Dominikk85

The analytics staff thing is probably also due to jerry, if hahn signed too many analytics guys jerry probably will come into his office and ask him why he is paying those nerds:). Many owners really hate non major league roster payroll costs

Start a soxtalk gofundme so soxtalk can buy the sox. Maybe you can get elon to donate 700 mil:). Free agent singings, draft picks and trades will be decided via a poll.

Yeah sure but why spend 500k on elijah then instead of getting a real prospect. I don't mind some kind of courtesy signing for 10k but 500k is real international money and could buy you a real prospect.

Most international prospects don't make it but I still wonder if elijah was a bad signing, at 500k he wasn't a high end signing but not a super cheap flier either. So far he struck out almost 50% while also not hitting for any power basically performing like an NL pitcher at the plate. Shouldn't a 500k guy not at least have one good trait at the plate? Was he signed just for his name? I don't mind signing such a guy for 50k but for 500k you at least want some skill, right? Of course sox player dev doesn't help with that type of raw prospect either but you would at least expect some glimpse of potential as one skill.

Imo he always was a little suspect because his athleticism got so much better after sox traded him. It is not uncommon that young guys get stronger but he also got faster and more explosive which is a rare thing. When he was signed he was seen more as like a solid 50 runner but not a 70 runner, his arm also got a lot stronger. Not saying Hahn didn't mess it up and he was a solid prospect but not that huge physical freak.

Kc could have a nasty offense in the next couple years if pasquantino, melendez, pratto and witt jr and the outfielder they drafted this year all reach their potential. Their pitching isn't great though expect for 1 or 2 guys.

The frustrating thing is that he lost all his impact on the ball. Moncada always was a risky prospect and I wouldn't have been surprised if he was a guy who busts because because he strikes out 37% and hits 0.19, that risk was always on the table. But he also was considered a 70 grade power guy and it was seen as if moncada keeps his K rate in check in the mid to high 20s like he mostly did he would be a high power slugging threat. His approach and swing never was geared perfectly for power but his raw pop should have been so good that he ran into 25 bombs by accident just by smashing the ball but nowadays he isn't even impacting the ball hard at all. Imo it has to be still a long term effect of covid. Sure his swing and mental stuff might also not be as good as they can currently but a 26-27 year old shouldn't lose all his power except for a very bad injury.

Vaughn really got better against RHP this year but worse against LHP. I think menechinos oppo approach helped vaughn against RHP as his weakness always was that he was pulling off pitches on the outer third and either missing or weakly capping them. He got better on that but he also got weaker on turning on inside pitches, especially by lefties. Maybe vaughn can get the best out of both worlds by looking oppo on good righties who can pound the outside corner consistently and looking to turn on lefties and bad righties with bad command who leave it middle in.

I think hahn is a smart person but he seems to be a bit risk averse. In drafts he often went with the polished performance college guys and also he rarely pulled the trigger in big trades to buy except for the kimbrel trade. Do you think he got a little gun shy after the tatis jr trade? I also don't like that he did almost nothing this year. Sure, the manager isn't great and there have been lots of injuries but they were only like 2-3 games back behind two pretty mediocre teams, half of the division is coming out of a rebuild and the core is in their prime now. I mean what is he waiting for? I'm not suggesting trading montgomery or colas but why not trade some guys out of the 6-12 range for more help? The division likely isn't staying this easy forever so they should really try to make it work the next 2-3 years. The twins actually did a lot at the deadline.

The issue with tearing it down again will be the same as last time though, the top 10-12 players of the roster are very good and the bottom 10-12 are quite bad due to mediocre player dev, drafting and international non cuba signings. That means sox can be very good if everyone is healthy but when 2 or 3 key guys are injured it gets tough. I think the sox need to ride it out with this core and maybe trade them with one year of control left but if you trade the core for new prospects you likely are in the same situation as 2 years ago and maybe worse if less of the prospects pan out. Don't forget the rebuild actually did work out very well, most of the top prospects reached about their ceilings, that could have gone much worse. The issue was that the sox weren't able to develope complimentary pieces around those guys so they are forced to play a minus 1 war guy like mazara or encarnacion for a whole season because there are no replacement. They wouldn't have needed to develope stars, just some 1.5 war guys that are there just in case and they weren't able to do it. If you want to tear down it only makes sense if analytics and player dev department can be brought up to at least a top 10-12 status in mlb.

