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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 14:49:42 GMT -5
Not that it really changes anything at all but that's still kind of a bummer. I was hoping for a modest rise just off the fact of players ranked higher than them graduating. I don't have a BA subscription but I imagine a few players must have jumped them for them to stay where they were. Then again looking at the MLB.com top 100 list on their site, not that many of their top 15-20 guys graduated. So far I'm only counting Langford, Chourio and Merrill in the top 15. MLB.com and BA lists obviously aren't going to be the same but I'd imagine there is probably a fair amount of overlap in the top 20. Evan Carter was the only one ahead of them who graduated, and Jared Jones understandably passed them. Ah guess I didn't have my timelines exactly correct. Langford, Chourio and Merrill would all figure to graduate soon, as well as Jones at this point. I am a little surprised they didn't just wait for that to release the updated rankings.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 12:50:12 GMT -5
Not that it really changes anything at all but that's still kind of a bummer. I was hoping for a modest rise just off the fact of players ranked higher than them graduating. I don't have a BA subscription but I imagine a few players must have jumped them for them to stay where they were. Then again looking at the MLB.com top 100 list on their site, not that many of their top 15-20 guys graduated. So far I'm only counting Langford, Chourio and Merrill in the top 15. MLB.com and BA lists obviously aren't going to be the same but I'd imagine there is probably a fair amount of overlap in the top 20.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 10:04:15 GMT -5
Has Cooper Criswell pitched his way onto the 26 man roster when Bello/Pivetta and Whitlock are all back? He's certainly pitched like a guy you'd be comfortable as the 6th starter/Swingman type, or do we keep him stretched out in AAA? Good question, I think I'd lean towards keeping him stretched out in AAA but I could see both sides of the argument.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 9:17:05 GMT -5
Also will say I'm rooting for Valdez to get another shot. I'm not sure how it happens here barring injury, he doesn't have a great path in Boston being 2B only, but he was getting pretty unlucky offensively and made great strides defensively. Maybe he rakes in AAA and he becomes a trade piece.This seems the most likely scenario to me, Valdez feels to me like he could return something of use at the deadline if the Sox are in a position to buy. I could see a rebuilding team thinking they could grab Valdez and give him some rope at the plate hoping he can blossom into a starting caliber 2nd baseman in time at a cheap price. It's hard to see him passing Grissom if Grissom is as good as advertised and he's not a great bench piece being 2nd base only as you point out. Also Yorke(possible trade-bait himself though) is nipping at his heels Mayer may be entering the equation soon at SS which could push Story back over to 2nd, not to mention Meidroth hopefully continuing to develop. They appear rather strong at 2nd base options in the foreseeable future.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 8:47:23 GMT -5
Too early to jump to any conclusions on Johanfran but seeing how his bat has shown the potential to carry to just about any position so far and the rigors of C being tough enough none the less coming back from what seems like a bad knee injury. Do they perhaps think of moving him off the C position? I see he is only listed at 5'11 so he doesn't really have the usual height one would think for a 1st baseman and with his body type I'm not sure what position might make sense? Just a thought anyway, hopefully he heals up and can come back as a C next year. I was thinking the same. Maybe move to 1st/3rd/RF (he has a good arm so 3B/RF could maybe work), but my worry is that Ian has mentioned he came in to this season a little on the heavy side so I could see this ACL injury causing him to put on a lot more weight since he's unable to use his lower body for conditioning for a while. Hopefully, he keeps it in check during his rehab. Love the bat. 3rd would probably make the most sense to me should he have to move off C, like you said the reports said he came in heavier than expected which would lead me to believe he's not the type of athlete who could play a good enough RF needed for Fenway. His scouting report on this site says well below average speed, so I'm not sure OF would be something he could handle. It also says he has soft hands and moves well behind the plate with above average arm strength which once again would point me to 3rd base being the potential spot to move him to if the knee injury hinders his ability to play C too much.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 8:43:03 GMT -5
Jordan has the second-lowest pitches/PA in the Sox system (Ravelo), and one of the lowest in minor league baseball. That severely hinders his one great tool and makes the rest of his data look funny. When the pitch metrics updates start leaking out, I'm sure the guys on the podcast will have some less than flatting numbers to share, but that's just a guess. Thank you for this, this shows my assumption is correct and he's going out there and swinging early and often. He's not striking out so I'm not sure if it is something to worry about but ideally he'd tweak his approach at least somewhat to look for pitches he can drive rather than just pitches he can make contact on.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 7:54:21 GMT -5
Too early to jump to any conclusions on Johanfran but seeing how his bat has shown the potential to carry to just about any position so far and the rigors of C being tough enough none the less coming back from what seems like a bad knee injury. Do they perhaps think of moving him off the C position? I see he is only listed at 5'11 so he doesn't really have the usual height one would think for a 1st baseman and with his body type I'm not sure what position might make sense?
