Nick

Really good move by Cora to take out Richards. He gave us quality start and the lead 3-2. No point in ruining his day. I like the move. Let's see if Darwinzon can locate the home plate.

The guy is NOT ready. Starts out second inning with four straight balls....... I rather watch our young guys....hope we don't give this guy a long leash if he stumbles. Just not ready to start the year.....had a horrible spring training.

Per MLB.COM Tanner Houck, RHP, Red Sox Key stat: +2.2 mph of fastball velocity, +2 inches of slider movement Houck is currently at the Red Sox's alternate training site because they needed roster flexibility, but the 24-year-old's pitching during Opening Week was more than big league-caliber -- he has 10 strikeouts in six innings so far in 2021. Boston's No. 7 prospect per MLB Pipeline was nasty in his brief debut stint in 2020, too, but his stuff got even better. Houck is throwing 2 mph harder in '21 than he did in '20 -- his four-seam velo has jumped from 92.8 mph to 94.6, and his sinker velo has jumped from 90.9 mph to 93.7, giving him an overall velocity spike of +2.2 mph. Houck's wipeout, crossfire slider is moving even more, with his average horizontal break up to 15.9 inches from 13.9 in 2020. That break is a huge +9.2 inches above average, when you compare Houck's slider to similar ones based on velocity and release point. And Houck is getting the most out of it, throwing his slider 42% of the time so far, his most-used pitch type. With that stuff, he'll be back soon. Sure looks like he's first one up if someone falters.

It's way early but if our starters can give us quality starts we're right there......thank you Mr. Obvious.....Moon I'm talking to myself, not you...

According to Penn National Gaming study, it's estimated that Sox ranked third in lost gate revenue during 2020, little over $175M. But if you look at Cot's, Sox player payroll data, opening day payroll in 2020 was around $74M. That's $160M less than 2019 figure. I have no idea lost revenue from concession, gift shop etc . Strictly based on gate, Sox only suffered net $15M loss in 2020. (based on gate revenue vs player payroll) Unless the fan attendance is ramped up from current 12% capacity, Sox stands to lose more money in 2021 because Sox is paying for full year's salary this time around ($180M). Gate revenue at 12% capacity is only $22M, creating a loss of $160M in 2021 vs $15M in 2020. Ouch.

Mookie was traded because Sox knew he was leaving. It would have been a monumental mistake not to trade him at that point. If you were my GM and kept Betts, I would have fired your ass. By the way, David Price is pitching out of bullpen while collecting $16M each from the Dodgers and the Red Sox. We made the right call. Not unlike marriage, sometimes one spouse wants to leave and that was Betts.

Good year out of Codero, Renfroe and Dalbec will help the money crunch coming up. I still don't think we need major upgrade to our offense. Defense? Can't have it all. Just look at our 2B-SS-3B.

Nice win by Rays over the Yankees. Kluber and Richards, racing to the bottom of ocean.

I've never been a big fan of Barnes but maybe he's figured something out. Always thought his command of strike zone was inconsistent and little soft mentally. With Ottavino probably gone, this is why it's critical for Bloom to develop young arms. We can then spend money elsewhere. I had forgotten about JD's money. If we're going for it, you need a top line pitcher to go along hopefully with Sale, I think we move our chips in it next year. Sign free agents and retain our young prospects.

I know that it's way too early, but I would've been pissed to see JBJ ($12M) and Beni ($5M) in center and left for the Sox. It was definitely time to move on.

Again, our current offense will score runs. We'll have Duran, Downs and Casas coming up. We have plenty of corner position players. With the $45M (Ottavino, Perez, E Rod, Richards and Pedey monies), my preference is to re-sign E Rod and get a #1 ace this off season. Again we'll score enough runs with what we have and what we have coming up. It may cost us $50-$55M to add a big name pitcher plus E Rod. Eovalid and his $17M plus Price's $16M will come off the books for 2023 season. I don't see Xander optiing out, just my opinion.

The team is set for 2021. Couple of things. According to Cot's, JD had two opt years after 2019 and 2020, not 2021. He can't opt out. I trust Cot's. JD's cost is already baked in for 2021 and we're still below the cap. There's no point in doing anything with JD. We need a DH and he's here for two years. We've thrown much mud on the wall...the biggest one being Richards' $10M deal. Let's hope some of it stick and bring some clarity to the future. There's $23M available between contracts of Ottavino, Richards and Perez in addition to $13.75M from Pedey's contract expiring after this year. That's $37M along with another $8.3M from E Rod's contract, bringing the total to about $45M. We should be able to extend E Rod and acquire another top line, proven pitcher for $45M. Matt Barnes can be retained to be our closer. Incremental free agent cost for Barnes will be $5M or less. (to what he's making). Sale, E Rod, Eovaldi, Pivetta, $20M guy, Whitlock and Houck should be formidable rotation for 2022. Two of them can be jettisoned to the bullpen. Our bats may not need much of an upgrade for 2022. We're 4-3, a half of game up on Yankees. Life is good.

Another clean outing by Rule 5 Whitlock. 2 IP, 3 K, 0 H, 0 BB. He's going to be my favorite pitcher Because we got him from the Yankees for almost nothing...something like $25K... And we'll have six years of team control. He will start for us at some point this year. Book it.

still pissed that Lester wasn't signed...

