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5/7-5/10 Red Sox @ Orioles Thread
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Post by Legion of Bloom on May 10, 2021 10:39:33 GMT -5
22-10 since being sweeped by the O’s to start the season.
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Post by huskies15 on May 10, 2021 10:46:44 GMT -5
Devers' O-Swing% of 40.3% is 14th-highest among qualified hitters. That said, his O-Contact% of 70% is 49th, so he's still making contact on those swings (although potentially and probably worse contact?). That said, his aggressive approach might just be part of the package. His 8.6% called strike percentage is third-lowest among qualified hitters, behind only Albies and Corey Seager. He's aggressive and that's part of why he's successful. If the aggression comes with .288/.375/.576*, I'm ok with it, although I certainly agree it would be nice if he cut it down a smidge without losing anything... * - Without actually running the numbers, that he still has a .087 ISOD as aggressive as he is on pitches outside of the zone is kind of impressive, I feel like. blogs.fangraphs.com/rafael-devers-still-has-another-gear/Fangraphs seems to have been reading this thread. The article hear basically talks about Devers' contact quality/discipline and how if he zoned in a bit more and has some regression (in a positive manner) he's in line for a crazy good season.
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Post by manfred on May 10, 2021 10:46:46 GMT -5
Grossman isn't a huge get but he would be a very good upgrade leading off and is an adequate OFer defensively. With him leading off it seems that it would have a trickle down effect on the batting order, sometimes a small move adds up to more than the sum. I would be willing to give a prospect in the area of a Wallace, something less and maybe Franchy. That would be 3 maybes for a guy whose worth isn't that great to a team like Detroit in there current form. Once again I am just spitballing and I know Grossman isn't much but he seems like exactly what the Sox could use right about now, not much of a ceiling but a decent floor. A legit OFer that could handle RF in Boston and move around when needed, also a good depth piece as time goes on. When it comes to Grossman, I have to wonder why he wasn't part of this team to begin with. He signed for 2/$10 so he could have been the guy to get instead of the other signings. I came across a recent interview of his and he obviously hates losing, so he may have cost even less for the Sox. If the front office didn't like him in January I don't think they'll like him any more in June. Grossman also might look better because he played well against us. He is batting .225, after all. Yeah, he has a high OBP, but it is a decent amount higher than his career number... I wouldn’t want to get him as he returns to his averages. I suspect internal (hence free!) options would be as good.
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Post by patford on May 10, 2021 10:49:57 GMT -5
Grossman isn't a huge get but he would be a very good upgrade leading off and is an adequate OFer defensively. With him leading off it seems that it would have a trickle down effect on the batting order, sometimes a small move adds up to more than the sum. I would be willing to give a prospect in the area of a Wallace, something less and maybe Franchy. That would be 3 maybes for a guy whose worth isn't that great to a team like Detroit in there current form. Once again I am just spitballing and I know Grossman isn't much but he seems like exactly what the Sox could use right about now, not much of a ceiling but a decent floor. A legit OFer that could handle RF in Boston and move around when needed, also a good depth piece as time goes on. When it comes to Grossman, I have to wonder why he wasn't part of this team to begin with. He signed for 2/$10 so he could have been the guy to get instead of the other signings. I came across a recent interview of his and he obviously hates losing, so he may have cost even less for the Sox. If the front office didn't like him in January I don't think they'll like him any more in June. In what way would Grossman be an upgrade? He's hitting .225. His career average is 6 HR.
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jimoh
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Post by jimoh on May 10, 2021 10:55:45 GMT -5
When it comes to Grossman, I have to wonder why he wasn't part of this team to begin with. He signed for 2/$10 so he could have been the guy to get instead of the other signings. I came across a recent interview of his and he obviously hates losing, so he may have cost even less for the Sox. If the front office didn't like him in January I don't think they'll like him any more in June. In what way would Grossman be an upgrade? He's hitting .225. His career average is 6 HR. Batting average? I think the idea would be that with this group of sluggers, half of whom have low OBP, a man like Grossman with a lifetime OBP of .352 and an OBP this season of .383 would score a lot of runs.
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Post by voiceofreason on May 10, 2021 11:00:02 GMT -5
When it comes to Grossman, I have to wonder why he wasn't part of this team to begin with. He signed for 2/$10 so he could have been the guy to get instead of the other signings. I came across a recent interview of his and he obviously hates losing, so he may have cost even less for the Sox. If the front office didn't like him in January I don't think they'll like him any more in June. Grossman also might look better because he played well against us. He is batting .225, after all. Yeah, he has a high OBP, but it is a decent amount higher than his career number... I wouldn’t want to get him as he returns to his averages. I suspect internal (hence free!) options would be as good. Career 350 OBP is an improvement at what the current options are at leadoff. More interesting thought to me is what would he do with better hitters following him in the order? Good point on the offseason signings but you can't hit them all. Happ in Minn for 8 million is having a typical Happ season.
