CaliSoxFanViaSWside

Ok now you're talking . Forget what I said previously.

I'm still trying to figure out why Goodwin isn't up yet over Hamilton. But lets forget about Eaton being banged up or your limited choices on the roster to play RF are Hamilton or Leury when one of them has to play CF ,and that there is a LHP on the mound for KC . I mean what exactly are you expecting from LaRussa here ? You can't make the lineup without Leury in the lineup against LHP so he has to play CF unless u want the lefty Hamilton to start in CF and Leury in RF or bring up Goodwin and he's also LH .

I would generally agree that catchers age poorly because of the demands of the position,but still talking about signing Grandal over McCann hasn't made sense and it still doesn't make sense. I can see an argument for 2 catchers who don't make much money who provide good work with pitchers since that's an often overlooked part of the job. But preparing to come out of the rebuild the Sox had certain needs like LH power and OBP. Grandal had both those things. He was actually an ideal fit because A.) he had a track record of being that type of player and B.) McCann had 1 one year of being who he was for the Sox and C. )Because of the 2 good years McCann had was always going to test free agency. Could the Sox have tried to extend him based on the 1st year ? Sure, if they really thought he was going to be special moving forward but that still didn't solve finding a LH power hitter who also provided OBP. Today the Sox are now among the leaders in OBP and I'd like to think that's because the Sox placed greater emphasis on it when they signed Grandal. It's no coincidence that the Sox are last in HR's but still are among the leaders in run differential and still considered one of the better offensive teams mostly accomplished without Eloy. It has a lot to do with OBP we are getting from guys who have more professional AB's now like Grandal, Moncada, Collins, Vaughn, Madrigal, Mercedes Anderson all guys who have either a high BA or have a good eye or some combination of both.

Frank Menechino

Lot's of different people post here. Not surprising you can find a multitude of opinions on every player based on current results. Message boards and twitter don't work real well with baseball because of small sample sizes. It's a game of patience . Abreu is showing his age, Eaton now sucks after being a good free agent acquisition at the beginning , the bullpen was awesome based on last years result and now it sucks. People talking about giving Rodon a qualifying offer after 30 games or what it will cost to resign him. We get way ahead of ourselves way too often. We'd have nothing to post about if we all waited for the final analysis.

Just like Mercedes. You can't tell me that he couldn't catch once every few weeks . But I'm thinking when the Sox run into a hellish stretch of 42 games in 40 days we might see him a few times.

So as the Vulture you basically eat the body of the dead so you are circling the barely alive carcass of the "lazy" Grandal is that it ? Oh I'm sorry "pure laziness". Since you don't remember him doing that at the beginning of the season, I'll just guess you don't remember he's had knee pain since the beginning of spring training. It may not be reported after every game "oh hey Sox fans, catcher is a very difficult position to play . In fact ,so difficult no one really wants to be a catcher and that's why most catchers are such lousy hitters and the one's who aren't often aren't kept at catcher by their teams because they don't want their best players playing through pain all the time." I'm just taking a wild guess here that "taking a knee" might have a little something to do with relieving pain in a sore knee or taking pressure off a knee that is balky. But that's just me . Can I ask what is "spring time" besides the time of year when flowers bloom ? Is this a stat I can look up so I can see if his spring time truly is increasing ?

With a pick axe ?

Just enough hitting and a whole lot of pitching . The pitching has been outstanding on the road trip. Our starters are really impressive so far.

I'm just going to enjoy the good news about Robert and chill until game time.

No just scroll back if you haven't already.

So are the Sox going to beat the Sox to the punch on acquiring any CF ? Let's DFA Hamilton, bring up Goodwin and let the Twins take Hamilton.

He upped the payroll because they won the World Series so they had extra money added to the budget and they didn't make the playoffs .So no playoff money and no consistent raises to the payroll afterwards, Right back to JR being JR.

I don't think it's cherry picking at all. I used the spray charts for his whole MLB career. Am I supposed to take spring training, alternate sites, his minor league career and college career into consideration ? Besides that, what I said isn't that much different from the guy I responded to in the 1st place @hi8is . He thought he could hit 5-10 HR's annually in his career and I think it's lower than that. He had no problem with what I said. He can be a good player no matter how many HR's he hits. I think if he would have to sacrifice anything to hit a few more HR's it would be his approach which would be sacrificing consistent contact and adding a few more K's in order to pull the ball more. He won't change his approach. His approach is what has put him right where is now which is a good thing.

