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8/20-8/22 Red Sox vs. Rangers Thread
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Post by incandenza on Aug 22, 2021 9:22:53 GMT -5
A problem I first noticed last year and thought had gone away this year is a lack of leadership and real intensity from the team. And I don't put that on Cora, I know strange right. I really think Cora is not the problem and they never would have had the first half they did without him. I think it is the players, their is not a leader amongst them and zero fire when things aren't going well. Maybe it is Sale but no position players. Hard for a pitcher to be that guy but someone needs to pull a Ortiz. Mookie would have been that guy. This team may have played a over it's head in the 1st half but they are better than this and the lack of leadership will need to be addressed in the offseason, they lack character. I was wondering about this. I didn’t know if anyone had a sense that there might be someone less obvious who could call a players only meeting and fire them up. Xander doesn’t *seem* like that guy, but it is hard to say. Who is the “captain” on this team? But that said, I don’t know if it matters. The moments when a veteran lights a team up are legendary, but this is a team with many veteran guys who are making boneheaded plays. Would an Ortiz harangue get CVaz to run the bases better? I don’t know. Maybe guys would focus? I don’t know. This rainout might help. Take a day off, get away from baseball for 24 hours, try to come back and start again. They’ve looked so tight. A break might be huge. I'm pretty skeptical of all the psychologizing. First of all (though I am blessed to not have seen yesterday's debacle) they have not looked lackadaisical or disinterested to me. If I were to diagnose a mental issue with the team, the closest I would come is to say that they sometimes try to do too much at the plate, leading to wild swings out of the zone and such, which is sort of the opposite of lacking "fire."
Second of all, they almost all seem like good clubhouse guys. Xander's a lead-by-example type. JDM is a helpful older brother. Verdugo is fun and energetic. They ride around in shopping carts. I mean, who knows, but I don't see the evidence that there's anything wrong with the makeup of the team.
It just seems like back-filling to explain the team's playing poorly. My bugaboo: "it must be something wrong in the team's soul." Or... maybe the bullpen got overworked, Duran struggled to adjust to major league pitching, JDM and Xander had slumps at the same time, and their luck regressed.
In any case, whatever this team's talent level was when they were going good in the first half, it's considerably better now with the overhauled starting rotation and the addition of Schwarber. They're a half game out of wild card position. Reports of their demise are premature.
I'd also add that even if you do hold a "soul of the team" theory, such theories are apparently not at all predictive (which is one of the problems with them): they were magical for months, and then they just lost it completely on a dime. Which means they could get it back on a dime!
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Post by Guidas on Aug 22, 2021 9:42:53 GMT -5
Is there a direct correlation between the announcement that the "sticky stuff" rules would be enforced and the decline of the Sox pitching staff? Just curious if anyone has tracked this?
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Post by kjkramer on Aug 22, 2021 9:46:24 GMT -5
I really want no part of JDM. Cvaz, Erod, Perez, Richard's, and Santana next year.
Guys like Verdugo (hope he was just injured), and Boddy D are on my short leash. I go in to next year with the following and see what they have;
C- plawecki
1- Dalbech
2- Arroyo
SS- XMan
3b- Devers
OF- Verdugo, Duran, Renfro
DH- Schwarber
Super Utility- Kiké
Starters- Sale, Eovaldi, Whitlock, Houck, Pivetta
Pen- Barnes, Otto, Sawamura, Taylor, and ??
Shit..... play them the rest of the year to see what you have for next year. So frustrating...