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Post by manfred on May 10, 2021 11:02:03 GMT -5
In what way would Grossman be an upgrade? He's hitting .225. His career average is 6 HR. Batting average? I think the idea would be that with this group of sluggers, half of whom have low OBP, a man like Grossman with a lifetime OBP of .352 and an OBP this season of .383 would score a lot of runs. Right... but i don’t necessarily buy the .383 — my point about the BA is the OBP is mostly walks, and I don’t know that he will keep this pace up. His career OBP year by year runs from very good (2016, .386) to not very good (.334 in 2019, .344 in 2020). If he ended the season closer to those more recent OBP, you’d be getting the come-down. If he’s cheap, I’m for it. I have no beef with the guy. I just don’t expect much.
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Post by voiceofreason on May 10, 2021 11:11:19 GMT -5
Well he would come cheap and Kiki at 312 vs Grossman at 352 OBP is an upgrade, he is currently #11 in the AL at 383. Like I said I am only spitballing but he is the guy on the team that I think could be a cheap upgrade sooner rather than later. No he is not a big addition but how would you like to have his 383 OBP so far this year and as far as regressing goes he would have one of the best 4 men in MLB following him.
Detroit qualifies as a noncontender which is why a brought him up.
It might be a bit much to expect someone from the system to come in and produce 350+ OBP. And OBP is a team need let alone leading off.
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Post by manfred on May 10, 2021 11:27:42 GMT -5
Well he would come cheap and Kiki at 312 vs Grossman at 352 OBP is an upgrade, he is currently #11 in the AL at 383. Like I said I am only spitballing but he is the guy on the team that I think could be a cheap upgrade sooner rather than later. No he is not a big addition but how would you like to have his 383 OBP so far this year and as far as regressing goes he would have one of the best 4 men in MLB following him. Detroit qualifies as a noncontender which is why a brought him up. It might be a bit much to expect someone from the system to come in and produce 350+ OBP. And OBP is a team need let alone leading off. I’m for it in theory, don’t get me wrong. Personally, I couldn’t care less about trading a guy or two from #20+ in the system. A contending year in the hand is better than two in the bush(leagues).
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Post by incandenza on May 10, 2021 11:34:19 GMT -5
22-10 since being sweeped by the O’s to start the season. And 13-10 since the end of the 9-game winning streak, which is itself a 92-win pace.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on May 10, 2021 11:37:55 GMT -5
On a purely subjective note, who is Red Sox player going back to 1962 who had a better hit tool than Raffy Devers? I can't think of one.
Define "hit tool" in this instance, please. Seriously. Is it barrels, BA, BABIP or what combination. I firmly believe if Devers could stop pretending he's Vlad Guerrero and acquire better plate discipline, he could lead the league in hitting, slugging and maybe OPB. I think it's been a point of emphasis with him that he just loses focus on, based on the fact that, when he draws walks lately, he looks like he's celebrating - like he's telling Cora: "See, I did it!" I'm indeed thinking of the combination of coverage within the zone and the ability to hit those pitches hard. jmei mentions Pedey, and Pedey had the same skill of getting his bat on the ball with authority no matter where in the zone the pitch was, but Pedey's authority was comparable to President of the U.S. and Devers authority is off in the direction of King of the Universe. So what I was really saying was that I have never seen a player with his ability to hit tough pitches in the zone so freaking hard. Think about how useful that is with two strikes. I've made the same observation about Devers celebrating his walks. And next I'm going to go deeper than the FanGraphs article which has Devers among the MLB leaders in xwOBA on pitches outside the heart of the zone.
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Post by redsox04071318champs on May 10, 2021 11:56:51 GMT -5
Obviously "hit tool" is subjective, but off the top of my head guys that need be considered: Mid to late 70's Fred Lynn, Wade Boggs, briefly Nomar, Mookie? I only remember seeing Yaz in his sunset years, but I'm guessing his hit tool was probably semi-OK in the triple crown year. Note - I get that Raffy probably hasn't hit his prime yet, and could really be an incredible (more) hitter soon. Pretty exciting. Boggs hands down, Nomar as well. That said, Xander is looking better than I've ever seen him and I'm not referring to the running stats. Totally. Boggs was a consistent .360 hitter who fouled pitches off at will and would pop up to the infield once a year. Devers has a really good hit tool, and his increased plate discipline is heartening and will allow him to make better use of his strong hit tool, but better than Boggs? No way. And as you point out, Nomar for awhile did, too. He could barrel that ball, but he was nowhere near as disciplined as Boggs so he would swing at pitches you kind of wish he wouldn't. When he got hit by Al Reyes, it took awhile, but he was never really the same. It took awhile for the injury to make its impact but when he came back from missing 2001 he wasn't the same and the plate discipline was what it was so he'd get himself out on pitches that he could no longer rely on his hit tool to carry him through. But for me, it's Ted Williams, and then Wade Boggs (if we're going beyond 1962), and then pretty much everybody else with Nomar at the head of the class until his injury impacted him.
