A couple things before hand. I see Gallo being this year's Mousotakas, cut before the season starts.
Last year Cease got traded before ST was over because he was really great in ST. I don't see that with Robert. He'll be completely unmotivated like he was as the trade deadline approached last year; this nick or injury and chasing balls low and away. He'll be starting in CF for the Sox, and we hope he shows something so we can trade him at the deadline.
So, here's my lineup, (not so much bench pieces).
1. Vaughn at 1st
2. Drury at 2B. He will be this year's DeJoung. The Sox will hope he has 10 or 12 home runs by the deadline and they can flip him. Then it's Sosa
3. At SS will be Rojas to start the season. All this talk from Merkin and the Sox PR people that Colson has a great chance to leave ST as the starting SS is total BS, and the fact that they're all saying it, makes me really think it is BS. They want that extra year of control. When the time is over, then he'll come up.
4. Vargas at 3rd. Rojas will be the back up with Vargas doing some 1st and DH.
5. in LF, a platoon of Fletcher and Stater.
6. In CF, Robert until the deadline and Getz will be forced to give him away because his stats will be less bad than last year, but still not very good for him. Then Taylor.
7. LF - Benintendi
8. At catcher: first Lee and Thaiss. The two minor league guys will be up after the all-star game.
Starting pitching -- I am really concerned with this. I keep hearing on various podcasts that it seems likely at Perez will be our opening day pitcher. If this is true, the rotation is in horrible shape, horrible. What is Perez? The 3rd, 4th, or 5th starter on a team with a real rotation? If we can't get, at least, two starters clearly better than Perez, our rotation will be terrible. I don't know; maybe the Sox will have him as their opening day starter to give him some false credit so we can flip him later.
This is who I see as the Sox best starting pitchers in order:
a. Cannon
b. Martin
c. Perez
d. Wilson
e. Burke
But if anyone knows me on this board, I am a huge Thorpe fan. If he is not injured, (that is a big if) I see him as the ace of the staff when he comes up, maybe after a 3 or 4 weeks.
I don't know about the bullpen. Let me use the same logic for Anderson as I did for Perez. If Anderson is our closer more than a few weeks into the season, the bullpen must be and will be absolutely terrible.
So that's my opinion.