JoeC

Probably an unpopular take, but I really hope the director or culture (or whatever that ex-marine dude’s position is) has a say in this hire.

No idea. Seems like this org is dead set against letting Colas get any plate appearances at the big league level - that was more my intent with my post.

Colas? Like he would ever get regular AB’s at the big league level…. Illogically, it seems like the Sox would be more likely to sign Maldonado to play 1B than give Colas regular AB’s at first base, under the guise of infield defensive leadership or some s%*#.

There was definitely an SNL skit about this involving Will Ferrell and a yoga class, FWIW.

Ope. Hope that wasn't serious.

this makes sense to me - thank you for clarifying. I think i agree with all of that

So, based on this, are you suggesting that Player Evaluation (scouting) should also be responsible for assessing the strengths and weaknesses of your Player Development process / system? That's an interesting idea / take, and I think it makes sense. I'm not sure I agree with the idea that they must not be combined (I always got the sense that teams like Cleveland did this, or at least had a nice symbiotic relationship between the two functions), but it does make sense for your scouting department to be able to see the trends in the players they put into the system vs. the players coming out of the system.

This shows he has some intelligence.

To paraphrase Wayne Campbell, "if it's Chris Getz, I'm going to be very upset."

Bought the ebook. Will likely order a hard copy too. What distribution gives you the most profit?

Please. This is the age of smartphones. They just had everyone download a free graphing calculator app on their phones.

Tons. Lineup constructions, pitching decisions, pitch selection, . . . There’s a little more to modern baseball than “throw hard and swing hard.”

Renteria’s tactics suck. However, you can pretty easily change tactics with buy-in. Besides, the 2025 and 2026 teams are going to suck. They’re going to suck really bad. Will tactics actually matter? What the team needs is a clubhouse presence who will show guys how to be professional - not just between the foul lines, but how to prepare and get along with each other… as grown ups. The manager for 2025 and 2026 should be chosen based on how they will prepare the team for 2027 and beyond. To me, tactics don’t matter for these next two years, because the wins and losses are a foregone conclusion - they’re going to suck. So let’s just pick the guy who will set the team up to succeed on their own starting in 2027 (I hope it’s that early).

I don’t disagree.

Yeah, the won-loss record in 2025 is going to be a trainwreck anyways, so I’m looking at the manager as someone who: 1. Will contribute to player growth / development (for younger players) 2. Will let veterans (read: “scrap heap pickups”) do what they need to but hold them accountable for performance Basically the goal is for the young players to be able to develop, and for the veterans to be able to play well enough to be flipped for assets. I don’t completely lack confidence in Getz’s ability to do that.

I mean, the Wings were good during the 2000’s, and the Pistons were also good at the time. The Lions were truly miserable. I moved to Michigan from Wisconsin after college. I was so used to 2-way trash talking with Packers fans, but I quickly found that Lions fans were immune to taunting. How do you hurt someone’s feelings when you say stuff that they agree with 100%?

Yeah. It was worth it in 2020 and 2021.

You can pretty easily circumvent blackout rules by VPNing to a different location. Just don't let it be Iowa, where you're basically blacked out from 1/2 of all games at any given time.

They're the 2000's era Detroit Lions.

This is correct. I can't watch the Sox when they play in Detroit. (caveat: I gave up my MLB.TV subscription after the 2023 season and the Getz hiring)

Or did they just stop paying attention and kept forgetting to turn off the feed after the game ended? Both are equally likely.

I would love: 1. For the Sox to be good 2. To be able to pay a fee to stream all Sox games, regardless of where they are, regardless of what network they're on, regardless of where I am.

The one area that Getz seems to be competent is in making personnel hires. I don't have high expectations, but I'm less frightened by the idea that Getz would pick his own guy.

We'll never know, of course, but I'm of the opinion that the regression would have been less severe.

Yeah, Ricky definitely had his flaws, but I'm of the opinion that the team in 2022 (and 2023) would have been in much better shape had Ricky been in charge in 2021 rather than TLR.