drewski6

If they were all 28 years old and you had Ortiz at 1b, Tek at C, Vmart at DH, Youk at 2b, Beltre at 3b, and pedey at ss .....you are prob winning a world series.

So we started giving Tek some days off to get vmart in there more, we started playing youk at 3b and even 2b sometimes to get vmart in there more. Pedey might have played SS from time to time but the team had a SS (Scutaro?). But this was like 2010. In the middle of a 15 year window when we were aggressive about adding quality bats. In that window we won the series 4 times. Since we switched to the joe brady model 5 years ago, wwhere we have to be super efficient that every player must have a spot and we cant have any overflow, starter level depth on our bench, and we must prioritize obp, defense, and pitching - we have never gotten past the first round of the playoffs or finished higher than third in the division.

We had Youk (1B), Lowell (3b), Papi (DH), Tek (C) and we wanted Vmart, despite the fact that at this point in all of their careers , they were prob all best served as DHs, as Tek was 37, lowells knee was shot, youk had gotten chubby, and vmart was always a bat first guy. You know how that movie ended? We got Vmart and were better for it. We didnt stress about who played where. We didnt freak at the d taking a modest step back. We moved guys around and figured it out. We used Youks positional versatility to rotate players. We didnt let not having a place to play vmart stop us from getting a good player in vmart. Because in those days we tried harder. Thats why this year(s) 2009,2010 altho not winning it all in those years, the aggressive team building mentality that you saw in that era had 4 world championships in 15 years and this was right in the middle of it.

If Youk agrees to diet , Im in.

Folks, if we cannot get CJ Abrams because then we would not have a SS to play SS, then Durbin needs to go. You see, Durbin is a defense first guy. As is Abreu, Cedanne. And if Catcher and shortstop, we must prioritize defense there as well....Well, this is how you get the easy out , send em home, scored 4 runs last 2 september and octobers combined (thats 1 run/month for 4 months, albeit not in a row)...the noodlebat Red Sox. See personally, I think many of you are too hard on JH. Because you blame him for not spending magical dollars on pretend players that dont exist. There are very very very few guys who are elite on both offense and defense. And if there are 6 in the MLB, maybe 1 is realistically acquirable. You have to give up one to get the other, usually. So what do you do? You get an elite offense and a bunch of pitchers who can strike guys out. In the words of the great Billie Eilish: Duh And MVP was very very very right, generally defense first players are cheaper. Its because usually the d first players go to teams like the pirates. You know who is not stacking championships? The pirates! The atheltics! The well we cant afford bats, so we'll get defense first guys. Yeah, that makes sense, if you cant get OFFENSE FIRST GUYS. You see some time ago, some of you got so in love with pointing out to your friends things that you think they cant see for themselves , like defensive fundamentals, and so you grew to love such player types. But if you would only get over the smell of your own farts, you would realize that the issue holding us back. The reason we cant get out of third place or win a playoff series isnt because JH is too cheap to get us 2 way studs. That makes no sense because 2 way studs are not free-agents. Ever. Its not the budget. Its not the cheapness. Its the choice to not put the bats first. Im okay with a few defense first players. But really, we should be prioritizing good bats who can play a bunch of positions serviceably, so even if we have some injuries or fall-offs, we can still juggle around a bit and be very good offensively without being awful defensively. defensive versatility > chasing ideal defensive alignment Offense = Pitching + Defense

If you are not going to spend the money to be competitive every year, you do not try to not be terrible every year. You do not try to treat all years equally. You use windows. Or youll just never make a deep run.

But right now, its not particularly fair to go on ur RS fans are impossible to please shtick. Because we havent won a playoff series in 6 years or finished higher than 3rd in teh division.

But fans that get mad when we win 2 championships in a row and then dont sign the most expensive FA are annoying too.

Complacency can be a trap.

The hardest team to jump is the second best team, ya know? Its easy to go from 30th to 25th, its absurdly difficult to go from 6th to 1st. Even though in both cases you are jumping 5 teams. Similarly, it is harder to go from average to good on offense than it is to go from bad to average. But going from good to great, thats very very hard and requires to you potenitally trade up some .750 bats to .850 bats.

I will accept your context.

I think the results we are getting match up with what we are doing.....We manage like a third place team. We are a third place team. We arent bad. We are above average even. But its a place where you can complacent, get stuck, and be a decent but not elite team for too long.

Im not sure thats the right approach if I was to even accept a reality where we are never going to be players for great players at market rate. Because if you think we have this guy who is just going to be awesome, and in 3 years hes going to be making 50m, so lets give him 30myr/7 yrs, only way we can keep him beyond the 3....But you are giving him such a raise in those first three years, where if you would just leave him cheap , its possible that you would have the resources to put a really good team around him. So I think if we are being serious and seriously considering how we are going to be perpetually under funded vs some teams, then to compete with these teams despite having less, we should not look to take a smooth it out approach. And extend. I think if this were the case, and Im not saying it is, we may be better served by circling 3-5 year windows and building towards that. And if you are on teh eve of a 3 yr window and you ahve roman making 900k, it doesnt make much sense to extend him at that point vs keep him cheap and build around him. Id rather take some years off to rebuild. I would rather build , play the youth, focus on the future, then flip a switch and focus on the present when that window comes, then stink again. This is not your approach as you are always concerned about a contract being bad in its final years, but with my plan, if those final years are after your window closes , thats okay. So you can be more aggressive in the season in which you are actually going for it....And if you are trying to swing up, you may need that advantage. Sucking in 2028, 2029 and being willing to suck in 2034, 2035 can be a big advantage to having a superstar team in 2031,2032,2033.....Because in 2031 FA, you arent scared to give a 6 yr deal to an aging player because thats your window. And in 2028, 2029 you can play your kids to see what they got. But the redsox just try to be .500, third place, half win-half sell, balance, balance, balance....And I think this is why the results are what they are. Never above third place. First round playoff exit when you make it....

If a 1055 OPS gives you a guy who you must play at SS despite the fact that he is bad at SS due to the awesome OPS What does that number adjust to if the player is average at SS but not bad? What about if we move him to 3b or 2b? If a 1.055 OPS gets you in at SS despite being an awful defender, then I would assume that .900 gets you in there at SS if you are just an avg defender (vs bad) and then .800 if you are 2b/3b. My point is that there is a point where your bat plays. What point that is depends on how good the bat is, the defense, the positional importance. And I believe that most defense first players are placeholders.

Almost like even at ss an on fire bat more than compensates for a bad defensive player?