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I advocate that if the SS is the best player left on the board. Drafting pitching for the sake of drafting pitching doesn’t work so well if the pitchers flame out High A ball. The high school SS could flame out as well, but when you take the best player available and he doesn’t work out, you didn’t really do anything wrong. Are you advocating the Sox take lesser pitchers solely for the sake of taking pitchers?

When they make moves to do so. Is drafting the only way to get pitchers? The Sox didn’t draft a single starting pitcher who made their rotation between Clay Buchholz (debuted in 2007) and Tanner Houck (debuted in 2020). Know what else they did in that time? Won three World Series…

And Crawford. Crawford deserves more love…

Maybe we can look forward to a midseason swap where we send Henry to the Mets for Steve Cohen?

And considering the same methodology had the Sox at 25-30 four years ago, that’s a step up. Most (all?) of those 6-9 programs ranked ahead of Boston didn’t come from so far down…

Ok. So Bloom’s strategy is largely the culprit…

I didn’t read the article. But in post 9662 above Hugh does say ten years. I’m going by that…

Yes in some respects. It’s largely a prediction of the future, and anyone whose job involves predicting the future from baseball scouts to weathermen to economists can and will be wrong sometimes. It turns out, for example, maybe ranking Garin Cecchini ahead of Mookie Betts just might not play out as such. Also it isn’t raining in Chicago today, much to Tom Skilling’s chagrin. But on the other hand, the ranking on the individual player does carry some value even as a minor leaguer, as it can enhance their value in a trade…

Ok. But doesn’t that counter your original point, if there farm is that good by some evaluation technique?

I think there definitely is some hope. Connor Wong was a pleasant surprise, but only because expectations were probably quite low. I will admit mine were, especially since the Dodgers were repeatedly trying him at other positions. Maybe that had more to do with how stacked their system was with catchers. After all, they did have Will Smith, Keibert Ruiz and Diego Cartaya all ranked ahead of him. Of course, Wong still strikes me as a good backup. A major league caliber player, but not a solid starter on a team hoping to contend. There might be some hope that Whitlock’s lack of durability was hampered by his hip surgery in 2022 as well. If so, maybe he is a good starter capable of 140-150 decent IP. Pivetta was always one of those “stuff” guys whose performance never seemed to match his scouting evals. Tampa had their eyes on him when Boston stole him from the Phillies for a couple journeyman arms. Crawford looked surprisingly solid last year. And Bello’s season appeared to be marred by fatigue that dragged him down in the second half. I’d still like the Sox to grab an arm or two, and there are some serviceable options still available beyond the Elite Contract Seekers in Snell and Montgomery, and beyond the Ethical Question Marks in Bauer, Clevinger and German. (I’m being kind with that label.) Not sure why the Sox refuse to pursue Lorenzen and Odorizzi. Or why they let Stanek and Lauer go elsewhere for peanuts. These guys are getting so cheap, they barely qualify as gambles. As for Giolito, a lot of teams gambled on him last year, which also means he’s had some physicals. Cleveland is a cheaper team and still took on his contract, allowing the Angels to sneak back under the tax limit. I’m guessing they checked him out, given their annual budget limitations. But pitchers do get hurt, and they all get hurt doing the same thing - pitching. It’s not hard for me to believe that the pitching he did in Boston was enough to hurt himself. Especially as he has had TJ before. I don’t like their apparent apathy, but this team might not be as bad as many think. They do need to abandon the Bloom practice of using bullpen arms to replace starters, and then following up by not replacing the bullpen arms. They still have options. They do have the money. They just lack the actual moves even to tweak this staff…

They should be. Sign Lorenzen and he also fills the RHH OF requirement…

You’re making me even more optimistic about this years Sox team. Granted, the number of players who can impact a team so immediately like Rutschman did is probably infinitesimally small. Even the massively hyped (and deservedly so in my book) Bryce Harper didn’t turn his team around merely by showing up. Hell, former Blue Jay prospect Travis Snider, who nickname was “The Franchise”, turned out to be anything but. Who besides Rutschman and LeBron, how many athletes have ever had such an immediate impact on their teams? (Tom Brady? We’re getting into Seriously elite company.) So while there is an argument the Sox are one first round pick away, it doesn’t seem all that likely. But on the be bright side, Baltimore won 100 games last year with a rotation less impressive than Boston has now. And while maybe there is no Rutschman on the horizon, maybe never, but the Sox do have a new pitching coach with an extremely effective track record at pushing pitchers ahead. I’m sticking with my optimism…

