Jake

I just have a memory of him pitching against us earlier in the year and at first thinking he looked like prime Nolan Ryan and then eventually we got to him

The past doesn't always predict future, but didn't Williams's previous outings against the Sox start out pretty much just like this before the Sox finally started squaring him up?

It's crazy how many times Sox pitchers have had breaking pitches hit almost off the ground lately.

Teel tried that strategy already

Williams is pitching really well. Gotta weather the storm and be ready to rock when he makes a mistake.

There have been good ABs and some not so good ABs, but one thing still absent is any good contact

Glad they aren't ringing up those check swings but Braden's body language looked very guilty while he waited for the calls lol

Just barely missed, but we'll take it.

Getting your opponent to burn their second best reliever in the first inning and then have their starter pitch through a lineup that is still very bad in terms of platoon feels like a big win for Cleveland IMO.

Surprised we only went for one inning from Newcomb.

Not a terrible AB there. If he's going to put that pitch just an inch outside the zone you just have to concede that he's gonna beat you.

Lots of talk about RISP. But that inning was a nice illustration of what goes on. The guys didn't really hit their way on base so there's no particular reason to expect there to be hits after that either. No hits with men on because there are no hits ever.

The replay was very obviously a 50/50 kind of swing based on how it's usually called. And IMO Mune's body looked worse than most players' do when their bat goes that far. The ump has to decide whether he "offered" at the pitch so there's no clear standard unfortunately (how far the bat goes is not discussed in the rulebook, for instance)

Not a bad call on the check swing IMO. Could have gone either way

Anyone interested in Umamusume Pretty Derby?

This may totally irrational since I can't explain the reasons, but I feel strongly that the Guardians are evil.

Given the concerns about abuse, I must note the word "opine" has been suffering serious abuse in this thread while its homophone "pine" suffers from neglect. The thought about the Whiteness of the Sox draft picks crossed my mind but I think it will be hard to look at the Sox draftees and get too terribly much out of it. About 80% of all players drafted in the top 5 rounds (by all teams) in recent years are non-Hispanic Whites, per this study: https://sabr.org/journal/article/examining-dusty-bakers-hope-is-help-on-the-way/ Sox took an obviously Hispanic player in the first round just a few years ago in the form of Jacob Gonzalez. Less obvious (from the name) is Billy Carlson, whose mother is Mexican. I believe Roch Cholowsky's mother is Indian-American. So IDK, it's possible he has some particular biases that affected his player evaluation, but in today's MLB you're going to see a lot of White guys among any team's draftees. It's fair to raise the question given the other things he's accused of. But there are other people involved in the draft decisions too.

If the Sox get out to a quick lead — optimistic I know — I wonder whether they would start deploying the other lefty relievers and make it a de facto bullpen game in an effort to go all out to secure the one win. If all goes smoothly on the pitching side, could get 2 or 3 from Newcomb, then 2 or 3 from Hagen against this very lefty/switchy lineup. And if they want to start using the pinch hitters, that's okay we can bring in Burke et al.

Ironic how thoroughly Getz has cleaned house, but one of the select few who survived the purge turned out to be an arsehole. Seeing interviews with Shirley, he didn't seem like the guy to be like that. But I guess that's how you get away with it. The resignation makes me think that there's either some contrition or the evidence is just seriously overwhelming.

If you're worried about the team collectively getting into the wrong headspace, the Tommy Pham types are what you like. He's in his own world. That was probably my big takeaway from 2024. He was just going to focus on doing his business and it didn't matter if it was the world's biggest s%*# show going on around him. What I would be most curious about is how he feels about Sam Antonacci

Seems like everyone in the Sox organization that has interacted with Pham really likes him. Will coached him in Boston, Barfield was AGM in AZ when Pham was one of their most trusted hitters, and Getz signed him up in 2024. I liked what I saw from him in 2024. I don't necessarily want to go get drinks with him but I appreciate a guy who is just obsessed with playing baseball as well as he can. I don't know if the team needed that this year but I don't think he hurts anything other than by having the physical (in)abilities of a 38 year old.

To be clear on this guy's system, AFAIK it treats TOOTBLANs and bad defense as part of the luck, so especially in this game with Sox making two outs on the bases and giving up at least one run with their defense they ruined some of their own luck.

Best thing at a time like this is that this Sox team has really never been streaky one way or another. The good times never rolled quite as much as you'd like but the bad times were never too bad either. No way to know how they are going to look from one day to the next. Would be great to have one part of the team just take it upon themselves to kick a little ass tomorrow to take the edge off.

No I don't think so, there's almost nobody with a consistent differential between the expected and realized results. Most of those who do are guys with low-medium power but they pull it in the air all the time to sneak extra homers to the corner. Plus a few guys who play in pitcher's/hitter's parks that accentuate their tendencies. Grounders have such a low xwOBA that they are more likely to contribute to a guy having positive luck (when the grounders sneak through) than the other way around. We ultimately saw the early-season bad luck guy, Luisangel, snap right back to his expected stats. Chase and Tristan were the big positive luck guys and ultimately started falling back to earth. Regression to the mean comes for us all (but in this case, we hope it does for Braden)

If you roll back to 30 days, Vargas jumps up to the top of the list with Braden right behind him although Braden getting heinous luck in that timespan too. Peters and Grichuk only others above league average over 30 days other than Drew Romo (RIP). Mune not quite as bad because that window includes the tail end of the heater he had in the middle of August.