Chisoxfn

Wow finally finished andor. Absolutely stellar!

Yeah - meaning projected WAR may not be a good thing to than compare to actual WAR contributions and say - well actual teams that made playoffs had 50 WAR but projected WAR is 40; might be apple to apples due to inherent bias or conservatism (no idea as I haven't done a study on it and no clue if someone did).

So by my count we could have gotten at a minimum an extra 20-30 minutes of him including use in a game where he could have been the difference in the US playing Netherlands vs. Senegal. With that said - it is truly unfortunate he had the soft tissue injuries he did and they just kept getting him. In general this squad was snake bitten when it came to availability, especially given the youth of some of its better players. Hoping Pulisic's injury is more mild and he can end up being himself on Saturday.

Plus it is projected WAR which I think typically undershoots actual WAR. All that said - its hot stove season so not bad to see the hypothetical's, but that is what they are. A year ago I think all of the projected WAR's had the Sox as a top 3 team and we know what happened there.

If anything it probably was an outsized used of resources to constantly try to coach them, despite the fact that all the coaching in the world could only do so much and I fully believe it ended up having a detrimental impact on other aspects of the game. I know for a fact Vaughn had to spend a lot of time on non hitting related items, both in the off-season and than how he maintained his body etc during the season and how the mental side of being in that spot certainly had impacts on his ability to be the best pure hitter and ultimately maintain over a full season.

Wales was a perfect game for him to be used. The US was clearly dead and did a poor job utilizing substitutions and even the England game we had a shot and could have used that injection of energy up front and they were very slow to bring him in. I agree he may not be able to start - but leveraging him more in the back half of the game would make a lot of sense.

Well - I don’t love Donovan but I don’t hate him either and I do think a bigger attribute is if they are going to land a star I believe he is generally well respected amongst players as a players coach (the kerfuffle with Lavine a week ago not withstanding and even than the fact that he could do it shows the clout he has). And in hindsight it was the right move to send a message.

Personally I don't understand our inability to use Reyna. But I'm a big believer in Reyna (not just in terms of how he could help the team now - but also in the importance he will have 4 years from now).

It is very different. Us loses a ton of its best athletes to other sports. And the reality is the way we develop here is still different than those upper echelon countries. Less people here Vs other countries end up getting home schooled at young ages to fully focus on soccer. It is starting to happen here and at young ages (think 7 or 8)…but even than that is typically involving people relocating but I know a program in my area that is setting up a home school around lower elementary age into middle school with plan to than send them into international team feeder programs (vs today more of the clubs at best get ties to our MLS clubs that are ultimately sub standard). But if we didn’t have the draw to MLB, NBA and NFL I think you would see our striker play, if nothing else get more on par with the best in the world. And with that said - this is the us team with the most upside I have ever seen in my lifetime and the next cup cycle could be special. Key word is could be. This is no knock cause the Donovan, Altidore, Dempsey era was pretty damn good.

They have always lacked the true striker. It is a historical weakness and Behralter hasn't made it better with some of his usage whne it comes to some of his more elite pieces.

I HATE prevent defense - wow that was an intense finale but nice to get the win. On to the Netherlands on Saturday...maybe they can somehow shock us, but either way - after 4 years ago disaster - this was nice. Now lets hope the injury to Pulisic is not too bad.

Very well said and nice announcement from JR.

And 36 WAR would put them tied for 14th in actual WAR in '22 (with the Twins). Twins ranked 14th (for perspective).

So this implies as of now we are an 84 win team.

This is part of why I don't think the Sox can just do nothing at catcher. They are really bad defensively back there and unless Grandal has a bounce back also bad offensively. That combination is not good - so at the very least - find a glove only guy that you can rely on (unless they think Perez is that guy and maybe he is). It isn't going to break the bank.

I expect the opposite - I expect they know Wales is vunerable and will go for the kill, especially knowing Wales is going to play for the win. If England parks the bus they are asking for trouble (imo).

That is the beauty of the games being played at the same time. Let's do this. USA USA USA!!!

It is all about connections though - so my presumption is he had ties with some people Montoya was close to. It is all about who you know as you know. It also seems like in general we are seeing a more diverse staff in terms of which orgs individuals are coming from. I don't worry as much about Boston and I had zero issue keeping Katz. Lets also remember that the best orgs ultimately tend to be pretty directive re: coaching staff anyway, so I don't think in this case having people selected by Front office per say is a bad sign (whether we have confidence in THIS front office - that is a whole nother story). But on paper - these seems like a deeper and more diverse staff than they have had in the past.

So that is 36 WAR (if my quick mental math was accurate). How do I translate that across the board in terms of how that stands, noting that it currently contemplates / assumes zero positional upgrades (whether OF or 2B).

Not really - if you ultimately like your job - you are regularly going to be in a spot where you and your boss may not agree. End of the day the buck stops with JR - I presume more often than not JR supports RH and his baseball people and from time to time he takes a different stance and sometimes they convince him and stand on a soap box and bang a drum and sometimes they don't. That is life and to pretend that the world and your bosses should always agree with you is just nonsense. To me the only time you really get on a soap box where you walk is due to more ethical / cultural type of items, not things that are naturally subjective. Maybe you can also have a philosphical difference as well - as in - I want to run the franchise and front office one way and you want a very different way.

I was using BR but maybe that was not good and looking at Yas who was -1.7 and Seby was +1 so netted the two. I am probably minimizing some minimal impacts from others who played catcher. I did notice a major difference between BR and Fangraphs views of catcher war.

So we are purely going to just hope that Grandal gets a lot better. The Sox had a negative WAR at the catching position last year and you are saying just do nothing and it isn't a top 5 problem? I get it - catcher is not a position that is great - and maybe the answer is Grandal will bounce back - but age and catchers do not mix well and Seby has a lot of limitations (and put up a 1 WAR while largely playing out of his mind with the stick). It would seem if nothing else - taking a chance on a Mike Zunino (see if he bounces back from his shoulder injury) at least gives you a bit more depth. Not saying you spend big money here - but it was one of the worst parts of the Sox roster last season. Or a Naverez (who had a bad year but I think the deeper stats show potential positive reversion to the mean). Unless I am way off basis and those guys are going to get paid a lot - but my presumption is those are 1 year type of guys .

It was on my list - I presume the Mets would basically pay everything and you can probably get him pretty cheap. He was good with our pitchers and maybe coming back to Chicago helps. Or do you spend money on someone like Christian Vasquez or buy into some BAPIP favorable regression and go with Omar Navarez. I just don't think you can do nothing at the catcher spot - unless there is something we don't know about Grandal (i.e., he had something that he couldn't get over during the season which is going to magically get better). And I did see where Grandal had his average impacted by BAPIP (and probably some removal of shift benefits) so there should be some regression but he also wasn't the same player - it was pretty clear.

It really stinks how the Bulls have made so many poor moves. Especially that Vuc move. That said - White had played a lot better than I have ever seen him. He just looks confident. But my god Patrick Williams. He is a softer Wendell Carter - but that reminds me that sometimes patience is important but man they could have had other talent on this squad. I am close to ready to go get Westbrook and just flip into a total asset accumulation phase. Unless they can somehow land a star or start doing something right.

Just a stellar White Sox - on and off the field. Will be missed and wish him nothing but a number of ALCS's in which he loses to our Sox