Dominikk85

440 is really long, the average homer in mlb is around 400 ft.

I think mazara should only play against righties. He can't hit lefties but normally he can hit righties and should get a bit better. EE will get more time because of his salary and because Vaughn will get service timed.

Well they have to start somebody and after keuchel, giolito and cease there is not much depth. Reylo could be blown up but at this point you at least need to give him another 2-3 chances because there is not much waiting to replace him.

Yankees, Rays, astros, As, twins should be a lock, that leaves still 3 spots. I think the Indians will make it too as their pitching can't stay this hot but their offense also cant stay that bad especially if they make an addition but that still leaves two. Honestly who should be those two beating the sox? A lot can happen but the Os still suck despite their record. And the blue Jays just don't have good pitching and now Pearson is hurt, bichette is hurt and vlad still has swing issues that he likely won't figure out. And red sox just have historically bad pitching and royals and tigers are pure tank teams. In the west the Mariners suck too. That leaves angels and rangers as contenders and the sox should be able to beat out at least one of them. I think the sox have a very good chance if they don't lose everyone to injury.

The pen is definitely the positive surprise of the season so far, many thought that would be a weak spot of the team.

Yeah, he could still get better. This year he is clearly his career worst, he looks lost and the swing long and out of sync. Historically he always was a platoon guy but he was decent against rhp. He could figure it out again but this year is not much time to make adjustments.

It is pretty sad that so many sox outfield prospects busted. Robert and eloy are really good of course but they had lots of prospects behind them (Gonzalez, walker, basabe, Rutherford, adolpho) and they all stalled in development or got hurt. Definitely thought one of them would step up but didn't really happen. Really the system does not have much depth except for dh/1b so I think maybe an external solution was needed. I actually liked the mazara trade, they did not give up much and got a former top prospect that maybe with a little swing tweak could have had a breakout. Did not work out but was worth the gamble.

Moncada 7th https://blogs.fangraphs.com/2020-trade-value-1-to-10/

I think it both needs a large sample and also changing pitchers. A catcher can also benefit from catching certain pitchers enough or maybe you just fit very well with certain pitchers.

fwar does now include framing, I think this improved it a lot for catchers. Without framing it was pretty useless of course. CERA creates way too much noise to be reliable especially in a 1-2 year sample.

The smaller team owners would never want that. The big teams who make the playoffs almost every year would not lose much money with shorter RS and longer playoffs but even with expanded playoffs half of the teams will miss the playoffs and then make no revenue increasing the gap between the rich and the poor. So those teams who only make the playoffs like once every 5 years or less consistently would never want it (Marlins, pirates, reds, mariners...). Those teams want guaranteed revenue and not maybe revenue in case they make the playoffs.

James had a great start but let's not get ahead of ourselves. His success is mostly driven by babip, he doesn't walk, has an average contact rate but a bit but not plus pop, projections all have him like around 80-90 wRC+. Now I do think he did improve some, his k rate went down and his power went up but he is also a 30 yo coming of a career year so I expect regression. Also fangraphs framing metrics have him consistently below average there (no value for this season yet though). I'm fine with him as a backup for another 1-2 years and you obviously ride his hot streak as long as it goes but he is nowhere near the player grandal is. You do have to make a decision on collins though. Sox have enough guys at 1b/dh and imo you either have to give him backup catcher for like 40-50 games a year and DH stints on other days or you trade him as long term it makes no sense to carry a 3rd catcher/second DH on the roster.

Mazara doesn't look great but the price was not huge either. Walker is a nice prospect but at best he is going to be a 4th outfielder unless he takes a big step forward.

Sox definitely do a good job beating up the bad teams. That sounds easy but often losses against bad teams are costing a playoff spot. The sox still struggle against good teams and have trouble scoring against good pitchers with plus stuff but they are doing a good job beating the teams they should beat.

good ab by eloy not getting himself out when pitcher of course is semi intentionally walking with first base open

Mariners DFAd dan vogelbach. He has hit 29 Homers last year. This year he hasn't hit the ball well with just 2 homers and like a .100 batting average but he still walked a ton like he always does and has actually improved his K rate so he had almost as many walks as strikeouts. His babip also was under .100 so that should come back up albeit it wasn't just bad luck and he actually did hit the ball badly as his EV and LA shows. Still somebody should pick him up, at least he walks a ton and has some power potential.

Maybe give him an opener against good opponent if that first inning woe continues? Against the tigers he must find a way but against better teams you could save him facing the top of the Lineup once with an opener.

The problem is the sox only have two guys who really can go more than 5 and if Rick pulled every starter that was in trouble in the 4th or 5th that would burn out the pen pretty quickly. This is losing games but the sox are already 6th in bullpen innings in the AL and the only good teams ahead of them are the Rays and As who have much deeper pens. A quicker hook would win more games but the sox don't really have the quality pen depth behind the top 3 guys do do that consistently and they also don't have the starters except keuchel who can give them 8 to give the pen a breather. Rick certainly makes some mistake but the way that pitching staff is constructed including all the injuries you simply need to sometimes just hope the best to squeeze out another inning.

If course GMs use projected WAR or their own version of it. What else would they use?

If vaughn hits enough for a 1b he hits enough for a DH, on average I think 1b even hit a bit better than DH. So I'm not worried he hits enough for either position.

Vlad was ranked the top prospect in baseball. War or not that means people expect him to become a star. He has a weakness in his profile (too many grounders like hosmer) and his body has gone the wrong direction but he is like 21 and people still expect him to get better and become a star. Changes are needed though.

He definitely is an asset and in his prime at 27 but he also has bad plate discipline and is a questionable defender. Now baez is pretty similar but he is an elite defender while tim has not so much to fall back on if his babip dips.

How is he working on defense with no minor league this year? He can take fungos but overall he is too advanced to really benefit from cage work and fungos and having no minors is a lost year of development. The good thing is he doesn't need much development and is a finished product so he should still be ready next may or so. Don't think he is called up albeit really with a first baseman service time plays less of a role as first basemen in their late 20s are not that expensive usually.

It is a bit risky as the kopech situation could happen (TJ and 1.5 years of service time lost) but those guys are not 19 but 22/23 and playing AA and AAA and losing a whole year of development at that point hurts. Also with pitchers service time often plays less of a role because they often break before they are free agents plus the tigers already get them through 2026 so I think it is a good decision to give them experience now.

Yeah but he also walks like 20%