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2016-2017 Red Sox Offseason (Non-Manager) Discussion
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Oct 22, 2016 4:14:01 GMT -5
Well there was a good chance Wright could of been left off the 25 man roster if everyone stayed healthy in Carson Smith and Eduardo Rodriguez. Injuries played a role and Wright was lights out in the first half and the rest is history. Now Wright looks like a mainstay in the rotation for years to come.
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Post by jmei on Oct 22, 2016 6:23:44 GMT -5
Almost nothing in that sentence is true. If you know studies that show that being injury-prone is real (excluding suspected PED users) and that E-Rod's track record passes the bar where it's significant, I'd sure like to see them. Even if they exist, it would be pretty obvious that he'd fall short of the required history. He apparently had a mechanical flaw when we got him from the Orioles, which we fixed immediately and effortlessly. And he struggled with his mechanics when he was trying to pitch with a knee brace. If that constitutes "consistently ... throughout his career," can I somehow apply that logic to my best year financially, and then call my bank? The best predictor of future injury for starting pitchers is past injury history, as measured by number of years with DL stints: www.fangraphs.com/blogs/starting-pitcher-dl-projections-part-1/"It's clear that the biggest risk factor for injury is previous injury. How big? Turns out the answer is "very."" (where any DL stint is a significant predictor of future injury): www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=19653The importance of consistent release points (as a proxy for consistency of mechanics): www.fangraphs.com/plus/the-importance-of-release-point-consistency/Biomechanics play a significant role in pitcher effectiveness and health, and are "sticky": www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/7712916/tommy-john-surgery-keeps-pitchers-game-address-underlying-biomechanical-flaw-espn-magazineAs an aside, I do sometimes cite my track record of projections and evaluations in some detail. Of players on the current roster, I was pretty much dead right on big debates about Wright, Porcello, Bradley, Ramirez, and (the previous winter) Shaw, partly right about Buchholz (correct that he'd eventually have a stretch of great pitching, wrong about the total value for the season), OK about Kelly (who looks like a relief ace rather than a #3 starter or worthless washout, which was the debate), right about key aspects of Owens (that his lack of fastball command would have no effect in MLB on the effectiveness of his changeup, and that his FB when commanded would play up beyond its measured velocity, a la Koji), right about E-Rod's upside once he got past the injury, right about Ortiz having an epic final season after just two games of data. The jury's still put on Vazquez and Pomeranz. That's a pretty good track record. I mean, Nick Cafardo thought Wright might not make the 25-man and that the hope for Porcello was that he could be a #4, and a lot of people here agreed with him. The fact that you think you were right about the "key aspects" of Henry Owens illustrates the sort of concerns I have about this ritualistic back-patting routine of yours. You're obvious a very smart guy and a great baseball analyst, but the constant cherry-picked recitation of your "track record" only ever detracts from your argument.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Oct 22, 2016 13:56:59 GMT -5
Almost nothing in that sentence is true. If you know studies that show that being injury-prone is real (excluding suspected PED users) and that E-Rod's track record passes the bar where it's significant, I'd sure like to see them. Even if they exist, it would be pretty obvious that he'd fall short of the required history. He apparently had a mechanical flaw when we got him from the Orioles, which we fixed immediately and effortlessly. And he struggled with his mechanics when he was trying to pitch with a knee brace. If that constitutes "consistently ... throughout his career," can I somehow apply that logic to my best year financially, and then call my bank? The best predictor of future injury for starting pitchers is past injury history, as measured by number of years with DL stints: www.fangraphs.com/blogs/starting-pitcher-dl-projections-part-1/"It's clear that the biggest risk factor for injury is previous injury. How big? Turns out the answer is "very."" (where any DL stint is a significant predictor of future injury): www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=19653The importance of consistent release points (as a proxy for consistency of mechanics): www.fangraphs.com/plus/the-importance-of-release-point-consistency/Biomechanics play a significant role in pitcher effectiveness and health, and are "sticky": www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/7712916/tommy-john-surgery-keeps-pitchers-game-address-underlying-biomechanical-flaw-espn-magazineAs an aside, I do sometimes cite my track record of projections and evaluations in some detail. Of players on the current roster, I was pretty much dead right on big debates about Wright, Porcello, Bradley, Ramirez, and (the previous winter) Shaw, partly right about Buchholz (correct that he'd eventually have a stretch of great pitching, wrong about the total value for the season), OK about Kelly (who looks like a relief ace rather than a #3 starter or worthless washout, which was the debate), right about key aspects of Owens (that his lack of fastball command would have no effect in MLB on the effectiveness of his changeup, and that his FB when commanded would play up beyond its measured velocity, a la Koji), right about E-Rod's upside once he got past the injury, right about Ortiz having an epic final season after just two games of data. The jury's still put on Vazquez and Pomeranz. That's a pretty good track record. I mean, Nick Cafardo thought Wright might not make the 25-man and that the hope for Porcello was that he could be a #4, and a lot of people here agreed with him. The fact that you think you were right about the "key aspects" of Henry Owens illustrates the sort of concerns I have about this ritualistic back-patting routine of yours. You're