Nick

Toronto is beating the Orioles....all 3 teams with same number of losses...a virtual tie....we need to keep winning.

I wonder if there's a way to signal the strikes via 'beeping' directly into ump's ear? Umps would still be needed. They would simply slow down on their strike calls. On close calls, they can wait for the signal. The ump was awful last night.

I disagree slightly. Baseball is one sport where you can put the best player in each position at any time. There's really no sharing of a ball as in basketball where 5 All Stars does not equal best team. I agree that we have pretty good talent but that's not to say that upgrades are out of question. Right now 1B, 2B, SS, CF, LF and DH are set. (Hanley is with us for 3 more years, Sox will not eat both Pablo and Hanley's contracts). Milwaukee catcher maybe someone that can be the gap to 2018 season for Swihart. Ideally Benintendi and Moncada are in the lineup for at least part of 2017 season. Hanley moves to DH and Shaw to 1B. Whole lot of tweaking is all we need. But will we have to make a big plunge to acquire a quality to of rotation pitcher? Is so, why wait?

Boston Herald; The Red Sox have to wonder how they’ll do when Sandy Leon inevitably comes back to earth. He entered last night with four hits in his last 19 at-bats, but was still carrying a .386 average. Can Leon and Ryan Hanigan handle the load down the stretch? Christian Vazquez’ offense has been subpar and he’s now at Triple-A Pawtucket. But, in a postseason setting, a grip on the pitching staff is most important, and Vazquez is capable there if needed. “Pretty good,” Hazen said of the team’s catching situation. “I think the way Sandy’s played, being able to hit from both sides of the plate is a definite advantage. You know, (Hanigan’s) been solid. And we have (Vazquez) too, and hopefully getting (Blake) Swihart back at some point. I think we feel pretty good from a depth standpoint.” It appears Swihart and catching still may have a future.

ANAHEIM, Calif — The Red Sox have been subtly introducing Yoan Moncada to the world outside of second base. Red Sox general manager Mike Hazen confirmed that the organization has been working Moncada at third base prior to Portland Sea Dogs’ road games, with the picture posted from @FlattsM on Twitter from Binghamton serving as the latest example. Hazen said the plan is to continue the pregame work at other positions other than second base, with a likelihood that the Red Sox will introduce outfield into the practice sessions in the near future. There is still the possibility Moncada will see game action at one of the alternate positions, although if/when a permanent switch is made it will likely take place in ernest during the offseason. With Double-A Portland, Moncada entered Friday hitting .270 with a .902 OPS.

Take a chill pill....these are not well thought out comments...can we have some fun when the team is struggling?

nice double play by Pedey.....he rocks

double play machine, Pedey.....another rally killer. 7, 8 and 9 gets one base and we score 1 run....Pedey sucks and I get to watch him for another 5 years...oh boy

This game should be 2-1 Sox, 3-1

never mind

Here comes DP machine..

Looks like long night for offense....no sense of urgency.....lets just swing without purpose....front running son of hitches....can't hit when matters.

Awful at bat by Xander.....

If the goal is to win the World Series, we probably need to get another top of the line starting pitcher. I'd hate to give up quality prospects but.....we know that we can't hit our way to the World Series Championship. Pitching still wins big games.

Per Fangraphs on White Sox Pitcher Chris Sale Boston Red Sox This one’s pretty easy; the team could start the bidding with either Yoan Moncada (#1 BA/#2 MLB) or Andrew Benintendi (#9 BA/#7 MLB) and go from there. Top 10 hitting prospects are highly valuable assets because they usually combine upside and proximity to the big leagues, and thus are worth something like $75 million; Moncada may be worth closer to $100 million, since he’s the guy who might be the top overall prospect in the game right now. So the White Sox would be right to demand either in a deal, but even Sale isn’t worth both, so the Red Sox would have to pick which of the two they wanted to keep around, and then add some additional value beyond giving up a terrific young hitter. If Benintendi was the main piece, Rafael Devers (#41 BA/#25 MLB) would be a reasonable piece to add, putting the Red Sox package on part with a Urias/Bellinger or Urias/Verdugo offer from Los Angeles. If Moncada is the guy they’re sending to Chicago, though, Devers’ value probably pushes the deal past what Sale is worth; his value gets you most of the way to Sale, so the second piece could be a higher risk guy like hard-throwing righty Michael Kopech (#93 BA/#83 MLB), since back-end Top 100 pitching prospects are worth about $15 million. Toss in some sweeteners on top of that, and the White Sox would at least have to think about it, as Moncada and Kopech could give them a pretty great return. Thoughts? Say we sign Encarnacion for 2017. We would have enough money to throw at Encarnacion. ......use Benintendi/Devers as trade chips Young and Swihart returns in LF for 2017. We still have Shaw at 3B, Hanley at 1B. Holt becomes super sub. We now have Chris Sale for 3 more years.....We would definitely contend for 3 more years. He's the starting pitcher type that DD covets. TEMPTING?

Blue Horseshoe loves Layne....

do i really need to add dws?

Say goodbye to Koji for 2017 and hello to $9M Sox can better use elsewhere. That's the bottom line. He's too old. Don't waste a spot on 25 man roster who can become injured taking a crap.

Who is the odd man out when Kimbrel returns?

How about 1 Xander Bogaerts.....he's a line drive, contact hitter with good eyes. He's fast enough not to hurt our running game on top. Give him an extra at bat. 2 Bradley Jr..............this will eliminate defensive shift when he comes up with Xander on base. He is by far the best base runner going from 1st to 3rd. 3 Mookie Betts..........he has the power to thrive at this spot. He's a 30 HR guy. 4 Encarnacion...........free agent 5 Dustin Pedroia.......I think he can hit from any spot in the order 6 Hanley Ramirez 7 Travis Shaw 8 Swihart 9 Benintendi I can live with this line up

We can tell him he's closing inning one, inning two, so forth until his arm falls off. He may not notice he's pitched every inning. Nah, he's probably smarter than that.

Moon, I've often thought of Sox offense as that of a SEC college football team going up against a mid major team. They score in the 70's. Run up 800 yards in offense. Then they play a tight game to say 17-14 loss vs comparable opponent. Offensive averages are still gaudy but the record is still 1-1. Obviously the better statistics indicator in this case would be for games only in the conference. Last night's game was perfect example. Great offensive team should have crushed the Angels and not wait until the 9th inning to lose 2-1. I get that we are still in thick of things and our offense is good. But I don't think it's great. One example maybe to eliminate lop sided wins by adjusting the runs scored to no more than 4 run differential. (I believe that's the 'save' criteria, no?). Thus 16-2 game would be averaged as 6-2 game and 10 excessive runs would be ignored for the purposed of offensive run output....call it the adjusted runs scored or something. Simply to say we are averaging full one run more than the next team may not be the best indicator. You can throw out every offensive numbers but they are just averages. John Farrell is dumbfounded by games such as last night. All he can say is WE HAVE GOOD OFFENSE. WE SCORE RUNS. He's confused because of extreme distribution in offensive output. I'm not sure how you would come up with it but there has to a better indicator of team's offensive output than simply 'averages'.

Time for entire team to just suck it up and play better. Quit looking over the shoulder for a white knight. Got you Pmeranz, Ziegler and Hill. Kimbrel should return. Joe Kelly is now in the bullpen. Holt (everyone's good luck charm) has returned. Ortiz continues to hit. Quit making excuses. As Godfather said, be a man. Get the damn job done.

Thx....Toronto could have been way ahead had it not for 10-18 record in 1 run games....

Moon, where do we rank in one run games compared to Baltimore and Toronto?