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2023 Red Sox Win Projection
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Post by incandenza on Feb 15, 2023 11:34:14 GMT -5
A mere 19 games behind the Orioles, lol.
This guy's projection for the AL East is what you might come up with if you thought every unsustainable trend from 2022 (Red Sox and Rays injuries; Orioles' inexplicable overperformance) not only continued but intensified in 2023. I sort of admire the audacity. I mean, it is easy to throw out a number like 85 wins and figure you are safe +/-5. Throw out 68, and if you are right it is genius — but you could be off by 15 and look like an idiot. I would admire the audacity if any thought went into it, but clearly it didn't. His own write-up of the Orioles doesn't remotely square with his win projection, and at the end he says "come to think of it, I probably am too low on the Rays," but just... leaves the low projection in anyways.
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Post by Guidas on Feb 15, 2023 16:47:53 GMT -5
I sort of admire the audacity. I mean, it is easy to throw out a number like 85 wins and figure you are safe +/-5. Throw out 68, and if you are right it is genius — but you could be off by 15 and look like an idiot. I would admire the audacity if any thought went into it, but clearly it didn't. His own write-up of the Orioles doesn't remotely square with his win projection, and at the end he says "come to think of it, I probably am too low on the Rays," but just... leaves the low projection in anyways. Agreed. I'm not sure how any reasonable analysis produces 68 wins. ZiPS has them at 79 last time I checked, Baseball Prospectus has them at 82 (I think). I haven't checked the Vegas sports books or FanDuel but I'm guessing they're also within 5 wins, plus or minus, of those. ADDED: I just took a look at ZiPS for the whole league. It would be demoralizing beyond words to have the El Sengundo Angels at Anaheim via the 405 to beat out the Boston for the last playoff spot.
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Post by Guidas on Feb 15, 2023 17:10:20 GMT -5
After a putrid story in today's Globe, I'm trying to get a handle on why people can't adequately evaluate the current Sox roster ... even people who are getting paid to do so.
I'd like everyone to answer the following question quickly and simply, without research. Make a gut-feeling educated guess.
Where did the 2022 Boston Red Sox rank, among all teams in MLB, in wins (or Win %, same thing) outside their own division?
I'll compile the answers and give the correct one at 3 AM, Thursday morning.
52-34, given an inordinately high record vs. the AL West 25-8. I'm not sure that's predictive in anyway. If it is, however, then how predictive is their 47-65 record vs. >.500 teams?
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Post by humanbeingbean on Feb 15, 2023 17:26:21 GMT -5
87-75
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bigmarty58
Rookie
2011 Pancreatic Cancer Survivor - One of the lucky ones
Posts: 162
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Post by bigmarty58 on Feb 15, 2023 18:20:59 GMT -5
78-84
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Post by scottysmalls on Feb 15, 2023 18:38:50 GMT -5
After a putrid story in today's Globe, I'm trying to get a handle on why people can't adequately evaluate the current Sox roster ... even people who are getting paid to do so.
I'd like everyone to answer the following question quickly and simply, without research. Make a gut-feeling educated guess.
Where did the 2022 Boston Red Sox rank, among all teams in MLB, in wins (or Win %, same thing) outside their own division?
I'll compile the answers and give the correct one at 3 AM, Thursday morning.
52-34, given an inordinately high record vs. the AL West 25-8. I'm not sure that's predictive in anyway. If it is, however, then how predictive is their 47-65 record vs. >.500 teams? Of this site's 27 listed players on the MLB active roster 18 are either entirely new or in line for a substantially bigger role (mostly due to injuries in the latter case). I'm not sure either is very predictive.
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Post by incandenza on Feb 15, 2023 19:00:14 GMT -5
After a putrid story in today's Globe, I'm trying to get a handle on why people can't adequately evaluate the current Sox roster ... even people who are getting paid to do so.
I'd like everyone to answer the following question quickly and simply, without research. Make a gut-feeling educated guess.
Where did the 2022 Boston Red Sox rank, among all teams in MLB, in wins (or Win %, same thing) outside their own division?
I'll compile the answers and give the correct one at 3 AM, Thursday morning.
52-34, given an inordinately high record vs. the AL West 25-8. I'm not sure that's predictive in anyway. If it is, however, then how predictive is their 47-65 record vs. >.500 teams? One takeaway from that is, geez, they played 112 games against teams with winning records! That's a ridiculous schedule. And considering they still won 78 games it's fair to assume their "real" level of play was that of at least a .500 team.
