RIP Larry Lucchino

Maybe he won’t get $42.4mil, but can he exceed $33mill?

Control arb costs, which can exceed free agent prices for many players. Also you do need Casas to be amenable to any deal. If you were in Casas’ position, do you sign a 6 year $11mill AAV extension that delays free agency for two years and has you finally reaching free agency at age 30? Or 31 if the option vests or gets picked up?

Last season, batters facing Houck for the third time in a game had a .937 OPS. Hitters facing him the second time had a .764 OPS, and those hitters had a .644 OPS on the first time through. Most if not all pitchers have their OPS climb with each appearance, and for multiple reasons. Learning his pitches. Pitcher fatigue. Weaker hitters occasionally get pinched hit for. But .937 is still pretty high…

One of Casas' most similar batters through age 23 is Mark Teixeira, per B-R.com. Fifteen years ago, Tex did get an 8 yr / $180mill ($22.5mill AAV) deal from the Yankees. By the time he got that deal, 29yo Teixeira was more established than Casas is, and had won multiple Gold Gloves and Silver Sluggers. More recently, Freddie Freeman, a clear future Hall of Famer, was only getting 6 year / $162mill contract ($27.7mill AAV). Freeman was 32 years old, but had a Gold Glove, multiple Silver Sluggers and an MVP under his belt. These are among the largest contracts ever awards to first basemen. So yes, they really don't break the bank anymore. Casas has age on his side, but also has less hardware than Evan White (4 yr $24mill contract with Seattle, now considered a bust). I don't see Casas breaking the bank. A six year deal like the one above would buy out all his arb years plus first two of free agency and take him to age his age 30 season. He certainly could wait it out and make more money, but an early deal like this buys him plenty of security, but might be better if it was a year shorter and allowed him to reach free agency before his age 30 season. A 29yo free agent just has more earning power. I would agree an extension like this, but maybe 5 years before the option probably makes more sense for both sides...

This Oakland team might be the worst team I have ever seen. Defensively they tied a record last night by committing 13 errors in the first 5 games of the season, something not done since 1906. My first thought was - were teams even using webbed gloves in 1906? Error numbers from that timeframe are much, much bigger than they are today. Are the A's as bad defensively as teams that didn't even used webbed gloves?

And the running game was a big factor early last season, when runners took advantage of the pitch clock and realized if it got down to 3 seconds and the pitcher still had the ball, they could just take off. That slowed down when a lot of pitchers realized they could take this away by pitching quicker...

No, this is the website where Houck has established himself as a starting pitcher by shutting down a AAA lineup for six innings and therefore people need to ignore that he has never pitched more than 106 IP in MLB in a season in his career. I still think Houck, like most pitchers, is better suited for the bullpen. But he is probably a better option for the rotation over any of the other pitchers the Sox have left...

Yes. Those Seattle Sox. I can’t get my facepalm emoji to work…

Sox SP through 4 games: 25K 1BB

Or maybe he could have acquired a pitcher or two since the Sox were only 2 games out of the postseason…