oldtimer

Honestly, the top three candidates for the Cy Young award this year all bombed in their starts in the playoffs. In addition, Pomeranz bombed as well. Sale definitely has been off but the playoff territory also has shown that other top pitchers just don't do well. Our best performance this year to date has come from Price. Sale got us to where we are. The problem is with him swooning, we don't have a lot of other options. Weak offense and less than stellar defense and relief pitching. We are a good team but not a great one. After the season is over, further discussion about how to improve will ensue.

Pretty clear from the game tonight that arguably our best hitter, Nunez, is gone for the playoffs. That is a tough blow for a relatively weak hitting team to absorb. Tonight, our guys tended to follow the same pattern of taking one or two strikes , mostly fast balls and then being put into a pitcher friendly count. I had hoped they might game plan for a different approach but didn't see that. Two runs won't get it done against the Astros. If Altuve at 5'6" and 165 # can hit it out 3 times, then we should be able to hit one once in a while.

Not if our guys take two strikes on the plate before getting permission to swing. We scored two off a starting pitcher that wasn't that good like Sale.

This kind of post is tiresome.

Hard to know if Sale is just worn down by all the innings pitched or if some mechanical issue has developed with his delivery. He still is throwing hard but certainly is not the same guy out there. How about that little Altuve hitting two home runs, one to center field. He is pretty small to generate that power.

Don't like the way both Bogey and Beni take two good fastball strikes and then are forced to swing at the pitchers pitch. For once, just go after that first fastball.

Tough start. The hittable Sale, Nunez gone, Baserunning error. Pedroia is not fast, don't try it.

The only truly big guys the Sox have on the roster are the pitchers. Hanley weighs 235 so he is our biggest hitter. We draft our guys out of the land of the lilliputians.

I expected Holt even though I didn't favor him. Marrero and Nunez made sense and I guess they took Holt to cover the case of injuries to both Pedroia and Nunez. JF does support Holt, so that also had to factor in. As far as pitching, I was surpirised by the inclusion of 5 starting pitchers along with Price. I expected them to keep Barnes on along with Maddox and Ross but I was mistaken there because Houston doesn't have many impact left handed bats. Maybe there will be an adjustment, should Boston win the Houston series.

Yes, pedroia is an old pro type who has a better chance of coming through that some on our team. His gimpiness though makes him quite slow to first so a double play candidate.

When will we know the playoff roster?

We won 93 games with our current strategy. Can they really just change it up at the drop of a hat? I don't think Chili and John used a single approach to hitting in all the games this year. If so, they would have been far too predicatable. I think that is what they used in a majority of games, that grind it out style they are known for. Therefore, I don't think they have to totally change their approach, just implement something they have used numerous times throughout the year. Otherwise, just be flexible to suit the situation that they will face.

The Sox are not alone in using a regular season batting strategy which attempts to build up pitch count on the starting pitcher and sometimes relievers. That is done by taking pitches early in the count and fouling off balls. The presumed advantages are to see a lot of pitches and tire out the starter early and get to the weaker middle relievers. The disadvantage of this approach is the batter will often take pitches on the plate early and put themselves in a hole with counts like 0 and 1 or 1 and 2, for instance. We have seen the result with batters then swinging at pitches out of the strike zone. In this crazy world of current baseball, a strikeout where the batter has extended to 7 or more pitches is considered a quality at bat. One wonders if in the playoffs, with a team taking only its best 3 starters and best quality relievers if this approach makes sense, or whether a more aggressive approach would work better. I say that realizing hitting is a very difficult art and that a batter needs to see release point, arm angle, timing to the plate, spin rate and likely position of the ball as it crosses the plate, all in a split second. If a batter hasn’t seen a pitcher recently, he might have to take a pitch or two to get a better feel of the many factors involved. I can’t vouch for this, as I have never faced a pitcher throwing over the low to mid 80’s, but I am told that at 95 and above, the seams look like a blur and spin rate is impossible to determine. Second or third times around a batter has all the information he will get, so it would seem a more aggressive approach would be in order.

Don't know which of us is older but both have probably been following things since the 1940's. We had some great teams along the way, including my favorite (1949) but under Yawkeys ownership we couldn't quite win the world series. I go in to this one not expecting too much and will be happily surprised if the Sox can make some noise.

He seems to have made at least a partial recovery in the past couple of weeks. Lets hope so as we do need to good hitting Bogey in the playoffs, especially since we will be facing the best pitchers they have.

Most people who post here a long term fans who have either played themselves or seen enough ball to know the game. That leads to us having opinions when the manager makes a move (or doesn't). We really are not a party to the managers reasoning and can only impute motives and reasoning based on what we see. Results are important, and the Sox have won the pennant. I personally was perplexed by some of jf's moves during the season and at times saw him as sort of a sitting Buddha (kind of inert and emotionless). Onthe other hand winning the pennant goes a long way toward indicating he has done some things correctly. He was given Nunez, Reed and Davis, whereas the Yankees were in a situation to bring in 5, some as impact players. So we had the further Handicap of the Luxury Tax Limit being a factor in how we could strengthen the team. Good time now to kick back and watch the playoffs unfold. Time enough later to discuss off season moves,

JF tried Workman and Abad in relief today and they both gave up runs. That may be a signal they will not be on the playoff roster . I didn't think either would make it so it makes sense to me.

Imagine the discussion if the manager pulled a starter after 5 that was doing well and put in a reliever who gave up a couple of quick runs. It might get ugly.

I see that as a reasonble position. If we have the guy, we should play who provides the most for the team.

I don't see Pedroia as able to play in more than 90 to 100 games next year but with Nunez available, that would be a place where he could play along with DH at times. Pedroia, when healthy is still an excellent 2nd baseman and he is a seasoned hitter. He is under contract into the future so we need to find the right place for him.

I guess the Twins have no chance

I like the inclusion of Smith, even though he had a rough outing yesterday. He has good stuff and throws strikes at a high rate. Hard to pick the last one but Scott as a lefty might be needed. Price can't pitch just to get one lefty out, he is more of a couple of inning guy.

I watched Carson Smith and he appeared to have good stuff. Unfortunately he gave up a little tap hit and then they hit a couple of rockets. He did need to relieve for Carson, since the Astros seemed to be picking up his stuff.

What we can say about the club is that there is a strong foundation we can build on going forward. Nunez return, a solid power hitter for the one of the corners and possibly another power hitter, although with Hanley still here, the only place a second power hitter could play is as a replacement for one of our existing outfielder.

I am okay trading Hembree but might just hold onto Barnes as we don't know yet about Thornburgh. Not sure we can rely on Hanley to play much 1st base next year so if we get a good first baseman and don't resign Moreland, then we would need a backup first baseman and Travis fits that role. Maybe if we get Nunez or an equivalent utility player, the first base role could be filled in that way. I still think Devers position for 2018 remains to be determined. We need his bat but we also need his defense to get much better. There will be many interesting discussions on where DD will take the team for next year. His judgment has been good so far with the possible exception of the cost and length of contract for Price. Price could well be a god send in the bull pen during the playoffs so he still seems to have a lot of value for the sox. The depletion of our minor league system has been a topic but so far I haven't seen a performance by those we traded that makes me think they would have helped the Sox.