Dominikk85

I think sosa should start in AAA. Fangraphs says he is a pretty bad defender so let him work at second base every day and not move him around.

I think andrus is a decent signing, he isn't great but is projected for around a 90 wrc+ and like 1.5 war, for a 9 hitter that is fine. When healthy the sox have a decent core of hitters, they just need to avoid that black hole situation in the bottom of the lineup where they are forced to play a 70 wrc+, negative war player like EE, mazara and others in the last couple years because a -1 war player basically turns a 4 war player in the middle of the lineup into an average player (4+(-1)= 3 which means the two players average at 1.5 war while if you get a 1.5 war or even just 1.2 war player you come out at like 2.7 war per spot between the two).

It's good that they are Investing in it but most important is that coaches and scouts are forced to use the stuff. Kyle boddy from driveline said a couple years ago that there were teams hiring analytics, biomechanics etc guys who would write in depth analytical reports and some of the old school coaches and scouts would put those emails in the trash without reading them. Most teams now do have biomechanics, analytics, data etc guys but what teams like the Astros, dodgers, rays or guardians do better is getting everyone to pull on one string and have a really streamlined approach while the worse development and scouting teams have the advanced stuff more as a "you can use that if you want" thing and still have many old school people who don't act accordingly to the analytics information or even actively fight against it ("we have always done it that way"). Many GMs have failed modernization that way, they bring in good analytics and good ideas but don't have the power against a wall of old school baseball lifer types who are loyal to each other and stand together to push against change. Here the owner is really important, you need the owner to tell the old school guys "my way or highway".

I think Jerry actually fired Tony. He is loyal and doesn't care much about winning but Tony was bordering on being senile and even Jerry saw that this is not working anymore so he kinda gave Tony that cop-out of citing health for stepping down. Of course Tony actually probably isn't healthy which is part of him not being able to do this anymore. At 78 or whatever his age is he simply wasn't fit to do the job anymore. Still with more player health he likely would have won 90 games and the division but that's not a testament to his performance but how bad the division is and how talented the Sox core is when everyone is healthy.

Miami hopes to compete though (although it's unlikely they do), they need every bat they have as their offense has been very bad. In fact they try to shop an arm for a bat, doubt they would be interested to trade chas unless they are getting a haul.

I don't think he would have been a good fit for several reasons 1. Adding another injury question mark to an Already injury prone roster 2. Adding another questionable defender to the OF mix Sure there is upside of being a 120-130 ops+ but after that injury that is far from guaranteed so worst case you have a league average bat which misses half the season and is more suited for DH than a corner OF. I think benintendi is a better solution, little less offensive upside (likely more 100-110 range) but more capable defensively and while there is some Injury risk too it is less than with conforto

Some are but some teams don't. If you have enough money insurances are a bad deal because the insurance doesn't give away money, they lessen variance. That means expected value is that if you pay your house insurance for 30 years you will lose money but you migitate the risk of being ruined by your house being burned down. In baseball the insurance will asses the risk of injury of the player and make you pay for it and since baseball owners are billionaires even a little 200m contract won't ruin them. That means they are really better off taking on that risk on themselves instead of paying the insurance for doing the same. Only advantage for a billionaire of insurance is that you pay it out over more years. Sure if player gets injured in year 1 the insurance pays off but if you insure 15 contracts over the average you lose money because that is how insurance makes profit, the "lucky" ones subsidize the unlucky one.

His plate discipline is a bit scary as he is an extreme free swinger but the sox have had success with that type of player before (robert, anderson). He likely will have a high chase rate and low walk rate but if he can do enough damage on contact and keep his k rate in check (not well over 30%) he could be a valuable contributor. Best case he hits 280/315/500 with 30 bombs but worst case he strikes out 36%, walks 3% and hits 220 with a 260 obp. Definitely a risky profile but could be really good.

If Rodon gives them 4 good seasons or even 4 good years with two of them only 120 innings due to injury and then blows up the deal would be good but I would be worried rodon blows up his shoulder and never is the same again after 50 innings of the first year and then you pay him for 5 more years without getting anything positive.

Not giving him the QO was a huge mistake by hahn, should have at least gotten the pick. That being said I think 6 years with his injury history is rather stupid by the yanks. But I'm happy for Carlos that he got paid.

One thing you have to consider is that the park in oakland is quite pitcher friendly so pitchers can work there who wouldn't work as well elsewhere. So they probably hope some of the pitchers do well for a couple years there and then can be traded at an inflated price. Oakland is essentially tampa bay minus the player development - owner doesn't like to spend on coaching and training facilities which why oakland doesn't trade for A ball guys but either for young mlb players or AAA players who are half a year away, then they are playing them for 2-3 years and trade them for new prospects. The rays do the same but their approach works a little better since due to their big player dev system they are able to take on younger, more raw and higher upside prospects while oakland with their budget player dev staff needs to get higher floor, older and more polished players which means the upside (and risk) is lower. Still the approach has worked reasonably well with 6. 500+ seasons, 3 90+ win seasons and 5 playoff appearances in the last 10 seasons but there are limits to that approach of course because it is hard to generate stars that way and a bunch of 2-3 win players is not stacking up favorably in the playoffs. But it could be a lot worse considering their low payroll, they could have been a team like seattle or Pittsburgh with 2 playoff appearances in the last 20 years.

I would not trade for Murphy but go into the season with grandal. Sure he was bad in many regards but I think a lot of it was injury, if he can get healthier and his legs under him more again he might also hit the ball a little less on the ground again and hit 230 with good obp and 15-20 homers. The question is whether the sox believe he can get healthy again or whether his body is just ruined from the years of catching and he never will get reasonably fit again physically.

In the end it was the right decision to let jose go. Partly he is victim of the roster construction of rick and kenny, they drafted and traded for a ton of DH types in the last 5 years (eloy, burger, vaughn, collins, sheets) and at some point that roster needed some cleaning and jose just was the oldest and most expensive guy and at some point he will decline.

I think part of the homer decrease was also that the ball was more dead. Regarding launch angle it is important what the reason was. It could be just a small mechanical tweak and the astros coaches are great at that. However it also could be physical and age related issues. For example instability and pain in the front leg can lead to a weaker "blocking" and thus body drifting through instead of staying behind the back leg which can cause grounders. Also the attack angle of the bat gets more upward more out front so if he is late due to declining batspeed his launch angle also could get lower (unless he were to slice the bat under oppo hit balls - which of course wouldn't be a good strategy). Regarding exit velo staying the same that could be a good sign but also consider usually low liners are the hardest hit balls so less fly balls could help his average EV a bit. If you look at his peak EV it is still good at 113 but lowest of his career and 2 ticks down from last year. He could be already in rather steep decline.

3 years is a pretty big commitment to an aging slugger. Usually I would give the astros the benefit of doubt as they are one of the smartest orgs but I don't know who actually currently runs the astros since click was let go and I read that crane has become a bit sceptical of new school analytics after the disaster with the luhnow regime. So maybe this was a gut driven decision by crane himself? I think abreu on a 1 year deal would have been great but in 3 years a lot can go wrong with a mid 30s guy. I guess the astros hope that he is at least average (110 wrc+ for a first baseman) for 2 out of the 3 years.