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Post by incandenza on May 10, 2021 12:11:31 GMT -5
This conversation is making me confused about the meaning of "hit tool." I always just assumed it meant "ability to hit for average." If that's right, though, Devers wouldn't even be in the conversation.
Red Sox BA leaders going back to 1962:
1. Boggs: .338 2. Nomar: .323 3. Adrian Gonzalez: .321 4. Reggie Jefferson: .316 5. Manny: .312 6. Lynn: .308 7. Mo Vaughn: .304 11. Mookie: .301 12. Pedroia: .299 17. Xander: .291 35. Devers: .280
Devers is definitely in the conversation for best "ability to freakin' smoke the ball" tool, but that's more like the power tool than the hit tool, isn't it?
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shagworthy
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Post by shagworthy on May 10, 2021 12:17:43 GMT -5
Boggs hands down, Nomar as well. That said, Xander is looking better than I've ever seen him and I'm not referring to the running stats. Totally. Boggs was a consistent .360 hitter who fouled pitches off at will and would pop up to the infield once a year. Devers has a really good hit tool, but better than Boggs? No way. And as you point out, Nomar for awhile did, too. He could barrel that ball, but he was nowhere near as disciplined as Boggs so he would swing at pitches you kind of wish he wouldn't. When he got hit by Al Reyes, it took awhile, but he was never really the same. It took awhile for the injury to make its impact but when he came back from missing 2001 he wasn't the same and the plate discipline was what it was so he'd get himself out on pitches that he could no longer rely on his hit tool to carry him through. But for me, it's Ted Williams, and then Wade Boggs (if we're going beyond 1962), and then pretty much everybody else with Nomar at the head of the class until his injury impacted him. I would agree it has to be Boggs, and maybe Nomar for a year or two, Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz also should get special notice, but I don't recall seeing many guys hit balls as hard as Devers does consistently. Maybe that's because the way guys hit is different today, and the way we measure it is different too. Would have loved to know some of the exit velocities on batted balls by Manny, Ortiz, Nomar, Boggs, Jim Rice, Don Baylor, etc etc. I've said it before, but one year Will Mo Pena hit a homerun that exited Fenway so fast it was ridiculous, if that guy could have ever harnessed his strength he was one scary man when he did put the bat on the ball.
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shagworthy
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Post by shagworthy on May 10, 2021 12:29:34 GMT -5
Nice! I'm right outside Asheville myself in Candler. Great! If you garden, I have a few thousand tomato seedlings in my yard at the moment - selling from my driveway! My wife went to a quilt shop in Candler last year. We are at trader joe in Asheville every few weeks. Love living here! My wife gardens, but she prefers flowers to vegetables. I have a brown thumb most of the time, but I sometimes plant various hot peppers with success. That Trader Joe's is always so packed I tend to only go there early in the mornings mid week if I have a hankering for one of their specialties. I have become a grocery store snob since we moved down here 7 years ago, I love the consistent layout at Ingles where everything is in a logical location. When I'm back home in Connecticut I cannot stand Stop and Shop anymore and dread having to go and get anything there.
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Post by James Dunne on May 10, 2021 12:41:09 GMT -5
So what I was really saying was that I have never seen a player with his ability to hit tough pitches in the zone so freaking hard. Think about how useful that is with two strikes. I compared Devers at one point around the time he came up to Gary Sheffield. They both had hands so quick and such good hand-eye coordination that they were able to take those violent swings and just totally punish even good pitches.
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Post by Guidas on May 10, 2021 12:56:44 GMT -5
Great! If you garden, I have a few thousand tomato seedlings in my yard at the moment - selling from my driveway! My wife went to a quilt shop in Candler last year. We are at trader joe in Asheville every few weeks. Love living here! My wife gardens, but she prefers flowers to vegetables. I have a brown thumb most of the time, but I sometimes plant various hot peppers with success. That Trader Joe's is always so packed I tend to only go there early in the mornings mid week if I have a hankering for one of their specialties. I have become a grocery store snob since we moved down here 7 years ago, I love the consistent layout at Ingles where everything is in a logical location. When I'm back home in Connecticut I cannot stand Stop and Shop anymore and dread having to go and get anything there. OK, I have to ask - where in Connecticut? We're refugees from the Nutmeg/Pothole state, as well - over in Chapel Hill right now, but if one of the job offers I'm working on comes through it'll be down to SC soon. btw, if you folks are BBQ fiends, 12 Bones in Arden or Asheville (and the full rack with the brown sugar rub) is to die for.
