Hugh2

I know the minor league reserve list went from 180 down to 165 but was that this year or did that start last year???

That's right, I had forgotten about that. Still, that movie is a classic, I think I may rewatch it tonight.

Do people truly believe Henry wants the team to tank and lose on purpose so he can sell the team? This isn't a Charlie Sheen movie, that logic makes zero sense.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/39763512/sources-mlbpa-call-majority-players-ask-removal-bruce-meyer Very interesting read.

Didn't he turn down 150/6 from the Yankees? This might be conjecture, but I feel Montgomery might not get another chance at a payday like Snell might if he performs and opts out. If there's something out there in the 90-95/5 range I wonder if he just takes out, maybe the contract can have some vesting options at the tail end of it to get him in the 140-145 range if he performs which would be close to his original asking price. I don't think the Sox should up their anti, if anything they should be more reserved going after these big guys on this current team, but I'd still sign him for whatever deal you were willing to sign him to prior. You have your evaluations, and if you have some faith in them and some conviction.....just go do that.

How about sunrise and sunset where we see vivid reflections of tangerine, magenta and all kinds of shades of grey. Light is pretty awesome.

Rafaela only got 282 at bats above AA last year. We've seen the "but he looks so good in spring training" mantra before with guys like JBJ. If he's truly ready, a month in AAA isn't going to stunt his growth, it's not like he still doesn't have things to work on. Getting the extra year of team control is just a plus, and one I wouldn't even consider if the team was confident he was ready and he plugged up a big hole and the team looked prime to compete, but they do not. It makes all the sense in the world to give him a month down in AAA.

1. Yankees 95 wins 2. Orioles 94 wins 3. Jays 86 wins 4. Rays 84 wins 5. Red Sox 79 wins Orioles are loaded, but have some growing pains, Yankees are primed to climb back to the top, Jays and Rays are still good but their windows are closing and they take a step back this year leaving room for the Sox to finish as high as 3rd place if everything breaks right, which rarely happens.

So we should spend money now so we can pay Jordan from ages 32 and on when the team is good again? Why not just sign younger and better players in a year or two? Or extend our own players now to save money later?

This becomes true if you believe in building thru free agency alone. A lot of people agree with that sentiment, it’s not about not spending, it’s about timing. This isn’t exactly the time to go big. If I was the Sox I’d stand my ground, and be willing to accept Montgomery on our terms.

At this point an upgrade to the rotation would be like making home improvements right before the bank repos your home This team is weak.

That was exactly my point, they should have some conviction in their evaluations of pitchers. I still think we shouldn't underestimate the hardship of literally having to reach far back into your AAA depth and what it can do to the team/bullpen

There goes our hopes of making the playoffs

Bad ideal for two reasons. First one is more conjecture on my part but I think contrary to the norm, Pivetta may hold more value at the deadline. If his uptick is real, then he’ll have 2/3 of a season like that under his belt. Up until now he’s never been terribly good, just consistent. Secondly, even if you don’t plan on competing this year you need innings. The rotation is thin, if you trade Pivetta you have Bello Crawford Houck Whitlock Winck You know there’s at least two guy on the depth chart getting a decent amount of starts, so that means Criswell, Murphy, and Johnson are starting games. The rotation could easily be horrible.

Second marriages have higher divorce rates. Get that man away from his girlriend and lock him up in the gym!!!!!

Maybe, even with that I'm not so sure. If you look at the signing grouped together as years, they're not signing a shortage of RHB, or Pitchers out of the Dominican. Those guys just aren't trickling up to the top. I could keep buying lotto tickets and complain that they aren't hitting, I suppose the solution would be to just start buying lotto tickets that are winners. From what I've been reading lately, it seems like more money spent on pitching yields better results in the Rule 5 draft than the IFA arena anyways. But still, numbers isn't the problem, they take pitchers, most just don't pan out.

It makes sense, he has 199 AAA at bats, if he's "ready" then one more month in AAA won't hurt him. This is most certainly the year to do it. The only argument I see against this is if her performs in spring training......which if he does.....it's spring training. We've been here before.

Sox actually draft a lot more college pitchers than highschool pitchers. What they don’t do is, at least in recent years is draft them early and give them money. You can go short stop at pick #12 maybe underslot with a guy and then throw your money at pitchers with your second and third pick. Kind of similar to what they did in 2022 and it was their second 2nd pick who got the higher bonus and is a stud right now (Roman Anthony) I also think there’s so much more fluidity between picks further in the draft than there is up front. For example, you probably have a pretty darn good ideal who is the best prospect at pick number 12th, maybe that is a pitcher, maybe it’s a hitter. But I don’t think these teams definitively value the guy they have ranked 50th much better than who they have 51-60, and that concept probably grows the further down you go. I think you can easily go BPA, draft a hitter first (or not, maybe yoy go pitcher) and take pitchers with your next two picks. What I want to see overall, is more MONEY being spent on pitching in the draft. It’s not just their first pick but rather the totality of what they do with picks 1-5

Exactly my point here. But no, I am not, I am saying I can see the a scenario where the Sox start drafting pitchers higher, spend more bonus money on pitching talent, but still go position player at 12 if they think the BPA is a position player. I’m not advocating, I’m predicting.

Since 2018 the Sox have drafted: 60 pitchers 53 position players That probably surprises people, but this won’t. Those 60 pitchers have accounted for 19% of the bonus pool money while the hitters have eaten up well….81% lol. I got this information from this read, which is pretty darn good and I suggest others to take a look. http://news.soxprospects.com/2024/02/how-red-sox-draft-strategy-has-affected.html?m=1

I think the highest bonuses handed out to pitchers since Tanner in 2017 has been Drohan and Feltman, and without looking it up those guys got around 600k. Drafting a bust 11 years ago is a piss poor excuse for not spending money on pitching. They’re dead last. New prediction. This changes, Sox start spreading the wealth between pitchers and hitters in the draft starting in 2024…..but they still take a high school short stop with their first pick and the board goes ape s***. Book it

If you want to talk about Ball and Groome then yes but the later of those picks was 8 years ago. In the time since we’ve spent the least amount of money on pitching in the draft. Of course we’ve done horribly picking pitchers since, we have t even given ourselves a chance

From Dave to Craig none of these guys have any active involvement in the signing of 16 year old players from Venezuela/Dominican Republic. That’s almost solely on the international scouting department. I also highly doubt anyone can number how many pitchers/RHB we’ve taken over the last 5 years either. But I’d bet some would be surprised if they looked it up.

Terrible at drafting pitchers because we don’t invest in pitchers. I was listening to the last episode of Soxprospects yesterday and I forget the exact timeframe here but it’s been something like over the last TEN years the Red Sox are dead last in MLB in bonus money handed out to pitchers in the draft. They don’t even give themselves a chance to develop good pitching.

I think it was an excellent move, I'd love to see more of them.