obvious a very smart guy and a great baseball analyst, but the constant cherry-picked recitation of your "track record" only ever detracts from your argument. Have you ever cited a counter-example? Without a whole bunch of counter-examples, it's hard to make an argument that I'm cherry-picking. (I was overly optimistic about Neo's progress this year, and both Ockimey and Chavis had rough stretches after their fast starts, although the former certainly enhanced his prospect status overall. But I've never argued that my track record with ml talent is as good with MLB talent, for the obvious reason that there's so much less data available.) There's no "ritualistic back-patting" going on here. I have a favorite methodology. I identify apparent performance outliers, games or stretches of games that, for one reason or another, I don't feel have predictive power. Sometimes the elimination is a priori (I know he was playing hurt and I don't think these games will be predictive), sometimes it's after the fact when I spot the outliers in the data and (usually quite quickly) derive a hypothesis as to why it might not be random. I try to derive other testable hypotheses from the initial hypothesis (usually about the deep data of the outlier performance), and test them. I end up with a subjective sense of the likelihood that I've spotted genuine, non-predictive outliers, and then I make a projection combined with an explanation and a statement of how certain I am about the projection. (As a quick set of examples, compare my being absolutely certain last winter that Rick Porcello was a #2, to my suspicion that Felix Doubront might have upside and turn out to be a #3 or even a #2. There's seldom any ambiguity at the meta-level; you can see just how strong the case is from the nature of your hypothesized explanation. The "maybe there's' upside here" cases are very common and I try not to put them forth as anything more than an interesting possibility. I actually can't think of too many that have paid off -- Travis Shaw, maybe.) Outlier elimination is a fundamental step in good statistical analysis. In fact, most Stat 101 textbooks say it's the first step: look at your data and see if there any outliers. Now, baseball has far more random variation than say, manufacturing quality control. That has led some people, those I call the Statistically Correct, to abandon the entire notion of outlier analysis. Every time I do one of these analyses, the Statistically Correct bitch and moan. (I classify you as a borderline case; you're overly skeptical but great at spotting flaws in my logic). There's really no defense against them except to point out that the methodology has a long track record of being amazingly f-ing good. Trust me, I find the need to point that out again and again as tiresome to write as you do to read. The short version is that a properly sophisticated outlier analysis on baseball data sets is not statistically bogus or even merely defensible. It's necessary. There's no possible methodological complaint. The only question you need to ask is, given that baseball data outlier analysis is so difficult that most people don't even try, is this guy any good at it? Well, the answer starts with, I was good enough at it that John Henry recruited me to work for the Red Sox. Do you see why I'm actually tired of defending it? Again and again and again? (And it's the same, f-ing, broad complaint. You can't do that, on principle. Usually in a mocking tone.) Re Owens, the anti-Owens crowd thought he'd get annihilated, specifically, that if he couldn't command his FB, big league hitters would kill his changeup, and obviously his FB would not be a swing-and-miss pitch either, given its velocity, because they rejected the argument that he has much better effective velocity due to deception. Henry Owens has thrown 85 innings now in MLB. There are 209 pitchers who have thrown 80 innings or more as a starter in these two years. Owens ranks 7th in Z-Contact%. The five guys directly ahead of him are Max Scherzer, Rich Hill, Clayton Kershaw, Chris Sale, and Yu Darvish. (Yeah, there's one more guy.) But wait, there's more. Z-Contact% is profoundly correlated with Zone% and Z-Swing%. Guys who can't throw the ball in the zone get fewer swings and misses within it. Guys who get more swings in the zone -- who can get hitters to be more aggressive -- get a higher percentage of misses on those swings. Both of these are really obvious. When you adjust for Owens' terrible Zone% (and his excellent Z-Swing%), he ranks 3rd among conventional pitchers (oops, spoiler). He's moved ahead of Kershaw, Sale, and Darvish. Let me repeat this. Out of 207 sets of pitch combinations in MLB (another spoiler there), the only ones that got more swings and misses in the zone that Henry Owens' fastball / changeup were Rich Hill's curveball/ fastball, and -- just barely -- Max Scherzer's FB / slider / change. I looked at pitch/fx data and found that -- as would pretty much be required to get that Z-Contact% given his command -- he was throwing his 89 mph FB past plus hitters in their hot zones. (I didn't do that systematically; I checked a few pitches that had impressed me to see if in fact they were in hot zones). So I don't think it's quite true that MLB hitters are a) hitting his FB because any deception he had only fools guys in AA and b) hitting his changeup because he can't command his fastball. His FB command has been as horrendously awful as everyone feared, but he's been 0.4 wins above replacement level per 32 starts, which is to say, a dead-average MLB 5th starter. The Owens skeptics thought he'd be destroyed if his command remained that piss-poor. (And yes, these are key aspects of his game, without scare quotes, because they relate directly to his controversial upside. At some point I'll try to use the plate discipline data we do have on him, regressed properly, to project him with various levels of control, since I did the study on the odds of those. I'll guess right now that his upside is ace or #2.) Based on what we've seen, I probably understated the case for the difference between his effective and actual FB velocity. Was I right about Owens? The only way I could have been more right was to state the case even more strongly. (Yes, the leader in both raw and adjusted Z-Contact is Steven Wright.)
