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Let me have my fun

There is no such thing as too much of a good thing when it comes to baseball players. The Sox still need a better 4th OF RIGHT Now. They can't wait on Cespedes for this year. But the Sox may feel they now have enough OF anyway. But long way to go. No telling what Hahn is thinking now. We may see a prospect or 2 traded or a piece off the 26 or not much else at all for the rest of the off season. They have some depth at 2b as with Romy, Sosa and Popeye Rodriguez but can any of them provide better than average defense which would be the only way to play them with the Sox if they aren't going to hit. One of them has to step up if that's what the Sox end up going with.

This. After addressing 2 crucial needs with Clevinger and Benintendi , I would much prefer they continue that trend. We might all disagree on what the next logical need is, another SP, 4th OF, BP, 2nd base ? There has been a lot of smoke involving catchers but Grandal probably deserves another shot but if he is through then the drop off is rather steep unless you think 2022 Zavala was real.

He's a Padres fan.

The only way Colas could've had a better year than did was K less and walk more. He was a guy who was 23, unranked, over hyped, rusty as hell, adjusting to yet another culture he had never been in before and in A+. How did he respond ? Only by getting stronger and stronger as the year progressed in a year that would have left mere mortals mentally and physically exhausted . The guy is a real beast. He does need to play and often. No one should underestimate what he accomplished in just one season and how rusty he was and how nomadic his life has been and how spectacularly he rose above it. Corlas , Corlas , Corlas !!! ??

The idea is to thrive not survive.

I guess you are comparing Outman to Cespedes. My scouting reports from MLB Pipeline have Outman at 55, 60, 60 Power, Run, Field. Cespedes 50, 55,50 I trust your fangraphs scouting reports are accurate. Its hard to say when looking at the scouting grades if they are old or updated even though I am looking at the Updated Top Prospects from August 16,2022 from Pipeline. I think the update list is just where they rank the player in the teams top 30 list and I have no idea how old the scouting grades are. I don't think Cespedes is garbage I just don't think he is MLB ready yet, whereas I think Outman is ready based on his 2022 slash lines at AA and AAA and 4 game sample in MLB. And all the guys I've been talking about appear MLB ready or had already logged some time in MLB. Hence I don't talk about Cespedes except to say he isn't good enough RIGHT NOW. Defensively he is but not offensively. Outman 6'3" 215 2022 AA 68 G .295 .394 .552 .946 38 BB 89 K 16 HR AAA 57 G .292 .390 .627 1.017 32 BB 63K 15 HR Total 125 G .294 .392 .586 .978 70 BB 152K 31 HR Cespedes 5'9" 205 2022 AA 119 G .258 .332 .437 .769 29BB 154K 17 HR Obviously they both K a ton but Outman substantially higher in BB's and everything else except steals. Plus Outman is LH and Cespedes is RH. I always think a LHB putting up very good numbers in AA and AAA has a better shot to do well in MLB because most pitchers are RH and most batters hit opposite handed pitchers better so a LHB will see RHP a lot more than a RHB will see LHP. I hope Cespedes can put up great numbers in AAA but he has some work to do on his plate discipline and to increase his offensive numbers. Getting Outman is a long shot anyway. The Sox have already picked up Hamilton, Payton and Reyes and have Leury but I still think a more substantial power guy is needed as a 4th OF. The MLB readiness and power plus run and field is why we'd have to give up something for him but as I said a long shot because the Dodgers have their own OF problems.

Larger bases mean slightly shorter distance between bases. Also pitcher's limited to only 2 pick off moves for a runner on base. Once you make your 2nd move its off to the races for the runner. Speeds up the game with the guys that will throw to 1st 3 or more times and gives fast runners license to steal.

Sox got lucky no doubt but damn 3.5 fWAR last year so that fits right in with good defense, smart base running, just a savvy ballplayer props you gave him. It's hard not to like a guy who actually performed when so few did last year. He looks good for 1.5 fWar standing on his head if he got the playing time. Plus maybe his hitting profile fits our park a lot better than it fit in Oakland or Texas or was just extremely healthy. He did play 149 games . Would be nice to get that from some of our guys. If the Sox are ATM ignoring 2nd base FA's , examining internal or trade options it wouldn't hurt to monitor Andrus situation if his market drops very low. He had to be doing a lot right last year to get that kind of fWar. Early in his career he was also a very good bunter. Don't see much of that out of him now but to be a 9th hitter in the lineup I wouldn't feel bad with him there and at 2b if all else but internal options fail. I guess he's viewed as a Josh Harrison equivalent but when was the last time Harrison put up a 3.5 fWar ? Eh someone will give him $6M . That's probably not a good idea for the Sox even though it's basically paying for about 1 War or less .

Billy's back ! Should just make the guy a coach to replace Boston

Good article Thanks !

His season ended Sept. 2nd because of the broken hamate bone but he should be more than ready for opening day. However it is the 2nd time he broke it and the fact he couldn't make it back for the playoffs shows it needed more healing time. Bad wrists do have a tendency to zap power but it's still a possibility he's between 10-15 HR's . He hasn't hit 20 since 2017 and despite all the graphics on how he would fare in his new home park I'm going to view 20 as unlikely if the ball is the same as last year.

