Such a welcome sight from all the groundballs.
I was curious if they were actually hitting a lot of groundballs this season or if it just seemed that way, so I decided to look it up. Turns out 1) they are hitting a lot of groundballs, but 2) they sort of always have (at least as far back as the data goes):
Year: ML Rank (GB%)
2021: #2 (47.7%)
2020: #5 (45.9%)
2019: #4 (47.1%)
2018: #8 (46%)
2017: #4 (48.2%)
2016: #10 (47%)
2015: #3 (50.3%)
Not meant as a comparison between the two, but this calls to mind the days of Dye in RF. Seemed like he was always making running/diving catches out there, but they would have been routine balls for most RF's.
No one is getting criticized for LIKING the team and I think you know that. The criticism comes from our different comfort levels currently with the team that we ALL LIKE.
I intentionally exaggerated, since that seems to be the level of discourse needed here. Expressing concerns over losing to a team you might see in the playoffs means you don't like the Sox? Cool, good talk.
What about with Rizzo, Sanchez, Urshela, Gleyber and Chapman all available for the Yankees?
Also, they still lost all those "coin flip" games. Oh, except for the Field of Dreams game. They won that coin flip.
The arrogance is a little off-putting. Like, it's weird to me that some folks just can't entertain the idea that there might be some AL teams better than the Sox. I've seen the Yankees quickly dismissed as non-contenders, despite the fact that they're only 2.5 games back from the Sox in the W-L column.
Don't get me wrong - I think this is a VERY good Sox team and I'm beyond excited for the potential playoff run. I just struggle to understand the cocky posts that state one's hopes as fact (and then invalidate those that don't see it the same way).