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Post by soxjim on Oct 22, 2016 14:42:32 GMT -5
Have you ever cited a counter-example? Without a whole bunch of counter-examples, it's hard to make an argument that I'm cherry-picking. (I was overly optimistic about Neo's progress this year, and both Ockimey and Chavis had rough stretches after their fast starts, although the former certainly enhanced his prospect status overall. But I've never argued that my track record with ml talent is as good with MLB talent, for the obvious reason that there's so much less data available.) There's no "ritualistic back-patting" going on here. I have a favorite methodology. I identify apparent performance outliers, games or stretches of games that, for one reason or another, I don't feel have predictive power. Sometimes the elimination is a priori (I know he was playing hurt and I don't think these games will be predictive), sometimes it's after the fact when I spot the outliers in the data and (usually quite quickly) derive a hypothesis as to why it might not be random. I try to derive other testable hypotheses from the initial hypothesis (usually about the deep data of the outlier performance), and test them. I end up with a subjective sense of the likelihood that I've spotted genuine, non-predictive outliers, and then I make a projection combined with an explanation and a statement of how certain I am about the projection. (As a quick set of examples, compare my being absolutely certain last winter that Rick Porcello was a #2, to my suspicion that Felix Doubront might have upside and turn out to be a #3 or even a #2. There's seldom any ambiguity at the meta-level; you can see just how strong the case is from the nature of your hypothesized explanation. The "maybe there's' upside here" cases are very common and I try not to put them forth as anything more than an interesting possibility. I actually can't think of too many that have paid off -- Travis Shaw, maybe.) Outlier elimination is a fundamental step in good statistical analysis. In fact, most Stat 101 textbooks say it's the first step: look at your data and see if there any outliers. Now, baseball has far more random variation than say, manufacturing quality control. That has led some people, those I call the Statistically Correct, to abandon the entire notion of outlier analysis. Every time I do one of these analyses, the Statistically Correct bitch and moan. (I classify you as a borderline case; you're overly skeptical but great at spotting flaws in my logic). There's really no defense against them except to point out that the methodology has a long track record of being amazingly f-ing good. Trust me, I find the need to point that out again and again as tiresome to write as you do to read. The short version is that a properly sophisticated outlier analysis on baseball data sets is not statistically bogus or even merely defensible. It's necessary. There's no possible methodological complaint. The only question you need to ask is, given that baseball data outlier analysis is so difficult that most people don't even try, is this guy any good at it? Well, the answer starts with, I was good enough at it that John Henry recruited me to work for the Red Sox. Do you see why I'm actually tired of defending it? Again and again and again? (And it's the same, f-ing, broad complaint. You can't do that, on principle. Usually in a mocking tone.) Re Owens, the anti-Owens crowd thought he'd get annihilated, specifically, that if he couldn't command his FB, big league hitters would kill his changeup, and obviously his FB would not be a swing-and-miss pitch either, given its velocity, because they rejected the argument that he has much better effective velocity due to deception. Henry Owens has thrown 85 innings now in MLB. There are 209 pitchers who have thrown 80 innings or more as a starter in these two years. Owens ranks 7th in Z-Contact%. The five guys directly ahead of him are Max Scherzer, Rich Hill, Clayton Kershaw, Chris Sale, and Yu Darvish. (Yeah, there's one more guy.) But wait, there's more. Z-Contact% is profoundly correlated with Zone% and Z-Swing%. Guys who can't throw the ball in the zone get fewer swings and misses within it. Guys who get more swings in the zone -- who can get hitters to be more aggressive -- get a higher percentage of misses on those swings. Both of these are really obvious. When you adjust for Owens' terrible Zone% (and his excellent Z-Swing%), he ranks 3rd among conventional pitchers (oops, spoiler). He's moved ahead of Kershaw, Sale, and Darvish. Let me repeat this. Out of 207 sets of pitch combinations in MLB (another spoiler there), the only ones that got more swings and misses in the zone that Henry Owens' fastball / changeup were Rich Hill's curveball/ fastball, and -- just barely -- Max Scherzer's FB / slider / change. I looked at pitch/fx data and found that -- as would pretty much be required to get that Z-Contact% given his command -- he was throwing his 89 mph FB past plus hitters in their hot zones. (I didn't do that systematically; I checked a few pitches that had impressed me to see if in fact they were in hot zones). So I don't think it's quite true that MLB hitters are a) hitting his FB because any deception he had only fools guys in AA and b) hitting his changeup because he can't command his fastball. His FB command has been as horrendously awful as everyone feared, but he's been 0.4 wins above replacement level per 32 starts, which is to say, a dead-average MLB 5th starter. The Owens skeptics thought he'd be destroyed if his command remained that piss-poor. (And yes, these are key aspects of his game, without scare quotes, because they relate directly to his controversial upside. At some point I'll try to use the plate discipline data we do have on him, regressed properly, to project him with various levels of control, since I did the study on the odds of those. I'll guess right now that his upside is ace or #2.) Based on what we've seen, I probably understated the case for the difference between his effective and actual FB velocity. Was I right about Owens? The only way I could have been more right was to state the case even more strongly. (Yes, the leader in both raw and adjusted Z-Contact is Steven Wright.) With all this said- Henry Owens at this point in time is not a number 5 starter. Especially not a dead average one. If Henry Owens is walking 8.2 batters per 9 innings like he did this year, he can't consistently compete in the major leagues. I do agree if he gets his fastball under control then "it changes the game for him" but to what level I don't know. But until he gets his control down with his fastball and doesn't walk as many batters he currently does, he's nothing but "potential."
And whose to say as teams that don't see more of him that they won't start to toast his other pitches if his fastball remains so poor?
As far as this thread goes, imo Owens has no shot to be in the show until he can get his fastball command under control. I think sox should keep him on 40 man because of the talent. If he gets his fastball going - then yeah he can be good. It's worth keeping him.
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ericmvan
Veteran
Supposed to be working on something more important
Posts: 8,915
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Post by ericmvan on Oct 23, 2016 0:11:41 GMT -5
Re Owens, the anti-Owens crowd thought he'd get annihilated, specifically, that if he couldn't command his FB, big league hitters would kill his changeup, and obviously his FB would not be a swing-and-miss pitch either, given its velocity, because they rejected the argument that he has much better effective velocity due to deception. Henry Owens has thrown 85 innings now in MLB. There are 209 pitchers who have thrown 80 innings or more as a starter in these two years. Owens ranks 7th in Z-Contact%. The five guys directly ahead of him are Max Scherzer, Rich Hill, Clayton Kershaw, Chris Sale, and Yu Darvish. (Yeah, there's one more guy.) But wait, there's more. Z-Contact% is profoundly correlated with Zone% and Z-Swing%. Guys who can't throw the ball in the zone get fewer swings and misses within it. Guys who get more swings in the zone -- who can get hitters to be more aggressive -- get a higher percentage of misses on those swings. Both of these are really obvious. When you adjust for Owens' terrible Zone% (and his excellent Z-Swing%), he ranks 3rd among conventional pitchers (oops, spoiler). He's moved ahead of Kershaw, Sale, and Darvish. Let me repeat this. Out of 207 sets of pitch combinations in MLB (another spoiler there), the only ones that got more swings and misses in the zone that Henry Owens' fastball / changeup were Rich Hill's curveball/ fastball, and -- just barely -- Max Scherzer's FB / slider / change. I looked at pitch/fx data and found that -- as would pretty much be required to get that Z-Contact% given his command -- he was throwing his 89 mph FB past plus hitters in their hot zones. (I didn't do that systematically; I checked a few pitches that had impressed me to see if in fact they were in hot zones). So I don't think it's quite true that MLB hitters are a) hitting his FB because any deception he had only fools guys in AA and b) hitting his changeup because he can't command his fastball. His FB command has been as horrendously awful as everyone feared, but he's been 0.4 wins above replacement level per 32 starts, which is to say, a dead-average MLB 5th starter. The Owens skeptics thought he'd be destroyed if his command remained that piss-poor. (And yes, these are key aspects of his game, without scare quotes, because they relate directly to his controversial upside. At some point I'll try to use the plate discipline data we do have on him, regressed properly, to project him with various levels of control, since I did the study on the odds of those. I'll guess right now that his upside is ace or #2.) Based on what we've seen, I probably understated the case for the difference between his effective and actual FB velocity. Was I right about Owens? The only way I could have been more right was to state the case even more strongly. (Yes, the leader in both raw and adjusted Z-Contact is Steven Wright.) With all this said- Henry Owens at this point in time is not a number 5 starter. Especially not a dead average one. If Henry Owens is walking 8.2 batters per 9 innings like he did this year, he can't consistently compete in the major leagues. I do agree if he gets his fastball under control then "it changes the game for him" but to what level I don't know. But until he gets his control down with his fastball and doesn't walk as many batters he currently does, he's nothing but "potential."