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Post by Soxfansince1971 on May 10, 2021 13:05:46 GMT -5
22-10 since being sweeped by the O’s to start the season. And 13-10 since the end of the 9-game winning streak, which is itself a 92-win pace. To get to 90 wins the Red Sox would need to go 68-59 or .540 winning percentage, if you presume that 90 wins makes the playoffs. 93 wins would be a .560 winning percentage, but either way the good start by the Red Sox makes the outcome of making the playoffs much more attainable (even with a much harder schedule coming). The roles for both the pitching staff and position players are much more clear approaching the 1/4 way through the season. I thought the Red Sox were going to be good, and ignored a lot of the negative comments....good enough for a wild card, but how good the Red Sox can be will be determined by adds like Sale, Duran, a 8th inning set up man, and not over using Barnes...
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Post by Canseco on May 10, 2021 13:32:58 GMT -5
And 13-10 since the end of the 9-game winning streak, which is itself a 92-win pace. To get to 90 wins the Red Sox would need to go 68-59 or .540 winning percentage, if you presume that 90 wins makes the playoffs. 93 wins would be a .560 winning percentage, but either way the good start by the Red Sox makes the outcome of making the playoffs much more attainable (even with a much harder schedule coming). The roles for both the pitching staff and position players are much more clear approaching the 1/4 way through the season. I thought the Red Sox were going to be good, and ignored a lot of the negative comments....good enough for a wild card, but how good the Red Sox can be will be determined by adds like Sale, Duran, a 8th inning set up man, and not over using Barnes...Yes. Previous instances of overuse have not been good for Barnes:
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Post by redsox04071318champs on May 10, 2021 13:44:30 GMT -5
This conversation is making me confused about the meaning of "hit tool." I always just assumed it meant "ability to hit for average." If that's right, though, Devers wouldn't even be in the conversation. Red Sox BA leaders going back to 1962: 1. Boggs: .338 2. Nomar: .323 3. Adrian Gonzalez: .321 4. Reggie Jefferson: .316 5. Manny: .312 6. Lynn: .308 7. Mo Vaughn: .304 11. Mookie: .301 12. Pedroia: .299 17. Xander: .291 35. Devers: .280 Devers is definitely in the conversation for best "ability to freakin' smoke the ball" tool, but that's more like the power tool than the hit tool, isn't it? I would guess there's hit tool as far as ability to hit the ball almost regardless of where it's pitched. We don't know if Wade Boggs could do that because Wade Boggs wouldn't swing if the pitch was a centimeter off the plate (in Ted Williams' case if it was off a hair he wouldn't swing - after awhile the umps would say, "Ted didn't swing? Must be a ball!"). Nomar had that ability to make contact with a pitch that could be in just about any zip code that he could reach. Adrian Beltre had some of that ability, although Nomar's ability was uncanny. I mean, he batted .372 in 2000, a year after hitting .357, and he had that bad ball hitting ability, something Yogi Berra had, Vlad Guerrero had, and Kirby Puckett had, one certainly that Tony Gwynn, Pete Rose, Ichiro, and Rod Carew had. But if that tool goes off a little, I think it's harder to maintain than the hit tool that a Ted Williams or Wade Boggs had, one that was specifically suited for pitches in the strike zone. But then again, Gywnn was able to keep his going longer than Boggs as it was Gwynn who had the better 30s than Boggs who excelled more in his 20s and was never quite the same again after the 1988 season. I mean if you put Boggs' stats from his 20s together with Gywnn's stats from his 30s you get some kind of hit monster that can rival Ty Cobb.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on May 10, 2021 13:48:59 GMT -5
So, first, let's break down Devers two big ways: with less than 2 strikes, and with 2 strikes. Within each of those, we'll look at his performance in 4 plate zones: Heart of the zone, Shadow strikes, Shadow Balls, and Chase. I'll give his expected slash line and xwOBA, where that ranks among the 290 players who have seen 240+ pitches (because StatCast rankings show total pitches but not total PA), and where Devers ranks in terms of number of PA that ended that way (the sample size).