But it was a huge financial success because it was accomplished Jerry's way. That way he's not signing huge contracts and hoping for a little luck like in 2005 with a bunch of guys having career or near career years. The way he has done it has consistently shown you can't make the playoffs but can still keep the investors happy.

LOL ,Yea I originally had it as he doesn't think it "has" hurt the bottom line and changed it and I even thought "well damn i just double negatived that and now it doesn't make any sense." But I hit submit replay anyway. Right ,his choice, I mean maybe they spend more and make better investments if he loosens the purse strings and allows the GM to stop making the mid range investments that turn out so poorly. But he also wants to avoid the really big investments that turn out poorly because he won't allow those big investments to take up such a high percentage of the payroll which would also have be raised. His way has worked so far for him ,his family and the investors. As a business that's really all he is concerned with. Yes, he is a big baseball fan but not to the point of jeopardizing the bottom line or care about winning World Series in any way financially but his own way. Would the Sox be worth more or have a bigger fan base if it was different? We will never know. Like now, he's probably hoping the Sox could win a World Series or 2 and bump the franchise worth over the $2B range but he won't go out of his way financially to accomplish that.

I was just using his MLB spray charts and saw hardly anything pulled in the air ( it might have been nothing pulled in the air) into the LF corner. Like I said things can change so I'm fine with seeing what happens . If I had to guess , yea sure, he might get a 5 HR season a few times in his career but 5-10 on a consistent basis I'd say no.

Reinsdorf obviously doesn't think the way he's been running the franchise hasn't hurt the bottom line and he's right. It's been a very good investment. Spending above and beyond the budget may not necessarily improve the bottom line especially if he has no faith attendance or TV revenues and sponsorships will dramatically improve with continuous winning vs costs associated with continuous winning.

I doubt LaRussa assumed that. LaRussa also said in the presser he had no intention of making Hendriks part of a double steal or risking Hendriks in any way that involved a play at the plate or 3rd. which answers the question on why Hamilton wouldn't have attempted a bunt (suicide or safety squeeze) if the steal was not used in the 1st place. The Reds knew this which is why they did throw through with the very strong armed Barnhart, another thing LaRussa should have taken into consideration for the steal ( Barnharts arm) Probably also explains why he just didn't have Leury attempt a sac bunt to get runners on 2nd and 3rd with no outs. So his decisions and lack of knowledge of the rules directly contributed to the rest of his (bad) strategy for the inning.

He makes them money (eventually when the team is sold) that's what they give a damn about.

Ok if what you just said is how you think then I 'm pretty sure that's right and we are interpreting it the same way. SO he had 3 choices, 2 of which did not involve the pitcher running but he choose to let Hendriks run because, A. He didn't know the rule and B. Because he wanted to keep Hendriks in . Someone could've had a more complete discussion with LaRussa from his staff which would have taken all of a minute to lay out the options . Abreu or pinch runner in for Hendriks, who was batting for the Reds the next inning , players left available on the bench should he pinch run, Bummer, Heuer whoever all available, off day the next day. I like the WTHDIK .

Actually I'm pretty sure besides using Abreu they could have also pinch run for Hendricks which would have taken him out of the game. Tony wanted him in the game but there was really no reason to keep him in the game . Only Kopech and Hendricks had been used so there were lots of guys available with an off day coming upp the next day. https://twitter.com/JRFegan/status/1390033735458902021/photo/1

I was only commenting on a post that said he would eventually hit 5-10 per year in his career . I disagreed. I did not critique Madrigal in any other way. Chill.

I don't know about that. I'm not sure he has hit a ball 350 ft yet in his whole career .Until I start seeing him pull some balls in the air it's hard to imagine him ever getting 5 in a season . I'm not even sure he has ever doubled into the left field corner yet on a fly ball. But things do change so I hope you're right.

That's just so bad for a AA team . 10 batters in a row, 9 getting walks and 1 HBP.