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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 6, 2022 0:36:34 GMT -5
Meanwhile, the Yankees, Jays, and Guardians all lost. And it's up to Bello (and the bats) to prevent three straight series losses after 7 straight wins, including 3 sweeps.
The previous funk was 8 games at the of May, when they went 3-5 after turning the season around with a 9-2 or 10-3 stretch. They then went 19-4 while taking the 7 series. This stretch is now 3-5.
The last funk was strange; they won the 3 games by an average score of 11.0 to 4.0, while losing 5 by 2.4 to 6.2. They were 0-1 in 1-run games and 1-2 in 2-run games.
In this stretch they've won 3 by an average score of 4.7 to 2.3, and lost 5 by 3.4 to 6.0. They are 1-2 in 1-run games and 1-1 in 2-run games.
Of course, it they win the rubber game, then it's a 1-4 skid followed by 3-1 streak, and all of the above is tossed out. Let's do that!
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 5, 2022 3:56:29 GMT -5
Here's a puzzle:
How can a Sox prospect rank 12th in MLB among 141 SP in xwOBA (minimum 75 BFP) since June 1, and 29th in wOBA ...
And go a year without anyone posting in his thread?
It's only four starts, but is it possible for someone who has a "ceiling of a back-end starter" to pitch like a #2 in his first four MLB starts after his nerve-wracked debut? His expected slash line is .247 / .276 / .352.
Can the scouting dudes opine how much of this real? I note with interest (since I had completely forgotten about it) that I concluded last May 31 that he had a BABIP skill, and that's exactly what we've seen so far.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 4, 2022 23:10:14 GMT -5
Is this likely to be a short piggy-back-style start or will they send him out looking to get ~5 innings (optimally, obviously)? I see no reason as to why he'd pitch other than he as been pitching.
On regular rest for the Woo, he's gone 5, 5, 5.2, 5.1, and has thrown 86, 93, 101, and 84 pitches.
This will be his 3rd straight start on regular rest. Last (and only) time he did that was June 14, 2019.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 4, 2022 22:55:50 GMT -5
True, poor performance is a lot more to blame. However, when Robles and Danish number 2 and 3 in appearances in the ninth inning, I think there's a lot of head scratching there. I agree to the extent that I'm surprised Schreiber wasn't given a shot as closer and Houck was given the 1 inning closer role instead of keeping him in the multi inning role. I see Schreiber in the 7th often and wonder why it's not the 9th, so yeah we see Robles and Danish in the 8th inning or later. I do think eventually they get a closer, and rotate Whitlock and Houck for the 7th and 8th innings, along with Schreiber being a 7th or 8th inning option as well in tandem with Strahm. That should stabilize the late innings and keep Robles, Danish, and Brasier away from those innings. I do agree with your overall point about the 9th. While blown saves stats are flawed because a lot of them are blown holds, the Sox have been wretched in the 9th. I figured their ERA that inning was high and I think the 9th inning save percentage is probably poor. The ERA above 6 probably isnt too much higher than I thought it was. I think the relief prior to the 9th has been good and would explain why the overall bullpen ERA has been good despite the many 9th inning misadventures, but like you said, a bunch of wins were left on the table and were turned into losses. I do think that can improve. In the 9th Sox relievers are 28th in wOBA and 30th (a/k/a/"last) in xwOBA. They are 22nd and 23rd in extras.
In the 7th and 8th innings they are 9th and 14th.
They are 2nd and 18th (!) in innings 1-6.
And I typed this, the Jays lost to the A's 5-1. With the Guardians losing twice to the Tigers, we are now 1.5 up on the Jays, 2 up on the Rays, and 4 up on the Guardians.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 4, 2022 22:31:24 GMT -5
When was the last time we had a BA top 50 starting pitching prospect make his debut? Anyone since Owens back in 2015?
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 4, 2022 17:04:03 GMT -5
How strange is it that, in a year where we have insane organizational SP depth ... that we have to use all of it? Pitchers currently hurt have started 61% of our games. And that's factoring in ... that they've been hurt!
Sale, Eovaldi, Paxton, Wacha, Hill, Whitlock. A formidable rotation! And they're all unavailable at present.
Leaving us with Pivetta and Winckoswki, Crawford, Seabold, and, next up, Bello.
Combined line for the last three outings: 15.1 14 3 2 4 18. That's a 1.17 ERA.
