18 replies to this topic

[mfried]

In the best of all possible worlds we will have at our disposal the following within about 8 weeks
Rh: Ross, Byrd, McDonald
lh: Ellsbury, Crawford, Sweeney.

Seems like two too many. McDonald seems headed for DFA, but something else will have to give. What are the wise thoughts aside from those who assume more injuries will crop up shortly?

Edited by mfried, 24 April 2012 - 05:31 PM.

[Red(s)HawksFan]

In the best of all possible worlds we will have at our disposal the following within about 8 weeks
Rh: Ross, Byrd, McDonald
lh: Ellsbury, Crawford, Sweeney.

Seems like two too many. McDonald seems headed for DFA, but something else will have to give. What are the wise thoughts aside from those who assume more injuries will crop up shortly?

I don't know if it's a wise thought, but the reports that they still haven't solved Crawford's elbow problem leave me skeptical that he's returning anytime soon. Ellsbury may be back before he is.

But if Crawford and Ellsbury return within your 8 week time frame, I'm not sold on the idea that it's McDonald that would be the odd man out. Byrd cost them next to nothing...the Cubs are paying his contract and Bowden had no future here. If he's not producing in any meaningful way, I think it's just as likely that he'd be the candidate to be DFA.

[Plympton91]

Yeah, Byrd reminds me a lot of Ed Sprague. Not long for this team.

[Rudy Pemberton]

Byrd and McDonald are both pretty useless. I wouldn't worry much about losing either.

[dbn]

McDonald has been an out factory so far. Fortunately for him, he has some time to turn things around; unfortunately for him, he's not a been good hitter other than his 2010 when he put up a 0.765 OPS in 319 ABs (0.704 OPS in 175 PA last year.) Sweeney and Ross aren't going anywhere, but if they keep a 5th outfielder I'm rooting for him -- I kind of like the guy -- to be hitting better than Byrd when the decision is made.

[JakeRae]

McDonald has been a slightly above replacement level player in limited exposure in his Red Sox career and has, anecdotally, gotten worse with increased exposure. Byrd has been a roughly average player in his MLB career and has shown he can handle a starting workload if necessary. Unless Byrd's first 15 games of this season are being given an extraordinary large amount of weight, it makes no sense to think that McDonald is a better player than Byrd.

Of course, we've got at least a month before this is even conceivably an issue so we'll get to see if Byrd has started to bounce back by then. I expect the team to carry 5 outfielders for most of the season so there isn't going to be much of a squeeze even if everyone gets healthy.

[JMDurron]

Red Sox outfielders are like any other team's pitchers. There will be no squeeze, as there can never be enough of them.

That's not meant as content-free whining, because with 2 months (at least) before the injured stars could return there are plenty of opportunities for any of the current group to suffer the kind of normal ailments that come up over the course of 162 games.

[rembrat]

Crawford out for possibly 3 months. There is no such thing as 'too many' in baseball.

[dynomite]

Here's what we're working with until the All-Star Break:


RF: Sweeney (L)
CF: Byrd ®
LF: Ross ®
Bench: Anderson (L), McDonald ®

How do people feel?

To me, Sweeney feels like the lynchpin of this MASH unit. Byrd and Ross are essentially known quantities. Sweeney, on the other hand, is having some fun, as is his BABIP chart:




Obviously he's going to regress. Luckily, though, his baseline appears pretty high. Despite the regression, Sweeney should be able to maintain an OPS in the .750 neighborhood, and I hope that's good enough to get the Sox to the ASB without any serious damage. And if Anderson starts hitting, all the better.

[Eric Van]

Here's what we're working with until the All-Star Break:


RF: Sweeney (L)
CF: Byrd ®
LF: Ross ®
Bench: Anderson (L), McDonald ®

How do people feel?

Lars may not be here long. When they first went to expand the bench to 4, they opted for Spears and his versatility, at the same time as they were replacing Ellsbury with Repko (Repko had a day-to-day injury when Ellsbury was hurt, which is why they called up Lin for a day). They then DFA'd Spears to clear a roster spot for Byrd -- I'm guessing they didn't want to risk losing Repko on a waiver claim, thus protecting themselves in case Byrd continued his Chicago struggles. Now it looks like they can safely DFA Repko and get Spears back on the MLB bench. (In terms of 40-man roster management, they might also be able to move Crawford to the 60-day DL retroactively, if he's expected to be out for more than 7 more weeks.)

Also, I was under the impression that Ellsbury would be back in late May or early June (out 6-8 weeks). Has that changed?

