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There were 101 losses in 2023 following a .500 record in 2022 .It was apparent to anyone paying attention the rebuild was dead and a new rebuild had begun. Unfortunately people chose that moment of hiring Getz to start believing JRs BS about a quick turnaround. I don't know if people were feigning being hurt by the lie just to magnify the total forked tongue nature of JR but typically when you tear down in the 1st year of a rebuild it's not pretty. We weren't expecting the Hindenburg either but it wasn't exactly a huge shock they were going to have another 100+ loss season. Getz got handed a s%*# sandwich and he swallowed it. He didn't like it very much and didn't know quite how to handle it. That much was obvious. He couldn't change the culture or the defense overnight like he talked about. But he did hire Bannister so a plan slowly took shape. Trade your assets and see if you can get more assets, rebuild the infrastructure, hire quality people , dumpster dive fringey arms , pick up a few position players with solid track records who come cheap and hope your new coaches and infrastructure based on communication ,scouting ,development and modernization pays off slightly before you are all fired once JR dies and the team is sold .

He followed that up with an update that said something up him coming back in May. Still probably not enough time to get 3ish WAR even if he comes back at his best which seems doubtful. Maybe it was it another thread .I know there are 2 similar ones. The other one is another thread about being 21st in spending the last 2 years started by Caulfield also.

Caulfield just liked to stir the pot. Doing his best I'm a teacher and this is how to get some discussion on Soxtalk. He should be a mod.He does more during the bad times to keep this place afloat than anyone . It's baseball talk at least.Better than telling everyone to quit carrying water or childish sexual analogies for attempting to have some optimism for Getz' plan.

The Sox made the playoffs 2 years in a row for the 1st time in franchise history and then it crashed and burned. I don't think the Orioles will burn as spectacularly as the Sox did but stagnation is coming if they can't find a way to get some top flight pitching to match their hitters. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they don't make the playoffs this year. Then it 'll be 2 playoff years in a row with 2 1st round exits just like the Sox. The rest of that division will doom you to 3rd place pretty quickly if they dilly dally making any significant lasting pitching additions. The only thing helping them now is TB might have run out of whatever magic they performed to be as good as they were for as long as they were and Boston losing some luster. Baltimore is still very good with some prospects that hit it big but that's only a part of a championship equation . But successful rebuilds have usually finished it off with high spending like the Cubs and Astros. Despite all their success with trades and their , scouting and infrastructure Tampa Bay could never win a championship nor did the Sox.

No one.Why would you ask me that ? I'm not advocating for that. I'm just telling you what's going on . I thought it was pretty obvious if you follow the whole situation closely enough.I know not everyone does. That was sarcasm about playing the kids and suck as much as last year to illustrate the point that there are a lot of different opinions about what do do because of dissatisfaction with the results so far from Getz. Some peoples reaction to that is just play the kids .Why block them with Rojas ? Why spend money on Tauchman and Slater ? Why trade youth for fringy arms ? My sarcastic reaction to that is if you do that you will suck as bad as last year. There's no doubt the plan is to be better than last year.Hopefully it'll succeed but I doubt it'll be much of an improvement. After all they do want the best shot at #1 pick in the draft. During the 1st rebuild the Sox always did just enough not to be the worst team in baseball so they never got a #1 or even a #2. With the anti tanking rules that changed the draft order it's more imperative now that the Sox get a 1 or 2 pick.

Fortunately I answered that question already like my next post after the one you quoted. It's a slow and painful process that's unlikely to work to a high degree of satisfaction to anyone and then when JR passes away who knows what happens ? That's the best way I can explain it.

That's twice as much as they gave Fedde. What if he plays like crap and you cant flip him ? I think the Sox aren't spending $29M right now on any one player when they have boatloads of young guys to go through . They don't care about getting any better this year.Well a little better .They don't want to set any new records for losing .

Problem is there's not really a strategy that is going to work much better than another one when spending so little in any year. Like I said how many $10M guys do you get and how do you identify which ones won't fail just as spectacularly as your $5M or less guys ? It's obvious what the plan is now. It's build the infrastructure and use Bannister to see if you can get enough cheap pitching labor to teach a new trick and make them worth better prospects because they got nothing else to sell. They want to use as little of the service time on the young pitching as possible until they can sell some of the arms they picked up. It sucks for guys like Addison Coffey and Garrett Schonele who are already 26 , had great seasons, but still are short on AAA time. Palette got an NRI, McGough too but those 2 didn't. It's like complaining that the 40 yr old pitcher they didn't keep last ended up better than guys they kept. It's impossible to identify which RP is actually going to do good. They're eenie meanie , miney, moeing it hoping Bannister can strike gold on occasion. It's a bad plan but so is any other plan when spending on players is severely limited. Expecting any pitching coach to work miracles on fringe arms is a rough train to ride but here we are just hoping Schultz and Smith , the Montgomery Twins and our catching prospects can overcome the odds. . Try to make the system deep enough to develop a few surprises with the new infrastructure in place. Just when you start to see some progress, JR dies and everyone is fired . I'm just sitting back and trying not to give a s%*# too much. I'll still hope it works out though. They're my team. I want it to work.

Guess we're not other teams are we ?

So what's going on with you ? Do you want them to throw more money at players who have a better chance of fetching better prospects at the deadline ? Do you think a $10M signing for a year makes that player more likely to play better and get better prospects at the TDL ? I thought people here just want them to suck worse than last year and play the kids and spend nothing. How many $10M players do you think will be the right amount ? Some will fail just like $3M players. I mean we can't just go around blocking all our prospects and wasting money can we ? Mostly I hear how everything is terrible but no one here can say what's the right way. Sucks waiting on a new owner . So far it's really helping the Orioles isn't it ?