Revised rotation projection (italics are subject to change based on how guys fare in the interim):
Yankees Winckowsi Wacha or Seabold. They can recall Seabold if Wacha has to go on the IL, which I think is likelier than not. Crawford Pivetta
@ Rays Sale
Winkowski or Bello 5 Bello 6 or Winckowski 5 Wacha 5 or Crawford
@ Yankees Pivetta Sale Winckowski, Bello Crawford, Eovaldi
They might also give Pivetta and Sale an extra day in the final series, if Wacha or Eovaldi is able to pitch by then.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 3, 2022 11:35:22 GMT -5
Latest rotation guess: Rays Wacha 5 Pivetta 5 Bello, Sale 5, or Murphy 5.
Sale is scheduled to pitch for Woo, on Bello's regular-rest day. Murphy is available because his regular turn on Tuesday falls on an off day. He would, however, fill a 40-man spot the rest of the year, prematurely (he needs to be added this year), and given all the guys on the 60-day IL, that seems very unlikely. If Sale starts in MLB, Murphy starts for Woo and then Bello would get an extra day there.
It would be something else if Bello, Winckowski, and Seabold pitched on successive days in this crucial stretch. That was not in the original plan, I suspect.
Yankees Winckowsi Seabold Wacha Pivetta
@ Rays Sale
Winckowski Seabold or hopefully Eovaldi Wacha
@ Yankees Pivetta Sale Winckowski
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 2, 2022 16:59:57 GMT -5
As rumored a few days ago. A big vote of confidence in Winck.
Tomorrow's starter is still TBD. They're either waiting to see how Sale feels while considering skipping Sale's last rehab start, or waiting to see if Wacha is ready to go on regular rest. Maybe both.
I would be all for this, too. Bring Sale up and let him rip for 4-5 innings. If he’s feeling strong, why waste pitches in the minors? Eovaldi is out, Whitlock is coming back as a reliever, and your #7 starter Seabold may be needed to take Hill's next start, and they are playing their division rivals. No way they're wasting Sale's next start in AAA, especially since they can give him an extra day.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 2, 2022 16:49:56 GMT -5
I believe I read it might be Seabold? I could be very wrong No way the skip Sale. Sox are going to be conservative. I’d say Seabold. Wink stays for now. And if Hill can’t go maybe we get to se Bello Both the Sox official site and ESPN have TBD. Another possible reason they're waiting is that they're thinking of a bullpen game if they don't use it much tonight. Pivetta goes on Monday and he's averaged 7 IP a start over his last 4 games and 6.2 over his last 9.
ESPN has Wacha for game 1 but they're just guessing because he hasn't been named yet for tomorrow. If they give Pivetta an extra day now, he's pitching the same day as Sale. But maybe they do want to give him extra rest ....
Rays Wacha 5
Pivetta 5 Hill (?) or Sale 5
Yankees Winkowsi
TBD or Hill 6
Wacha Sale or Pivetta
Rays Pivetta 5 or Sale
The version in italics isn't bad.
Re Sale, he's going to pitch 5 innings in either AAA or MLB. If you trust him not to do too much, there's nothing to be conservative about. All he has to do to make it worthwhile is be better than Seabold or whoever else.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 2, 2022 12:32:47 GMT -5
Just read on Yahoo that Cora says Whitlock will come back as a reliever. As rumored a few days ago. A big vote of confidence in Winck.
Tomorrow's starter is still TBD. They're either waiting to see how Sale feels while considering skipping Sale's last rehab start, or waiting to see if Wacha is ready to go on regular rest. Maybe both.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 2, 2022 12:20:23 GMT -5
Awesome, yet sobering, analysis. But then again, we spent the entire first half of the Celtics season with the same issue and that turned out fine. The optimist in me says that they are a few small parts away from fixing this rather than needing a big splash at the deadline. I actually agree completely. To begin with, the lack of clutch hitting is not predictive.
And you could well ask how, in heck did they go 31-11 (including 7-2 against contenders) in that awesome stretch without ever coming back from a significant deficit? While looking at the Win Probability graph at Fangraphs of every game I noticed that they had done really well when games were close (within 1 run or tied) after 6 innings. They scored runs and the front-line relievers pitched well.
Robles has the 11th highest average Leverage when starting an inning (inLi) of any qualified reliever at Fangraphs. He also has the third worst Win Probability Added (of anyone), at -1.64. If you graphed that against inLI, he'd be by himself in a corner.
