Hugh2

Add: I know you weren't comparing Perales to Mata, but I think Luis has shown us more and given us a lot more hope than Mata ever has.

Yeah, I don't like giving up Perales, but the reality is he's the type of prospect you'd have to include in a basket of prospects so it's whatever. I didn't want to trade Teel, and Montgomery either but that's the price of admission and to be honest, I'm not even thinking about those guys right now.

So Campbell made the team before Mayer and Anthony just as I predicted. I poke at Notin, I had to have my fun. Honestly, a tad just a wee bit surprised. I agree with the last 4 sentences to a T. I figured the Sox may use Campbells struggles as a reason to give him just a little bit more seasoning in AAA and see if Hamilton/Grissom could figure things out. I was a little late to the Campbell bandwagon because I read into the scouting reports about his unorthodox swing and the pessimism that created. But last year he slowly turned all his doubters into believers and a lot of those concerns have been eased. Nothing is guaranteed in this life, and you're not a good mlb player until you're a good mlb player. But you have to love the trajectory this kid is on.

That's a lot of the pitching depth we've actually managed to start building up. I'd want to trade out one of those arms for a Mickey Romero

Good, trial by fire. Lets see if the kid can adjust. If he can, he's going to be stud.

I mean, if we were going with ST stats you'd think they 'd plug Mayer in at 2nd. But we might see a Campbell/Mayer infield at some point this year.

It's been obvious all offseason that the Sox wanted him to have the job, I thought he might be playing his way out early this spring. I think he will be fine, I'll be interested to see how he is performing come august, I won't complain if he Dustin Pedrioa's it out of the gate but I think he's going to be great once he settles in. Here's to hoping he nets them a pick amongst many other good things hopefully to come for the team.

The pitching in the system has taken a massively encouraging step forward this year so far.

ADD: I think I'm perhaps underselling the odds of a Thompson sighting in Boston this year. I can see a future scenario where due to health and/or performance someone like Anthony is already in the outfield and Campbell is in the infield and then when Refsnyder goes down Thompson comes up to be the RHH platoon outfielder. That's what he is. The back up platoon corner outfielder.

Thompson is the type of guy who sign to start the year in AAA, maybe you need him maybe you don't and he's likely DFA'd at some point mid to late season. You add guys to the bottom of your roster like that every year. I would not be surprised if he had zero at bats in Boston.

Base case, base. Best case would be Story Colorado shows up, Casas is a middle of the order bat, Bregman and Devers are all stars, Duran does not regress, Rafaela improves, and Campbell and Anthony are absolute studs.

I think base case scenario the lineup is marginally better than last year. Which if the defense and pitching can improve a little should be fine enough to make them a contender. Guys like Story and Casas who only got 94 and 212 at at bats could make the lineup look different if they are healthy this year. And if any of the youngsters step up with Bregman added the lineup could look very different by the end of the year than what we saw last.

I think Duran might regress a little with the bat, but his defense is legit.

No that's exactly what I mean, your 5th starter should be your 5th best starter. Perhaps a better way to say it is, you 5 best starting pitchers should be your #1 #2 #3 #4 #5 starter. We all know there's a spot open and guys are competing for it. I could care less if they actually end up being the 1st or 5th best starter. That's irrelevant. Whoever looks best between Priester/Fitts, assuming one of them looks capable, in a couple weeks from now should get the node.

Whoever looks like they're one of the best 5 starting pitchers on March 26th, that's who should be the 5th starter.

But did they say at what level? they may be looking for depth or even a guy to fill a spot in Worcester if Campbell or Anthony start the year in the bigs. At the very least, I find it hard to believe they're not looking for something lesser than a starting caliber player.

I'm all for defferals, but 25 million a year isn't a budget breaker for an ace. The years is a lot of risk, but if you sign a premium free agent at 30 you're likely paying him into his late 30's, rather than his mid 30's and getting his prime years. Given Crochetts thin track record for starting that may be too much of a risk for some to swallow, but it's the kind I would hope the Sox would make if they really really believed in a guy.

I was going to say an extension might come around the $225 number. That seems high, but if it was for 9 years, you'd be paying him 25 million a year until he's 34. That's a lot of risk. But he, and the Sox are probably looking at a much smaller window that allows him to hit FA again around 30 years old. Still, If they believe in him I'd take that big swing.

#1 Prospect in baseball holds a lot more value than the #4 prospect in your system. Kopech was also very highly regarded at the time, after he was traded after that year he was a top 25 prospect when the next set of rankings went out. This haul might work out better for Chicago, but at the time the Sale deal was a bigger package.

That's the way the game is played. A bird in hand is worth 2 in the bush, but it the open market of MLB baseball a high end talent like crochet is worth 3 birds in the bush. If all the prospects pan out, or even just two hit their ceiling it's going to look like the Sox got fleeced. But for a point of reference in Yoan Moncada, Luis Basabe and Michael Kopech all hit their ceiling that would have looked like an awful trade on our part, but in the end you don't complain if the guy you got does what he's supposed to do. In a fair trade, it hurts both sides, both sides have to feel like they're winning the trade.

This is also the time of year where everything is amplified in the media and teams are overcautious. It's kind of hard to tell at first glance if an injury is bad and concern is warranted or a team is just being cautious. I'd bet there are many times a guy walks into camp feeling a little off, a little sore, where they might play during the regular season but because it's spring training they're just shut down. It's very telling that he's taking BP and plans to play this Saturday, it might just be caution and nothing else. If he ends up not playing this weekend.....I'd start to be a little bit more concerned.

Exactly

shooting a basketball isn't max effort, but jumping 40-48 inches vertically off the ground is. And they do that after running up the court as opposed to at rest (which actually might make jumping with max effort more safe for a short duration of time until one fatigues)

I beg to differ, I think my comparison has been misunderstood. Elbow flexion is elbow flexion, 65% max heart rate is 65% max heart rate, maximum effort is maximum effort. Whether you're sprinting up the court or sprinting towards a line drive if you're going 100% your body is it's ATP-PC & Lactic acid system for that short burst of energy. so on and so forth. Your body doesn't differentiate, it's the function of the movement that determines the risk regardless of what we call the sport. Jumping is jumping, running is running, diving is diving; on a physiological level the body does not discriminate. Obviously the nature of each sport is different, and puts strains on the human body in different ways; in basketball ankle sprains are much more common for example. Now just like in basketball how someone could tired from running up and down the court all day I could buy the possibility that shorter periods of rest could tire an arm out quicker. However, I see many pitching injuries as chronic injuries resulting from years and years of unnatural movement, they're not an acute sports injury like rolling an ankle. I think shorter periods of time between pitches just tires pitchers out quicker, and in turn might actually preserve their arms in the long run if it leads to lower pitch counts. I'd be interesting if any studies actually show this in the future that the pitch clock actually curves the rise in injury. However this is purely a hypothesis on my part. We've clearly seen a dramatic spike in injuries the past couple decades (especially just the last) that correlates and has been corroborated with studies showing it to be a function of throwing harder and an uptick that started well before the pitch clock. I'm open to possibly being wrong, but until there's evidence that's more than just anecdotal that's how I feel.

They've done studies on what people think about studies.