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9/24-9/26 Red Sox vs. Yankees Series Thread
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Post by congusgambler33 on Sept 27, 2021 2:32:26 GMT -5
I will sum it up this way..I am sure that the Sox brass were very surprised how well the Sox did this year.I know that Bloom said we will be competitive, but I don't think that he had any inkling that we would be fighting for the division early on. This has been a bonus for this year for this team because everybody was surprised with the great play until after the All Star game and then they just fell apart basically. Early on they were making the pitchers pitch and hitting strikes and then unexpectedly they started swinging at everything and pitchers adjusted by pitching out of the zone and the Sox obliged them constantly. Cora kept saying that he wanted them to stay in the zone, but that didn't happen enough and the losses started to pile up with over 10 strikeouts in every game for a spell. On the other side pitchers were walking the opponents at a record pace and errors compounded the problems.
Right now we are faced with the fact that the Yankees just swept us in our stadium and walks,errors and poor hitting were the main reasons. We basically gifted the Yankees 2 games. The Blue Jays swept the Yankees in their building, so what does that say about the Sox?
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Post by alexcorahomevideo on Sept 27, 2021 6:22:45 GMT -5
Awful sweep. The 8th probably never happens if Richards could find the strike zone. I'm thinking the Sox still sneak into the post season but they're making it interesting.
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Post by trajanacc on Sept 27, 2021 7:38:57 GMT -5
You can say it was Joe West or whatever but winning teams win and losing teams make excuses. It was Joe West.
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Post by soxfansince67 on Sept 27, 2021 8:08:30 GMT -5
Morning thoughts of a long time Red Sox fan/MFY hater
Why, Joe West, why? All of those lead off walks - why can't our pen throw strikes? Sure, it was the MFY, but we got em in 2004 and burned through the league in 2007, 2013, 2018 We sure do waste good starts Getting swept at home by the MFY, the way the games unfolded, was horrible Usually a team can't wait to get home. Now they have to leave home and finish business on the road - and they are not a good road team They are playing 6 games against patsy teams, so should have no problems Sox don't play like a playoff team - too many fault areas Does Cora have any magic left? Why do Xander and JD look so bad right now? We are well beyond expectations, so don't worry, be happy
But we are not happy - because we got swept by the MFY in bizarre, embarrassing fashion
And... Joe West.
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Post by station13 on Sept 27, 2021 8:52:13 GMT -5
2nd Half ERA
Barnes 7.07 Ottavino 6.35
Not sure if any team can get to the playoff with closer and his next of kin producing those stats or go deep in the playoff.
Dawinzon 5.59 Sawaruma 4.91 (bonus 2.11 WHIP)
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Post by greenmonster on Sept 27, 2021 9:02:19 GMT -5
2nd Half ERA Barnes 7.07 Ottavino 6.35 Not sure if any team can get to the playoff with closer and his next of kin producing those stats or go deep in the playoff. Dawinzon 5.59 Sawaruma 4.91 (bonus 2.11 WHIP) and dont forget to add an injured Whitlock... IMO, This is largely the result of the lack of ability/desire/trust/willingness (take your pick) for starters to pitch passed the 4th innning.
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Post by incandenza on Sept 27, 2021 9:04:13 GMT -5
The "soul of the team" folks are really out in full force after this one - the team just didn't have What It Takes to Win.
I think they played poorly enough to lose two of these games, mainly because of Eovaldi's start and the 8th inning bullpen performances. But it took bad luck on hard hit balls and Joe F'in West to make it a sweep.
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Post by dirtdog on Sept 27, 2021 9:13:15 GMT -5
2nd Half ERA Barnes 7.07 Ottavino 6.35 Not sure if any team can get to the playoff with closer and his next of kin producing those stats or go deep in the playoff. Dawinzon 5.59 Sawaruma 4.91 (bonus 2.11 WHIP) and dont forget to add an injured Whitlock... IMO, This is largely the result of the lack of ability/desire/trust/willingness (take your pick) for starters to pitch passed the 4th innning. Bullpen has been gassed for months because starters cant go deep into games. More of a reflection on starters IMO. Bloom has done more right than wrong so far, but the Richards signing at that rate of pay was a head scratcher for me.