Just a thought anyway, hopefully he heals up and can come back as a C next year.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 2, 2024 7:18:56 GMT -5
Not sure what is more surprising so far this season. How low Blaze Jordan’s walk rates have gotten or how low his K-rates have gotten He's having a bit of a strange season to me so far, his BB% is 3.8% which has sky rocketed from earlier in the week when I checked and it was 1.5% or something crazy but he's also not striking out hardly at all at just 8.8%. I'm no scout and haven't seen a single one of his ABs but that would lead me to believe he's swinging early in counts. He is hitting .268 but only slugging .437 so I'm wondering if he should try and be more selective at some point to find pitches he can drive and put that plus raw power to use. But like I said I haven't seen any of his ABs so perhaps one of the many on the site who have seen him and have a much better idea than myself could shed some light on what they've seen from Blaze?
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 19:32:05 GMT -5
Mayer seems to be locked in right now. Hopefully Anthony and Teel join him in getting locked in soon here. That Portland team seems stacked.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 15:31:29 GMT -5
Randy Arozarena is now batting .139 through 116 ABs after another 0'fer. The Rays team OPS was like 950 in the middle of May last year and since then almost every hitter has been a disaster They've had a heck of a run with their resources but it is looking like their magic is running out. It seemed like they somehow found productive players at just about every position by scouring under rocks and finding random people. Arozarena has been a disaster and Diaz hasn't been much better. Diaz was their leader in fWAR last year and Arozarena was 3rd. So far they've gotten -.6 from them, hard to field a winning team when two of the batters you were banking on the most so far have turned to pumpkins. Then the whole Franco stuff obviously doesn't help, that could have been the beginning of their downfall so to speak. Of course as I say this they'll probably reel off 10 wins in a row and be right back in it by the end of May. They do have some help on the way in Caminero and Parades is a stud so we'll see.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 14:35:45 GMT -5
Why wouldn't it make sense to platoon Smith/Cooper? They seem like a pretty good platoon combo at first base to me. Cooper has some positional flexibility too so it's not like they'll be keeping two first base only guys for platooning. I'm struggling to articulate what I think. A straight 1B platoon with a healthy Yoshida just feels...odd...since Yoshida offers close to zero positional flexibility already and frankly shortens the bench. So if he really is the full-time DH, that suggests to me that Smith-Cooper would really be sharing one position with token emergency duty in LF; Smith was only really a LF in the days before the NL adopted the DH and the Mets wanted his bat in the lineup since he and Alonso played the same position and you're not sitting Pete. Smith offers video game positional flexibility, but I'm not convinced his career outfield experience is going to result in much actual on-field decision relief. Frankly, same with Cooper. He played a few innings in LF this year for the Cubs, but has otherwise been 1B/DH only since 2021. I mean, we have 4 corner outfielders and all 4 are hitting the snot out of the ball, so you're not sitting them in favor of Smith-Cooper, nor are you doing late-game defensive replacements since all of our outfielders can field. Does that make sense? I feel like there's a way to say that in 75 words, but I'm not sure how. Basically, if either of them could play third, I'd be more excited about positional flexibility, but backup-to-the-backup Corner outfielder doesn't move a needle much for me any more than "Christian Arroyo, right fielder" did. Ultimately I think another shoe is going to drop that helps this all make sense (guessing it's "Yoshida to the IL"), because right now I'm not sure I see it as-is. I bet this Smith signing is brought to you by some really bad news re: Yoshida's imaging. I can see your point on positional flexibility and it wouldn't surprise me all that much if Smith is just around long enough for Yoshida to heal up and get off the IL. The hope is he won't be around in a couple months if Casas is able to heal up and return so either way I think Smith is probably just a short term band-aid who can will play against righties while Yoshida is out and platoon with Cooper a little bit until Casas gets back. I think their positional flexibility is fine right now with Grissom back. Short will be the backup 2nd/SS/3rd for now and like you said they have 4 solid OFers in Abreu/Duran/O'Neill/Ref. They may pivot with another roster move if a better more versatile option becomes available than Smith but for now Smith seems like a reasonable addition to me.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 12:28:12 GMT -5
So in very short order, we are likely swapping Reyes for Cooper, Valdez for Grissom, Hamilton for Short, and Dalbec for Smith? I'm not sure it makes sense to platoon Smith and Cooper, so this might mean Yoshida's hand is in bad shape? We have to get at least one DFA to get Smith a roster spot, too. Why wouldn't it make sense to platoon Smith/Cooper? They seem like a pretty good platoon combo at first base to me. Cooper has some positional flexibility too so it's not like they'll be keeping two first base only guys for platooning.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 11:35:04 GMT -5
A Smith/Cooper platoon until Casas gets back might work out rather decently. Smith isn't great by any means but vs righties in 2023 he did have a 102 wRC+. Combine that with Cooper's 145 wRC+ vs lefties in 2023 and that could make for about as good of a 1st base platoon as we can hope for in the time being.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 11:30:58 GMT -5
Don't really get adding this guy but my assumption would be he won't be around very long and is just a very short term band-aid anyway.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 7:25:24 GMT -5
I really scoffed at a lot of the optimism when Bailey was brought in since my original opinion was pitching coaches can have some impact on a staff but their impact generally isn't all that large of a factor. I feel like at this point I stand corrected, Bailey has pretty clearly had a large impact on the staff. I'm not going to bash Dave Bush like many on here have been doing but it certainly is night and day right now.