And whose to say as teams that don't see more of him that they won't start to toast his other pitches if his fastball remains so poor?
As far as this thread goes, imo Owens has no shot to be in the show until he can get his fastball command under control. I think sox should keep him on 40 man because of the talent. If he gets his fastball going - then yeah he can be good. It's worth keeping him.
It may be your opinion that Owens is not a #5 starter, which is fine. Your entitled to it. The fact is, that's exactly how he's performed the last two years. I'm guessing your sense of how good he's been is a little biased by the fact that he was muxh less good in MLB in 2016 than in 2015, but that has no predictive value; he didn't actually go backwards. He just happened to pitch less well in 2016 in small sample sizes both years. But the main thing driving your subjective impression is that you have no idea just how lousy the average MLB #5 starter is. The point is that having someone as shaky as Owens as your #5 does not put you at a huge disadvantage. For a pennant contender, it makes him perfectly acceptable as the #7 guy on the depth chart. Even if he spins his wheels again and makes no progress on his FB command, the idea of him getting 5 starts over the course of the season shouldn't put anyone into a panic. It's not a position that needs upgrading. This is especially true when we'll have as alternatives Johnson, and maybe Elias, and hopefully one or two waiver claims that DDo likes, and of course Owens himself is likely to be better. My overall opinion hasn't changed. If I had to pick a single likeliest scenario, it's that he's a #4 / #5 starter for four years and turns into a top-of-rotation guy with two years of team control left. I think we maximize his value by trading him at the right point during his apprenticeship, but also giving him some time to beat that timetable. That probably means keeping him in the organization until he's out of options.
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Post by burythehammer on Oct 23, 2016 5:34:43 GMT -5
]I'm guessing your sense of how good he's been is a little biased by the fact that he was muxh less good in MLB in 2016 than in 2015, but that has no predictive value; he didn't actually go backwards. He just happened to pitch less well in 2016 in small sample sizes both years Amazing. Truly amazing.
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Oct 23, 2016 6:58:46 GMT -5
]I'm guessing your sense of how good he's been is a little biased by the fact that he was muxh less good in MLB in 2016 than in 2015, but that has no predictive value; he didn't actually go backwards. He just happened to pitch less well in 2016 in small sample sizes both years Amazing. Truly amazing. Yeah Henry Owens had the worst walk per nine inning totals of his entire career last year. If that's not regression, then I don't know what is. I still have a little hope for Owens and that new mechanical adjustment he made at the end of last year but he still needs a lot of work. If Owens can keep his B/9 innings down to at least 3 batters per nine, then he's no doubt a backend starter and a quality one but there's no reason to believe he will be that in his career. Not yet at least. His walk totals have been going up every year.
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Post by James Dunne on Oct 23, 2016 7:54:57 GMT -5
The correct question to ask about Murphy is: what percentage of such transformations, where we have dramaticaly better results from a well-documented significant change in approach, stick? I can think of Bautista and J.D. Martinez as positive examples. Kevin Millar had one that lasted a month (when he opened his stance crazily) that worked because it turned his old cold zones into hot ones, and then pitchers figured out where the new cold zones were, and he went nack to his natural style when it proved to be no better (or worse). Can you think of any others? Dwight Evans! He tinkered with that stance constantly in the 1970's, with really mixed success. He had a couple really good seasons but would go through massive, massive slumps. Then in 1981 he dropped his hands and at 29 went from a solid borderline all-star to one of baseball's best hitters for almost a decade. Of course, Evans also grew the 'stache in '81, right? So it was probably equal parts that and the new approach.