I think it very likely that the Sox are talking David Robertson and Daniel Bard (8th and 9th in leverage-adjusted WPA, all relievers with inLI > 1.0; Schreiber is 4th) as we type. I don't know how many other contenders (if any) badly need a RHR right now, and we have so much interesting prospect depth that we must have some guys we think are somewhat overrated.
I don't see a reason why one of them shouldn't be in a Sox uni for the homestand. If Barnes comes back in July and we have a surplus of good pitchers ... you can always sell someone at the deadline.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 2, 2022 5:00:24 GMT -5
Most telling team stat so far:
The Sox are 43-34 ... but ...
They are 50-27 at being the first team to establish a 75% chance of winning.
Keep in mind that good teams almost always have more wins after being down below 25% than they have losses after being up 75%. Asking for the team to simply break even in coming back from a deficit / holding on to a lead is a very modest request. But if the Sox had managed that, they would have the second-best record in MLB and they'd be just 6 games behind the Yankees.
And it's actually been worst than that. On April 26th in Toronto they had a .179 win chance after the Jays got the leadoff man on in the top of the 7th, leading 2-1. The Sox put up a 4-spot in the 8th and pushed their win chance to .968.
On June 28th in Toronto they had a .135 win chance with 2 outs an a runner on in the top of the 7th when Refsnyder went yard, and they got their win chance up to .837 when Devers drew a 1-out walk in the top of the 9th.
Those were the only two times this season when they rallied in the 7th or later after being down below .250. And of course you know what happened ... they lost both games. The Sox have been below .250 starting the 7th (or while batting in the top of the inning) 21 times and have yet to win.
Overall, they've lost 13 games where they had >.750 (including the two where they were <.250 earlier) while rallying after<.250 and winning just 4 times. But the losses have been more severe; they've blown four >.910 while winning none. If you factor that in, they're 8 wins below average in clutch rather than 7.
Yes, the batting splits reflect this; they have a 95 OPS+ relative to league Late and Close, for instance.
Here's another fun split, OPS+ by outs, hitters-opponents (i.e., hitters, pitchers)
0 0ut 128-88 (+40)
1 out 111-94 (+17)
2 out 90-100 (-10)
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 1, 2022 11:17:19 GMT -5
Sunday's TBD should be Wacha on regular rest. Not sure why they haven't committed to that. Last thing we need now is someone who can't take their regulat turn, scramlbling the whole rotation.
If it is Wacha, you get the following for the homestand (4 days rest unless noted)
Rays Pivetta Seabold 7 or someone else (but not Bello, who would be on 3) Hill Yankees Winkowsi Wacha Pivetta Sale (assuming one more rehab start on the 5th)
Note that in this series, Hill is going on 4 days rest and Wink on 6. They appear to have done that to get Wink against the MFY's and Hill against the Rays. There was talk after Wednesday's same that Whitlock would be coming as a reliever. That suggests that Wink is in the rotation until Eovaldi returns--at least.
Alternate version with Seabold on Sunday
Rays Pivetta Sale Hill (or Wacha 6)
Yankees Wacha 7 (or Hill 5)
Winkowsi 5
Pivetta Sale
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 1, 2022 3:27:03 GMT -5
Sunday's TBD should be Wacha on regular rest. Not sure why they haven't committed to that. Last thing we need now is someone who can't take their regulat turn, scramlbling the whole rotation.
If it is Wacha, you get the following for the homestand (4 days rest unless noted)
Rays Pivetta Seabold 7 or someone else (but not Bello, who would be on 3) Hill
Yankees Winkowsi Wacha Pivetta Sale (assuming one more rehab start on the 5th)
Note that in this series, Hill is going on 4 days rest and Wink on 6. They appear to have done that to get Wink against the MFY's and Hill against the Rays.
There was talk after Wednesday's same that Whitlock would be coming as a reliever. That suggests that Wink is in the rotation until Eovaldi returns--at least.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jul 1, 2022 3:11:20 GMT -5
DD traded A LOT of minor league inventory and unequivocally won almost all of those trades. He's already lost the Sale trade 15.3 WAR to 14.5, and Kopech and Moncada have 6 years of original control left between them (3.5 and 2.5). That's going to be a massive loss. In 2018 Sale missed the equivalent of 9 starts due to injury and had a 4.11 ERA in the post-season, so (given our final division lead) it's hard to say that he made a difference in winning the WS, when compared to a less costly acquisition.