Of course they're still in the AL East, but the more balanced schedule should help, and the fact that they were not terrible despite a brutal schedule is a bullish sign.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Feb 16, 2023 6:49:22 GMT -5
52-34, given an inordinately high record vs. the AL West 25-8. I'm not sure that's predictive in anyway. If it is, however, then how predictive is their 47-65 record vs. >.500 teams? Of this site's 27 listed players on the MLB active roster 18 are either entirely new or in line for a substantially bigger role (mostly due to injuries in the latter case). I'm not sure either is very predictive. You could argue that Kiké is "new" given that last year was a wash for him, and if Verdugo really was playing through an injury in the first half, then maybe him too. Same with Sale. You could argue that Pivetta, Brasier, Arroyo and Devers, plus maybe Houck depending on how things shake out, are the only guys on the roster filling the same role they did last year who made it through the 2022 season healthy. And I don't mean that's a positive or negative. Just that 2022 doesn't tell us much.
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Post by awalkinthepark on Feb 16, 2023 8:00:38 GMT -5
I'm going to be optimistic and say 90-72. I think they hang with everyone in the first half, Story comes back and they take off in the second half.
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Post by incandenza on Feb 16, 2023 15:35:06 GMT -5
Fangraphs playoffs odds launches with the Red Sox at 30% to make the playoffs, and an 81-win projection. They're solidly in 4th place in the division, projected to be 5 games better than the Orioles and 6 games worse than the Blue Jays.
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ematz1423
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Post by ematz1423 on Feb 16, 2023 15:39:28 GMT -5
Fangraphs playoffs odds launches with the Red Sox at 30% to make the playoffs, and an 81-win projection. They're solidly in 4th place in the division, projected to be 5 games better than the Orioles and 6 games worse than the Blue Jays. This is about where I am leaning towards myself, which is to say I have no earthly idea how the Sox are going to do this year. Could honestly see them losing or winning 90-95 games.
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Post by Guidas on Feb 16, 2023 15:59:17 GMT -5
Fangraphs playoffs odds launches with the Red Sox at 30% to make the playoffs, and an 81-win projection. They're solidly in 4th place in the division, projected to be 5 games better than the Orioles and 6 games worse than the Blue Jays. They also have 9 AL Teams with better odds than theirs, including (gulp) the Rangers and the Angels, FWIW. Their calculation system incorporates ZiPS and Steamer. Put another way, they only have 5 AL teams as ranked worse than Boston with regard to playoff odds.
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Post by incandenza on Feb 16, 2023 16:29:59 GMT -5
Fangraphs playoffs odds launches with the Red Sox at 30% to make the playoffs, and an 81-win projection. They're solidly in 4th place in the division, projected to be 5 games better than the Orioles and 6 games worse than the Blue Jays. They also have 9 AL Teams with better odds than theirs, including (gulp) the Rangers and the Angels, FWIW. Their calculation system incorporates ZiPS and Steamer. Put another way, they only have 5 AL teams as ranked worse than Boston with regard to playoff odds. They also have only 4 teams projected to finish 3+ games ahead of them.
BOS/MIN/CHW/SEA/LAA/TEX are all between 25-50%, and 79-84 wins. Gonna be an exciting 162-game marathon to decide which couple of teams get to play in a one-game coin flip to hopefully advance to a three-game coin flip.
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ematz1423
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Post by ematz1423 on Feb 16, 2023 16:50:25 GMT -5
This is about where I am leaning towards myself, which is to say I have no earthly idea how the Sox are going to do this year. Could honestly see them losing or winning 90-95 games. I can't see them losing 90-95 games, although I do agree that I have very little idea of where they do finish. Looking at the list of teams that lost that many games last year and it doesn't happen by accident, you have to commit to lose to have that kind of W-L record. Now that I'm thinking of it, I still see this team winning in the 88 game range but there's 100 different ways they could get to that number. Maybe the uncertainty with this team isn't how many games they win but the path they take to get there. I'm not predicting 90 losses but in a scenario where all hell breaks loose and they get bad injury luck it's possible. Suppose you can say that about almost every team but this team seems to have more potential variance than the average team at least how I'm seeing it.