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Post by redsox04071318champs on Oct 23, 2016 8:22:03 GMT -5
The correct question to ask about Murphy is: what percentage of such transformations, where we have dramaticaly better results from a well-documented significant change in approach, stick? I can think of Bautista and J.D. Martinez as positive examples. Kevin Millar had one that lasted a month (when he opened his stance crazily) that worked because it turned his old cold zones into hot ones, and then pitchers figured out where the new cold zones were, and he went nack to his natural style when it proved to be no better (or worse). Can you think of any others? Dwight Evans! He tinkered with that stance constantly in the 1970's, with really mixed success. He had a couple really good seasons but would go through massive, massive slumps. Then in 1981 he dropped his hands and at 29 went from a solid borderline all-star to one of baseball's best hitters for almost a decade. Of course, Evans also grew the 'stache in '81, right? So it was probably equal parts that and the new approach. I remember Dwight Evans circa 1981 very, very well. He was so clutch that season. It always felt like the Sox were down 3 in the 9th with two outs and two on. Evans would work the count to 3-0 and then tie the game. I remember Evans with that mustache and the new spot in the lineup. He went from the bottom of the order to batting 2nd in the order. New manager Ralph Houk believed in him from the start while previous manager Don Zimmer thought Evans lacked guts to put it kindly. The fact of the matter is that Evans actually reworked his stance by the middle of the previous season and had a pretty good half season in the second half of 1980 but his overall numbers don't reflect it too much because he had a really bad first half and actually lost him job for a bit to Jim Dwyer. Evans had usually spent his career up to that point batting in the bottom third of the order with a BA hovering around .260 with 20 home run power. Of course he had the walks, but nobody back then seemed to care. I think he had that toe tap mechanism going on too that Walt Hriniak worked on him with. He had the Hriniak swing going on at that point and it started to work for him and he became as consistent a threat in that lineup for the remainder of the 1980s decade. He was such an underrated player and I think he got a raw deal - I think he should be in the HOF and I think his number should be retired with the Red Sox. The problem statistically was that he was too ahead of his time, a power hitting, gold gloved RF who drew a ton of walks. I'll stop it there. I'm just glad to get a chance to post about Dwight Evans. I think there are a lot of 20 and 30 something year old Red Sox fans who have no idea how great a player he was. I would have put him in the HOF before Jim Rice quite honestly even though Rice had the better peak.
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Post by ryan24 on Oct 23, 2016 9:16:00 GMT -5
Being new to this site I am totally amazed at some of the posts. The Sox won the division, won 90 plus games, and have a very young core. Plus a half dozen promising prospects. So the future looks very good. There are no glaring holes like there was last year at this time. There are at least 25 other clubs that would take jbj in a heart beat. We complain that we trade prospects and weaken the farm system and the club's long term future. Then make a proposal like trading 4 very good YOUNG players to get one pitcher who could step off the curb and break his ankle and never pitch the same again. Besides the fact that it will open a hole in the outfield and wreck the farm system for a while. The pitching appears it will get better next year. The run diff was over 150 on the plus side this year. Even if we lost half of this with no papi, we are still in very good shape. My point is we DO NOT NEED to make any big changes, especially the magnitude that has been suggested.
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Post by soxjim on Oct 23, 2016 11:26:12 GMT -5
With all this said- Henry Owens at this point in time is not a number 5 starter. Especially not a dead average one. If Henry Owens is walking 8.2 batters per 9 innings like he did this year, he can't consistently compete in the major leagues. I do agree if he gets his fastball under control then "it changes the game for him" but to what level I don't know. But until he gets his control down with his fastball and doesn't walk as many batters he currently does, he's nothing but "potential."
And whose to say as teams that don't see more of him that they won't start to toast his other pitches if his fastball remains so poor?
As far as this thread goes, imo Owens has no shot to be in the show until he can get his fastball command under control. I think sox should keep him on 40 man because of the talent. If he gets his fastball going - then yeah he can be good. It's worth keeping him.
It may be your opinion that Owens is not a #5 starter, which is fine. Your entitled to it. The fact is, that's exactly how he's performed the last two years. I'm guessing your sense of how good he's been is a little biased by the fact that he was muxh less good in MLB in 2016 than in 2015, but that has no predictive value; he didn't actually go backwards. He just happened to pitch less well in 2016 in small sample sizes both years. But the main thing driving your subjective impression is that you have no idea just how lousy the average MLB #5 starter is. The point is that having someone as shaky as Owens as your #5 does not put you at a huge disadvantage. For a pennant contender, it makes him perfectly acceptable as the #7 guy on the depth chart. Even if he spins his wheels again and makes no progress on his FB command, the idea of him getting 5 starts over the course of the season shouldn't put anyone into a panic. It's not a position that needs upgrading. This is especially true when we'll have as alternatives Johnson, and maybe Elias, and hopefully one or two waiver claims that DDo likes, and of course Owens himself is likely to be better. My overall opinion hasn't changed. If I had to pick a single likeliest scenario, it's that he's a #4 / #5 starter for four years and turns into a top-of-rotation guy with two years of team control left. I think we maximize his value by trading him at the right point during his apprenticeship, but also giving him some time to beat that timetable. That probably means keeping him in the organization until he's out of options. I’m wondering if your confusing the issue of currently he was not a legit number 5 starter this year vs what he might be(predictive) next year? If you want to predict what he will be next year, that is fine, but this year he was bad. Though some might be “giving up on Henry” however I’m not one that is and my guess is many aren’t either. I like the idea he that if he could spot that fastball he can be something. So for some of us, it’s not that we’re in a panic and wanting to sell sell sell Henry. We’re just stating what we saw this year – and it was awful. Those 5 starts were not worthy of a pro starter on a contending team. Number 5 starters for championship contending teams don’t go around walking over 8 batters per game. I’m not in a panic though. As I said, keep him on the 40 man. But averaging over 5 walks per 9 at Pawtucket too we can see what his trend was this year that he couldn't throw the ball over the plate. No matter what else he is doing, if your control is this awful, you aren't ready as a starter on a top team. If you use him, you are playing with way too much risk. The walks tells us as of this moment in time that he’s isn’t good enough to be called up for a championship contending team like the Red Sox.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Oct 23, 2016 14:13:01 GMT -5