[JMDurron]

Also, I was under the impression that Ellsbury would be back in late May or early June (out 6-8 weeks). Has that changed?

We will find out around then whether or not "rest and no surgery" was successful, at which point he will have season-ending surgery on his shoulder.

Sorry, perhaps I should have spoilered that last bit.

[bosockboy]

Definitely think they need to move forward with the assumption of no Ellsbury or Crawford from here on. This team can hit enough without them....focus on fixing the pitching staff and they should be fine.

[OnWisc]

Lars may not be here long. When they first went to expand the bench to 4, they opted for Spears and his versatility, at the same time as they were replacing Ellsbury with Repko (Repko had a day-to-day injury when Ellsbury was hurt, which is why they called up Lin for a day). They then DFA'd Spears to clear a roster spot for Byrd -- I'm guessing they didn't want to risk losing Repko on a waiver claim, thus protecting themselves in case Byrd continued his Chicago struggles. Now it looks like they can safely DFA Repko and get Spears back on the MLB bench. (In terms of 40-man roster management, they might also be able to move Crawford to the 60-day DL retroactively, if he's expected to be out for more than 7 more weeks.)

Also, I was under the impression that Ellsbury would be back in late May or early June (out 6-8 weeks). Has that changed?

I tend to overlook the obvious when examining the roster, and that's probably the case here, but even if they moved Crawford to the 60-day to make room for Spears (and optioned Lars), wouldn't they still just DFA Repko once he came off the DL? Or, if they're okay with Repko, keep Spears off the 40-man entirely until someone else gets hurt?

[Drek717]

Here's what we're working with until the All-Star Break:
RF: Sweeney (L)
CF: Byrd ®
LF: Ross ®
Bench: Anderson (L), McDonald ®

Pretty much it, though I'd like to see a healthy dose of Anderson in LF against RH starters. With Crawford's health now looking like a perpetual issue Anderson finding a home in LF could be just the medicine this team needs to get quality offense out of the corner OF spots long term.

[kieckeredinthehead]

Is Kalish also expected to have season-ending surgery when he's eligible to come off the DL?

[Snodgrass'Muff]

Pretty much it, though I'd like to see a healthy dose of Anderson in LF against RH starters. With Crawford's health now looking like a perpetual issue Anderson finding a home in LF could be just the medicine this team needs to get quality offense out of the corner OF spots long term.

His 50th percentile projection from PECOTA this year has him at .245/.323/.383 which would put him at just about league average OPS (.706 vs .704 for the AL) for left fielders in 2011. I don't think he's the answer long term, but if he can provide near league average defense in left (might be a tall order), he could be a decent bench player.

[Reverend]

His 50th percentile projection from PECOTA this year has him at .245/.323/.383 which would put him at just about league average OPS (.706 vs .704 for the AL) for left fielders in 2011. I don't think he's the answer long term, but if he can provide near league average defense in left (might be a tall order), he could be a decent bench player.

As I understand statistics, the PECOTA percentile method was designed very precisely not to be used in this manner. PECOTA's approach here recognizes that they are attempting to estimate an unknown mean which can, as such, only be estimated in terms of confidence intervals. This is to say, we consider ranges within which we are confident that the true mean resides, but that information doesn't let us say that we are more confident that it is on one side or the other, much less in the center.

From the BaseballProspectus write-up:

What this means is that you can't look at a single stat (say, hits or strikeouts) and think that's the range of expectations PECOTA has for that skill. The percentiles are supposed to reflect what we know about the distribution of a player's skill, but they are in essence the average batting line we should expect from that player if he puts up that level of performance in that season. There are a lot of different shapes that performance could take, however, and that means there's more variance in any single component than is reflected in the percentiles. So the correct test of the percentiles is the overall level of performance, not the underlying components.

The more playing time, the more things "even out," but that's the functional equivalent of larger sample sizes giving you tighter confidence intervals for a given level of confidence, i.e. a tighter range within which you might say you are, say, 95% confident the true mean will lie--a range which will not necessarily converge on the 50th percentile numbers. It does not, however, mean that we can expect that results will converge upon the 50 percentile mean projections from PECOTA, (which, of course, is why they explain it as such).

Edited by Reverend, 27 April 2012 - 10:13 PM.

[knucklecup]

Bobby Abreu?

[Savin Hillbilly]

Bobby Abreu?

Winning question to the Final Jeopardy answer, "This guy who was down to one remaining useful skill and now appears to have lost even that."