oldtimer

Yes and we had Pedey in and also Bogey had a surprising night for him. Hanley not anything. Kimmi has said, and i agree, we go nowhere without our young talent, like Betts and Bogey hitting. She included Hanley, and that would be nice, but we could work around him if the others are productive.

Big day for the Sox and down to 15 for the magic number.

This is a critical period going forward. We need to keep winning as the Yankees seem to be winning a high percentage. Nunez has been our best hitter so his loss will be felt. No Beni tonight either. Lets hope the lineup is so weakened that we can't score a few runs. At least Pedey is in the lineup.

Nunez

The Sox had better take care of business as the Yankees are creeping up on them. No more anemic lineups. If Pedey and Nunez are able, they are needed in the game. They are the two best hitters at this point. Hanley also is needed and he has to produce.

My b rother and his wife rode the storm out by sleeping in the hallway while the windows rattled in the 100+ mph wind but came through it all with only minor property damage. Thanks for the kind words.

My input leaned more toward 2nd half issues which seem to impact Bogey. Whatever is going on, injuries, mental issues, lack of effective coaching, he seems to lapse after4 the as break.

There is a discussion going on of who we should make the 11 playoff pitchers should we make it in. Most are obvious, with the question marks being Price (in my opinion he won't be ready) and Barnes. We have Smith and Maddocks with a chance. Barnes has looked awful at times. So we have 4 starters and our 5th starter probably with be added as long relief. We have Kimbel, Kelly, Reed, and Workman. So with 2 more slots available, would you take a lefty in Scott, or Smith or Maddocks and would you take Barnes or Price? I think we can wait to make that decision to see who remains impressive.

I can't remember what part of the season that Bogey was moved to third. In retrospect, his performance in the second half of most seasons has fallen off. Could it be the move to 3rd coincided with the 2nd half doldrums he seems to wind up in each year?

It was up to me, I load up the batting order with our best in a row and hope to score the runs there. I believe the player hitting third should be a good contact hitter and one capable of driving the ball. Some statisticians believe otherwise, I think they are totally wrong.

If you tried to find a correlation factor using Crystal ball, I think it would be a futile exercise. I would look for other reasons.

Xander the Enigma Xander is listed at 6'1" 210# and is a young but experienced player just turning 25 Oct 1st. He is athletic and has good speed. He is not a flashy fielder but okay at short. He will always be mid pack or below in that regard. To me though he is an enigma at the plate. Looking at a few statistics, including this incomplete year and not putting in his very limited year of 2013, will give one an idea of inconsistency, not explained by injury or pitchers finding the holy grail against him, but a series of ups and downs. Note that I have put a (1) after the year to designate pre-all star break figures and a (2) for post all star break BA RBI OPS HR 2014 (1) 235 22 658 6 2014(2) 248 24 661 6 2015 (1) 304 43 750 3 2015 (2) 337 38 803 4 2016 (1) 329 56 863 10 2016 (2) 253 33 729 11 2017 (1) 303 41 806 6 2017 (2) 200 12 573 2 In both 2016 and 2017 he has shown a steep drop off in his hitting and in this year precipitous. Hard to figure since one would expect a player gaining his experience would actually be able to avoid late season slumps. Also a person of his size would provide more power. He certainly hasn't earned a big raise going forward and it is hard to know what to do with a soon to be 25 year old who is otherwise a good yooung man who may still have some upside. As a minimum, I would say he should get a new hitting coach and go over the fundamentals of his plate mechanics going forward, and work on those things this off season. If he can't find a way out of these funks he gets into then I suggest that is time to trade him and look for someone who can be more productive. I wouldn't do that until the trade deadline next year and see if he can improve himself and realize the gifts that he seems to have.

If you went up and down the Sox lineup to identify our best hitters to the so so ones and then those who are hardly ML level, how would you score them. Not by batting average or OPS, but what you can see they are capable of with some consistency in the second half. To me it is as follow: 1. Nunez 2. Pedey Significant drop off 3. Beni 4. Devers Small drop off 5.Betts 6. Vaz 7. Moreland Another small drop off 8 Rameriz 9 Bradley 10 Travis 11. Lin 12. Bogaerts Still lower 13. Leon 14. Marrero 15. Holt 16. Young Of these, the ones with redeeming defensive qualities include Bradley, Travis (rookie), Lin (rookie), Bogaerts (possibly could be able to make adjustments, but needs an overhaul at the plate), Leon (always can use a good defensive catcher) I would keep outright or in some cases attempt to trade for better.

Watching the game play out last night with our depleted lineup, I still remained worried about an older brother (80's) who made the decision to stay in Venice, Fla rather than go into traffic with little gas or lodging available. I wanted him to drive up to North Carolina to stay with us but age gets in the way. I heard from him around 9:00 pm with hurricane force winds battering the house and water from rain rising near to the house (not storm surge). Trying to contact them but there is no power there. He and his wife are both big Sox fans.

There is a fine line between being aggressive and being stupid. Many of the contributors here agree with that and are okay with aggressiveness. There have also been many plays where our runners were out by many steps after unwisely trying to get the extra base, or were out when they didn't remember how many outs we had or were out on what appeared to be botched hit and run situations. Those are the ones that we all wish they would avoid going forward.

And today it appeared that Nunez, Haley and Pedey were not available. Some for a rest but Nunez is a little bit of an unknown given his gimpy leg the other night. It didn't give Farrell much to work with today and Cobb is a really good pitcher. What we did have looked anemic. We can use the day off that we have. Maybe our regulars will be available.

At least they extended Cobb that inning. Between Vaz and Holt, he had to throw 11 pitches. Maybe he will only last a full 6 innings. No one other than Vaz is hitting much.

wasn't there also $32 million for Allen Craig? We also got nothing for that expenditure.

Just Hanley being Hanley and having a goldilocks moment that doesn't turn out to be "just right"

Funny thing that other teams are considering Machado as a possible short stop as he has tremendous fielding ability. The point is he probably can do both.

Machado could possibly play short. Then you could Devers at 3rd, Machado at short and still have room for a good player at first, assuming Hanley is no longer with the club for the 2019 season. Means some hard decisions.

The Rangers put up a good fight but were unable to solve the Yankee pitching today. We have to help ourselves tonight.

Probably made the FO more gunshy of getting into these deals.

There will be enormous competiition to sign both Machado and Harper from the FA market to play in 2019. Machado is intriguing, since he can play 3rd base and possibly SS. That would give us some flexibility is structuring our team. Harper is another who will be greatly sought after. Either would come in a possibly replace a starter that we currently have in our lineup. To be competiitive, it would be a help to have rid ourselves of a $22.7 million salary who as you say has a negative WAR value. I would also hope the medical staff can get Price back to a sound condition so he can opt out of his $127 million that remains. Shedding over $50 million a year being paid to unproductive or underproductive players would allow us to be fully competitive in the FA market.

Baseball is a crazy game. Nothing is easy. They need to take it a game at a time. It would be great if the Sox build some momentum going into the playoffs, unlike last year.