It may be your opinion that Owens is not a #5 starter, which is fine. Your entitled to it. The fact is, that's exactly how he's performed the last two years. I'm guessing your sense of how good he's been is a little biased by the fact that he was muxh less good in MLB in 2016 than in 2015, but that has no predictive value; he didn't actually go backwards. He just happened to pitch less well in 2016 in small sample sizes both years. But the main thing driving your subjective impression is that you have no idea just how lousy the average MLB #5 starter is. The point is that having someone as shaky as Owens as your #5 does not put you at a huge disadvantage. For a pennant contender, it makes him perfectly acceptable as the #7 guy on the depth chart. Even if he spins his wheels again and makes no progress on his FB command, the idea of him getting 5 starts over the course of the season shouldn't put anyone into a panic. It's not a position that needs upgrading. This is especially true when we'll have as alternatives Johnson, and maybe Elias, and hopefully one or two waiver claims that DDo likes, and of course Owens himself is likely to be better. My overall opinion hasn't changed. If I had to pick a single likeliest scenario, it's that he's a #4 / #5 starter for four years and turns into a top-of-rotation guy with two years of team control left. I think we maximize his value by trading him at the right point during his apprenticeship, but also giving him some time to beat that timetable. That probably means keeping him in the organization until he's out of options. I’m wondering if your confusing the issue of currently he was not a legit number 5 starter this year vs what he might be(predictive) next year? If you want to predict what he will be next year, that is fine, but this year he was bad. Though some might be “giving up on Henry” however I’m not one that is and my guess is many aren’t either. I like the idea he that if he could spot that fastball he can be something. So for some of us, it’s not that we’re in a panic and wanting to sell sell sell Henry. We’re just stating what we saw this year – and it was awful. Those 5 starts were not worthy of a pro starter on a contending team. Number 5 starters for championship contending teams don’t go around walking over 8 batters per game. I’m not in a panic though. As I said, keep him on the 40 man. But averaging over 5 walks per 9 at Pawtucket too we can see what his trend was this year that he couldn't throw the ball over the plate. No matter what else he is doing, if your control is this awful, you aren't ready as a starter on a top team. If you use him, you are playing with way too much risk. The walks tells us as of this moment in time that he’s isn’t good enough to be called up for a championship contending team like the Red Sox. It's absolutely true that what he gave us in 5 starts this year was unacceptable. But that's not uncommon for a random five-game stretch by a 5th starter. Just like a team as good as the Red Sox might lose three straight to a team like the Indians. Owens actually looked like a #4 starter in his 11 starts the year before, which was just the opposite sort of luck. So, yeah, I'm predicting what he'll be next year even if he doesn't improve. And that's a guy who is good enough to get five random starts when you have two guys on the DL. I mean, if you're going to just pick what happened recently rather than look at the big picture, you would want to dump Xander Bogaerts, who was, beginning in late June, barely above AAA quality. Of course, before that, he'd been neck-and-neck with Trout as the best player in MLB. The other thing you're doing is focusing on his weakness while ignoring the strength, which in this 16-game sample was even more noteworthy. Can you be an average #5 starter in MLB while walking 4.7 guys per 9? Ordinarily, no. But if you were also essentially tied with Max Scherzer for the best swing-and-miss stuff in MLB (in the zone, knuckleballs excluded), you sure can.
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Post by soxjim on Oct 23, 2016 14:50:35 GMT -5
I’m wondering if your confusing the issue of currently he was not a legit number 5 starter this year vs what he might be(predictive) next year? If you want to predict what he will be next year, that is fine, but this year he was bad. Though some might be “giving up on Henry” however I’m not one that is and my guess is many aren’t either. I like the idea he that if he could spot that fastball he can be something. So for some of us, it’s not that we’re in a panic and wanting to sell sell sell Henry. We’re just stating what we saw this year – and it was awful. Those 5 starts were not worthy of a pro starter on a contending team. Number 5 starters for championship contending teams don’t go around walking over 8 batters per game. I’m not in a panic though. As I said, keep him on the 40 man. But averaging over 5 walks per 9 at Pawtucket too we can see what his trend was this year that he couldn't throw the ball over the plate. No matter what else he is doing, if your control is this awful, you aren't ready as a starter on a top team. If you use him, you are playing with way too much risk. The walks tells us as of this moment in time that he’s isn’t good enough to be called up for a championship contending team like the Red Sox. It's absolutely true that what he gave us in 5 starts this year was unacceptable. But that's not uncommon for a random five-game stretch by a 5th starter. Just like a team as good as the Red Sox might lose three straight to a team like the Indians. Owens actually looked like a #4 starter in his 11 starts the year before, which was just the opposite sort of luck. So, yeah, I'm predicting what he'll be next year even if he doesn't improve. And that's a guy who is good enough to get five random starts when you have two guys on the DL. I mean, if you're going to just pick what happened recently rather than look at the big picture, you would want to dump Xander Bogaerts, who was, beginning in late June, barely above AAA quality. Of course, before that, he'd been neck-and-neck with Trout as the best player in MLB. The other thing you're doing is focusing on his weakness while ignoring the strength, which in this 16-game sample was even more noteworthy. Can you be an average #5 starter in MLB while walking 4.7 guys per 9? Ordinarily, no. But if you were also essentially tied with Max Scherzer for the best swing-and-miss stuff in MLB (in the zone, knuckleballs excluded), you sure can. But I'm okay with you predicting what he might be in 2017. I'm saying in 2016 he wasn't a number 5. In 2016 he did have 5 starts and those 5 starts were not of a number 5. When you see all the walks in 2016 combined in Pawtucket and The Red Sox - it is not only more than just the 5 games you cite, its a season so its not "cherry-picking, therefore its also unacceptable enough to conclude he was not a number 5 starter. You've even said his 5 starts were unacceptable. With what he also did in Pawtucket we can't pretend his awful control is just a fluke and will miraculously turn around at game 6. What did you feel about his starts in Pawtucket in which he averaged over 5 walks per 9? That many walks are unacceptable too and gives us a vision as to why he was also so bad with Red Sox. And "unacceptable" means "not ready." We're trying to be a title contender. If Henry performances are "unacceptable" - then we can't wait for him by having him throw many games in the show, right?
You seem high on the Red Sox starting staff, and are down on Farrell as many of us are. If Owens can't throw strikes how many games are you going to risk throwing him out there when we're trying to be among the best? He's unacceptable. He puts too many guys on base to be a legit number 5 in the 2016 season. And imo the 2016 overall performance for a top tier team trumps the prior year (2015) until Henry shows us he can harness his control, correct? If you want to argue he could pitch as number 5 for a crummy team with no real aspirations of being a contender, okay. But this thread is about the Red Sox. Henry's Owens performance as a Red Sox and with his lousy control even at Pawtucket shows he's not ready to be a number 5 pro pitcher for the Red Sox and their title aspirations.
