oldtimer

Who will be available vs Tampa Bay. We have had Pedey on the DL and Hanly sitting? Bogey still could use more rest. Will Leon be catching Sale? Interested in the lineup in the first game against TB. They are a team with good pitching and decent hitting so we need the best we can put on the field.

Young just homered again along with a double.I think Kimmi and I preached forebearance with him as a good fielder and a decent hitter for a ultility outfielder. He certainly is coming through today. Fister has gone 5 and we have a 3 run lead. Hope JF will take Fister out at the first sign of weakness.

We have cutting edge base running. Young is hitting well today but got caught trying to stretch a double into a triple. To me, in scoring position with 2 outs is almost as good as being on third with two outs and miles better than being the third out.

Ryon Healy is the A's 1st baseman. He is a 25 year old and a big guy with power potential and I would expect fairly cheap. Why wouldn't he be in consideration?

No one has mentioned Ryon Healy of the Oakland A's, who is second on the depth chart behind Alonso, is a 1st baseman/DH prospect and a big guy with good home run power and reasonable OPS. He might be available for a reasonable price and is a 25 year old.

When Beni pulls the ball he is much more effective. He had one ground rule double into the pen in right center last night. His bat is important so lets hope he gains confidence after the great night and it carries forward.

Thanks. Upon reading it, I get the impression that a fielder could grab the top of the wall (Out of play), pull himself another couple of feet higher, catch the ball and it would be legal so long as his feet remained in or over the field of play. Not a likely play but possible. Even a fan could reach over and help pull the fielder higher, although that might be fan interference. The right field and at Fenway is low enough to allow for that and several parks have that possibility.

At this point in time it looks like the FO may have cost the team games by taking such a cautious approach with bringing him up. Whats done is done and he may well run into a cold spell. Hard to tell a great deal after a week. That siad, I am glad he is up.

So a player can make a legal catch so long as he is not touched down in the out of bounds area. If a player leaps, but has not as yet alit, even though he may have his body out of bounds he may make a legal catch? This begs the question I would think about whether the tops of the walls are out of bounds areas. For instance, if a ball hits the top of the wall in the outfield it is considered a HR. Now if a player jumps up and hits the top with his body or arm before catching the ball it seems to be called an out. Beni did it once when he caught the ball and fell into a table. I guess i would have to read the rule in total to understand the distinction.

Interesting story on WEEI which says the Sox management forbade DD from trading any of the top prospects (Groome, Chavis, Devers, Travis) to pick up players are the trade deadline. It is one of the constraints he was under, probably also with financial considerations such as not exceeding the Luxury Tax limits this year. DD did well with those limits imposed on him.

About the only major deal which DD pulled off which looks questionable at this point is Price, although even that may work out better with some luck. Thornburg was unlucky as was Smith and the hope is we get something next year from those guys.

JF has to try to get Beni hitting again to fulfill the capability of this team and tonight will be that attempt. I have been watching him hit and he still seems to have a pretty swing so maybe somethig about his plate approach is being worked on. I would like to see him pull more often rather than hit weaker balls to left field and also be a little more aggressive going on an earlier pitch. Saying that, I really don't see major flaws but the results haven't been good of late. JBJ has also gone into another slump. In the past, his swing was long and he was getting past that but seems to be chasing more now. Moving Beni to 2nd and JBJ to 9th and Devers to 5th may help and it can't hurt. Love to see them beat Bauer tonight.

Baseball is a crazy sport. One of the oddest games last night that I have ever lived through.

The runs are coming from unexpected places. Nunez, Devers, Moreland, Vazquez are getting in the mix. Maybe it will spread as Betts got a couple of hits. JBJ has gone cold again and Bogaerts has shown some small signs of life which Beni isn't getting into the lineup in favor of Holt who is also contributing. Crazy game last night as I had shut down when I thought Moreland had struck out last night only to wake this morning to see he reached base on a wild pitch and then Vaz hit the home run. Crazy. Both cleveland and the Sox BP's weren't able to hold leads last night.