Margot is at 11.4 WAR with 1.5 years of original control left. Kimbrel had 6.5 for the Sox. In the 2018 post-season he gave up 7 R/ER in 11 IP, with 9 hits, and 10 BB or HBP versus 10 SO. Another complete non-factor in the WS win, versus a less costly acquisition.
In Sale's case, the team never addressed his consistent, annual late-season decline which reduced him to a #3 starter in August and beyond. In 2018 the same factors that had led him to decline instead produced injury, it seems.
Kimbrel was coming off an off year and the trade doesn't make sense unless you knew why it happened and how to fix it. What we got was two more off years sandwiched around a sole classic Kimbrel year.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 29, 2022 23:38:22 GMT -5
Verdugo had +50.5% WPA in this game. Cordero had +35.9. That's two players of the game. Would you trade Cordero straight up for Benintendi? Franchy's now 9/18, 4 DB, 3 BB in his last 6 G, starting with the Tigers series.
.216 / .296 / .368 before .252 / .331 / .413 now
Season so far, wRC+
75 in 49 PA (through 5/18) 209 in 32 PA (through 5/29) 29 in 61 PA (up to this streak).
So in terms of results
110 PA @ 49 wRC+ 53 PA @ 232
---- 109
I may look at Stacast tomorrow ...
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 29, 2022 22:44:05 GMT -5
Guardians did to the Twins almost exactly what the Jays didn't do to us. Twins score 3 in the top of the 10th, Guards score the ghost but have 2 outs with runners on second and third. PB makes it a 1-run game. But Josh Naylor doesn't pop up; he goes yard and the Guards leave their posts.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 28, 2022 17:14:50 GMT -5
I'd offer the Sox choice of Bello/Mata, Murphy/Walter/Groome, Winck/Seabold/Crawford, and a lower rated hitter, something like a Nick Decker or Devlin Granberg, and even then I don't think that's enough. Which is why I hope that the Yankees overpay for him. Not singling out trill here ...iImagine that I've quoted everyone who wants Castillo.
Castillo is indeed the best starting pitcher who will definitely be available.
Castillo is also a name you know from his 2019 ace-and-All Star season. I think people are putting 1 and 1 together and coming up with 1, as in ace. That's reasonable ... until you look at the numbers.
He's now pushing 30. Last year and this (so far) he has been a borderline #2 / #3 starter.
Some contending team that has crap for 5th starter will pay a high price for him, and that will be a good move if it makes the difference between making and missing a Wild Card berth.
Us?
It's actually not clear that he would start for us in the postseason. Paxton was a bit better before he got hurt and Wacha has his magic BABIP thing going that might well be real, and Sale, Eovaldi, and Pivetta should all be better than he is. There's no one you can bump out of the rotation while being certain you've made the team better rather than worse.
Now, if Barnes doesn't come back I'm all over Bard, and I think that every MLB team now knows that relievers have been hugely overvalued in the past.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 28, 2022 11:04:51 GMT -5
Wacha has allowed a .265 wOBA ... and a .344 xwOBA. That's kind of insane. Of the 174 pitchers who have allowed 100 or more balls in play, he ranks 24th and 120th respectively. He's a #4 starter by expectations and a #2 by results.
It is true that all of MLB is doing this, to a lesser degree. BABIP is as low as it's been in years. Teams have figured out stuff about positioning defenders in just the last few seasons. The league is .310 / .329 (-.019), which means that Statcast is going to have to recalibrate all their data, because by definition xwOBA should be based on the average defense.
So the proper way of looking a this is to look at wOBA and xwOBA on balls in play only. The league is .359 / .387 (-.028), and Wacha is .287 / .394.
Is there any evidence that this is for real?
There are two ways a pitcher can have a BABIP talent. As I've mentioned often, pulled fly balls have a big differential, favoring the hitter of course, while fly balls hit straightaway favor the pitcher to a large degree. Each combo of batted ball type has its own differential.
This is clearly more important for hitters than pitchers. There are "pull hitters" but no "pull pitchers" (which would be bad). If you look at Refsnyder's wOBA / xwOBA in the majors -- and he's been much worse in the majors than you'd expect from his AAA numbers -- you immediately say, wow, super unlucky, that explains MLB failure. But when you adjust for his batted ball distribution, which has been terrible overall, he's actually been a little lucky! (The Twins seemed to have fixed him last year. More on that later.)