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Post by DesignatedForAssignment on Aug 22, 2021 9:49:07 GMT -5
Is there a direct correlation between the announcement that the "sticky stuff" rules would be enforced and the decline of the Sox pitching staff? Just curious if anyone has tracked this? No. Bullpen ERA is 7.00 in August. Otherwise, pitching has been consistent. "First, they say they want you
How they really need you
Suddenly you find you're out there
Walking in a storm"
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Post by manfred on Aug 22, 2021 9:55:25 GMT -5
Is there a direct correlation between the announcement that the "sticky stuff" rules would be enforced and the decline of the Sox pitching staff? Just curious if anyone has tracked this? No. Bullpen ERA is 7.00 in August. Otherwise, pitching has been consistent. "First, they say they want you
How they really need you
Suddenly you find you're out there
Walking in a storm"
Eyeballing baseball reference, I’m amazed by how consistent the numbers are at a macro level. Pre vs post break, they are almost identical. But looking at monthly numbers, the staff was better in March/April. Maybe it *feels* like a drop off because they jumped out to a really good start? But generally, they have been in the same range. I don’t know if the swoon can be dumped at the doorstep of any group. We’ve seen some guys throw really well of late. It just seems like a stretch when someone at some point does something really bad. This happens, and I bet we feel now how Yankees fans felt earlier in the season. They couldn’t do anything right for a while. Then they righted the ship. So now it is our turn. |
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Post by greenmonster on Aug 22, 2021 9:56:31 GMT -5
Is there a direct correlation between the announcement that the "sticky stuff" rules would be enforced and the decline of the Sox pitching staff? Just curious if anyone has tracked this? No. Bullpen ERA is 7.00 in August. Otherwise, pitching has been consistent. "First, they say they want you
How they really need you
Suddenly you find you're out there
Walking in a storm"
The thing that I find odd is you would expect to have seen an increase in offense as a result of the sticky stuff ban. Hasn't been the case for the Red Sox. That's my perception at least |
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Post by incandenza on Aug 22, 2021 10:12:27 GMT -5
No. Bullpen ERA is 7.00 in August. Otherwise, pitching has been consistent. "First, they say they want you
How they really need you
Suddenly you find you're out there
Walking in a storm"
The thing that I find odd is you would expect to have seen an increase in offense as a result of the sticky stuff ban. Hasn't been the case for the Red Sox. That's my perception at least Team wRC+ by month:
Mar/April: 103 May: 106 June: 103 July: 100 August: 115
Pretty darn consistent until this month, though that's goosed a bit by facing position players in a couple of blowouts.
Incidentally, in addition to having the 4th-best offense in the AL in August, they also have the best team FIP in the AL, the 4th-best xFIP... and the 2nd-worst ERA.
To repeat: best FIP. 2nd-worst ERA.
They've all become Eduardo Rodriguez.
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Post by trajanacc on Aug 22, 2021 10:18:46 GMT -5
There are a few obvious problems with attempting armchair sports psychology on a message board:
1) (presumably) none of us are experts on the topic
2) there isn’t a demonstrable or provable correlation between team/player attitude and winning baseball games
3) what we are observing on TV makes up less than 1% of these players’ thoughts/actions during the course of a day, and we aren’t even getting audio of what they might be saying. Judging a player’s attitude by their facial expressions for the 3 seconds they are on TV after they make an out might not be that reliable of a process.
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Post by GyIantosca on Aug 22, 2021 10:36:19 GMT -5
Maybe the FO was smart not extending anyone really. I mean Barnes was cheap. You can tell J.D. showing his age. If Bogey opts out after next year is he really gonna get a huge raise and term? I still want Devers he can hit anyone . I was pissed about the trade deadline but I didn’t expect the team to just fall apart. The pen is gassed. I mean Perez and Richards , sometimes Pivetta not making even 5 inning starts I guess catches upto the bullpen.
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Post by semsox on Aug 22, 2021 10:55:33 GMT -5
The macro view of the statistics not looking all that different from the rest of the reason recently sort of jives with what I've been seeing from the games, which is just a run of pretty unbelievable bad luck in terms of distribution of our production. It seems so many games have come down to an at bat or two that could have swung the whole game, and we've been coming up small. Per Fangraphs, looking at the past 30 days splits, our pitching staff is 19th out of 30 teams in terms of clutch and our batters our 28th out of 30 (with only CLE and NYM being worse in that span). Clutch isn't really predictive of future performance, but it does show how putrid we've been recently.
