S5Dewey

I was with you until you brought AGon into the conversation. I remember all the chatter about his "God's will" comment as well as the talk about his complaining about the scheduling. IIRC there was a lot of the STFU attitude from the fans. All three of those players got free passes as long as they were performing as well as the fans expected. (Well, OK, Crawford never did perform that well, but anyway...). The fact is that we as fans have expectations for players and it usually doesn't revolve around their salaries. Iggy @ $2M was vilified as much as any of the three in spite of the difference in his salary. JBJ was being thrown on the scrap heap in spite of his GG defense and his playing for the ML minimum. We expect them to perform well no matter how much money they make and when they don't perform well the fans hold them accountable. IMO that's fair. It goes along with being a professional athlete.

Wow. I had no idea the AFL was that strict about who can play. Thanks.

The problem with that scenario is that Sam Travis may be a better player than Travis Shaw on both sides of the ball. Given those choices I'd as soon see T. Shaw @ 1B and Hanley at DH. But obviously that's not an optimal scenario. Does anyone know what players like Shaw (Ok, Shaw in particular) do over the winter? AFL? Winter ball anyplace?

The only things remarkable about him are that he had an ERA of 0.00 in Wilmington and Portland but in SSS's, and that he completely s*** the bed in Seattle in his first outing. Assuming you think a one game ERA of 81 is s***ing the bed. And I do. Hey, it's not like there's anything else to talk about right now!

IMO you can't rule out his being rushed. At age 22 in 2005 he pitched in four leagues, High A Wilmington, AA Portland, AAA Pawtucket, and then Boston. He did very well until he hit Pawtucket where he had an ERA of >5.50 in 40 games. I can't imagine why they brought him up then, but there must have been a reason. For some reason I remember the game he imploded - against Seattle. The second game of a DH. 1/3 inning, 2H, 2BB, 3ER, 1 HR (a GS IIRC) and was essentially never heard from again in Boston. I remember thinking, "C'mon.. will you pull this guy for God's sake. He's just a kid. You can't leave him there!" Here's something I didn't remember. Meredith was traded to the Padres for Doug Mirabelli.

I don't disagree with this at all, but there is a certain risk involved in letting a young pitcher be tried by fire. Every time I think about something like this I think back to Cla Meredith. He had great stuff and was supposed to be a TOR pitcher of the future until he was rushed to the Bigs, got shelled, and was left out there too long. He was never the same after that. Maybe Meredith didn't have the self-confidence to be a major league pitcher and that incident showed it. Or maybe he would have succeeded if he'd been handled differently. I dunno. Players are different. But I do know that suddenly one of out top pitchers was headed for the dumpster and I don't want to see that happen to another one.

I have a saying that I use when there's something I know nothing about that someone is trying to explain to me. I say, "Talk to me like I'm ten years old". Since you need some interpretation of what I posted I'll talk to you like you're ten years old. I am comparing the two only in that the Red Sox organization stood behind Lester during his illness giving him the full weight of their organization. Therefore it's probably safe to assume that they do the same for any player with issues that concern the player's health and/or their development. Lester took advantage of the help offered. The question now is whether Sandoval will. I don't know John Lester, Pablo Sandoval, or any member of the Red Sox FO, but if we're going to confine our discussions to only what we each have personal knowledge of this is going to be a pretty dead forum.

The bottom line for me on this topic is this... I have no problem with holding Sandoval responsible for his weight. I understand that it MAY be due to an eating disorder, but lacking that knowledge I also recognize that it also MAY be due to nothing less than gluttony. Either way, he has millions of reasons turn himself around, not even including what should be the most important reason, his health. When John Lester was battling cancer he has the full support of the Red Sox organization behind him. I have no reason to doubt that it's the same with Sandoval. But as I like to say, "Even God only helps those who help themselves".

That's what I suspected. So it was just Harmony coming around again trying to stir things up by mentioning players whom he knew probably wouldn't be traded.

Ok. And was Benintendi mentioned in the conversation, or was that all conjecture?

Or perhaps the discussion was who the Sox might have to add to Pablo in order to get Johnny Cueto.

Picture this: We pick up a one or two year DH to bridge the gap while Travis matures, then Hanley moves to DH and Sam Travis becomes our 1Bman. Problem(s) solved! Anyone buying in?

I would never call into question his ability to play well and play hard. He's also gotten into it with Gibbons at least once in the dugout and I've heard rumblings of clubhouse issues with management. Earlier in the year he also got into an obscene shouting match with another team. It's basic immaturity, like too many players have.