Has Wacha shown this skill? No. In fact, when you adjust for his batted ball distribution, his apparent luck increases by .004!
The second way to have a BABIP skill is to simply get hitters to hit the ball to a predictable location, and put your fielders there. The analytics department looks at a hitter, looks at each type of pitch, plots where they hit the ball as a function of location in the zone (and maybe velo and break as well), and finds the spot in the zone for each pitch that will lead to the most predictable results. This is what teams have been doing, I believe.
You'll note that team offenses would differ in how pitchable they are. And they do. While the MLB average on BIP is -.028, the Cardinals are at .001 and the Tigers are at -.049. The Yankees are at -.048, second worst. The Sox are 13th best.
It tuns out that Wacha's opponents have been a bit on the predictable side. How much so? Yup, .004.So the two confounds cancel each other out.
Is there any evidence that Wacha is particularly good at executing this?
Yes, there is. To pull this off, you have to hit your spots in the zone. What's the other, more generic, old fashioned reason you want to hit a spot in the zone? Painting the corners to get a called strike.
Is there a correlation, start by start, between Wacha's wOBA differential and his percentage of all pitches that are taken for strikes? Which is to say, a start-by-start correlation between his hypothesized ability to hit the "at-em ball zone" and hit the paint?
Yes there is. It's not huge -- r = .39, p = .21, but it's as expected.That's actually impressive, I think, for 12 data points, given all the noise in the data.
(I will admit to looking at the correlations to various strike percentages first and then spotting the biggest one, so the "expectation" is after the fact and technically bogus. But the quickest way to do this is to see what correlates, and then see what kind of sense it makes. In this case, it makes perfect sense. It can be tested by looking at other pitchers, teams, etc. I may do that at some point.)
That the MFY's have a terrible differential is promising. You probably have already connected that to the Astros' success against their lineup. They do have the second highest xwOBA on balls in play, but they're just 6th in wOBA. Since 5/9 when we turned it around, we have a .006 edge on them in overall xwOBA but .018 in wOBA.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 28, 2022 0:31:05 GMT -5
EDIT: If I was in his shoes, I'd love to go to Korea. I've been there once and it's a fascinating culture with amazing food...
You just reminded me that I haven't had okdol bibimbap (from the Korean place in the Super 88 food court in Allston) since the pandemic! My brother and I have to give it a shot ...
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 28, 2022 0:03:12 GMT -5
Is there any indication that anyone would want Dalbec or that we could get anything for him? I'd be surprised to be able to use him in the same trade that would net his upgrade. Since the team got its collective head on straight, Dalbec is .278 / .350 / .472 in 40 PA vs. LHP, and his expected line is .239 / .317 / .591. That's a .359 wOBA and .377 xwOBA. And he has yet to have one of his torrid streaks. He can play 3B, and he's working on being able to play LF.
Wannabe championship teams do not trade a guy who's that solid a platoon / bench player, just because you hoped he could be something better. And he still might.
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 27, 2022 23:51:21 GMT -5
You want to start by listing the roster you hope to have in August and September.
Lineup
Vazquez Casas or Cordero / Dalbec. The other LHB is likely on the roster whenever someone is on the IL. Story Devers Bogaerts Verdugo Hernandez Bradley Jr. / Duran / Refsnyder
Vs. RHP you platoon JBJ (home) and Duran (away, in CF with Kiké in RF), with Ref vs. LHP home and away. That's good enough to make a trade for a RF impossible to justify. (This is of course assuming that Ref doesn't collapse, JBJ doesn't stop hitting at Fenway, etc.)
Bench
Plawecki Arroyo
You'll note that this is a 5 man bench, which means a 7 man pen instead of 8, until September. I would institute this as soon as everyone is healthy, because Duran has too much value to option and nothing to learn offensively in AAA. You can go to 13 pitchers whenever a position player is on the IL.
You could trade Arroyo for someone similar who has an option left. Kiké then becomes the backup skill infielder. What you want to avoid is leaving yourself with the 15th best position player on the 40-man, which is to say, the guy who gets called up if you have 2 men hurt, being a choice between Downs, Wong, and R. Hernandez. I think you'll be glad you have Arroyo on the 28 in September; if you swap him out, it has to be for someone as good. I sincerely doubt there's such a trade fit.