Right you wanted power and that's where you saw a chance to get it. Totally understandable. You said something earlier that is the main reason I look elsewhere for power. The Sox are priced out of the big power names so you have to be creative in getting power bats. I settled on Outman for this year. But I did bring him up as a possible trade piece for Kimbrel when that was happening. I also brought up Varsho after the 2021 season ended and now I've brought up Nootbaar right before the Benintendi signing went down after reading he might've been available when the Blue Jays wanted to trade with the Cards. I trust other organizations known for producing prospect after prospect like the Cards and Dodgers way more than I trust our organization. People want sure things, I get it, but reality suggests we are priced out of all but a Benintendi type of sure thing. Knowing that, some people rather take a chance on guys who used have a good career than take chances on 25-27 yr old unproven guys with speed, power and defense because they could bust or , they aren't ranked or their development paths were unconventional due to being 7th or 8th round picks and only in 2021 or 2022 did they become a thing. The unknown is just too scary to rely on right away when the Sox are supposed to be winning a World Series. Gotta be a ranked prospect or formerly good player to spark the hope.

I'm basically with you on almost everything you said. I love that they spent money on a better and LH OF. I never pushed for an upgrade offensively at catcher because with too many holes to fill that were more important like OF and starting pitching I'm fine with Grandal , Zavala, Perez. I'd prefer an outstanding defensive catcher. BUt I understand wanting a "sure thing" power hitter. I'm very in tune with helping the pitchers as much as possible with a guy with a good arm and good rapport with pitchers. I want speed and LH and defense. I want to take advantage of the new shift and pickoff limits with speed. I wanted an OF or OF's with speed and power. Those are reasons I wanted Colas to play so badly and wanted Outman or maybe Lars Nootbaar although my main opposition to them has been they are not sure things I know my Outman stance has become a joke now but he would still be an ideal 4th OF because when Robert gets hurt he's still a LH power hitter who can play all 3 OF positions. It's why I wanted Garrett or Aquino rather than Payton or Reyes. Speed and power plus controllable youngish players with upside though not top prospects . Guys like Outman and Nootbaar were developed by their organizations known for how they develop guys, Nootbaar through his work with Driveline and Outman with the Dodgers. Both totally revamped there swings and improved tremendously in a short period of time so much that they have never even had a blip on ranked prospects or even their own Top 30 lists . Both these improvements came after the off year in 2020 . The Cards did not hesitate to call up Nootbaar after only 35 games in AAA in 2021 after showing nothing before because they believed that though his work ethic he really did become much better. Outman followed a similar path reworking his swing with the Dodgers but just wasn't given the same chances in the OF with the Dodgers. Him spending any more time in the minors would be a shame. He's ready to contribute now. I understand the reluctance even with Colas to rely on rookies given they all go through periods of looking like crap offensively . However you still get the defense and the power because they are truly well rounded defensive OFers . But we've suffered both offensively and defensively with Vaughn, Sheets and Eloy through injuries during the peak years of our "window" in the OF that I have a hard time believing that there would be all that much suffering with Colas and Outman or some other guys who I thought were better than Cespedes, Payton and Reyes. It's one thing to want Eloy and Robert to have the best offensive years of their careers to propel us to the playoffs but you still have to prepare for the injuries they cannot seem to avoid by having strong backups available. The last thing we want is Eloy, Leury or Reyes in the OF because Robert got injured. Maybe it's just that some see 2023 as the last chance to actually make a run in the playoffs before everything really falls apart. But the last 2 years have been quite the disaster and a sure thing floor wise like Benintendi is like a Godsend to us now . Vaughn and Eloy are where they belong now at 1st and DH and that' s where I want to keep them. It's just a shame that it appears the Sox are finally coming to their senses in a last ditch effort to salvage the damage they've inflicted for the last 2 years.

Thinks Go Better With Colas ! He's the Real Thing. For the uninitiated these were popular Coke slogans 60's and 70's and were 2 of there best along with the very popular "I'd like to buy the World a Coke" sung to the tune of I'd Like To Teach the World to Sing in which they also incorporated It's the Real Thing at the end of the Song.

Thread needs some Benintendi highlights from 2022 : It's all offense , no defense in the highlights.

What time was the Jesse Roger's tweet that it was official ? 4 PM ? Kap got it right .

See if you waited we could've added Benintendi to the current Sox side !

It sure helps though if you think the Central is so weak that they are all going to do pretty poorly against the East If you are going to fatten up on teams it should be against the Tigers and Royals.

Speculation but we'll find out eventually.

The carry overs doing better was always going to be part of the plan. It had to be. Sox lacked any real LHH last year and had terrible OF defense. You get better OF defense by a lot with a healthy Robert and Colas/Benintendi is good enough defensively to keep Eloy and Vaughn out of the OF. Vaughn finally gets to play his natural position and not hurt the team because he needed to be a superstar bat to offset his ugly OF play. If his offense can take another leap forward HR + OBP) in his 3rd season he can replace Abreu's production. Just need to finish the OF with a solid back up OF. Yes I still want Outman for that ! But the Dodgers have their own needs in the OF for them to give up Outman yet. I don't know how comfortable they would be playing their top prospects Vargas or Busch in the OF. Vargas was up for a little while but played mostly 1st and LF. Busc,h they didn't call up at all and called up Outman for 4 games. Bellinger's gone. Chris Taylor didn't do well last year. So that leaves Betts and Trace Thompson. Right now our OF looks better than the Dodgers.

If we think of Cleveland as our main competition in the division they are a pretty RH pitching staff as are the Twins. Plus hard to prioritize LHP when there's not that many of them. But Benintendi is a better hitter vs, RHP .

They actually play him pretty straight up. He's not a dead pull hitter but when he hits HR's he hits them to RCF and RF. He sprays the ball all over.

He does get shifted on a lot and hits a lot of singles to the right side so probably even more singles than before. Takes walks so maybe he could get his OBP to up around .350. If he could hit 10 Hrs and keep his slg. at .400 or so a .750 OPS from him wouldn't be bad at all. Haven't checked on his fielding.

Nice. Finally getting their priorities straight when we've needed a LH starting OF for a while. Starting pitching LH OF, better defense without Eloy, Sheets or Vaughn in the OF.