Whatever happens with Cora after this season I would consider it a must to retain Bailey whether that is a promotion to manager if it opens up or just keeping him as pitching coach, I'd give him a nice raise at this rate if I was them though.
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Post by ematz1423 on May 1, 2024 6:48:52 GMT -5
What is pretty crazy in my mind at this point is they Sox are 17-13 and the weak link so far has been the IF which going into the season I had figured the IF would be their strong suit. Sure would be nice if they could find a way to keep O'Neill around for a few more seasons past this one, he fits rather well with Duran and Abreu. So far Duran and Abreu are showing they are every day guys though so it might be tough justifying spending decent money on O'Neill to basically be a platoon mate with them since I doubt the plan next year will have Rafaela at SS. If they could find a way to move Yoshida and open up the DH to be more of a revolving door it could work really well though.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 30, 2024 19:26:36 GMT -5
Replace the sub mendoza line Valdez with hopefully a .270+ BA guy in grissom and this offense looks sneaky strong all of a sudden and thats without arguably the best hitter on the team in Casas for several months.
Not going to get my expectations too high but this team should be fun to watch the rest of the season either way.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 30, 2024 9:45:47 GMT -5
If I'm remembering correctly pre-season last year Elmer was one of the low minors arms that was a guy to watch as a potential breakout. He only pitched 55 innings, looks like he dealt with some injuries but if this start is any indicator that breakout may just be happening this season. Definitely a guy to keep an eye on.
The development of Houck, Crawford and Bello as young SP arms is a great sign for the Sox and does help dispel the why can't the Sox develop SPs narrative but looking at the current farm rankings it does still seem position player heavy in the top 15-20. Obviously the work is never done and hopefully some pitchers in the minors are able to take that step forward and help make the farm more balanced.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 30, 2024 7:57:33 GMT -5
I was hoping for Votto but also very happy with Cooper. Votto's on the shelf with an ankle injury and hasn't started playing yet. So you're saying he'd fit right in as a 2024 Red Sox since he would come already injured?
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 30, 2024 7:21:10 GMT -5
how you can possibly grade a draft when the players haven’t played?What you’re asking is, how well do NE’s draft choices match my armchair amateur opinion (formed by reading mock drafts penned by other amateurs) of what they should have done? While I understand what you're saying and do agree on some level, it isn't likely we will come back to this thread 5 years from now and re-visit the 2024 when we have the full picture. You are correct we don't know how these players will perform but it is still a fun thought exercise to take a dive into the draftees and give them a grade/predict how the Pats did.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 29, 2024 19:28:08 GMT -5
That's a real nice looking illustration on the year zerfjan is having. Seems to me more than just a hot streak and some really nice developmemt. If he can put up #s even approaching that through the rest of the year he would seem an easy decision to protect from the rule 5.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 29, 2024 11:03:17 GMT -5
Can you fit them all in AAA though? Pablo Reyes and Romy Gonzalez are also in the picture here... Pablo Reyes was DFA'd today which I only just found about because I googled him to check his FG page. True it is a fair amount of overlapping players even with Reyes DFAd now.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 29, 2024 9:59:46 GMT -5
There is starting to be a pile-up at 2B. Grissom is the starter, and then you have Hamilton and Valdez, who are both lefties but can also both only play 2B. And then Yorke, who's a righty and can only play 2B (or maybe LF I guess). Only Meidroth seems to have any real positional flexibility out of the whole group. He's probably the one I'd most want to keep at this point. It's too bad Valdez got off to such a slow start this season; it would have been nice if he had helped his trade value. In any case, I would bet that at least one of these guys is gone by the trade deadline.Probably correct but according to the site it appears they both have two options remaining so it's possible they could be kept around another year since they at the very least seem like viable AAAA players and perhaps still have some upside to become true MLBers even if just bench pieces.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 29, 2024 9:56:24 GMT -5
Not entirely sure why 2021 vs 2024 is the metrics being looked at for Yorke. I would find looking at his 2023 vs 2024 as more pertinent since he was in AA for all of last 2023 and is currently there.
2023 BB% 10.1% K% 24.1% wRC+ 116 2024 BB% 9.3% K% 16.0% wRC+ 141
2024 so far is just 17 Gs and a 75 PA sample size which is obviously small but it feels like he must be on the precipice of a promotion to AAA in the coming weeks here. That K% dropping would be some nice development progression if that is not just a function of a SSS/hot streak which is certainly good be. Something to keep an eye on though.
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Post by ematz1423 on Apr 27, 2024 14:54:31 GMT -5
Gotta be the end of Bobby dalbec in Boston I'd hope. Good pickup to hopefully just add even a league average type guy vs the awfulness they've gotten from Dalbec.
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