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Post by juanpena on Sept 27, 2021 9:15:02 GMT -5
The "soul of the team" folks are really out in full force after this one - the team just didn't have What It Takes to Win.
I think they played poorly enough to lose two of these games, mainly because of Eovaldi's start and the 8th inning bullpen performances. But it took bad luck on hard hit balls and Joe F'in West to make it a sweep.
Sure, but the team isn't very smart or fundamentally sound. Clay Holmes struck out the side on pitches that were balls from the second they left his hand. The Yankees don't do pitchers favors. The Red Sox go up hacking and give up a ton of easy outs. Verdugo doesn't tag up on a fly ball. He almost costs the team a run by not running on Schwarber's ball that Gallo dropped, because Schwarber, who was halfheartedly jogging out of the box, then decides to run and is thrown out easily at second, killing the inning. And when Dalbec is going over for the popup, no one in the dugout is giving him any help, telling him he had plenty of room. None of that is on Joe West or bad luck. The team played like crap all weekend, and if they play like that this week, they're coming to Fenway Monday to clean out their lockers.
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Post by dirtdog on Sept 27, 2021 9:19:20 GMT -5
The "soul of the team" folks are really out in full force after this one - the team just didn't have What It Takes to Win.
I think they played poorly enough to lose two of these games, mainly because of Eovaldi's start and the 8th inning bullpen performances. But it took bad luck on hard hit balls and Joe F'in West to make it a sweep.
The team played better than the sum of its parts until the AS break IMO. Since then the the team has been about what I expected them to be all along. Over 162 games usually you are as good as your talent level. Talent here is good enough to compete but it would take a whole lot going right to make a playoff run.
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Post by voiceofreason on Sept 27, 2021 9:38:03 GMT -5
All you guys referring to the BP being gassed and the rotation not pitching enough innings I refer you to the TBay pitching staff. Get used to it, it is the new normal in baseball and it isn't going back. Gerrit Cole arguably the #1 starter in the AL is averaging 6 innings a game. Average for the league is less than 5. Not many guys out there can get thru the lineup 3 times without getting lit up. This is a site full of guys who are into the advanced analytics so you should understand that it makes sense, like it or not. As I have said numerous times, what a staff needs is more guys that can go more than 1 inning. This is also a Chaim Bloom creation to a degree.
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Post by incandenza on Sept 27, 2021 9:48:06 GMT -5
The "soul of the team" folks are really out in full force after this one - the team just didn't have What It Takes to Win.
I think they played poorly enough to lose two of these games, mainly because of Eovaldi's start and the 8th inning bullpen performances. But it took bad luck on hard hit balls and Joe F'in West to make it a sweep.
The team played better than the sum of its parts until the AS break IMO. Since then the the team has been about what I expected them to be all along. Over 162 games usually you are as good as your talent level. Talent here is good enough to compete but it would take a whole lot going right to make a playoff run. I think you could divide the season into three chunks:
through 7/29 (63-41): team did play kind of over its head with good luck and a lot of come-from-behind wins, but also a very solid bullpen was part of their ability to do that
7/30-9/12 (18-23): luck totally flipped to being pretty bad, and just as the roster was massively improving with the additions of Schwarber, Houck, and Sale, they got hit with the covid outbreak
9/13 on (7-4): luck seems to be pretty even, but they finally have their best roster together for the first time this season; it's not great that they still couldn't win one game in this series with that roster, though a mitigating factor is that we had to face Cole while the Yankees got to dodge Sale
Ups and downs are part of any season. My read on this team is that they're pretty much as good as their record says they are, not especially better or worse.
My other read on the team is that a) bullpen performance is super damn important and a big part of this team's story, and also b) I don't know how in the hell anyone can ever predict any relief pitcher's performance - it's just a total chaos space.