The more I think about Sale the less I like that idea. He used to look to me like a high risk - high reward player. Now he looks more to me like a high-risk, moderate reward player. I don't know what to think about the clubhouse influence any more. Is it worth it, or is it just a figment of the fan's imagination? On the one hand we have the incident with Iggy (and no, I'm not trying to start another Iggy debate) where he got into a pushy-pushy on national tv in his own dugout and was eviscerated for it. OTOH we have Josh Donaldson who has been trouble on two teams now but still seems to be desirable. So is Sale with his two incidents in the past year someone we'd want? That's the risk. You decide. The flip side of that coin is his reduction in velocity, and that's the tipping point for me. I see a very real possibility that we could give up several of our best prospects along with a GG CF'er and end up with another #3, .500 pitcher. Sure, he'd be cheap on a year-to-year basis but the initial cost would be the killer. I love pitching and defense. I do. But IMO the Sox with their current staff aren't in a position where they have to take on that risk in the hope that it'll pan out. I recognize that there are probably GM's who are desperate enough to take on that risk and pay dearly for it but if the CWS get the sun, moon, and all outdoors for him I'll be glad we passed.

I agree with paragraph #1. IMO we had a lot of overkill in our offense last year. While our offense (obviously) won't be as strong without Ortiz it still should be good enough to get the job done even if we have to resort to DH-by-committee. However, I'd still like to fill that position on a one or two year basis if it can be done at the right cost. At this point I'd like to see the FO focus on run prevention rather than run creation. You can't have too much pitching, whether it's SP or RP, so I wouldn't object to improving the pitching staff as long as it can be done without damaging the defense of the position players. Translation: Free agency, trades of prospects, or improving from within (which I don't see happening unless Big Johnson or Owens has a breakthrough). Sandoval has left us, in the words of George Clooney in O' Brother.... "in a tight spot here". The team has a lot of money tied up in a 3rd baseman and we still don't know if he's going to be able to cut it or not. Spring Training should determine whether he gets a chance. Unfortunately even if Sandoval wins the job all we've got is an overpaid 3Bman who's mediocre both offensively and defensively. The good news is that 'mediocre' is better than what was there last year. The rest of the good news is that if the worst position on the team is defined as mediocre the rest of the team is pretty darn good. Were I in DD's shoes I'd be looking to improve the pitching and setting some money aside in a fund to improve the team at 3B in case either Sandoval can be moved or Sandoval craps out at 3B. Scenario B probably being more likely than Scenario A. In a nutshell, try to pickup a respectable dedicated DH but don't break the bank doing it, protect the seven position players we already have (3B being the exception), and do what can be done about the pitching staff. And keep in mind that the BP was kinda the strength of the team during the last part of the season. BP's are always a crap shoot but we may be better off signing some of what we've got rather than signing someone else's crap.

What?? Did you just admit that WAR has problems????? :D

True enough. But at the same time, as fans when we see someone whom we know is only getting 40 games a year having the same WAR as a full-time player we know that there's something amiss in WAR. I'm not advocating substituting WAR/G for WAR and eliminating WAR completely. I'm just saying that WAR/G is more valuable (to me) than having to look up the two players to determine the # Games Played and then interpolate it on my own.

Flawed in that it doesn't represent a player's worth, at least at first glance. WAR/G is a better representation of a player's contribution. Just as the number of hits a player gets during a season has value, it has even more value when that number of hits is divided by the number of AB's. Adding the /G is a qualifier, bringing a player's WAR into perspective. Please don't interpret this as my now being on board with WAR. I'm not. But if we're going to use it let's at least make it relevant.

At last. An admission that WAR is flawed. I hear what you're saying about the injuries or the splits. WAR/G is calculated on the basis of a player being put into his best position to be successful, unlike non-platoon players who are out there every day. However, to look at WAR/G from the back side, a platoon player is actually helping the team when he doesn't play in favor of someone with better splits. That doesn't entirely compensate for only playing in situations where he's expected to be successful but it does temper it some.

True enough. When everything works it works well. I've used the analogy before of a pitcher like Randy Johnson - a big guy with a big motion. When everything comes together it gets great results and when it doesn't you end up with Henry Owens. The problem is that the more complex something is the harder it is to find the flaw. A secondary problem is people tend to think that something is more accurate just because it's more complex - but that's a perception thing.

This is the time of year when I'd like to be a fly on the wall in the FO, listening to the ideas that are being floated. I'd like to listen to them discuss who wants to trade what player? Who feels which players are untouchable, and why? How often do they agree? How often do they disagree?? What offers have they made and what offers have they rejected? What's their plan for the future, both near and far? I'm aware that no one here has answers to those questions... it's just my Day before Thanksgiving musings.

Hmmm.. I wonder if Bogaerts would be willing to move to 3rd.

Don't blame ME for perpetuating this topic. I gave it up a few hours ago.

AHA! I can see that you still want to talk about the Lackey trade! Well, you're not getting away with that!!

The numbers are growing. Now there are THREE of us!! Soon we'll be taking over the board!