Nick

Sales' trade with White Sox was Freakin' good. His extension SUCKED.

Yes they have always thought of him as a starter

Cooper and Smith are hired guns. They won't be back next year. Like you said this is the year of discovery. Finding the core for next few years. I think Duran has punched the ticket. Grissom should get a long look.

Someone suggested we offer him QO. Unreal.

We are 1-6 vs AL East. That is my best measuring stick. I just don't see things getting better when our starters have pitched above expectations and still has a losing record. Only open question for me right now is viability of Grissom.

Latest Whitlock setback has me in the category of "Whatever I don't give a damn".

I was saying 2 lefties and one righty works for me. Do you think I didn't know that Ref and Rafaela bats right?

I get the L-R balancing act. But I was thinking we could live with Duran/Rafaela/Abreu in the OF. My problem is can we find a ss better than Rafaela? Just not coumting on Story. He looks like Chris Sale injury wise. Not sure how dependable he will be going forward.

I would extend Duran and Abreu.

I agree. The season is not half over. He definitely has couple of holes in his swing. What idiot would give him a qualifying offer? Geez....let's get real.

I don't know about anyone else but our 1B tandem sucks. It's really bad when they both play. 0-8 coming up.

Hey I can only go by what I read.....I nelieve NESN followed up by saying his bat feels like a big lumber or something heavy due to weight loss.

We still have Whitlock as a starter. He's not a reliever until Breslow says so......Murphy and Walter doesn't get me excited at all. They are long relievers. I still see Pivetta on the trading block especially Whitlock comes back and Criswell is still pitching well. Who can he fetch for us? I'm not ready to commit 4 years for Pivetta. Maybe two.

I agree. My only point is at some point he has to show progress. He's good looking athlete for sure.

OPS for 2nd base is 15th in AL. 1B & SS is 9th and DH 11th. Grissom's OPS is .297. I think I'm more concerned that he is not at 'full strength' and he literally means it. He lost about 15 lbs when his debut was delayed with the flue. If we're still in contention by May 31st and he's not hitting any better, he maybe platooned. It's unfortunate but with Casas out we can't have too many more black holes. Perhaps OBP guru Meidroth who has 28 walks and 30 hits in AAA should be brought up.

My comment was in jest. Just relax... And I am Japanese.

I just have bad feeling about Yoshida. If he was a samurai, he'd volunteer to retire and return to play in Japan. Yoshida-son has failed and needs to save his family honor.

I said DEAD $$$$. That should include $17M paid to Atlanta. I stand by my $82M.

We have $82M in dead money including Yoshida.....unfreaking believable. Spend wisely, we did not. Good thing 5 relievers plus a starter are minimum wage guys along with Wong, Casas, Grissom, Rafaela, Duran and Abreu.

It helps that most of the guys are coming into their prime years, Houck, Kutter, Whitlock and Criswell. Then we have the 'kid' plus a young veteran in Pivetta. Sprinkle them with the magic of Bailey and Breslow and you got something special. Casas injury is devastating to the offense. O'Neil will surely come down and there's no way Wong can keep up his current pace.

Sox went 2-11 vs Rays in 3023. We have 7 games coming up.

I always penalize a team for losing the series 0-3. So I take away one series win and add to series lost total. Same is true if we win 3-0, but go the other way.

That's five players with at least 5 years of team control. Nice

“The message is go down there and work,” Cora said. “That’s the bottomline. Like I said, we’re much (more) talented than last year. And there’s going to be tough decisions. And there’s more tough decisions coming up. Over the five years (as manager), the message is a lot easier now. Kind of like, for us to be good, we have to be better in certain aspects. I know the numbers are the numbers from last year. But there’s a few things this year that he’s been off. He knows it. Obviously disappointed that he’s going to the minors but we’ve all been through that. So just go down there and work. If he wants to come back here, then do the things that you have to do and the things you can control and he’ll be back.” Cora talking about Winckowski. Not being flippant but Moon, Cora doesn't give damn about the stats you provided. I like his bluntness......And I agree with his assessment. We're easily swayed to think he's one of our better pitchers but he's been getting a pass this year. He's been hit hard and his control is not always there. That is my eye test and I have nothing to back it up. No matter what any of us think, the management thinks we're a better team. Damn the wins and losses.... To me the management is going in the way of more analytics to determine who plays, where and when.

Criswell with another decent outing. 9K and only 2 walks in 5 innings. He's a keeper.