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Post by manfred on Sept 27, 2021 9:51:26 GMT -5
All you guys referring to the BP being gassed and the rotation not pitching enough innings I refer you to the TBay pitching staff. Get used to it, it is the new normal in baseball and it isn't going back. Gerrit Cole arguably the #1 starter in the AL is averaging 6 innings a game. Average for the league is less than 5. Not many guys out there can get thru the lineup 3 times without getting lit up. This is a site full of guys who are into the advanced analytics so you should understand that it makes sense, like it or not. As I have said numerous times, what a staff needs is more guys that can go more than 1 inning. This is also a Chaim Bloom creation to a degree. I’m not sure those examples entirely disprove the fatigue issue. The Rays have three of their top relievers on the IL right now. They have also spread the innings better with other guys than the Sox, though. Darwinzon’s 47 games would be 2nd on the Rays. He is 5th on the Sox. Sawamura, Taylor, and Barnes would all lead that team in games even having missed time. Whitlock’s 72 innings is… a lot. More than anyone in the Rays pen who hasn’t started double-digits. (More than Kittridge, their leader, who has 4 starts, too). One of the things I wonder is how much Sox relievers warm up relative to other bullpens. That adds to wear and tear, too.
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Post by soxfansince67 on Sept 27, 2021 9:52:30 GMT -5
The team played better than the sum of its parts until the AS break IMO. Since then the the team has been about what I expected them to be all along. Over 162 games usually you are as good as your talent level. Talent here is good enough to compete but it would take a whole lot going right to make a playoff run. I think you could divide the season into three chunks:
through 7/29 (63-41): team did play kind of over its head with good luck and a lot of come-from-behind wins, but also a very solid bullpen was part of their ability to do that
7/30-9/12 (18-23): luck totally flipped to being pretty bad, and just as the roster was massively improving with the additions of Schwarber, Houck, and Sale, they got hit with the covid outbreak
9/13 on (7-4): luck seems to be pretty even, but they finally have their best roster together for the first time this season; it's not great that they still couldn't win one game in this series with that roster, though a mitigating factor is that we had to face Cole while the Yankees got to dodge Sale
Ups and downs are part of any season. My read on this team is that they're pretty much as good as their record says they are, not especially better or worse.
My other read on the team is that a) bullpen performance is super damn important and a big part of this team's story, and also b) I don't know how in the hell anyone can ever predict any relief pitcher's performance - it's just a total chaos space.
I agree with all of that. I think there is one additional point on what is going on with our big hitters - Raffi some some degree, but mostly, Xander and JD, particularly with men on base. When we are winning, it is with Schwarber, or Kiké, or Renfro, or Dalbec - the top and bottom fringe of the order, not the heart.
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Post by incandenza on Sept 27, 2021 10:07:08 GMT -5
I think you could divide the season into three chunks:
through 7/29 (63-41): team did play kind of over its head with good luck and a lot of come-from-behind wins, but also a very solid bullpen was part of their ability to do that
7/30-9/12 (18-23): luck totally flipped to being pretty bad, and just as the roster was massively improving with the additions of Schwarber, Houck, and Sale, they got hit with the covid outbreak
9/13 on (7-4): luck seems to be pretty even, but they finally have their best roster together for the first time this season; it's not great that they still couldn't win one game in this series with that roster, though a mitigating factor is that we had to face Cole while the Yankees got to dodge Sale
Ups and downs are part of any season. My read on this team is that they're pretty much as good as their record says they are, not especially better or worse.
My other read on the team is that a) bullpen performance is super damn important and a big part of this team's story, and also b) I don't know how in the hell anyone can ever predict any relief pitcher's performance - it's just a total chaos space.
I agree with all of that. I think there is one additional point on what is going on with our big hitters - Raffi some some degree, but mostly, Xander and JD, particularly with men on base. When we are winning, it is with Schwarber, or Kiké, or Renfro, or Dalbec - the top and bottom fringe of the order, not the heart. You know, it feels like there have been issues with those guys, but Xander has a 148 wRC+/.926 OPS since coming back from the covid IL. In that same stretch Devers is a good but not amazing 120/.805, and JD is at 124/.855. That's a pretty effective heart of the order. (When I looked those numbers up I expected that Xander would look okay, but I was surprised that the other guys look pretty good too.)