The more accurate picture is looking is to look at 2016 both at Pawtucket and Red Sox in determining what he was in 2016 which as you say "unacceptable" and imo Pawtucket lousy control only enhances that. IMO 2015 is more relevant to use in combining 2015 and 2016 to show what you might think he'll be in 2017. That's why I think many of us aren't panicking because he did show some stretches in 2015.
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ericmvan
Veteran
Supposed to be working on something more important
Posts: 8,915
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Post by ericmvan on Oct 23, 2016 23:33:12 GMT -5
It's absolutely true that what he gave us in 5 starts this year was unacceptable. But that's not uncommon for a random five-game stretch by a 5th starter. Just like a team as good as the Red Sox might lose three straight to a team like the Indians. Owens actually looked like a #4 starter in his 11 starts the year before, which was just the opposite sort of luck. So, yeah, I'm predicting what he'll be next year even if he doesn't improve. And that's a guy who is good enough to get five random starts when you have two guys on the DL. I mean, if you're going to just pick what happened recently rather than look at the big picture, you would want to dump Xander Bogaerts, who was, beginning in late June, barely above AAA quality. Of course, before that, he'd been neck-and-neck with Trout as the best player in MLB. The other thing you're doing is focusing on his weakness while ignoring the strength, which in this 16-game sample was even more noteworthy. Can you be an average #5 starter in MLB while walking 4.7 guys per 9? Ordinarily, no. But if you were also essentially tied with Max Scherzer for the best swing-and-miss stuff in MLB (in the zone, knuckleballs excluded), you sure can. But I'm okay with you predicting what he might be in 2017. I'm saying in 2016 he wasn't a number 5. In 2016 he did have 5 starts and those 5 starts were not of a number 5. When you see all the walks in 2016 combined in Pawtucket and The Red Sox - it is not only more than just the 5 games you cite, its a season so its not "cherry-picking, therefore its also unacceptable enough to conclude he was not a number 5 starter. You've even said his 5 starts were unacceptable. With what he also did in Pawtucket we can't pretend his awful control is just a fluke and will miraculously turn around at game 6. What did you feel about his starts in Pawtucket in which he averaged over 5 walks per 9? That many walks are unacceptable too and gives us a vision as to why he was also so bad with Red Sox. And "unacceptable" means "not ready." We're trying to be a title contender. If Henry performances are "unacceptable" - then we can't wait for him by having him throw many games in the show, right?
You seem high on the Red Sox starting staff, and are down on Farrell as many of us are. If Owens can't throw strikes how many games are you going to risk throwing him out there when we're trying to be among the best? He's unacceptable. He puts too many guys on base to be a legit number 5 in the 2016 season. And imo the 2016 overall performance for a top tier team trumps the prior year (2015) until Henry shows us he can harness his control, correct? If you want to argue he could pitch as number 5 for a crummy team with no real aspirations of being a contender, okay. But this thread is about the Red Sox. Henry's Owens performance as a Red Sox and with his lousy control even at Pawtucket shows he's not ready to be a number 5 pro pitcher for the Red Sox and their title aspirations.
The more accurate picture is looking is to look at 2016 both at Pawtucket and Red Sox in determining what he was in 2016 which as you say "unacceptable" and imo Pawtucket lousy control only enhances that. IMO 2015 is more relevant to use in combining 2015 and 2016 to show what you might think he'll be in 2017. That's why I think many of us aren't panicking because he did show some stretches in 2015.
Your last paragraph seems to contradict the earlier stuff and seems to be in agreement with me. It's not unusual for a guy working on his command to go backwards (especially in the minors, where you're going to throw the pitch your struggling with more often). Randy Johnson went from a .127 rate to .171 with the Mariners in 1990 and 1991; the next year he was .156. (His breakthrough came the next year at age 29). Including both levels, Owens went from .104 to .143. I think combining them to get a projected rate for next year is perfectly reasonable, and that guy is an acceptable 7th starter. You can't go making roster decisions about marginal guys like your 7th starter based on downside fears. I want them to acquire a couple of upside AAA RH arms to be in the mix with Owens, Johnson, and hopefully Elias, and if they do that, they should be fine at 7th starter.
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Post by soxjim on Oct 24, 2016 14:00:57 GMT -5
But I'm okay with you predicting what he might be in 2017. I'm saying in 2016 he wasn't a number 5. In 2016 he did have 5 starts and those 5 starts were not of a number 5. When you see all the walks in 2016 combined in Pawtucket and The Red Sox - it is not only more than just the 5 games you cite, its a season so its not "cherry-picking, therefore its also unacceptable enough to conclude he was not a number 5 starter. You've even said his 5 starts were unacceptable. With what he also did in Pawtucket we can't pretend his awful control is just a fluke and will miraculously turn around at game 6. What did you feel about his starts in Pawtucket in which he averaged over 5 walks per 9? That many walks are unacceptable too and gives us a vision as to why he was also so bad with Red Sox. And "unacceptable" means "not ready." We're trying to be a title contender. If Henry performances are "unacceptable" - then we can't wait for him by having him throw many games in the show, right?
You seem high on the Red Sox starting staff, and are down on Farrell as many of us are. If Owens can't throw strikes how many games are you going to risk throwing him out there when we're trying to be among the best? He's unacceptable. He puts too many guys on base to be a legit number 5 in the 2016 season. And imo the 2016 overall performance for a top tier team trumps the prior year (2015) until Henry shows us he can harness his control, correct? If you want to argue he could pitch as number 5 for a crummy team with no real aspirations of being a contender, okay. But this thread is about the Red Sox. Henry's Owens performance as a Red Sox and with his lousy control even at Pawtucket shows he's not ready to be a number 5 pro pitcher for the Red Sox and their title aspirations.