With less than 2 strikes:
.453 / .495 / 1.004 = .615. Heart. Ranks 6th, after Buxton, Harper, Judge, Yermin Mercedes, and Realmuto. His 58 PA is nothing special, but it's the highest total among the top 9; Otani and Salvador Perez have 59 each and rank 10th and 11th. My guess is that he's second to Buxton in run value per PA.
.500 / .526 / 1.148 = .689. Shadow Strikes. Ranks 3rd after Mercedes and Mitch Garver, but they have just 10 PA each. Devers has 26, which ranks 6th in MLB. The only other players in the top 20 in both frequency and results are Freddie Freeman (t3, 14), Acuna Jr. (t17, 7), and Avasail Garcia (t17, 8). He's just off-the-scale for doing damage on these tough strikes with less than 2 strikes.
.257 / .443 / .344 = .366. Shadow Balls. His PA / Pitch ranks 268th (highest), and his PA are tied for 259th least, but he ranks 156th in xwOBA, just a bit below average (.384). The relationship between PA / Pitch and xwOBA, while statistically significant, is not as strong as you'd think, so he doesn't seem to really have a skill on these pitches, which are good pitcher's pitches.
.367 / .770 / .397 = .565. Chase. Here he's a bit above league average (.547) in results, ranking 151st, despite having the 3rd highest total of PA and ranking 286th in PA / Pitch. But this and the previous are presumably his areas of improvement that have led to the extra walks, so at the end of the season I'll compare these to his previous performance.
With 2 Strikes.
.367 / .367 / .634 = .425. Heart. The league is .243 / .243 / .348 = .288, so this seems great at first glance. But he ranks only 36th here, so there's definitely room for improvement. He's 108th in percentage of all pitches that are 2-strike heart, with 23. It strikes me (no pun intended) that you're doing more thinking about what will be thrown once you get into 2 strikes.
.162 / .162 / .419 = .238. Shadow Strikes. The overall line is .172 / .184 / .273 = .198. He has a great Iso but he's not yet using his hit tool to be better than average in BA on these deadly pitches, and so ranks only 90th.
I'm gonna call it quits for the time being, because it's clear that relative to his other performance, he is not yet anything close to a good 2-strike hitter. That's room for further improvement, which is a rather scary and exhilarating thought.
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Post by philsbosoxfan on May 10, 2021 13:49:06 GMT -5
Some of the peeps are talking tools, some skills.
In my life's viewing, I can only think of 6 that I'd grade as 80 hit tools and Raffy isn't close, 60-65 maybe.
Williams, Bonds, Boggs, Gwynn, Carew, Brett. That's it for me.
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Post by incandenza on May 10, 2021 13:50:57 GMT -5
And 13-10 since the end of the 9-game winning streak, which is itself a 92-win pace. To get to 90 wins the Red Sox would need to go 68-59 or .540 winning percentage, if you presume that 90 wins makes the playoffs. 93 wins would be a .560 winning percentage, but either way the good start by the Red Sox makes the outcome of making the playoffs much more attainable (even with a much harder schedule coming). The roles for both the pitching staff and position players are much more clear approaching the 1/4 way through the season. I thought the Red Sox were going to be good, and ignored a lot of the negative comments....good enough for a wild card, but how good the Red Sox can be will be determined by adds like Sale, Duran, a 8th inning set up man, and not over using Barnes...You'd think that having the extra arm in the bullpen would help with that, but the main effect of keeping Brice seems to be that they turn blowouts into close games and then Barnes has to get warmed up that much more often...
On an unrelated note: does anyone who posts here actually live in New England? Lol...
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jimoh
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Post by jimoh on May 10, 2021 13:54:20 GMT -5
Career 350 OBP is an improvement at what the current options are at leadoff. More interesting thought to me is what would he do with better hitters following him in the order? Good point on the offseason signings but you can't hit them all. Happ in Minn for 8 million is having a typical Happ season. There is a lack of a true leadoff hitter on the team right now, so I can see him in the role you're outlining. I almost think it would be preferable to give up one of Kiké, Marwin, Franchy, or Renfroe in a deal just to clear some roster space if the team decided to pursue him. If not then maybe look at the Worchester roster for a AAAA-type guy? Someone who could start for the Tigers but not the Sox. Over the winter it seemed attractive to sign someone like Tommy La Stella for 2b, since his career OBP was close to 350. Signed with Giants for 3 yr(s) / $18,750,000 Currently hitting .235 .297 .353 .650
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Post by jmei on May 10, 2021 14:07:50 GMT -5
I haven’t been following the team super closely, but is there a reason Verdugo isn’t hitting lead off (followed by Bogaerts/Martinez/Devers in whatever order you like)?
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