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I think all of the 3 years lost were due to the Achilles rupturing twice. I knew other players lost development time due to Covid and a little more due to labor problems , but Burger wouldn't have played those years anyway. He was rehabbing his injuries and not able to play baseball at all. Someone like Vaughn lost time but he was still able to play in Schaumburg taxi squad in 2020.

He could turn into better than Schwarber . Schwarber has the advantage in that he is LH and mainly faces pitchers who are RH. That's the built in advantage of being LH in a sport where over 70% of pitchers are RH. Doubtful Jake ever comes close to taking as many walks as Schwarber . Schwarber's 2 highest fWAR years were 21 and 22 and fWAr of 2.8 and 2.6. Mostly all of it is from offense. So far this year Burger has a 2.0 fWAR with positive contributions offensively and baserunning while the defense hasn't been nearly as bad as Schwarber. Already in 2023 in twice as many games as 2022 Burger's defensive fWAR is a lot better (-4.9 to a now acceptable -2.1)

Yes it is early . His power metrics probably were never going to be as high as they were. They were outrageously high . His latest line with the Marlins is .326 , .396 , .488, .884 . A lot of the complaints about Burger were he wasn't hitting for average and had a terrible on base percentage. These complaints are typical of fans refusing to look at the full picture. He did lead the team in walks in July. He also lost 3 years of development time with the injury. 3 years !! That means a lot. Aso his 1st year getting nearly full time playing time so basically 4 months of really just getting into a chance to adjust. James Otman , atrue rookie at 26, started hot then got cold and is now hot again. Same thing except Outman always knew how to take walks and is a good fielder but then again he didn't miss 3 years. Plummeting power numbers are a bit of an exaggeration when he's now hitting for average and taking walks and his OPS is higher for the time being. He also would've had a double instead of a single on that game winning hit. 1 HR and 4 doubles in 12 games is not a big deal when he's hitting over . 300 and his OBP is nearly .400. A guy should actually have more singles than all his extra base hits combined if he's going to be a well rounded hitter. EARLy results say he's been being a better hitter . He's one of those guys who studies his craft and his wife helps him. The guy wants to be better, he studies to be better. so I hope he will be better.

However you can't say blocked if they only have Moncada and Eloy each for 1 more year which is a distinct possibility. Also Devers isn't a great 3rd basement either and he plays 3rd a lot. Burger isn't terrible at third , he's near the bottom for sure but it's still a fairly limited sample size and precludes the possibility that he'll get better. It's basically the same argument I've been using about his hitting. If he all of a sudden starts hitting for a higher average and taking more walks., it won't be that the Marlins fixed him. He was never broken. He just lost 3 years of development time and had already started showing he was learning ( 11 walks in July ) and showing a proclivity for wanting to dive into data. He hit's the ball as hard as anyone in baseball when he makes contact. His BABIP should be able to go much higher than it was. He might not hit HR's at the same pace but he's shown he can go oppo and just isnt a pull only guy.

https://www.mlb.com/marlins/video/jake-burger-on-his-clutch-hit https://www.mlb.com/marlins/video/marlins-rally-to-top-yankees

Maybe they did something, maybe they didn't besides your basic, but necessary, we believe in you , just keep playing great defense, taking walks and running the bases well. You're a important part of this team. It's still his 1st year and he probably had to adjust to the adjustments. Fans just aren't patient enough to give guys a chance. Plenty still think Burger is who we saw batting under .200 and just hitting bombs. Outman didn't miss 3 years like Burger did. He got a chance to hone his new swing. But it was always very helpful to him that he had a good eye . Sox had better start taking OBP in player development very seriously. It's the one thing that can spell doom for otherwise very talented hitters. MLB pitchers are nasty and they are smart and have smart catchers. Your weaknesses will be exploited continuously.

