Chimpton

TLR may cost them 2-3 games due to in game decisions, as most managers will, but he will cost them more with his lineups.

You are right, the offense is massively underperforming. Apart from TA and Robert none of them can be relied on consistently and with the injuries to Eloy and Moncada I can't see either of them producing good figures this season. As for the pitching Keuchel and Velasquez have been as good/bad as expected and either would be fine as a 5th starter or Cueto if his good start carries on. Unfortunately I think we are expecting too much if we think Lynn will be back and contributing anywhere near his level last season, and at some point they will need to consider the workload on Kopech. But we can hope that the bats wake up consistently and the pitching holds up. If that happens then they should be thereabouts come season end.

So is our glass half full or half empty?

So what you are saying is that the Sox are statistically even worse than we think and have lucked into a few undeserved wins!

What an arsehole, if he took the punishment all this would blow over in a few weeks but instead he has to make it an even bigger issue.

The offense just needs to get up to average for the wins to become more regular.

Yep benching your best hitter always seems a bit strange to me, but keeping TA fit and healthy is vital to this team so maybe TLR is being cautious?

To win so do the bats need to bring their A game and get across more than the 3 -13 RISP they got yesterday.

A better performance from the pen was good to see, but we are still reliant on Anderson and Robert for run production. But I must admit at 4-1 down I wasn't very hopeful of a win!

Thanks for the detailed response. My big problem is that the Sox attempted a rebuild and this is where they are at now, and the only way of 'retooling' now would be giving up a piece that a challenging team wouldn't really want to give up, unless it is just a case of swapping like for like and hoping a change of scenery works. I guess I am just depressed that the 'challenging for a number of season' rebuild appears to have ground to a halt after 2 playoff appearances.

Do you really think they would get much for Lynn, Graveman, Hendriks or Moncada based on current form and/or injury records? Not arguing just curious. And wouldn't Robert, Cease and Kopech be a core you would want to rebuild around?

Who are these valuable trade commodities? There are none in the lower league system and probably only Robert and Anderson would get much from the MLB team.

Who would we use to get this 'big, big trade'? The farm is empty and the young players like Sheets and Burger wouldn't get much in return, even more experienced players like Eloy or Moncada wouldn't get much in return. The only players who would get much in return are Anderson, Robert, Giolito and probably Vaughan, and if you are trading them away it is more than a retooling. The biggest 'trade' would be to trade in the manager and get one who is vaguely competent.

Playing by numbers loss- when the whole team seems to be going through the motions when batting and make little league fielding errors.

After again coughing up 2 runs in the 9th last night, the Sox bullpen is leading the MLB in runs conceded in the 9th inning of games averaging 0.59 runs per game (although that was before last night's game).

Must be a lot of gimmicks in the Sox clubhouse then.

a) so do any stats matter? Dallas 'pitched his ass off' for 5 innings and Hendricks blew that in 5 outs. b) He didn't get through those 5 outs though because he gave up the run that tied the game.

Once again it seems ridiculous that Hendricks gets a win for blowing the save and robbing Keuchel of a deserved win. Two good games in a row from Dallas and he got the win in neither of them.

It all depends if he is asymptomatic.

Typical law suit by lawyers involving an ex-employee that covers everything 'sexual orientation, age and disability'. Of course if any of the allegations are true then it is curtains for Hahn and a big pay out in compensation from the Sox.

Yes but did the Phillies also have a dodgy batting line up who can't hit RHP, no starting depth a crumbling pen and a senile manager?

Collapses like that are exactly why we should be concerned. The win streak was nice but we were hardly playing world class ball and giving up 6 in the 9th yesterday was just shameful.

That's if you can call what he is doing 'managing'.

Just wanted to congratulate Dallas on a decent effort today. I thought bringing him out for the 6th was pushing our luck and so it proved.

The team is still 20th in batting average and 29th in fielding so whilst they have got better there is still plenty of room for improvement.