As a team their MLB ranks in September are: 3rd in wOBA, 4th in wRC+, 6th in runs scored. I think they've recovered from their August nadir, when they really were having problems with timely hitting, etc.
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Post by soxfansince67 on Sept 27, 2021 10:09:04 GMT -5
Each of the three have poor numbers against the MFY - I've not looked at what they do against Tampa and Toronto.
I think this is a case where advanced stats and reality - watching the games - are a bit of a mismatch.
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Post by incandenza on Sept 27, 2021 10:19:36 GMT -5
Each of the three have poor numbers against the MFY - I've not looked at what they do against Tampa and Toronto. I think this is a case where advanced stats and reality - watching the games - are a bit of a mismatch. If you're just talking about this series, then yes on Bogaerts; but Devers hit .364/.417/.727 for the series, and JD looked better to me than his OPS/wRC+ numbers, with a couple of hard-hit lineouts.
Overall, Bogaerts has a .766 OPS against the Yankees, Devers is at .816, and Martinez is at .614. You'd hope for a little more than that in general, but it's JD that really stands out.
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redsox04071318champs
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Post by redsox04071318champs on Sept 27, 2021 10:30:03 GMT -5
You can say it was Joe West or whatever but winning teams win and losing teams make excuses. It was Joe West. Joe West wasn't the one who dropped the easy transfer. I mean, how many times have you seen a pitcher throw a perfect strike but the catcher speared at the ball rather than framed it nicely and it gets called a ball? The umpire messes up those calls but the catcher contributes to them. If Vazquez makes the easy transfer of the ball from glove to hand, Joe West isn't in position to mess up the call. Vazquez contributed to that. And Joe West isn't the guy that gave up a rocket to Giancarlo Stanton either. At some point, it's ok to point fingers at the players. Joe West didn't help the situation, but the loss wasn't on him. It was on the bullpen for the second straight night not throwing strikes, nibbling rather than being able to overpower batters, a 1b not catching a foul ball for the second straight night, and poor offense that can't score more than 3 runs a game against this team.
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redsox04071318champs
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Post by redsox04071318champs on Sept 27, 2021 10:32:41 GMT -5
and dont forget to add an injured Whitlock... IMO, This is largely the result of the lack of ability/desire/trust/willingness (take your pick) for starters to pitch passed the 4th innning. Bullpen has been gassed for months because starters cant go deep into games. More of a reflection on starters IMO. Bloom has done more right than wrong so far, but the Richards signing at that rate of pay was a head scratcher for me. I didn't realize just how gassed Ottavino is. I guess that explains why Cora gave him a week's vacation. I mean, Ottavino went into late October without surrendering a HR, and now he's given up 4 in a month. Whitlock out, Barnes a mess, and Ottavino gassed. Not surprising the pen's problematic. The Sox don't have that one guy that it their bullpen ace who can come in and get 3 outs or extend to get 4 or 5 if necessary.
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Post by voiceofreason on Sept 27, 2021 10:38:07 GMT -5
All you guys referring to the BP being gassed and the rotation not pitching enough innings I refer you to the TBay pitching staff. Get used to it, it is the new normal in baseball and it isn't going back. Gerrit Cole arguably the #1 starter in the AL is averaging 6 innings a game. Average for the league is less than 5. Not many guys out there can get thru the lineup 3 times without getting lit up. This is a site full of guys who are into the advanced analytics so you should understand that it makes sense, like it or not. As I have said numerous times, what a staff needs is more guys that can go more than 1 inning. This is also a Chaim Bloom creation to a degree. I’m not sure those examples entirely disprove the fatigue issue. The Rays have three of their top relievers on the IL right now. They have also spread the innings better with other guys than the Sox, though. Darwinzon’s 47 games would be 2nd on the Rays. He is 5th on the Sox. Sawamura, Taylor, and Barnes would all lead that team in games even having missed time. Whitlock’s 72 innings is… a lot. More than anyone in the Rays pen who hasn’t started double-digits. (More than Kittridge, their leader, who has 4 starts, too). One of the things I wonder is how much Sox relievers warm up relative to other bullpens. That adds to wear and tear, too. I think this might speak to my stating that their needs to be fewer 1 inning guys, more relievers that can go 2 helps spread the workload. I just read that Richards seems to be embracing his new role as a reliever, that is good news. He could have a great ending to his career in a 2,3 inning role.
