JoeC

Or JR leaked this to him, and now Hahn will say "we were in the market for Judge"

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2022/11/justin-verlander-triggers-opt-out.html URL says it all.

Plus AJ is basically $5MM ahead right now, so he can be had at a pretty good discount for the next team, thus making him more attractive to teams who are looking for a bargain.

Not disagreeing, but it's a 2-way street. Also keep in mind that Milwaukee isn't known for its ineptitude either. I see that trade as a swapping between peer organizations... or at least way more so than if the Sox went after anyone from Tampa.

If you're playing limbo, that makes it harder.

the return? https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/r/rasmudr01.shtml

Yeah. Hopefully it gets properly allocated to shoring up the bullpen.

Thank you for doing your part in guaranteeing that the Sox never sign a high pedigree arm out of the draft ever again in the future.

I wish I could thumbs down a post.... but I half cynically agree.

...or... adjusted for relative payroll impact, a little less than 1 Leury ($5.5MM on Sox's 2022 payroll is about $7.5M on LA's 2022 payroll)

You think they’re willing to trade for a back-end-bullpen arm with us again?

He needs 2 things to be a starter - a third pitch and to stretch out his arm. not sure if both are attainable.

I am OK with that combo at 2B if they figure out the corner OF positions.

…or, to look at it another way, the analytical guys who showed some success in a nonanalytical organization have fled to a team that is hopefully looking for a growth in its analytical approach.

He did objectively lead the Sox to having the highest batting average in the league. That emphasis is literally what made him a failure.

Touche. I should have specified directional development.

Plus they didn't develop him. They're relying on his innate talent to sink or swim. This org does a horseshit job at working with players to help them grow.

My point is that if the Sox fail, it should remove any and all doubt in anyone's minds. There will be literally zero excuse at all. Your mind is clearly made up. My mind is 80% made up. 2023 would remove doubt from the other 20%.

Also, to me this is the time to truly hold Hahn’s feet to the fire. This was his first actual leadership hire to lead the team in a supposed contention window. No more equivocation about it being TLR’s fault / JR’s fault for the TLR hire.

I do like his embracing of analytics. About f’ing time we got someone like that.

The more i read about him, the more i like him.…. Which probably just means that the sycophantic media is doing its job well

…so… can we finally put this thread to bed now?

I mean, he DOES come from a winning organization... at least in H2H against the Sox this year.

So they are saying that an elite athlete in his 20’s acted arrogantly? Mark this one down for the history books, folks. Hopefully something like this never happens again.

I interpret that as "I trust colleges to develop players better than our minor league system." If you have a good player development system, you want to get players into that pipeline as soon as you can.