Are we going to cry about 2024 forever ? Hey this should make you feel better .That's just on players isn't it ? Think of how much more above what they might've spend in a year where they fired a bunch of people hired their replacements, hired extra people, and bought a bunch of equipment to modernize the infra-structure and still going to have another terrible season. And they all run around saying they believe in Getz' vision and that good things are happening. What a bunch of putzes am I right ? Hey putz is kind of like Getz. Chris Putz !I feel so much better joining in on making fun of everything and everybody.

https://www.mlb.com/news/dodgers-rumors-latest-trades-and-signings Kirby Yates signs with Dodgers. $13M

What part of not spending legit money don't u understand ?

NFL commercial with Matthew McConaughey practicing his Ditka in front of a mirror with the sweater ,dark hair and 'stache was good.

Like who needs to establish themselves and who would he be blocking ? NRI's rarely make the ML team out of spring training especially a guy barely pitched last year who never really overcame his control problem but had nasty K ability at the expense of his control and shoulder. They don't seem like they are in any hurry to add a bunch of young guys to the 40 just yet. If they can flip 4 older relief pitchers at the deadline they'll do it. Which ones get the shot I have no idea. It's going to be a revolving door. You pitch well, you stick, if not , try someone else. If Robert fails in the 1st half getting much of anything at the TDL will be difficult .If you add a bunch of young relief pitchers to the 40 or 26 and they succeed you won't want to trade them . You want to trade the older ones you're picking up off the scrap heap. Maybe you can get a DSL SS .

Lots of pictures .Thanks

Except Meidroth actually had a very good year at AAA whereas Montgomery did not and appears to be more ready. Sometimes it's hard to know what you are arguing. If we were all saying Montgomery should get the 1st chance at SS you'd be saying he was forced up and playing out of position . If Rojas gets PT you think he's blocking someone and he's not good at SS . I'd like to know what u think about who should play where and when ,not just taking shots are our feeble attempts to figure out who's going to play where and when. It's easy to be right when you say this won't work when you have a bunch of young guys who all have flaws who all play multiple positions and, as of yet ,we have no idea who'll be able to hit. Take your best guess like the rest of us.

Seriously. He's doing his famous I'll put quotes around stuff I made up to make it look like I'm quoting someone in the Sox front office. There were a lot of people in Soxtalk at the time who were madly in love with Vaughn and wanted him to get PT no matter what and were really angry with me for suggesting just because he played an adequate LF in a limited sample size that he will eventually be exposed because he couldn't run and that he didn't need to be in the lineup as much as he was especially against RHP early in the season that 1st year. I don't know if him playing 1st base in the minors more would've helped him or not. It's not like the Sox have been known to find ways to improve many prospects hitting abilities nor defense for that matter. Maybe they just draft poorly but again hitting a baseball consistently well is still the hardest thing in sports. You need a discerning eye and to somehow control your quick twitch impulses or natural ability that got you very far to begin with but make u swing at hard breaking stuff that ends up out of the zone and makes you look stupid and has fans screaming why is he swinging at that ? Especially when many times when you're behind in a count and you're telling yourself , here it comes down and away , and they still whiff at it. Robert, Jr. still goes through long droughts where he looks like an A baller trying to hit MLB pitching with no pitch or count recognition or cognitive thinking.

I saw an interview with McGuffey. He looked like a giant next to McGuffey.

We're not talking about a lifetime here Caulfield.we're talking about to open the season . Right now there aren't any quick fixes if you're trying to pin the position on someone permanently. If Montgomery starts the season in minors your options are Meidroth, Baldwin, Rojas and maybe Sosa. Pick your poison. I'm taking Meidroth because the guy knows how to get on base so I'm expecting him to open the season at SS leading off unless the Sox are facing a LHP. Then maybe Baldwin unless he's not on the OD 26. Who makes the 26 is also a bone of contention. Total mystery . I'm not sure a one of us can predict the OD infield unless we know who the SP pitcher is going to be and even then it's a crap shoot ..

I'm certainly not banking on anyone. That's why almost all these guys play multiple positions. Sosa's minor league history shows a pattern of starting off levels slow and then adjusting. Of course in the minors he got consistent playing time necessary to adjust.Since MLB is the highest level in the world and playing time needs to be earned and not just given he took longer to adjust.That's the theory I'm going with. When the whole team can't hit their way out of a paper bag you look for any signs of life you can unless you prefer to live in utter despair as a fan.

But you can't just dismiss Sosa. Logically he should get the 1st shot at 2nd with Meidroth at SS even though he'd have to be added to the roster. If Vargas had a last month like Sosa I'd be a lot happier about him too. Hitting MLB pitching isn't easy .Hitting across the league was down significantly in 2024. Plus you don't have as many late season pitching call-ups skewing late season offensive numbers as you once did.

While I try not to take guesses among the mishmash of candidates from 3rd through 1st on the infield I think Sosa gets 1st shot at 2nd base just because he may be the most likely to hit MLB pitching just by late season hitting and off season hitting in Venezuela and he's out of options ,which is about as useful as Colson Montgomery's AFL stats. But it's better than sucking. There's so many guys I want to see do well but they need to step up.

Crevier with a goal .3-1 now. Hawks carrying the play in the 2nd period ,most offensive control 5 on 5 than I've seen this season without Hall or Seth Jones who was held out for "sickness". Del Mastro has looked very good too in the 2nd. Primary assist on the Nasr goal was Bedard. Kids having a good game with half the game to go.