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Post by alexcorahomevideo on Feb 16, 2023 16:51:28 GMT -5
68 is light. I'd take that bet. I think 75-82 is realistic. A lot depends on the rotation holding up. Yoshi emerging too
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Post by seamus on Feb 16, 2023 17:25:30 GMT -5
People, both here and elsewhere, keep saying that the Red Sox have huge variance, but I honestly don't see it (excepting the "all the stars get injured" scenario that would crush virtually any team). Outside of Devers, the difference between Plan A and Plan B isn't impossibly huge anywhere aside from 3B because of the flexibility they have. If there's an injury/underperformance in the outfield, they have a bunch of solid options like Tapia, Allen, and Refsnyder, or they can switch Hernandez back to OF if they prefer Arroyo/Chang/Goodrum in the MIF versus those options. If there's an injury/underperformance in the rotation, that just clears up who gets bumped to the bullpen/IL. The point isn't so much that all of these players are great or even good, but that they just have a lot of guys who've shown they can play at least respectably in the big leagues. All their hopes aren't pinned on one guy going crazy and a bunch of unknowns providing they belong, so they can probably mix-and-match their way around "normal" bad luck as well as any team in baseball.
I agree they need a lot to go right to get over 90 wins... but I think they need even more to go wrong to get below .500. If I was to consider their 20th/80th percentile outcomes, I think they'd more resemble a high-floor/low-ceiling team than the low-floor/high-ceiling squad that many are describing.
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Post by incandenza on Feb 16, 2023 17:39:53 GMT -5
People, both here and elsewhere, keep saying that the Red Sox have huge variance, but I honestly don't see it (excepting the "all the stars get injured" scenario that would crush virtually any team). Outside of Devers, the difference between Plan A and Plan B isn't impossibly huge anywhere aside from 3B because of the flexibility they have. If there's an injury/underperformance in the outfield, they have a bunch of solid options like Tapia, Allen, and Refsnyder, or they can switch Hernandez back to OF if they prefer Arroyo/Chang/Goodrum in the MIF versus those options. If there's an injury/underperformance in the rotation, that just clears up who gets bumped to the bullpen/IL. The point isn't so much that all of these players are great or even good, but that they just have a lot of guys who've shown they can play at least respectably in the big leagues. All their hopes aren't pinned on one guy going crazy and a bunch of unknowns providing they belong, so they can probably mix-and-match their way around "normal" bad luck as well as any team in baseball.I agree they need a lot to go right to get over 90 wins... but I think they need even more to go wrong to get below .500. If I was to consider their 20th/80th percentile outcomes, I think they'd more resemble a high-floor/low-ceiling team than the low-floor/high-ceiling squad that many are describing. In regards to that, this is notable, from the fangraphs write-up for their playoff odds: If your take on the team is right (and I'm inclined to agree) it would underestimate a team like the Red Sox. And overestimate a team like, say, the Yankees, where there's a huge dropoff if any of their top 5 or so players gets hurt.
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Post by fenwaydouble on Feb 16, 2023 18:05:28 GMT -5
People, both here and elsewhere, keep saying that the Red Sox have huge variance, but I honestly don't see it (excepting the "all the stars get injured" scenario that would crush virtually any team). Outside of Devers, the difference between Plan A and Plan B isn't impossibly huge anywhere aside from 3B because of the flexibility they have. If there's an injury/underperformance in the outfield, they have a bunch of solid options like Tapia, Allen, and Refsnyder, or they can switch Hernandez back to OF if they prefer Arroyo/Chang/Goodrum in the MIF versus those options. If there's an injury/underperformance in the rotation, that just clears up who gets bumped to the bullpen/IL. The point isn't so much that all of these players are great or even good, but that they just have a lot of guys who've shown they can play at least respectably in the big leagues. All their hopes aren't pinned on one guy going crazy and a bunch of unknowns providing they belong, so they can probably mix-and-match their way around "normal" bad luck as well as any team in baseball. I agree they need a lot to go right to get over 90 wins... but I think they need even more to go wrong to get below .500. If I was to consider their 20th/80th percentile outcomes, I think they'd more resemble a high-floor/low-ceiling team than the low-floor/high-ceiling squad that many are describing. I've been thinking this for a while too. I think they're high variance in that it's easy to imagine the lineup being pretty good (Yoshida lives up to the hype, Casas adjusts right away) or thoroughly mediocre (those guys struggle, Verdugo and Kiké spin their wheels). But I really don't see how the team is anything worse than decent given how many usable arms they can run out.
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Post by jmei on Feb 17, 2023 11:13:29 GMT -5
Eh, they have a lot of names for the rotation, but I think a reasonable pessimistic (call it 30th percentile) projection for a good chunk of their starting pitching depth is either hurt (Sale, Kluber, Paxton), in the bullpen (or at least on an innings limit) (Whitlock, Houck) or replacement level (all the AAA guys).
