vilehoopster

Thank you 2Deep for inadvertently helping me out another example of a stat that can be questionable. But I agree with you on WAR. Everyone quotes it as gospel, but there are times when it seems to defy logic and make no sense.

"There are lies, damn lies, and statistics" BABIP is one of a ton of new stats that people use to make this or that point. An ERA of 1.23 sounds great, but that means nothing because his BABIP implies he was lucky. Sorry, not buying that. There are so many stats in baseball now, that some stat or another can be use to prove just about any player is bad, great or just lucky. So does that five-game BABIP mean the Sox lost the Cease trade?

Sorry that this is in bold, but I wrote it in google docs to check my grammar and spelling, and when I copy and paste it in, it's in bold and I don't seem able to make the bold go away. Sorry, but no statement meant by being bold. "The asking for high returns is similar to what we got last winter about Cease. Other GMs won't offer anything near what Getz is supposedly asking, and when Getz gets desperate he will accept a lower return" "All the talk is what a big return Cease or Fedde will require and then we end up with a mediocre to bad return." "If you could get a weak return deal, like the one the White Sox got for Cease, that's better than winding up with nothing for him." "Seems to be a thing with Getz. We did the same thing with Cease." One of the things that happens on this board is that someone will make a statement, and everyone will run with it and quote it and it becomes accepted as fact. My best example of this is when people used to complain about having Sheets or Vaughn in the outfield, and they would state that having Sheets/ Vaughn in the outfield, that they were more likely to not call a fly ball and therefore collide with Robert and injure him. This was stated over and over: “Bah, bah and he’s a risk to Robert out there. Or “He’ll injure Robert” And it happened so often that this stupid supposition became accepted as fact, quoted continually as fact as people complained about Sheets’/ Vaughn’s bad defense in the outfield. Yes, they were bad defenders out there, but the idea that they were more likely to collide with Robert was just ridiculous. The newest supposition that now seems to be taking hold is that Sox/ Getz lost the Cease trade, and that it’s a fact. There’s no way that saying the Sox lost that trade can be taken as fact and, to me, it seems very likely that the Sox may have won that trade. Right now, I see that trade is looking as 50/ 50 either for the Sox or for the Padres depending on the health of Thorpe’s arm this next year and going forward. There was a 5 game stretch where Thorpe, as a rookie, had an ERA of 1.23. Certainly better than anything Cease did his first year with the Sox, showing outstanding potential and promise. One could make the argument that with Thorpe alone the trade could be a win for the Sox. Of course, it’s early. And a bigger of course is that a five game stretch means very little, but so does half a season. So to my point: there’s a long way to go before this trade can be judged good or bad for the Sox But . . . if you add in the three other players who also came with Thorpe, two also full of promise and potential, this trade is looking very reasonable. In my opinion, at this early juncture, the Sox are winning with this trade, or at least, breaking even. But there seems no way someone can state as fact and as a starting point for other arguments that the Sox lost the Cease trade.

Excellent point. This didn't occur to me.

I think his being the starting SS is all but a done deal. And I have to say that I agree with that call. Unless he comes in to Spring Ball and is terrible, I really expect to see him at shortstop. With there being no other reasonable option, I really think it's a stretch to say calling him up is rushing him. Yes, he struggled, for a while, in AAA; but he had a .815 OPS in September and has had two really good AFL seasons. Again, I see him at SS and Sosa (after his September) at 2nd as a done deal, and I'm looking forward to watching them there.

The last I heard was back in early September, when we were told that his injury was a bone spur on his elbow. The plan was to shave down the bone spur and that would clear up the problem. Again, that is the last I heard of it. Has anyone heard anything since? Was the surgery successful? Is he throwing or due to begin throwing? Anything?

I disagree completely. For the first time since mid-May, I'm excited for a series. Does knocking the Tigers out of the playoffs, redeem the season? Of course not. But it will be fun and exciting. A real reason to play. Come Sox!! Let's stick it to the Tigers and keep them out of the playoff. I'll be watching.

I'm not as down on some other players as most of the people on this board. But . . . I am absolutely ready for the Gavin Sheets experiment to end. What else do we need to see: he can't hit and he can't field.