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TearsIn04
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Post by TearsIn04 on Sept 27, 2021 10:43:19 GMT -5
I'm not on board with the crowd that says this season has been enjoyable because we started with low expectations, so whatever happens now is Ok. It's been a grind for quite awhile now and I'll repeat what I said a couple of weeks ago: I'll be relieved when it's over. A season in which we blow a massive lead to the MFYs, allowing them to qualify for a one-game playoff against us and likely beating us in that game will not go into my memory bank as a golden year in my life of Sox fandom.
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Post by curtisw on Sept 27, 2021 10:50:42 GMT -5
Awful sweep. The 8th probably never happens if Richards could find the strike zone. I'm thinking the Sox still sneak into the post season but they're making it interesting. Yeah, I mean I’ve been thinking about this aspect as well. Richards is supposed to be remolding his career to be a 2-3 inning guy and largely has excelled. But against a good team he spit the bit. Looked really good in the first inning, real nice 3 pitch strikeout to get Sanchez. Etc. Then he came on for the second inning and well the rest is history. I guess it’s baseball and all so maybe I shouldn’t make too big a deal of it on a coffee fueled, fatigued morning. But still. If he’s gonna be a new version of Whitlock this was not as convincing as you would have liked.
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Post by manfred on Sept 27, 2021 11:07:27 GMT -5
I’m not sure those examples entirely disprove the fatigue issue. The Rays have three of their top relievers on the IL right now. They have also spread the innings better with other guys than the Sox, though. Darwinzon’s 47 games would be 2nd on the Rays. He is 5th on the Sox. Sawamura, Taylor, and Barnes would all lead that team in games even having missed time. Whitlock’s 72 innings is… a lot. More than anyone in the Rays pen who hasn’t started double-digits. (More than Kittridge, their leader, who has 4 starts, too). One of the things I wonder is how much Sox relievers warm up relative to other bullpens. That adds to wear and tear, too. I think this might speak to my stating that their needs to be fewer 1 inning guys, more relievers that can go 2 helps spread the workload. I just read that Richards seems to be embracing his new role as a reliever, that is good news. He could have a great ending to his career in a 2,3 inning role. Maybe. But Whitlock — their multi-inning guy — is hurt, even as they’ve been especially careful with him. The multi-inning guy is hardly new, of course. But many of the rubber arm guys in the ye olde were sinker ballers. It’ll be tough to have guys come out and throw 96+ for 2 innings a few times a week AND keep them healthy for the season and beyond. It seems like a formula for short careers.
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Post by curtisw on Sept 27, 2021 11:28:23 GMT -5
I think this might speak to my stating that their needs to be fewer 1 inning guys, more relievers that can go 2 helps spread the workload. I just read that Richards seems to be embracing his new role as a reliever, that is good news. He could have a great ending to his career in a 2,3 inning role. Maybe. But Whitlock — their multi-inning guy — is hurt, even as they’ve been especially careful with him. The multi-inning guy is hardly new, of course. But many of the rubber arm guys in the ye olde were sinker ballers. It’ll be tough to have guys come out and throw 96+ for 2 innings a few times a week AND keep them healthy for the season and beyond. It seems like a formula for short careers. Well, I’m sort of wondering if a statement in there unlocks a bit why this all looked so ugly. We didn’t have Whitlock. That simple. That hurt hugely. Richards attempted to be Whitlock, looked the part for one inning, and then lost it. What this really means is the bullpen is thing and hardly built for October, and certainly not deep October. In my humble opinion
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Post by soxfansince67 on Sept 27, 2021 11:31:06 GMT -5
We are talking pitching, pitching, pitching - why let the offense off the hook? We averaged 3 runs per game against the MFY in the second half. We scored 3, 3, and 3 runs (so the average hasn't budged), left a boatload on base, and expanded the zone.
We can fix the pitching all we want - but we are not scoring enough to take pressure off of the pitchers to be perfect.
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