GreenSox

Great hitters swing at only what they like; but they learn to foul off stuff they don't like.

We need a couple of those huge overpays. Instead, we get Cordell and Gillalspie. Do we have a single player in all of these trades that we could put on the field right after the trade?

Phillips looks like he can at least play. For the rent of Moustakas.

MB could paint the corner at the bottom of the knee pitch after pitch. Command out the wazzu. With today's hitters, he'd get more Ks. As it was, his WHIP was .94 in Birmingham. If the scouts say that Flores doing that and inducing weak contact, then that's great too. But I don't see scouting reports, so the only stat that lets me know about "stuff" or contact is the K rate.

For better or worse, Cards seem to trade these guys near 30: Jay, Craig, Freese. Sitting out this trading period didn't make much sense. I've wondered about build-up trades; I don't think this can succeed solely by waiting on these prospects to develop. I don't know why a rebuild should take much longer than 3 years, when numerous others haven't.

Palka has a trait/skill that is exceptional. Certainly worth hanging on to in hopes that his deficiencies can at least be minimized and turned into average skills. But OBP will always be a tough one to improve in this organization; but he does have some minor league walk pedigree.

The Red Sox won the AL East the year they traded Bagwell. Every GM makes mistakes, but this was the whopper on top of the 2013-16 era failure.

Flores K rate is 6.67 per 9. Really doesn't miss enough bats. On the other hand, the Braves pitcher who dominated the Sox in game 1 averages almost 12Ks per 9 - and he's not in their top 30.

This is probably the 5th or 6th game this season that prompted that question. So, probably not. Very little pitching.

You're right. I edited my post to more clearly state what I was trying to say.

To simplify on edit: Tatis is a constant reminder of the open, but often unspoken, question in the back of the minds of some people (the elephant in the room) re this rebuild: Does this FO have the ability to pull this off? Some think it's just one of those things that happens; perhaps bad luck. They are understandably annoyed by Tatis talk. Others think it's

The team is in no position to sign FAs anyway. There's not one position of strength, other than utility player and one starting pitcher (and a few maybes). If they did sign FAs, they would do other silly things and this rebuild would peak out at about the Hahn level, which is 78-80 wins.

There's tanking And then there's this. What is this?

I'm not exactly sure what you're saying but those other guys I believe had called up before by their prior teams so clocks were already running. Also, the development of Moncada and the 3 pitchers hasn't exactly excelled so maybe they want to take a different track and zig-zagging is something they've done numerous times during their years in the FO.

Another insightful article from Mr. Bilek. Thanks for writing it and posting it. Hahn speaks in cliches, fondly called "Hahn-isms" I found this intriguing: "I should note, it’s only in Hahn’s interest to stress patience as it just pushes back the time until he is graded on his performance in this overhaul. Realistically though, Hahn wants to have enough time to gather enough young assets to achieve the “critical mass” – perhaps the most key Hahn-ism – to build a sustainable, annual winner." I think the first sentence is absolutely true. You could have said that about the rebuild itself, although most would agree it was necessary. RE critical mass, it seems to me that after the trades of Sale, Q, Eaton and numerous top 11 picks, that the critical mass right now should be sufficient to create a team that wins for a few years. But the key to sustained winning is the constant re-engergizing of that critical mass through new young talent, which is going to be more difficult than it was to amass it.

They have to do something about this field staff after the season.

I would say that Medeiros at 40 is a bigger concern, to the extent one is concerned with fangraphs. But fangraphs see him as a LOGGY and if they are right, then, yes, that would bad value. But the Sox think he can start. That's sufficient upside.

With all due respect to my tanker friends, losing tonight's game was ridiculous.

Maybe because he was "toolsy" and people are sick of toosly, but Burger was a reach (and later signed for below slot) and people didn't seem too upset. There was no real consensus as I recall.

Yep

The Sox got an elite prospect. Tampa didn't. But they are two different types of trades. Tampa made a re-tooler trade for young ML players Sox made a rebuilder trade for prospects who were good ways away.

Dozier's a player I'd like to see on the Sox - can he play 3rd? He's not having a good year, and is 30, but he's a good athlete and maybe he can be signed for reasonable terms.

I remember him from college as a starter and was going to ask whether he could start - thanks for addressing that in the write-up.

I would say definitely so.

Nice trade for the redbirds...they move a lot of their good not great players along when they approach 30.