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Post by incandenza on Aug 22, 2021 11:07:11 GMT -5
Already been postponed. Make-up tomorrow at 1 According to the current weather underground forecast, there's a 20% chance of rain this afternoon and a 40% chance of rain tomorrow afternoon... |
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Post by redsoxfan2 on Aug 22, 2021 11:11:44 GMT -5
It’s ok to be glass half empty after the pitiful display of baseball last night. That was the worst game of the year I think. Lifeless on a day everybody else won before them. Completely unacceptable, and that’s from somebody who considers himself an optimist I’ve now changed my goalposts from sweep this series to “win every series from here on out” The problem is that Glasshalfempty is that way even when the Red Sox win! Look back at the thread. Complains about Schwarber in a 6-0 win, after getting on base 4 times, complains he was the DH, complains Schwarber is not playing 1B. Glasshalfempty searches for a negative continuously taking over the title of biggest downer from Manfred. Team is awesome. Schwarber helped put this team over the top. Best trade ever. Got it. I mean, it's a miracle that they're 1- against the mighty (now 43-80) Rangers at the moment. Just can't be annoyed with the team when they just blew a 10.5 game lead and just got swept by the team that just passed them, even though they showed so much resiliency the next day against a lineup of .680 OPS hitters and a starter with a 5 ERA in a season they're trying to get the best draft pick imaginable. |
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Post by greenmonster on Aug 22, 2021 11:13:28 GMT -5
The thing that I find odd is you would expect to have seen an increase in offense as a result of the sticky stuff ban. Hasn't been the case for the Red Sox. That's my perception at least Team wRC+ by month: Mar/April: 103 May: 106 June: 103 July: 100 August: 115 Pretty darn consistent until this month, though that's goosed a bit by facing position players in a couple of blowouts. Incidentally, in addition to having the 4th-best offense in the AL in August, they also have the best team FIP in the AL, the 4th-best xFIP... and the 2nd-worst ERA. To repeat: best FIP. 2nd-worst ERA. They've all become Eduardo Rodriguez.
So is this suggesting that the Red Sox offense has never been better than it has been in August?? edit: I just see you mention a few August blowouts skewing the numbers |
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Post by incandenza on Aug 22, 2021 11:40:56 GMT -5
Team wRC+ by month: Mar/April: 103 May: 106 June: 103 July: 100 August: 115 Pretty darn consistent until this month, though that's goosed a bit by facing position players in a couple of blowouts. Incidentally, in addition to having the 4th-best offense in the AL in August, they also have the best team FIP in the AL, the 4th-best xFIP... and the 2nd-worst ERA. To repeat: best FIP. 2nd-worst ERA. They've all become Eduardo Rodriguez.
So is this suggesting that the Red Sox offense has never been better than it has been in August?? edit: I just see you mention a few August blowouts skewing the numbers They've been very feast-or-famine: 6 games with 6+ runs, 9 with 2 runs or fewer, only 4 games in between.
That's actually even more true of the pitching. They've held opponents to 2 runs or fewer 8 times, given up 8+ runs 7 times, with 4 games in between.
They've scored 90 runs and given up 90 runs but they're 7-12.
Team's just kind of been weird lately.
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art
Veteran
Posts: 382 
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Post by art on Aug 22, 2021 11:51:35 GMT -5
To repeat: best FIP. 2nd-worst ERA.
They've all become Eduardo Rodriguez.
This bolsters my skepticism of the value of FIP. |
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art
Veteran
Posts: 382
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Post by art on Aug 22, 2021 12:03:58 GMT -5
Already been postponed. Make-up tomorrow at 1 According to the current weather underground forecast, there's a 20% chance of rain this afternoon and a 40% chance of rain tomorrow afternoon... It doesn't seem like an appropriate day to be enticing fans out onto the highways and into the ball park. |
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Post by incandenza on Aug 22, 2021 12:17:15 GMT -5
To repeat: best FIP. 2nd-worst ERA.