I specificly mentioned Outman because in the off season I did a lot of research on him so I know for a fact they rebuilt his swing. I don't know if you were posting back then but I started posting a lot about not so young OF's to target , guys who were around 24-27 who all appeared to be MLB ready. Outman was my favorite and I became the Outman guru and as usual when you hype someone as much as i did you get meatballers who , no matter what you say, think you only like him because he had a very good debut with the Dodgers last year. I went on and on about his speed, defense, power and how once they rebuilt his swing that he now had a large enough sample size in the minors to say it was successful. I thought he could quickly be valuable on the bases, offensively and defensively despite a high K rate. I said he was better in my eyes than the Dodger's ranked prospects Michael Busch and Miguel Vargas who weren't as fast nor had good reputations for defense. SO yea I took a lot of flack but I also had a lot of posters whom said you convinced me. Now he's approaching 3 fWAR on the season and has about a .500 OBP since the All Star break, tops in MLB.

I know he's around the team all the time but I would imagine he may get a lot of "this is off the record" or "you didnt hear it from me" stuff. He also doesn't speak spanish as far as I know and that would leave him vulnerable to only getting one side of a story . If you have to use an interpreter you might not get the type of inside info that you would getting it straight from the horses mouth. This is the danger zone that most reporters fell into who only speak English in a sport where many of the players speak spanish but the scuttlebutt you hear is often from only those who speak English. You can see how it might be slanted against the non english speaking players.

Garfien and McGuffey are basically Soxtalkers with a forum. How much extra special inside knowledge they have is anyone's guess. My guess would be not much. Thank goodness that Salvy Perez deal fell through.

Did somebody steal all the Dodgers people and ways to make a guy who can't hit a lick into a MLB player ?

Excuse my ignorance but after a certain amount of time in an organization do you become Rule 5 eligible or a minor league free agent ? Or do you have to be a certain age for all of that to take place ? Seems to me HS players drafted can still be relatively young developmentally and be Rule 5 eligible ?

The good organizations have a lot of things at the disposal from the right people to the right machines (computers , cameras, biometrics . Think of it like this. Have you ever watched special features from a movie that uses a lot of CGI where they attach things to your body to get computer images of your exact movements from head to toe ? . The right people can analyze your mechanics a lot better using that stuff than their eyeballs especially if they have some type of CGI template for the ideal pitching mechanics. Same thing for swings and swing paths or ways to speed up your bat. I wish I could've been a fly on the wall to see exactly what the Dodgers did for Outman. Most interviews only talk about it in general terms. I'd love to hear about it step by step, like a daily journal from him and the people involved and detailed looks at the computers , programs and data analysis from breaking down his swing then rebuilding it.

I know his final 2 starts in AA with the Marlins affiliate were very good. I'm still looking for confirmation that he has less velocity than he did in 2021. He did miss about 22 months between the TJ surgery and a stress fracture in his foot in ST this year.

Are other new 100 lists out yet ? Besides Quero, our Soxtalk posters were mentioning the pitcher they got for Burger (Jake Eder ) was ( or nearly was) a Top 100 guy . I know people want to justify the trade but Top 100 was jumping the gun wasn't it ? Seems to me he's not really all that close. He was great in AA in 2021 . TJ surgery and it's now 2023 and he's back in AA but not yet back to where he was in 2021 and hasn't he lost velocity ?

Clevinger pitched 6 innings 3 H, 1 R 6 K. Colas hit his 3rd HR a 2 run shot. Moncada went 2 for 3 , 2 double, RBI and a walk Grandal 2 for 3 , RBI and a walk Andrus 2 for 4 , bases loaded double 3 RBI Robert 1 for 1 with 2 SB, an outfield assist when he gunned down Bauers at 3rd base and a walk. He also sprained his pinky finger on his right hand when he stole 3rd and left the game. Santos pitched 2 innings in relief after coming off the bereavement list. 0 hits, 0 runs, 3 K for his 3rd save.

i don't think they have them any more but it used to be when guys would pay a decent amount of money to play against some ex big league Sox players. It lasted about a week or so and they'd all be in a hotel and have other perks besides playing the games.

They have to catch the Tigers 1st. They're still 5.5 back of them. I doubt they catch either one.

Last year it would ve meant something if anyone else had done well. It's not like they had him all of last year. They got the best of him last year.

He Ain't Nothin' but a Hound dog.

Pretty petty if it was intentional. Move on White Sox.

Benintendi can't hit pitches right down the middle.

Nice job by Bummer to limit to damage !

I wouldn't mind Eloy trying a Judge type stance . It's a somewhat similar open stance.

Trayce 1st Sox hit in a long time .

One side or the other should refuse it.