SoxBlanco

Both Beef tweets deleted now?

How is this thread not blowing up after the eyeballs drop? My guess is Vaughn.

Is that independent of whether Vaughn starts the year with the big league club?

He’s played every game since Monday. You probably just couldn’t see him out there. Alright, that was a low blow. A VERY low blow, am I right?

Not a good start for Lopez tonight so far. 3 hits and 2 runs so far in the first.

Will today be Kopech’s first game this spring?

That’s definitely fair. I don’t disagree.

I feel like Leury is under appreciated around here. Solid bench piece who is basically the same as a lot of guys who people here wanted to sign.

I just voted “other” with Vaughn in mind.

What kind of extension would make sense for both sides? Something like the Eloy extension?

I've never been more confident in a player not becoming a bust. All you have to do is watch his at-bats. He gives a professional at-bat almost every time up. He has a great approach with a great eye, and he has such a nice, compact swing. He's not going to have the same issues with chasing sliders low and away like Eloy and Robert did when they first came up. I'm so excited about this kid.

Yeah, poor joke attempt on my part. On a serious note, seems like low A is likely to start the year, right?

Between A and AA...what is that...Aa? Or A.5?

This seems like an appropriate thread to pull out a post from 6 months ago. @joesaiditstrue told us to bookmark his post, so I did. That prediction is not looking so good right now.

Yeah, that is pushing it a bit. James, do you think he breaks camp with the Sox and is on the opening day roster?

Completely agree. I share these same thoughts.

I think you missed the words “maybe” and “some”. Sounds like there is a plan in place for both Kopech and Crochet, where they are both on an innings limit but will both be available to contribute in the playoffs. Sounds good to me.

If Kopech and Crochet are actually both on the MLB team to start the year, then they should just use them as a combination starter to build up innings. Rotate which guy starts and which guy comes in relief. Start with 2 innings each and build up to 4-5 innings for the guy who starts. If there is no room in the rotation at the start of the year for the "combination starter", then just have both of them come in relief for a couple innings at a time. Eventually we will need another starter, and at that point, you start the rotation of which guy starts. Could a plan like that actually work?

I don’t think we’ll look to free agency for a starting pitcher. I think we’ll land a nice starting pitcher via trade at the deadline this year or next offseason.

I don't know how many lefties we will face, but I think we will win 123 out of the 125 games started by a righty. You might be thinking, "Wait a minute, if you know how many times we will face a righty, then you know how many times we will face a lefty". But I'm not sure how many ambidextrous starters we will face.

Wow, things just got very interesting.

I’d rather have Lynn and Rodon than Odorizzi and Dunning.

Agreed. He also knew (for the first time in his career) that he didn’t have to carry the load on offense. His approach was noticeably different, swinging at less pitches out of the zone.

Good stuff. Thanks, James and Mike. I can’t wait to see how our prospects do this year. This will be the first time in forever where we can excitedly follow the minor league guys while also rooting for a playoff caliber team in the big leagues. Should be a fun year.

Of course each individual try is still 25% no matter how many times you do it. But if you do it twice, you have a 43.75% of succeeding on at least one of the two independent tries.