Yes, in theory, they have enough options that it's hard to imagine them all performing below expectations, but it often takes a while before it's clear that the guys you're giving innings to are just not that good. Let's say a few starting pitchers get hurt and they give starts to Crawford and Wink. Would not surprise me if those guys put up, say, a combined 20 starts of replacement-level performance before they yanked them in favor of, say, Mata and Walter. And by that point, those 20 bad starts might have already sunk the season.
ADD: call it the Travis Shaw effect. In theory, having an extra layer of depth in Travis Shaw only helps. In practice, he somehow gave them -0.6 WAR in (checks notes) 19 plate appearances over seven games (!) last year. Not a perfect analogy in the sense that Shaw is an over-the-hill veteran and their depth is more injury risks and fringy fifth starter types, but you get the point.
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Post by Foulke_In_Athol on Feb 17, 2023 11:35:50 GMT -5
I also think a lot of fans/writers/Pundits are going by the talk radio/Tomase consensus of "Bloom is an idiot who only wants to make this Tampa Bay North and is a cheapskate!!111!!" Or but they lost Xander, and didn't sign a big name in Free Agency, the ownership doesn't care!!111!!" Without really paying attention to how this team is built. I think they've built a sneaky good team, that can cover for injuries with depth, has a couple really solid kids in the minors who can provide even more depth and that over 162 games versatility is so important. Add to that, that Bloom and company seem to have tried to take advantage of the new rules and have picked players that should thrive in Fenway (Turner, Yoshi, Duval).
I say 87 wins, with a chance to make some noise in the playoffs, if they get in.
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Post by incandenza on Feb 17, 2023 11:40:58 GMT -5
Eh, they have a lot of names for the rotation, but I think a reasonable pessimistic (call it 30th percentile) projection for a good chunk of their starting pitching depth is either hurt (Sale, Kluber, Paxton), in the bullpen (or at least on an innings limit) (Whitlock, Houck) or replacement level (all the AAA guys). Yes, in theory, they have enough options that it's hard to imagine them all performing below expectations, but it often takes a while before it's clear that the guys you're giving innings to are just not that good. Let's say a few starting pitchers get hurt and they give starts to Crawford and Wink. Would not surprise me if those guys put up, say, a combined 20 starts of replacement-level performance before they yanked them in favor of, say, Mata and Walter. And by that point, those 20 bad starts might have already sunk the season.
ADD: call it the Travis Shaw effect. In theory, having an extra layer of depth in Travis Shaw only helps. In practice, he somehow gave them -0.6 WAR in (checks notes) 19 plate appearances over seven games (!) last year. Not a perfect analogy in the sense that Shaw is an over-the-hill veteran and their depth is more injury risks and fringy fifth starter types, but you get the point. So in this scenario 3 or 4 of their top seven starters (Sale, Paxton, Kluber, Pivetta, Bello, Whitlock, Houck) are on the IL at the same time. And the replacements (Crawford and Winckowski) are... replacement-level. And this happens before other replacements (Mata and Walter) are ready. And presumably their remaining healthy starters are not good enough to compensate for the poor performance of the replacements.
This is not *wildly* implausible; indeed it's not far from what they actually went through in the middle of last season (though they started with less depth then). But it's clearly one of the worst plausible outcomes. By the same token the Yankees will be in trouble if Cole and Rodon miss significant time...
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Post by jmei on Feb 17, 2023 12:06:35 GMT -5
Eh, they have a lot of names for the rotation, but I think a reasonable pessimistic (call it 30th percentile) projection for a good chunk of their starting pitching depth is either hurt (Sale, Kluber, Paxton), in the bullpen (or at least on an innings limit) (Whitlock, Houck) or replacement level (all the AAA guys). Yes, in theory, they have enough options that it's hard to imagine them all performing below expectations, but it often takes a while before it's clear that the guys you're giving innings to are just not that good. Let's say a few starting pitchers get hurt and they give starts to Crawford and Wink. Would not surprise me if those guys put up, say, a combined 20 starts of replacement-level performance before they yanked them in favor of, say, Mata and Walter. And by that point, those 20 bad starts might have already sunk the season.
ADD: call it the Travis Shaw effect. In theory, having an extra layer of depth in Travis Shaw only helps. In practice, he somehow gave them -0.6 WAR in (checks notes) 19 plate appearances over seven games (!) last year. Not a perfect analogy in the sense that Shaw is an over-the-hill veteran and their depth is more injury risks and fringy fifth starter types, but you get the point. So in this scenario 3 or 4 of their top seven starters (Sale, Paxton, Kluber, Pivetta, Bello, Whitlock, Houck) are on the IL at the same time. And the replacements (Crawford and Winckowski) are... replacement-level. And this happens before other replacements (Mata and Walter) are ready. And presumably their remaining healthy starters are not good enough to compensate for the poor performance of the replacements. This is not *wildly* implausible; indeed it's not far from what they actually went through in the middle of last season (though they started with less depth then). But it's clearly one of the worst plausible outcomes. By the same token the Yankees will be in trouble if Cole and Rodon miss significant time...