The more accurate picture is looking is to look at 2016 both at Pawtucket and Red Sox in determining what he was in 2016 which as you say "unacceptable" and imo Pawtucket lousy control only enhances that. IMO 2015 is more relevant to use in combining 2015 and 2016 to show what you might think he'll be in 2017. That's why I think many of us aren't panicking because he did show some stretches in 2015.
Your last paragraph seems to contradict the earlier stuff and seems to be in agreement with me. It's not unusual for a guy working on his command to go backwards (especially in the minors, where you're going to throw the pitch your struggling with more often). Randy Johnson went from a .127 rate to .171 with the Mariners in 1990 and 1991; the next year he was .156. (His breakthrough came the next year at age 29). Including both levels, Owens went from .104 to .143. I think combining them to get a projected rate for next year is perfectly reasonable, and that guy is an acceptable 7th starter. You can't go making roster decisions about marginal guys like your 7th starter based on downside fears. I want them to acquire a couple of upside AAA RH arms to be in the mix with Owens, Johnson, and hopefully Elias, and if they do that, they should be fine at 7th starter. We're not really agreeing but okay- I misread a portion of you last statements.
I'm with you on EE and not wanting to pay a lot for expensive fa bats etc. And that Freddie would be a super super pickup.
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Post by fenwaythehardway on Oct 24, 2016 17:30:20 GMT -5
]I'm guessing your sense of how good he's been is a little biased by the fact that he was muxh less good in MLB in 2016 than in 2015, but that has no predictive value; he didn't actually go backwards. He just happened to pitch less well in 2016 in small sample sizes both years Amazing. Truly amazing. How much predictive value does not being able to find the strike zone with a GPS and a team of sherpas have?
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Oct 24, 2016 20:10:46 GMT -5
An awesome pickup would be Greg Holland. The guy would probably only want a one year pillow contract in order to reestablish value.
Plus, he would be exactly 1 and a half years removed from tommy john surgery in spring training.
I have no faith in Dombrowski in finding these kind of deals however. This was a kind of deal Theo was known for while here in Boston. Between the Beltre contract and others I'm forgetting.
My main complaint about Dombrowski is being able to come out on top of a deal and actually find value in a deal. The only two trades I can think of that he did that with was the Carson Smith and Ziegler trades. Ziegler was a rental and Smith got hurt.
For once I want Dombrowski to have some hindsight and actually find a good deal instead of overpaying top market dollar for everything. You can splurge once or twice if you want, but you can't just have David Price/Kimbrel/Pomeranz kind of fixes with every single move you make.
Edit- Watch Theo pickup Holland and the Cubs go to the world series next year with Holland as their closer, ironically.
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Post by sox fan in nc on Oct 28, 2016 8:30:05 GMT -5
I was pondering the comparison of Chapman and Michael Vick. When Vick came out of jail, most teams didn't want anything to do with him. He's played 7 years for Phi, NYJ, & Pitt since. Same great natural abilities. Though I feel Vick's "problem" was much worse, feels like Chapman has been given more of a pass.
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Post by James Dunne on Oct 28, 2016 9:24:20 GMT -5
In that he didn't go to jail or face any consequences, at all. Or show any remorse.
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Post by fenwaythehardway on Oct 28, 2016 15:32:11 GMT -5
In that he didn't go to jail or face any consequences, at all. Or show any remorse. Also he's about to get paid like seventy million dollars.
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Post by larrycook on Oct 30, 2016 0:56:13 GMT -5
I was pondering the comparison of Chapman and Michael Vick. When Vick came out of jail, most teams didn't want anything to do with him. He's played 7 years for Phi, NYJ, & Pitt since. Same great natural abilities. Though I feel Vick's "problem" was much worse, feels like Chapman has been given more of a pass. I would take a pass on chapman, but Jansen seems very intriguing. I am sure the Dodgers will run up the tab on him, but Kimbrel is scary and Jansen, not so much.
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Post by sarasoxer on Oct 30, 2016 6:49:13 GMT -5
Musings.
Kopech has been reportedly throwing his fb at 95-99 in the AFL. This is clearly outstanding. But does this suggest that reports during the year of 103 and 105 were erroneous or does he have a "dead arm".
Curiously there has never been a report on what medically was not disclosed on Pomerantz or even now what his "forearm and elbow" problems are.
It appears that with so many umpires choosing to position themselves over the batter's inside corner rather than directly over the plate that angular view could skewer pitch calls. To me it seems that they often miss calls to the outside.
With technology gains and stat proliferation, it seems that everything short of discovering "the God particle" can be quantified. Yet I have never seen a stat as to "bat speed" despite its importance and so often being referenced...e.g. "He has great bat speed"..
Are such comments just "eye test" or is there actual quantification?
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Post by artfuldodger on Oct 30, 2016 8:39:59 GMT -5
Should the Red Sox target (and possibly overpay) the player that the team feels best replaces Ortiz or should the Red Sox wait to get replacement with the best value?
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Post by pedrofanforever45 on Oct 31, 2016 4:37:37 GMT -5
Should the Red Sox target (and possibly overpay) the player that the team feels best replaces Ortiz or should the Red Sox wait to get replacement with the best value? Why can't they do both? This is Boston after all?
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Post by rjp313jr on Oct 31, 2016 8:33:50 GMT -5
I'd sign Chapman. He's a beast and he showed last night he can be used as a multi inning reliever earlier in the games during the post season.
The problem is you would have to convince him to be a setup/Swiss knife reliever because Kimbrel can't do that. Now Andrew Miller may help here as he's made that role a big time thing again so a closer like Chapman who's a stud regardless and will be treated like one may accept that type of role. I full expect the Cubs or Yankees to sign him, but I would be happy as hell if the Sox did. Smith-Chapman- Kimbrell would be dynamic and compliment the solid rotation they have. I'd rather give Chapman 4/60 than Edwin 4 or 5 at 20+ per season.
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