Rotation
Sale Eovaldi Pivetta Wacha Paxton
Bullpen
Shreiber Whitlock (minimizing innings) Houck Barnes Strahm Diekman and/or Davis Hill (long / spot starts)
Optioned: Taylor Sawamura Danish
DFA: Robles
Note that it's almost never the case that no pitcher is on the IL, so you don't really have to worry about moving Diekman or Davis. OTOH, if Taylor returns to form, you'll want to deal one of those guys to make room, and if he doesn't, you may well want to deal one and get a better LHR from someone else. If Barnes is good enough to pitch in high leverage -- and I think that's likelier than not -- you already have 5 guys who can pitch in the 7th or later, so in that case it becomes a luxury rather than a need.
So I think that if Taylor doesn't come back to be a high-lev guy, there's a real good chance they add a LHR who they think has significant immediate upside via a tweak of some sort -- basically, this years Robles, who cost nothing and had a nice little run.
Another reason to hesitate on acquiring a bullpen arm at cost is that Bello will almost certainly be in the pen in September, and he could well be electric.
So if we get our wishes I don't see a need for any major acquisition; just something like a 60% chance of adding an interesting LHR and dumping Diekman..
That's a big if, obviously. Barnes is clearly the biggest wild card, with Paxton next. Sale was 5 1 0 0 1 7 against the Astros in game 5 last year before running out of gas, and really looked like his old self, so I think we should be optimistic about him, given that the injury is not to the arm.
So what we're looking at in the next month is the progress of all of the injured pitchers. That will determine how much talent, if any, that we need to add.
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 27, 2022 15:25:21 GMT -5
As a point of perspective, Houck has pitched in three consecutive games so he likely would be due for a day off tonight regardless No doubt they did that on purpose In fact, Cora specifically said he'd do that if it made sense.
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 26, 2022 23:09:27 GMT -5
On June 3, Jeff Passan of ESPN did a comprehensive rundown of possible trade deadline candidates, behind the firewall at ESPN+. He began of course with the guys on obvious non-contending teams.
He then wrote the following. Emphasis is mine (after the headlines).
"We have two months to find out
The wild card
Chaim Bloom and the Boston Red Sox
The truest bellwether for the wildness of this trade deadline might not arrive until the third week in July. By then, the fate of the Red Sox -- the 2022 version of last year's Chicago Cubs, in terms of tradeable talent -- should be clearer. And if Boston finds itself in a hole from which it cannot reasonably escape, this deadline is primed to be exponentially more exciting and make Bloom, the Red Sox's chief baseball officer, as important a figure as any.
If Boston finds itself, say, seven games back of the third wild-card spot in the AL-- the current gap is just 2 1/2 behind Los Angeles ..." He then went on to speculate about the Sox moving Bogaerts, JDM, Eovaldi, CV, Wacha, Hill, Strahm, and Kiké, and maybe Robles, Sawamura, and JBJ.
Under what circumstances would this happen? "... if the returns of Chris Sale and James Paxton, plus the potential promotion of Triston Casas, don't extract this Red Sox team from the malaise of its own creation."
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The Sox were 13th in MLB's Power Rankings a week ago, and 11th in ESPN's. Both are of course laughable. The rankings come out again tomorrow and there's no way the Sox belong lower than 6th, and you can make a good argument for 5th ahead of the Padres.
We do have evidence suggesting that a terrible start by talented team can be completely non-predictive. I dimly recall a team starting 19-31 and then going 38-18 ... and then 36-20 and winning the WS ...
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ericmvan
Veteran
Supposed to be working on something more important
Posts: 8,952
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Post by ericmvan on Jun 25, 2022 21:58:42 GMT -5
Poor send of Arroyo. Febles bad decision. Announcers were talking about Straw working on his throwing pre-game. I suspect the scouting report was "run on him whenever possible due to lousy accuracy." However, he has excellent numbers this year (for the first time) so they may have missed that development ... Franchy + Wincowski WAR total creeping up on Benintendi And we got 12 years of control and traded 2. We were going to win the trade if either guy turned out to be solid.
Meanwhile, we are now 31-12 since the turnaround post 5/8 ... and have lost 1 game to the MFY's who are 33-12. But they are also 3-3 in their last 6.
It's very strange to think at this date that the Sox and Astros seem pre-ordained to meet in the DS with the winner playing the aforementioned.
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