We scored well tonight but Cleveland has a good lineup and got to Sale and then our BP gave up what would have been a nice win. Cracks have begun to show in Kimbrel's invincibility. Notthing to do but to move on. We got good contributions from many in the lineup with Holt looking better than Beni at this juncture. JBJ is sliding back into a slump snf Bogie is showing signs, but is still not fully back.

Ouch. Kimbrel not only gives up a HR to tie the game, he loads the bases and makes a wild pitch to give Cleveland the lead. What else can go wrong?

Big ifs. How long do you suppose Devers and Nunez will stay on fire? We do need the strong parts of our batting order to do a lot more. Hope they do!

We heard over and over how Devers was Ethelred the Unready. Several of us said the Sox coaching and FO were in the best position to make that decision but also added that when he does come up if he looks like an all-star it will make the delay look stupid. Devers got 4 hits again tonight. It probably can't last, but he certainly has been impressive to date and with Nunez he is making the Sox offense almost respectable. How many games might he have got that one big hit we were so lacking?

Maybe Fister replaces Price, especially if David has a worse strain than we have been given to believe.

I thought we were dead meat tonight against Cleveland with Fister pitching. Instead, Fister had a good game and showed he still could be valuable. Cleveland is a tough lineup and to hold them scoreless for 7 2/3 innings and to do it emphatically was encouraging. Meanwhile our 217 million dollar man sits with a sore forearm. With Reed we now have a reliever we should have had with Thornberg. Pitching is still good.

Another gaff tonight. Mookie makes a catch in right field and has the chance to double the man returning to first but doesn't because he doesn't remember how many outs. The result is the Guardians score two and threatened for more. These things keep happening to us. I'm sure they happen to other teaams as well, nobodys perfect, but they seem to happen often with the Sox.

Funny how we get Nunez and bring up Devers and they are both hitting like major parts of our lineup, while against the same pitchers we aren't getting much from Mookie, Beni, Hanley and Bradley at times. Thats not to mention Moreland who was talked about by the color man tonight as falling away when he swings, something I had mentioned earlier. Bogaerts just looks messed up at the plate, although somehow he managed to hit t he ball hard. Maybe that is just him but he has so much odd movement in his swing it is hard to believe that makes him a better hitter. He is a pretty big guy who shows little power. Pedey is injured but will likely hit once back. We need more than a couple of guys who are hitting with authority to have a dangerous offense. Are the guys not coachable or not being coached?

We may really need one but are unlikely to get one. The message is wait til next year.

Sounds like we gave up a law firm like Dewey, Cheatem and Howe of the old Bob and Ray show. I like getting Reed and would have liked it more earlier as we did need a solid setup man/Closer. Like Nunez, who has also been good, the problem will be trying to sign them to contracts next year with our youngsters coming on. Can our pickups along with Devers get us to a wild card spot? Only if guys like Betts, Beni and Bogaerts give us more. DD probably did as much as he could considering the likely constraints he was under. You can question the decision not to bring Devers up earlier. You can wonder about poor game management and/or coaching, and you can wonder about why so many of our players have performed below exppectations. You can wonder why our biggest money acquisition is popping off and not getting disciplined. To be fair, the team has suffered injuries to Pedey, Bogaerts and Moreland and Rameriz has been playing with pain so some of the problems could be related to those issues, but the general malaise seems to go deeper. I don't think spending big on another quality bat would have righted the ship.

Is that we get, 2 months of control. With the Yankees getting Gray, it is likely that we are playing for a wild card. With Beni and Betts still mired in a slump and Price out for whatever reason, our chances are pretty slim. Looking at the trade in that light you can wonder if it was worth it. In terms of quality it was good, same with Nunez. Can we keep them in contracts in follow on years? Only if we stand up to the bar and that will be difficult.