I think it included all them, right? If it’s 10 years, it includes a couple Cherington years, too. The DD years do have some excuse as the Sox were picking 20-30 most of them and bonuses for all players (not just pitchers) were smaller…

Ok. I’m not surprised the Sox are near the bottom, especially with my theories about Bloom. But it’s not so goood to be at the bottom…

I assumed, correctly or not, the primary reason Bloom didn’t take pitchers highly is he was trying to stockpile legitimate prospects into the Sox farm system, and position players are easier to scout and evaluate. I think he passed on pitchers solely to increase the prospect volume in the farm system. My theory anyway…

Dues that last place include IFA or just draft bonus money?

Wasn’t Mayer that same f***ing guy in 2021? You’re f***ing amazing. Last week I said Eovaldi wasn’t worth his contact and you immediately jumped all over it with a poorly-researched stat. And then cried victim and got into all sorts of accusations against me. Let’s rehash some recent chats quickly Notin: Eovaldi wasn’t worth his contract. 5GG: You’re wrong. He was. He lead the SP in WAR over those years. Notin: Actually he didn’t. 5GG: We’ll if you’re going to jump all over everything I say, WTF? That’s why other posters don’t come here anymore!! And it’s way worse you correcting me than me doing it to you, which is how this whole argument started! I get stuff like this all the time, too. Like yesterday. Notin: Giolito would have had the second best bWAR on the Sox last year. Bellhorn: Incorrect. You didn’t add in his negative performance across two other teams. Notin: yeah I f***ed that one up. But yeah. I’m the only perp and you’re the only victim…

Right, the obvious solution is to just draft pitchers higher. I mean, if you select a player in the first round, he automatically becomes a first round pick. Look at Atlanta. They’ve clearly done better with their first round pitchers. Who wouldn’t take first round picks Kyle Wright and Ian Anderson over 4th rounder Spencer Strider and fifth rounder Bryce Elder? And obviously 1st rounders Hunter Waldrep and Owen Murphy are clearly better talents than the higher ranked seventh rounder AJ Smith-Shawver. So go ahead! Force those first rounders! We need more Ricky Romeros!! That’s the obvious plan…

Right. Much better strategy than moving the Gold Glove right fielder to a position he hasn’t played since A-ball to make sure Jason Heyward gets into the lineup. If Miguel Rojas and his 396 games over the last 3 years is a utility player, how do you classify Heyward and his 276 games? But Heyward does give better offense, bringing his OPS+ of 87 over the past 3 years to the starting lineup and benching that paltry 78 Rojas brings. I mean, obviously it’s the smart move. The Dodgers are doing it! This isn’t some stupid Red Sox move, like letting Dalbec start one game at SS…

Would it be better if we passed on Troy Tulowitzki to draft Ricky Romero? These names were chosen because Toronto did exactly that, and did so for the exact reasons people on this board are complaining about - the Jays wanted to draft a pitcher. Also Trey Ball was a BA top 100 prospect at one point. I don’t think he was dragging down the farm ranking to much…

No one has said that. Don’t be the guy who blames the rest of the world for not being as negative as you want them to be…

Why do Holliday and Skenes get credit for turning their organizations around already? What have these guys done that Teel and Anthony haven’t?

Just draft the best players available. Don’t worry about position and don’t worry about college vs high school. The pitching situation can work itself out. The Sox have two pitchers they drafted slated to start in their opening day rotation, including one who was a first round pick (and is quite possibly the worst of the five, and definitely one everyone wants to see bumped back into the bullpen). So maybe first round pitchers for the sake of taking first round pitchers isn’t the way to go. In fact, that seems like an even worse strategy than what they’ve been doing. Just take the player you think has the best future…

Bench Hayward, who only brings defense to the table, but is still worse defensively than Betts in RF. Put Mookie in RF. Put Miguel Rojas at SS, as Rojas is basically to SS what Heyward is to RF. The Betts-Rojas lineup is significantly better defensively than the Betts-Heyward lineup. And not much worse offensively. Am I missing something? Or are the Dodgers really this f***ing stupid?

Cora is not exactly known for his attention to defense either. But both guys - especially Cora - are heavy into metrics…