Hugh2

They could be secondary pieces for a decent rental if a team values them higher than the Red Sox. Meidroth is starting to intrigue me, I've never given him much thought because the scouting worries me in that the underlying metrics tells he's a guy who can't impact the ball and will be exposed at the higher level. But he's been nailing the ball lately so I'm wondering if something is changing with him.

Re read your post, and look up those ages.

How many times a day do you stare at yourself in the mirror with a little finger mustache and say "Those are the facts!!!! and the FACTS! are undisputed" in a deep voice?????

I'm going to look for some examples, but I'm certain top 100 prospects have been traded for rentals before. And depending on who's list you're using you're getting 1-4 guys who are above Fitts and not even top 100, and you got two guys top 10 behind Fitts. EDIT: wait, I think I pretty much agree with your post. But, to be fair Sandlin is ranked below Fitts

I would be semi surprised if we got him without parting with a top 10 prospect, certainly not the top 3 though. That would shock and maybe even upset me.

possibly, possibly they jump on it. or not.

Exactly, just because a team is trading away a guy doesn't mean they don't think highly of them. You have to give something to get something. But it is also certainly true that every team has their own evaluation method and metrics and some teams are going to value guys in our system higher than we do (and lower).

Yes, buying a rental doesn't diverge from the "long term plan" which I didn't know trading away all your prospects was part of that plan. A rental shoulnd't cost you those top guys, Think of it this way, Whatever Flaherty would cost, he'd cost 3X the amount if he had mutliple years of team control. I'm all for a rental. Good teams rent.

BTV accepts Justin Slaten for Jack Flaherty, realistically they may want another prospect in the trade. Maybe a lower level guy. Slaten/BJordan. I'd do this in a heartbeat.

Someone like Flaherty might be a good FA candidate this winter as well, not only can you rent him for a playoff run but you can get a good look at him, build raport and see if he's someone you want to sign long term.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/07/top-50-trade-candidates-mlb-trade-deadline-2024.html Flaherty is ranked the #1 rental arm on the market. Obviously this is a subjective topic, but there really aren't many better options out there......imagine being unhappy with the Sox going out and buying the top rental????

So vague, no real answer. So any guy that gets traded must of have something wrong with them? In that case, I suppose we shouldn't trade for anyone.

If I don't get traded to a contender I quit

I'm surprised these guys at the top get above full slot. Like.......he would really turn down 9 million and return to school as a senior and risk a payday over 800k? As I'm typing this I started to think about nil money, I have no ideal what these kids are getting paid in college.

Well if you “do your homework” you would know now wouldn’t you?

Sox took Zach Ehrhard at 115. MLB ranked him 221, Baseball America ranked him 399, perfect game ranked him 133. That’s 3 boards and every team has their own board. Thats why I say when fans say “they should have taken this guy over that guy” I say they don’t know what they’re talking about. They’re going off of one board, and it’s not even the best board…just a public one. They don’t know….and neither do I.

Add: Brady Tygart may also eclipse any bonus given to a pitcher since 2017. But Tolle and Cason will certainly eclipse any number given since Tanner.

Or at least that’s what I always thought we meant by BPA. Maybe I’ve had it wrong all these years

Wait, I just realized. Most people don’t know that BPA is almost always mostly about your first round pick. You always want to nail that pick. You don’t think teams are filling organizational needs afterwards? There’s the same amount of pitchers and hitters on every team; top to bottom up the system. You nail your first pick, then after that you’re may be going BPA according to more of needs at some point….you just have too, you can’t carry 25 pitchers in Salem, or 25 “Short stops” in Greenville. Teams have a very clear ideal who they think is the best player available at #8 or #12 in a draft. Do people actually think by the time they get down to #250 that they have a clear cut BPA? Rather than tranche of players they all put in the same tier? It’s like rankings. Most people clearly can say Marcelo Mayer and Roman Anthony are our two top prospects. Do people actually think people definitively can say Jojo ingressia is better than Noah Dean? Sox did just that, and just what I predicted. They went position player in the first round then focused on position. And guess what? So did most teams. This draft set a record for pitchers being drafted and also the least amount of high school players were taken in the top 10 rounds ever. Ever. In the end, the Sox took 14 pitchers, only TWO more than last year. The biggest difference is Cason and Tolle will probably get bigger bonuses than the Sox have paid out since Tanner Houck.