His defense appears to be absolutely stellar, among the very best for an outfielder. So, what does he have to hit to make him a truly valuable RF for the Sox next year and solve that hole in RF that the Sox seem to have had forever. I just looked it up and the average OPS in the AL is .707. So I think if he could have an OPS of .700 for the season next year, with his defense in RF, I would think that the Sox management and fans would have to be very happy to have him there. I know he is quite a distance from that right now, but in 2023, in OPS in 93 at bats was .791. So I think .700 is very possible, (but I would agree probably unlikely). What do you think?

We'll see. They were very happy with Lance Lynn until he gave up four home runs in a row in the playoffs. I am confident that Kopech has that type of performance in him when the Dodgers really need to rely on him. Well, maybe not four home runs in a row, but certainly a 4-run 9th.

This didn't age well.

One thing about Fletcher, he has a better arm than Mena.

I can seriously see them losing out the rest of the season. When you can only get 5 hits against that piece of garbage starter the Orioles put out there today, this is clearly a team that no longer gives a s%*#.

Sheet can NOT be on the Sox next year. This from a former Sheets fan. He give the Sox nothing.

Did the baseball gods look down on this game and get the teams and uniforms mixed up. How is this possible?? The bullpen throws five shutout innings AND/ ALSO the Sox score four runs in the nine inning. IN THE SAME GAME??? That's what's been happening to the Sox all year!!!!

Anybody else expecting Crochet to get hit hard again tonight. I think he has pretty much entered the Luis Robert I-couldn't-care-less phase of his season. And like Robert, he doesn't care who knows. I could be wrong, but . . . doubt it.

Really?? You can't keep him in there to try and so he can try to get one more out to give him a chance to get a major league win over the Yankees. I would be more okay with it if you were removing him for a real pitcher, but you're taking him out with two outs in the 5th to bring in Touki? I don't get that.

All these complaints about trading Mena for Fletcher, and how terrible that trade was. There were just so many on here that these complaints were being accepted as fact. Well . . . Fletcher seems to be hitting with playing time. Also he plays good defense and has a very good arm. I can remember a couple of very nice assists from earlier in the year, seems he has a very good arm. Mena has an MLB ERA of 12.00. Maybe Fletcher has a better arm than Mena.

Wow, I hadn't heard/ read that he said this. In a way, this statement reinforces my opinion of him being a head case that can never be fixed. It makes me feel more confident of my prediction that he'll blow up on them when they need him (again, like Lynn).

On the topic of Kopech being good/ great for the Dodgers. Well, the Dodgers were extremely happy to have Lance Lynn right after they traded for him from the Sox. But they weren't too happy when he gave up four home runs(five if you count the one that was barely foul) in a row to the Diamondback in the playoffs. Make no mistake, Kopech has an outing or two like that in him, a total head case. Sure he's great while everything is going smoothly for the Dodgers, but put a little heat/ pressure on Kopech and he will again have a 4-run 9th. He is who he is; you can't fix a head case.

I think this is the truth of things with the Sox now. How many Sox players do you think were VERY disappointed not be be traded at the deadline. I would guess it's, at least, five or six.

I still don't get how St. Louis got Fedde and Pham and basically gave up nothing. For both the Sox and the Dodgers, this makes no sense. Even if you buy it as a salary dump by the Sox, the Dodgers got nothing also. I don't get it.

It's a non-issue. This board is really incredible these days. And I certainly get it: the team is so terrible to watch that you just want to be angry and complain, and rant and rant and rant some more. But this board just looks and works so hard for things to complain about, just the dumbest stuff, and bitching about a 1st year announcer's call, to the point of we're now up to three pages, just really shows the extent to which people want to complain; again, even on the dumbest of things.

All the Sox starters have to deal with it, but Flexen has been screwed over by our bullpen far and away more than any other starter. And it never seems to take very long, like last night for example. He leaves with a 5 to 2 lead, and before the bullpen can even get two outs, it's a tied game, and before the inning is over, Sox are down. When Flexen left, Stoney said it, something like, "Flexen got 18 outs and hands over a 3 run lead. All this bullpen has to do is get 9 more outs." The Sox bullpen couldn't even get TWO more outs and keep the lead. Just incredible how terrible this bullpen is. Seriously, it's hard to believe that the guys down in single A could be worse.

Also, I never understood all this "Pham is gone by the trade deadline" stuff. No one except the desperate Sox wanted to sign him as a free agent. Why would anyone trade for him now?