They've all become Eduardo Rodriguez.
This bolsters my skepticism of the value of FIP. I don't think FIP is perfect or anything, but why do you say that? It does seem to me that they've been hurt by a lot of bad BABIP luck and subpar defense. |
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Post by soxinsf on Aug 22, 2021 13:16:23 GMT -5
This bolsters my skepticism of the value of FIP. I don't think FIP is perfect or anything, but why do you say that? It does seem to me that they've been hurt by a lot of bad BABIP luck and subpar defense. Your earlier post about feast or famine is a lot closer to the truth than this comment. The Sox have some OK stats absent the realities of inconsistency, failure in the clutch, relief pitching blowing winnable games. But ultimately, the stat that counts and cannot be overcome by any other metric is wins and losses. |
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Post by manfred on Aug 22, 2021 13:24:53 GMT -5
Honestly, some of this just “baseball happens.” For all the poor play yesterday, I thought Lyles pitched well. Guy’s stats may suck, buy for a day, he got it done. If going 1-3 makes you an elite hitter over 162, it is a good reminder how much of an advantage pitchers have. Sometimes you just say… you got me.
Obviously there is, er, the rest. But some of this has to come back to the Sox side soon.
Add: I remember early in the season destroying Giolito— everything was working. This is just sort of karma, maybe? But hopefully we are even with the cosmos now.
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Post by patford on Aug 22, 2021 13:29:59 GMT -5
Already been postponed. Make-up tomorrow at 1 According to the current weather underground forecast, there's a 20% chance of rain this afternoon and a 40% chance of rain tomorrow afternoon... I haven't looked at a forecast in years. All a person has to do is look at the radar and it's obvious what is coming. I try to use a bicycle whenever possible and the radar has been a god-send for me. You can even see little pockets of clear skies which are about to open up for a half hour. |
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cdj
Veteran
Posts: 15,828
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Post by cdj on Aug 22, 2021 13:55:46 GMT -5
Honestly, some of this just “baseball happens.” For all the poor play yesterday, I thought Lyles pitched well. Guy’s stats may suck, buy for a day, he got it done. If going 1-3 makes you an elite hitter over 162, it is a good reminder how much of an advantage pitchers have. Sometimes you just say… you got me. Obviously there is, er, the rest. But some of this has to come back to the Sox side soon. Add: I remember early in the season destroying Giolito— everything was working. This is just sort of karma, maybe? But hopefully we are even with the cosmos now. Yesterday was a HEAVY reimbursement, we should hopefully be good moving forward |
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Post by voiceofreason on Aug 22, 2021 13:57:40 GMT -5
A problem I first noticed last year and thought had gone away this year is a lack of leadership and real intensity from the team. And I don't put that on Cora, I know strange right. I really think Cora is not the problem and they never would have had the first half they did without him. I think it is the players, their is not a leader amongst them and zero fire when things aren't going well. Maybe it is Sale but no position players. Hard for a pitcher to be that guy but someone needs to pull a Ortiz. Mookie would have been that guy. This team may have played a over it's head in the 1st half but they are better than this and the lack of leadership will need to be addressed in the offseason, they lack character. I was wondering about this. I didn’t know if anyone had a sense that there might be someone less obvious who could call a players only meeting and fire them up. Xander doesn’t *seem* like that guy, but it is hard to say. Who is the “captain” on this team? But that said, I don’t know if it matters. The moments when a veteran lights a team up are legendary, but this is a team with many veteran guys who are making boneheaded plays. Would an Ortiz harangue get CVaz to run the bases better? I don’t know. Maybe guys would focus? I don’t know. This rainout might help. Take a day off, get away from baseball for 24 hours, try to come back and start again. They’ve looked so tight. A break might be huge. Nothing against Xander as I love him but he is a Caribe island guy and IMO has that vibe, that can be a good thing to but intensity is not his thing. I think the fact is there is no captain and none of the veterans have that gene or cashet. As far as the blunders go I think it has a bit to do with guys trying to do too much by being aggressive and it has backfired at every turn. Rounding bases or trying for the extra base is a team trying to make something happen because they are feeling the pressure and the weight of the situation they find themselves in. Just my thoughts on the subject. |