Easy there Cowboy....I was simply reinforcing Original Poster's thesis about the Rays and young talent. Maybe I didn't make myself clear. My perception of Rays is that they know they don't have the money to sign long term deals on many of their young talent. So if the Rays had Devers as an example, they maybe faced with two additional years of huge salary increases which they can't afford. They simply would move Devers to a big market club or a team desperate in need of big name player, securing couple of young major league talent, say with 10 years of team control between them. No way was I suggesting what you said. We should extend Devers. He's part of our core moving forward. As the announcers mentioned today on YouTube telecast, Devers is younger than Dalbec.

Well if we take their approach, we would be trading Devers this winter because you can't afford him and get couple of good major league ready pitching prospects in return. I think that's how you would do it.

Dalbec finally gets on board, going 2-4. Looks to be a pretty good defender at 1B. His height there seems to play well. Xander, JD and Vaz swinging the bat. Great outing by Eovaldi. I love to see him throw more breaking pitches. He probably could have gone another inning but up 9-1, what's the point. Great to see we only used two pitchers. We get a day off on Friday then 16 straight games, Orioles (2), Twins (4), Blue Jays (2), White Sox (4) and Mariners (4). See what our bats can do vs Orioles.

I agree....college pitcher from great college program trumps any high school kid.

Good article on MassLive (subscription required for this piece) about how Bloom is gathering young, starting pitching talent. He's very high on several young pitchers, detailing pitches they have and pitches they are working on. Whitlock as a Rule 5 player is working not only to help in a long relief role for Sox in 2021 but expanding his pitches to return to starting pitcher. Houck is working on a third pitch but Bloom thinks his slider is special and he could become one of those pitchers that may thrive as a starter only having two pitches. Noah Song will reapply to get relief from his military commitment in May. His fastball had topped 97 and he has several secondary pitches to go alone with it. Potential high ceiling guy. Bryan Matta's elbow issue has raised some concerns, reading between the lines. A top prospect. Thaddeus Ward, Conner Seabold, Chris Murphy, Frank German, Josh Winckowski and Chi-Jung Lui were other pitchers mentioned. He said he's been on the job for 17 months and has not seen a minor league game and THAT's been difficult. His primary focus (farm system) is developing young pitching talent right now.

I could agree with you except I just think he wanted out of Boston.

Yep.....I think you know more about him than anyone here....

Tidbits 3 out of 4 starts have been acceptable. Little concerning with Richards. Not sure I liked his comment about "I threw some good pitches".......perhaps, but you threw several bad pitches. I wouldn't mind seeing Houck start another game. Let's see if Pivetta can stay in the rotation for entire year. More and more I read about Whitlock, I'm intrigued. I can see Bloom doing the Rays thing with him. That is eventually extending him to become a starter. I think Cora is FORCING something that's not there. I know he wants Kike to leadoff but maybe that's not his best spot. It's early. To me this is typical Red Sox offense. Dormant for 3 out 4 games but cumulatively right in the thick of runs scored category in AL East. We feast on bad pitching at Fenway to bring up the offensive stats.

If the data above doesn't refute the idea that Henry is cheap, well noting will and we have nothing to talk about. It's what you do with the money that's most critical. We're big market team, however the Yankees and the Dodgers are in another category when it comes to revenue. It's far superior to the Sox. My guess is our player payroll budget is the top line of competitive tax payroll. If I'm the owner, that's where I would put the payroll budget. If the GM can not toe that line, he's gone. You sign multiple year deals so the additions to payroll must be viewed in the context of future obligations. Businesses are always forward looking. Sox will fetch multiples of free cash flow. It remains to be seen how quickly the top line will fall in line Pre-COVID. We need infusion of production from our cost controlled players. Period. Whitlock, Dalbec, Devers, Houck, Pivetta...... We have $153M in play right now. They have to produce. That's what I would tell my baseball people. YOU got me into this position. Fix it. I think Bloom is working on it.

I see this year as identifying the core group that can take us to become competitive teams into the future. As Moon has said, many of the players are on a short leash contracts. I'm more interested in development of Devers....find out once and all his best position...don't we have professionals that can decide? Dalbec....is his bat for real and can he make enough contact to be a major leaguer? Whitlock....can he be expanded and be a starter in the future? Houck....can he develop a third pitch and command the strike zone to be a middle of the pack starter? Duran....can he make enough improvements to reach majors this year? can he come close to what Bloom is predicting for him? a potential to be a 'great' player? Chavis...what will convince Cora to believe in Chavis? Downs...is he a viable major leaguer in 2021 at some point? Pivetta....is he a permanent major league starter? Casas.....what positions will Casas, Devers, Chavis and Dalbec settle into? Hernandez....at what point can he become a closer or is he a finished product? Great stuff but no command? etc, etc The Cliff is real. We need to separate the future from the place holders such as Peters, Richards, Eovaldi, Barnes, etc, etc....

Pretty good list...I would note however the cost of acquiring Moncada...doubling the bonus payout or something crazy? Let's look at what DD left us behind Triston Casas Jarren Duran Tanner Houck Gibert Jimenez Boby Dalbec Bryan Mata Noah Song Jay Groome I think this group has as much chance to succeed as Ben's group.