Jake

I'm still trying to figure out if Kopech and/or Eloy will be in the top 10 or left off entirely. EDIT: On reflection, I don't think they'll be on there at all. Eloy didn't make it last season and there's no way he's raised his stock enough to go into the top 10. Same goes for Kopech.

The Athletic did a similar article a little while back and it was much better.

FWIW, to me Moncada is the clear answer.

It's very hard to predict the future in baseball but I'd rather be the Sox than most of the other teams.

Would you rather have Moncada on his current deal or Madrigal with his current contract situation?

Well I've seen at least one comment from Tony that he's very happy with Burger's play so far but the last thing he wants to see is a young guy like that on the bench. I don't really know where he's supposed to play, I'm not super optimistic that he's going to defend at 2B. Could DH some but that's probably not the ideal role for him either.

Seems impossible to evaluate from the outside whether Yoan "doesn't care" and while he's certainly no Charlie Hustle, it's not like it's very easy to tell whether some of his issues are due to something fixable or if he's just not the kind of person who is going to be super consistent at anything he does.

This is the only number that matters. Even promoting him to AAA would be borderline criminal at this point. He has to make more contact.

I think it's right to point out that Rodon has never been a bad pitcher for any extended stretch. We've all felt disappointment with him not meeting high expectations, but if he pitches anything like he used to he's a good value. Will he? Well we don't know, that's why he didn't get a $10M+ deal. But I also think you can't rule out the possibility that Carlos finds some of that ceiling we've all been hoping for, either, so there's some real upside in the deal. I do think the main part of the deal that is questionable is that his health status makes it uncertain that he could cover the innings we might need. But I don't hate it and it's just not that much money.

My interpretation of the signing was that Sox decided they weren't willing to force it defensively in RF with Brantley or Ozuna (who was even more of a reach on D) and must have preferred Eaton to Joc at least for the respective price points. If they signed Brantley now and saw him as RF only if/when Eaton is hurt, I could see that. FWIW, FG's crowdsourcing has Brantley getting 3/$45M. I can see an argument against that although I'd consider paying it if I was in charge of Jerry's money.

Can someone explain what happened on the radio today?

My position is that managers are generally not very important, so I take some comfort in that. And I honestly don't know TLR that well. The biggest risk here is if he can't get along with his players, which does feel like an unnecessary risk given that the upside of a good manager is minimal.

Remember that one reaction to the shift besides individual players changing their approach to pull less is that different players succeed because the ones who spread the defense out have a marginal advantage over players who don't.

Trying to solve a non-existent problem and by doing so, you just greatly incentivize one-dimensional hitters that the same sort of people can't stand. I don't know how many times I have to say it, there's been a significant change in the game in the past 10 years and that's the size of the strike zone. It's gotten a lot bigger, especially on the bottom of the zone, because the umpires have gotten better at calling it according to the rulebook. They should switch the rulebook strike zone back to what it was before mid-90s, which defines the bottom of the zone as at the top of the knee. The reason the rule was changed was because umpires weren't calling the low strike properly so changing the definition made them call it as if the rule was the top of the knee. But now they call it correctly and the zone has expanded downwards. Make pitchers attack hitters more and you'll see a significant reduction in strikeouts and a more exciting game. Unlike the 3-batter rule, also a fairly significant change to the rules IMO, there is really no justification for banning the shift besides a very specific opinion about the aesthetics of the game. And unlike the 3-batter rule, banning the shift helps promote more specialized/less well-rounded players. And banning the shift of course won't shorten games; it will probably lengthen them by making it easier to hammer a grounder through the infield. Allowing shifts adds an advantage for hitters who use all parts of the field and further incentivizes teams to have well-rounded defenders who can be shifted around the field.

Have to think that Mendick was listed by mistake and now there's no takebacks

Still no all clear from Sox beat writers.

Yeah this just doesn't seem like a good trade for the Indians to me. Quantity over quality is definitely what occurred. They improved the MLB team's offense a bit but I'm surprised they couldn't do better.

Yeah I don't endorse the way of talking about aces that some scouting use that defines a #1 as someone meeting a definition that typically between 1 and 3 or 4 pitchers meet at any given moment.

I thought it was pretty clear in context that Coop literally didn't (yet) know why Kopech had opted out and was worried about him based on the same public information we all had on his past.

Yeah I mean the decision to put him out there is defensible but it was clear he was in big trouble pretty quick

I don't know what peripherals you're looking at, but seems to me that Lynn is pitching his ass off.

I think he has a non-zero chance of success, but not with the Sox. Wish him the best.

FWIW, I think the "loss" he's referring to reflects this math: Revenue MLB expected to generate in 2020/21 – Revenue MLB will actually generate in 2020/21 = 9 figure difference I think it's not obvious to the reader that this is the case and leaves one with the impression that there will be a negative profit of 9 figures, which would be preposterous IMO

I'll be honest that I'm surprised we haven't yet seen pitchers getting hurt — surely anyone who was following stay-at-home orders in March-April-May-June was not getting their arm ready for a season and is going to be at risk of heating up too quick. I'm sure that's something that was weighing on Kopech. Very unorthodox pre-season and then he's going to be in some weird situation where maybe he's pitching sim games to the taxi squad while they manipulate his service time. And after that, they might have him bouncing back and forth from bullpen to rotation depending on other players' performances, health, etc. If you're worried about this strange season costing you arm health and add on top of that concerns about COVID-19, it's not crazy to me that he might have seen it all as not worth it.

Seems plausible to me that he could feel fine physically but still be worried that he'll re-injure himself due to the strange run-up to this season. More of a concern based on just the facts of the situation than actually having a present physical problem. Of course, that's only speculation.