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5/20-5/22 Red Sox @ Rays Series Thread
gerry
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Post by gerry on May 23, 2024 10:59:30 GMT -5
Could just be the additions to Duran’s great speed and hustle (Rafaella, Hamilton, Grissom and the persistence of Abreu, Wong, ONeill) just naturally allows, even mandates taking advantage of this unique gathering of talent?
We had recently been wondering if all of Grissom, Hamilton, even Rafaella needed more time in AAA. These guys are emerging, albeit unevenly, all at the same time. What a gift.
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Post by philsbosoxfan on May 23, 2024 11:58:48 GMT -5
If you want a good laugh, go to Duran's thread when he was in Salem (high A at the time). It' all just BABIP. Spraying line drives all over the field has nothing to do with it.
“keep your eye clear and hit 'em where they ain't” Hall of Famer Wee Willie Keeler
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Post by greatscottcooper on May 23, 2024 12:13:48 GMT -5
I love it ! I go on vacation and the Sox morph into this. I'm watching, not posting, but smiling. Too tired from kayaking every day! I'll gladly stay on vacay if this keeps working! 😀 You know how superstitious us Sox fans get, we might be able to start a gofundme page to just keep you on vacation.
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Post by scottysmalls on May 23, 2024 12:15:06 GMT -5
If you want a good laugh, go to Duran's thread when he was in Salem (high A at the time). It' all just BABIP. Spraying line drives all over the field has nothing to do with it. “keep your eye clear and hit 'em where they ain't” Hall of Famer Wee Willie Keeler Didnt Duran change his swing like right after Salem to add more power?
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Post by scottysmalls on May 23, 2024 12:21:28 GMT -5
Regarding the baserunning the Red Sox have been about average, 16th in the league, at generating runs on the bases. This is a slight improvement from last year when they were 19th.
Duran, Hamilton and Abreu have been very good, and relative to their position so have both catchers. Smith, Yoshida, Casas very bad, everyone else somewhere in the middle. Smith in particular, given how rarely he gets on base, has been awful.
If Rafaela can develop into another good baserunner and they get Story back next year, or if Hamilton can play a lot and hit decently, the 2025 team could be quite good on the bases. Right now feels like a lot of talk about something they are only decent at.
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Post by thegoodthebadthesox on May 23, 2024 12:28:16 GMT -5
If you want a good laugh, go to Duran's thread when he was in Salem (high A at the time). It' all just BABIP. Spraying line drives all over the field has nothing to do with it. “keep your eye clear and hit 'em where they ain't” Hall of Famer Wee Willie Keeler Do you really want to play this game of bringing up old bad takes? That seems like a precarious position for you. Also, that’s not even that bad of a take about Duran, it’s not illogical to bet against guys being outliers, Duran just may be one. And that’s great! Given that, and the genuine developmental concerns that Duran had, I don’t think any skepticism was unwarranted. It just turned out to be unnecessary, and we can acknowledge that without crafting these arguments in hindsight to try to (unsuccessfully) make yourself look smarter for being optimistic about it.
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Post by incandenza on May 23, 2024 12:34:45 GMT -5
Regarding the baserunning the Red Sox have been about average, 16th in the league, at generating runs on the bases. This is a slight improvement from last year when they were 19th. Duran, Hamilton and Abreu have been very good, and relative to their position so have both catchers. Smith, Yoshida, Casas very bad, everyone else somewhere in the middle. Smith in particular, given how rarely he gets on base, has been awful. If Rafaela can develop into another good baserunner and they get Story back next year, or if Hamilton can play a lot and hit decently, the 2025 team could be quite good on the bases. Right now feels like a lot of talk about something they are only decent at. They are 9th in the majors since Yoshida's last game on April 28th (and Casas having gone down on the 20th). It could be fair to say they're a speedy and athletic team since their lumbering guys who are also good hitters got injured. Relatedly, they have only a 95 wRC+ since both those guys went down.
Obviously if Casas and Yoshida come back and run 140 wRC+es while dragging down the team BsR that wouldn't be a bad thing. Which maybe just goes to show that all the talk about "we are an X type of team now" is sort of empty. Duran, Hamilton, and Abreu can add value on the basepaths while Devers, Casas, and Yoshida add value in the batter's box.
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Post by scottysmalls on May 23, 2024 12:47:53 GMT -5
Regarding the baserunning the Red Sox have been about average, 16th in the league, at generating runs on the bases. This is a slight improvement from last year when they were 19th. Duran, Hamilton and Abreu have been very good, and relative to their position so have both catchers. Smith, Yoshida, Casas very bad, everyone else somewhere in the middle. Smith in particular, given how rarely he gets on base, has been awful. If Rafaela can develop into another good baserunner and they get Story back next year, or if Hamilton can play a lot and hit decently, the 2025 team could be quite good on the bases. Right now feels like a lot of talk about something they are only decent at. They are 9th in the majors since Yoshida's last game on April 28th (and Casas having gone down on the 20th). It could be fair to say they're a speedy and athletic team since their lumbering guys who are also good hitters got injured. Relatedly, they have only a 95 wRC+ since both those guys went down.
Obviously if Casas and Yoshida come back and run 140 wRC+es while dragging down the team BsR that wouldn't be a bad thing. Which maybe just goes to show that all the talk about "we are an X type of team now" is sort of empty. Duran, Hamilton, and Abreu can add value on the basepaths while Devers, Casas, and Yoshida add value in the batter's box.
I was going to point the injuries out but Casas’ main replacement in Smith has been even worse than he was. Anecdotally it feels like the whole team has less dumb pick offs lately though
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Post by incandenza on May 23, 2024 13:04:01 GMT -5
How has Smith pulled that off? He's been on base fewer than 20 times!
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Post by itinerantherb on May 23, 2024 13:05:14 GMT -5
Cora alluded to this a bit in his post-game interview when he was asked about the team's speed/aggressiveness and he replied (paraphrased)......I was thinking about that afterwards and wondering who he might have been talking to. I don't think it was the fans on SoxProspects. Could it be the front office that he might not be in full agreement with? He was probably talking generally about fans who prefer the long ball instead of having a team that can use speed to manufacture runs rather than just swinging for the fences. I dont think it's some feud with the front office or anything like that. He could have been thinking about Duran who is jacked enough to smash 20 plus homers but is better off with middling power and using his athleticism instead. I think this might be the emerging insider critique of the contemporary turn to hyper-analytically informed hitting, including the emphasis on maximizing bat speed and optimizing swing path. Youk was on 310 to Left recently and he made a similar point--basically, that among the most analytically minded player development folks, the drive for swing optimization has come at the expense of (a) allowing diverse hitting skill sets to develop, and (b) situational hitting skills. (His point wasn't to disparage the analytical turn, but rather that it needs to be married to old-school baseball intelligence and situational awareness.)
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gerry
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Posts: 1,725
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Post by gerry on May 23, 2024 14:58:13 GMT -5
I can’t see any downside to having the bats of Devers and Casas hitting behind, for example, Grissom, Hamilton, Rafaella, Duran.
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