I don't think it's that implausible. My median projections of Sale and Paxton are that they are on the IL, so you just need one more starter to get injured (not hard to imagine). My median projections of Crawford and Wink are that they are sub-one win players and that they are first in line for starts. So, on a team-wide level, call this a 30th percentile outcome that they have a replacement-level starting pitcher for a decent chunk of the season. That's where the downside variance comes from. ADD: keep in mind the context of the conversation. I am expressing caution about their ability to (and I quote) "mix-and-match" through injuries or underperformance. It never works out as well in practice as it does in theory because there's a difference between having a lot of options and having a lot of good options. They have a lot of guys who could be good starting pitcher depth, but those guys could also be replacement-level guys. Ditto for whichever one of SS/CF that isn't covered by Kiké, 2B if Arroyo gets hurt, etc.
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Post by manfred on Feb 17, 2023 12:19:31 GMT -5
Of this site's 27 listed players on the MLB active roster 18 are either entirely new or in line for a substantially bigger role (mostly due to injuries in the latter case). I'm not sure either is very predictive. You could argue that Kiké is "new" given that last year was a wash for him, and if Verdugo really was playing through an injury in the first half, then maybe him too. Same with Sale. You could argue that Pivetta, Brasier, Arroyo and Devers, plus maybe Houck depending on how things shake out, are the only guys on the roster filling the same role they did last year who made it through the 2022 season healthy. And I don't mean that's a positive or negative. Just that 2022 doesn't tell us much. Sure, though you could also argue “injury” is a form of performance, especially when it is a pattern. Sale might be “new,” but who wants to be on a healthy season? I guess I think some injuries are as predictive as anything is really predictive. (I mean, looking over Kiké’s career, is *anything* truly predictive? He has had a range of results).
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Post by incandenza on Feb 17, 2023 12:29:37 GMT -5
So in this scenario 3 or 4 of their top seven starters (Sale, Paxton, Kluber, Pivetta, Bello, Whitlock, Houck) are on the IL at the same time. And the replacements (Crawford and Winckowski) are... replacement-level. And this happens before other replacements (Mata and Walter) are ready. And presumably their remaining healthy starters are not good enough to compensate for the poor performance of the replacements. This is not *wildly* implausible; indeed it's not far from what they actually went through in the middle of last season (though they started with less depth then). But it's clearly one of the worst plausible outcomes. By the same token the Yankees will be in trouble if Cole and Rodon miss significant time...
I don't think it's that implausible. My median projections of Sale and Paxton are that they are on the IL, so you just need one more starter to get injured (not hard to imagine). My median projections of Crawford and Wink are that they are sub-one win players and that they are first in line for starts. So, on a team-wide level, call this a 30th percentile outcome that they have a replacement-level starting pitcher for a decent chunk of the season. That's where the downside variance comes from. Surely you don't think there's a greater than 70% chance of Sale or Paxton being on the IL at any one time, right? Even if you assume 70% odds there, that implies a 49% chance of them both being on the IL at any given point in time. So even with very pessimistic assumptions the median outcome shouldn't be that both of them are on the IL. And then if they are you'd still need another starter to go on the IL. And then at that point we're talking about a Crawford type taking the ball once every five games - but there's some chance he's good!
It seems to me you're taking a number of reasonable possibilities and saying that there is therefore a reasonable possibility of all of them occurring. But it's like flipping a coin - there's a reasonable (50%) chance I get heads on any individual flip. But only a 6% chance I get heads four times in a row.
ADD in response to your ADD: I actually think it's unlikely any of their top 8 starters are replacement level of worse. Last season Crawford - the last guy on this list - was worth 0.5 WAR in 77 IP. Winckowski had negative WAR but he's their, what, #9 starter? And probably gets eclipsed by mid-season.
More generally, the team had -6.4 WAR combined from guys (both pitchers and position players) with negative WAR last seaso, the worst in the division. -3 WAR from such players is probably closer to average. And they are certainly going into the season with better depth than they had last year. This potential to cut down on the black-hole performances is one of the reasons I'm fairly bullish about them this year (after being pessimistic about them last year for the same reason).
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Post by bosoxnation on Feb 17, 2023 18:36:18 GMT -5
80 wins or Cora should be on the hot seat. More importantly don't finish in last place.
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