There's also something to the "do what you're good at" argument. Sox have always been better at drafting and developing position players. The fact that Bloom was trigger shy wasn't an indictment in that, it was a seperate issue. They always could have traded for pitching, it's been done. Luis Basabe, Yoan Moncada, and Victor Diaz were all position players they trade for SALE. I think we all agree the Sox could do more in drafting and developing players. But they've also ignored the IFA market and the free agent market to bring in talent as well over the years. If the Sox are going to spend less on position players and more on pitchers in the draft then then better have the infrastructure to support it. Otherwise they're just pissing away money and will be worse off for it by having less Roman Anthony's and Marcelo Mayers in the system. Just drafting more pitchers alone means jack s***. Just go ask the Angels how that works. They drafted 20 out of 20 pitchers in 2022 and have little to show for it. Caden is their top ranked prospect, but he's not top 100 and after that they only have two other top 20 prosepcts in Mederos and Hurtado at 13 and 18. Keep in mind they have what is considered the worse system in baseball, they're ranked dead last by both fangraphs and MLB.

Not the worse outcome in life. Got 1 million dollars to play ball, went pro (more than most people can ever say) now he has a good job and is married to Jenny Dell. Perspective is everything.

Time and time again we see examples of player development not being linear. People almost expect players to be Mookie Betts or bust. Take a guy like Vaughn Grissom, maybe he’s the next star, or maybe….hes the next Middlebrooks and after a brief stint of MLB success never finds it again.

Agreed, this draft was obviously a glimpse of a change of philosophy the Sox have made and a statement about piliing more resources into pitching. I'm hoping one of these offseasons this also translates into buying a big name FA pitcher. This offseason will be a big test, Breslow will have a full year under his belt, and all things considered the 2024 team will be coming off a very good season in which they performed much better than expected, likely they will fall short of a WS but most fans will feel more optimistic about the future after 2024. They will also have names like Burnes and Fried on the board.

The reason why you never draft for need is because your organziational needs are going to be 100% different by the time these guys get to the majors. You draft, roughly 50% pitchers and 50% hitters every single year. For the most part, little has changed as the Sox drafted 2 pitchers more this year than last year....2. However there is this. Here are the BA rankings of the Sox pitchers drafted in this draft. 82 212 289 124 210 175 Sox took roughly the same number of pitchers in last years draft but here are their BA rankings 474 385 That is all. Its fun to look at the "SS' or the "P" next to their name, but it's the $$$$$ that matters.

Drafting for need? I mean I suppose they needed a new catcher in the low minors. I think you have it mixed up for a few reasons. First off, it's not so much that they draft pitching, but it's how highly those guys are regarded and how much money they put into them. There's a difference between drafting a pitcher in the 2rd round and paying him a million dollars vs. Drafting Dalton Rodgers and paying him $447k Secondly, the "drafting highschool short stops" is insanely misleading. They aren't drafting highschool short stops, they're drafting baseball players. When they draft a SS out of highschool, they're drafting the best player available and moving him to 3B, to 2nd, to LF, to CF, to RF etc etc etc. You literally don't have to go any further back than last year to find a bunch of short stops playing all those positions know. They're not drafting these guys to "flip them" The Sox have two players drafted as SS playing LF/RF/3B in Worcester (Yorke/Lugo/Meidroth), down in Portland Kristian Campbell who was drafted as a SS has been playing mostly 2nd and CF, the list goes on. Thirdly, this draft was considered the weakest in high school position players in years. https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/2024-mlb-draft-class-could-be-among-weakest-ever-for-high-schoolers/ In the end, they drafted only 2 more pitchers last year than they did this year. 14 pitchers vs. 12. You're drafting SS because 1/2 your roster is positions players so natually about 1/2 your draft is going to be position players. So if the best player on your HS/college team is a short stop, then with the caveat of the occasional catcher or outfielder than it makes sense and follows logic that a lot of your picks are going to be short stops. I like the new strategy, and it's something I said I think the Sox might exactly do earlier in the year. Admitedly to get under some skin I said "watch the Sox go position player #1 and then draft primarily pitchers the rest of the way" But I wasn't surprised that was actually the case. If you look at the draft year after year, for the most part, they've always drafted 1/2 pitchers. It's the money and investment that has lacked. 50% of their bonus pool is still going to a position player this year, it's not like Montgomery is going to be a huge underslot pick and they drafted a bunch of highly ranked pitchers afterwards they're going to throw money at is Conrad Cason who guess what?????? is 50% SS