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Post by voiceofreason on Aug 22, 2021 14:01:02 GMT -5
I was wondering about this. I didn’t know if anyone had a sense that there might be someone less obvious who could call a players only meeting and fire them up. Xander doesn’t *seem* like that guy, but it is hard to say. Who is the “captain” on this team? But that said, I don’t know if it matters. The moments when a veteran lights a team up are legendary, but this is a team with many veteran guys who are making boneheaded plays. Would an Ortiz harangue get CVaz to run the bases better? I don’t know. Maybe guys would focus? I don’t know. This rainout might help. Take a day off, get away from baseball for 24 hours, try to come back and start again. They’ve looked so tight. A break might be huge. Ortiz was a great leader but even he was powerless to stop the collapse of 2011. More than words a key RBI chance he missed in the 9th inning of Game 162 might have made a difference. I've come to the conclusion that sometimes you can talk to you're blue in the face and it doesnt matter. Did Chris Sale yelling at teammates in the 7th inning of Game 4 of the World Series wake the Sox bats up or was it simply Rich Hill being taken out of the game? Or both? Who knows? Another one of those things that is hard to measure but leadership matters, always has, always will. Leadership, character, how does a team respond to pressure or bad breaks or losing streaks, pressure. |
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Post by Guidas on Aug 22, 2021 14:40:36 GMT -5
Is there a direct correlation between the announcement that the "sticky stuff" rules would be enforced and the decline of the Sox pitching staff? Just curious if anyone has tracked this? No. Bullpen ERA is 7.00 in August. Otherwise, pitching has been consistent. "First, they say they want you
How they really need you
Suddenly you find you're out there
Walking in a storm"
Thanks for this! |
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Post by Guidas on Aug 22, 2021 15:10:45 GMT -5
I was wondering about this. I didn’t know if anyone had a sense that there might be someone less obvious who could call a players only meeting and fire them up. Xander doesn’t *seem* like that guy, but it is hard to say. Who is the “captain” on this team? But that said, I don’t know if it matters. The moments when a veteran lights a team up are legendary, but this is a team with many veteran guys who are making boneheaded plays. Would an Ortiz harangue get CVaz to run the bases better? I don’t know. Maybe guys would focus? I don’t know. This rainout might help. Take a day off, get away from baseball for 24 hours, try to come back and start again. They’ve looked so tight. A break might be huge. Nothing against Xander as I love him but he is a Caribe island guy and IMO has that vibe, that can be a good thing to but intensity is not his thing. I think the fact is there is no captain and none of the veterans have that gene or cashet. As far as the blunders go I think it has a bit to do with guys trying to do too much by being aggressive and it has backfired at every turn. Rounding bases or trying for the extra base is a team trying to make something happen because they are feeling the pressure and the weight of the situation they find themselves in. Just my thoughts on the subject. In amny ways, I think this falls on Cora. If not their leader - although the team as a whole seems to perceive him as such, based on public comments - defense and base running philosophy rests with him, as does plate discipline philosophy. In fact, he's repeatedly expressed some frustration with the latter and defense. I agree, though, when the team gets behind lately they start chasing balls out of the zone and trying to do too much on the basis. In football we'd call this "lack of discipline" or just "failure to execute your assignment." Much the same on the bases (don't give away outs, they are finite) and chasing pitches (don't give the pitcher "free" strikes). Also, when they were winning and still did this - Devers in particular seems to find pitches six inches off the ground irresistible - we tend to ignore or forget, but it's been happening enough all year to be noticeable. |
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