I wouldn't say hahn did a bad job overall. He build a great core of star players via trade, trading sale, quintana and eaton couldn't have gone any better. He also did a great job with his Cuba connection There were some things which didn't go so well though. 1) free agent signings. Some signings worked but quite a few busts too. Wouldn't put all the blame on hahn though as jerry simply didn't give him the money to get the "A" guys 2) the draft Apart from vaughn that wasn't good at all. Montgomery and crochet might work out but overall the strategy of drafting high performance college bats with limited tools has not gone well. Hahn seems to have learned from that though, the last two years he drafted high upside HS guys and even crochet wasn't the typical "floor" signing even though he was a college player but more an upside play. 3) international non cuba signings: this one is really bad, sox haven't developed a high profile Domenican guy they signed in like a decade. Sure they signed tatis jr but that seems almost an isolated incident. I'm not confident on the sox developing that but maybe the international draft will level the playing field and reduce the edge of teams like TB who have developed a great international scouting department 4) development of non high profile guys. The last time the sox developed a non top10 overall pick into an above average player was tim Anderson. Overall the record with raw guys is very bad but they didn't really get that "bit extra" out of those supposedly save college guys either. Sox did well not messing up the blue chip guys (probably by leaving them alone) but they haven't really had much success really improving flawed guys with the exception of giolito who got a private coach (who now works for the sox). So overall I would say hahn already did learn a lesson in the draft so that could be fixed already. Sox still need to get better in development of players and in signing non cuba international guys, also in free agent signings. Those 3 things really cut into the sox depth and caused them to be a top heavy org which lacks depth, especially SP and up the middle prospects. That is actually similar to the stars and scrubs sox team of the mid 2010s but instead of having 3-4 good guys they now have 9 or 10 (pitchers plus hitters) so the situation is much better. Still roster spots 18-25 are probably sub standard compared to other contenders and also the depth of the next 10 guys coming out of the minors.

Not sure if it was a mistake, maybe jerry way afraid rodon takes the QO and he has to pay the 18 mil or whatever the QO is now

I don't think jerry will fire him but maybe TLR would step down by himself if he sees that he doesn't hmm have it anymore. He could cite like family reasons for that for example to have an elegant way out.

Sure, my comment was directed at that comment which said "I would trade the entire sox farm system for soto. Apart from the sox not having a farm system anymore this would also mean the nats would have to release like 100 minor leaguers to make room for the system of the sox:). That's why the sox have no chance to trade for soto, because their best prospects are only like 45s or so currently and the nats would want at least a 55 as a headliner. Montgomery might turn into a 55 but I don't think he is valued like that already

The sox don't have the high end talent to make that trade. Sure, in theory they would have the depth to make the trade but there is a reason why those 7 for 1 trades that some fans propose do not happen: Minor league roster spots a limited too and the supply if 40 fv prospects is pretty big, so if you would lets say take on 10 40fv prospects, you would need to release some of your 40s to make room for them. There kind of is a minor league replacement level too and there essentially is an unlimited supply of players of that level. So if minor league replacement level is maybe like a 35 fv then getting 10 40s on your roster is only providing marginal extra value. Because of that those quantity for quality trades rarely if ever do happen, the Nats don't have a great system but they have those roster spots occupied and if the incoming guy is not better than the existing guy his value is essentially zero.

Hahn did some things quite well and others not so much. 1. Positive : -signing sale, quintana and eaton to cheap extensions that made them very valuable in trades -getting great trade value in the big trades -not ruining those acquired top prospects -the cuba connection, getting robert and jose was huge 2. Negative -the draft. Sox had a lot of top20 picks in the last years and really only vaughn is looking like an above average player. Burger looks like a decent role player but other than that not much came out from the draft -international non cuba signings: sox do not have signed and developed any notable non cuba latin players in the last decade -organisational depth: Sox did well developing those top guys but had not many lower ranked prospects making a big jump in performance and many semi highly ranked prospects outside of those very top guys took a step back. It would have been nice for example to have a home grown utility infielder instead of just going leury and mendick for years or to develope some more backend starters. -roster construction: with vaughn, abreu, sheets and burger this team has simply too many corner types and that is eating into their defense. Not quite his fault: -free agent signings had very mixed success and the smaller money signings did go especially bad. However that can be blamed at least to a large degree to jerry who did not give him more money

Phillies are also very bad

Cease looks like freddy mercury

I'm not sure how much you can blame menechino. Sure it was bad but there also was a big amount of injuries. Would they have struggled as much if grandal, eloy, moncada, tim and Robert would have been healthy all year?

Sure but as long jerry is owning the team even if TLR is gone he will probably hire Joe torre or bobby valentine.

Well I guess the medical staff wants to be careful with him and ease him in. There is urgency but sox are only like 4 games back and what they really can't afford is another injury to one of the star players. I think the offense is already coming back around, but lynn and giolito need to get back on track

Bichette helping the sox out, not sure why he is stealing third with their best hitter at the plate.

Signing leury for 3 years was just unnecessary. He is not as bad as he currently is but even if he hits for his usual 85 wrc+ such a player is dime a dozen and you should go year to year with him. Give him a 1 year deal and Play him as long he is decent

The sox definitely need to win today or they could face a sweep the way they are hitting righties against Verlander and javier who are really good right handed pitchers. Sox are 25th in wRC+ against righties (87) and first against lefties (141) so they really better score 7 runs tonight and win that thing as they could have a hard time scoring against the other two astros guys.

It is pretty normal to use a closer in a low leverage spot if he has not pitched more than 2 days or so and there is no closing opportunity to keep him in a rhythm (usually it is about an every other game rhythm). Hendriks hadn't pitched two days in a row so friday was just "time" for him to pitch again.