Hugh2

No it’s not crazy at all. All players (or people) progress and learn differently, progress isn’t linear. We don’t know how much adjusting to mlb pitching at same time as learning a new position no matter how much easier it’s supposed to be has effected Bobby. This doesn’t excuse his level of play, but I don’t think we can write it off either. If his bat stays hot, or perhaps a more reasonable request is to ask his inevitable cold streaks aren’t as bad ensue he’s probably penciled himself into at least consideration at 1B in 2022 with the hope Casas is ready mid 2022. People might be surprised by how much he can improve with a full offseason. With that said, I’m going to be 100% not shocked if the Sox sign a 1 year stop gap at first base for 2022.

He also has a 161 OPS plus in the 2nd half of the season.

"other things on his mind" encompassed all things baseball.

It would be 100% worth the season skid to get a wild card, beat the Yankees and go on a tear.

People underestimate how much offense affects the defense. You're trying to adjust to MLB pitching, and struggling with pitchers adjusting to you while learning a new position at the same time. People assume that because it's the easiest position to play that anyone should be a better defender there than they're at the natural position. This might generally be the case but it takes time for some people, especially people like Dalbec who has his mind on many other things. This doesn't mean he's guaranteed to be a good first baseman but I don't think this argument can be dismissed either.

Exactly, and now that he seems to be finally healthy he's made big improvements, it gives you a little to dream on.

And he might have done just that.

I think a better question is what do the Yankees look like long term. They looked not too great this year and the team STILL decided to be buyers at the deadline. Right now that looks like a good decision and is EASILY worth it if you guys add another ring to your "modest" collection. But you guys paid a pretty high price if you don't win it all this year. Good luck.

I mean....who does? But you're not wrong he's perceived ceiling has definitely taken a hit. Groome will become whatever he becomes. I have a feeling that if he can stay healthy then he's going to exceed expectations, I forsee a #3 #4 pitcher, and a good #3 #4 pitcher at that.

Do you think that his OPS+ for his first full season clearly represents his value over anything else? This assumes that teams don't consider age, progression, potential, splits, trends, and other various factors.

If the Sox view him as their 1B in 2022 then he's definitely not trade-bait. If the Sox want a stop-gap there for Casas and a team wants to buy high on him then why not?

Not really, it's not as if they traded off 1/3 of their farm for Rizzo +

Because he WAS better at 3B than he was at 1B, the scouting report you reference projected him as an average defender there. I've seen Dalbec play both 3B and 1B............He's better at 3B. You're using logic here MVP and your logic is sound. 1B is easier to play, anyone should hypothetically be better at 1B than they're at 3B, but for whatever reason Dalbec became a worse 1bman than he was a 3rd baseman.

He's been walking more lately. His OBP has gone up a full .100 in the second half.

He projected as an average defender at 3B even after taking a step back in 2019. You're assuming that because his defense sucks at 1B that he would continue to regress and look horrible at 3B. No point in comparing him to Devers, he's never going to play 3B over Devers on THIS team but another team might like him better back at 3B.

He's not an upgrade over Devers, his defense might just be average there as opposed to below average at 1B (which doesn't make much sense but that's the way it's). This might make him more valuable to another team than he is to us, especially if he doesn't fit into the long term plans. Maybe they work with Dalbec in the offseason and improve his play there, if he can walk more he might be a much better hitter next year too.

No he should not, he's fine in the role he's in now and it sets him up beautifully to slide into the rotation next year.

I think people forget that Dalbec came up as a 3rd baseman was actually considered pretty good there. He has plenty of length and more than enough arm and was only moved to 1B because of a guy named Rafael Devers. Dalbec is probably not as bad as he was the first month of the season and not as good as he's been the last month. I wonder if Bobby is trade bait if a team can use a 3B. I think Xander eventually moves off of SS, but I don't think that will happen for another year or two, but I agree they could eventually sign a guy to play there and move Xander to 3B/2B I'm just not sure next year is the year to tie up more money on the lineup when the rotation needs some love. I think most permutation of the Sox offseason revolves around getting a stopgap guy at 1B with the assumption/hope that Casas finds his way there in mid 2022/early 2023. I was thinking that guy could be Schwarber, but for a guy who many thought could play 1B he's not been playing any 1B. Although that's probably partially due to Durans struggles, Arroyos inability to stay on the field, and Dalbecs success at the plate recently.

So he's now a 23-year-old (by one week) who is in AA. Given all the time he's missed and a completely lost Covid season it's kind of amazing to think he's here and could be knocking on the door towards the end of next season.

I completely and wholeheartedly agree. Everything has a price, but I do think there's value in continuity in terms of connecting with a fan base and building goodwill towards current and future players in your organization. Now who do you trade, and who do you build around? That's Blooms jobs.

Yeah, I thought not spending capital on expensive starters when you had Sale coming back and getting a bargain on Schwarber (compared to what Rizzo cost) was a real steal, but the bullpen arms were a head-scratcher. I know Robles had been good against lefties so he made sense but they really could have used an extra late-inning bullpen arm. Ottavino and Barnes are just taxed, I brought this up over a month ago too. I said that Barnes was on pace to throw a record number of innings and that if the bullpen is not managed better it's going to start falling apart. It's not all on the bullpen, the starters in the lineup have been very lackluster lately too. In the beginning of the season, the lineup seemed very unbalanced and top-heavy but it didn't seem to matter because all those guys were racking, but not they're starting to get exposed. It's not that I'm giving up on the season, but things don't look great. We could very easily be looking back at the end of this year and have witnessed the Sox pull it back together while teams like NY and TB go on to slump, it sure doesn't look that way now but they could saying in NY come October that they peaked too soon.

If he was a stud. Sox started Xander Bogaerts at 20 years old. Yes, he's a hitter and not a pitcher but the lesson is the same. If you're a phenom you fly through a system quickly, but we shouldn't expect most players to progress like that.

Exactly. Fans evaluate games on a game-by-game basis. We reset after every single game. A good manager has to think about 162 games. Cora might of been able to save Whitlock for yesterday and we would have won that game, ok great, good manager who managed for Sunday better.....but in that world, we might end up losing on Saturday.

True, he easily could have been told "go improve the pitching staff" or "don't feel like you don't need to improve the pitching staff" But we do know that ownership was trying to get under the cap this year. A team like Boston that hovers right around the cap gets under it to reset and go back over. With that in mind, no good G.M. is going to blow their load prematurely. He knows he's going to be able to spend big soon, and if he's a good G.M. he's going to wait for that window to spend assets. His only tool to improve the pitching staff would be to trade away the farm, and the farm system had been very weak until recently. Now the farm system is improved he will have more resources to make the moves some of us want to see within that window. That may be frustrating for that fan that demands instant gratification but it's good planning. Also, the pitching staff this year has been good. Ok they haven't been that good but they've been MUCH better than they were last year and have been good enough. Despite some recent struggles the overall majority of losses during the last 6-8 weeks seem to be more on the offense than the pitching.

It’s true that our stock rising also has to do with teams like NY emptying their farm system. It’s the depth comment that got Me. Prospects in the 20th-40th range is as about as strong as I’ve ever seen it. Yes, most of their guys will bust, but you probably have a regular or two in there, maybe a few role players and a reliever or two and just maybe an all star. They might only be up 1 top 100 prospect because of Mayer, but the depth of the system has taken huge leaps forward and much of it has been organic.