Following Former Red Sox 2018

Sampo Gida

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Aug 7, 2010
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Feels like the weakest crop of Former Red Sox Allstars in a long while. Sure I’m missing some obvious names, but not much comes to mind beyond Lowrie, Rizzo, Cespedes, Gonzalez, Lester, Miller and longtime mainstay Adrian Beltre.
Josh Reddick, Travis Shaw, Margot(some day?), Pablo (future All star reliever) , Bartolo Colon, Victor Martinez

Yeah, not much, especially pitching.
 

mt8thsw9th

anti-SoSHal
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Jul 17, 2005
17,120
Brooklyn
ERA-wise, sure, but 2 HR, 7 BB, and just 9Ks in 16 innings doesn't really portend success moving forward unless he makes some big adjustments.
 

soxhop411

news aggravator
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Dec 4, 2009
46,274
Josh Pennington has retired.


Part of brewers trade.
 
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Rovin Romine

Johnny Rico
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Yes, Moncada has started hitting, just from what I see on highlights, and occasionally plays well in the field.https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/moncayo01.shtml
He's definitely improving, but Sale is Sale!
Oh, I'm not saying it was a bad trade, but he's a conspicuously performing former Sox.

***
Pitching wise, apart from Lester: Noe Ramirez is doing well in LA. Reed is doing very well in Milwaukee. That's all I can think of off the top of my head.

There are a lot more who had good runs, but are now barely hanging on, or recently retired. Lackey, Anibel Sanchez, Melancon.
 

sittingstill

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Yes, Moncada has started hitting, just from what I see on highlights, and occasionally plays well in the field.https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/moncayo01.shtml
He's definitely improving, but Sale is Sale!
Funny, when I think of the Sale trade I think of Michael Kopech, who also has a bright future ahead. I am hoping to see him in AAA but I'm a bit dubious he'll still be in the minors when Charlotte comes to Pawtucket at the end of July.
 

ngruz25

Bibby
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Sep 20, 2005
18,971
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Here’s a few:

That Andrew Miller dude is still going strong.

Josh Fields is having another solid year in LA, although he never made it to the majors with the Sox. He was lost in the Rule 5 draft.

Matt Albers has somehow become a solid reliever the last couple years.

Alex Wilson is still dependable in Detroit.

Ryan Cook just made his season debut for the Mariners a couple days ago. Remember him?! No?

Alexi Ogando took the L against the Yankees in his only appearance this season for the Indians. That was earlier this month.

Junichi Tazawa has a gaudy 9.00 even ERA this season for the Marlins. 22 appearances, too, so he earned that ERA. Edit: Missed that he got DFA’d. Guess he earned that, too.
 

Deathofthebambino

Drive Carefully
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Apr 12, 2005
41,946
Old friend Clay Buchholz is pitching for Arizona today. Thru 5 innings, he's given up 1 hit, 1 walk, and struck out 2. 1-0 lead on the Mets.
 

Cesar Crespo

79
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Dec 22, 2002
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Yeah, Shaw has been mashing lately. Last 14 games: .333/.414/.765 with 6 HRs. Now at .254/.338/.541 for the year.

edit: HUGE splits too
vs R .291/.375/.664 in 152 PA
vs L .149/.231/.191 in 53 PA

Wow.
 

Cesar Crespo

79
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Dec 22, 2002
21,588
Yoan Moncada
March/April: .267/.353/.524 in 120 PA with 14bb/47k
May: .205/.280/.301 in 82 PA with 8bb/24k.

vs R: .267/.351/.504 in 149 PA with 17bb/52k
vs L: .170/.245/.234 in 53 PA with 5bb/19k.

He had a pretty big split last year too
vs R: .235/.357/.447 in 157 PA with 23bb/51k.
vs L: .224/.297/.343 in 74 PA with 6bb/23k.
 

ledsox

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Nov 14, 2005
398
In San Diego, Manuel Margot is hitting right around .200 with no power.
Carlos Asuaje (2b) lost his starting job and was sent back to the minors a little over a week ago.
 

Cesar Crespo

79
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Dec 22, 2002
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In San Diego, Manuel Margot is hitting right around .200 with no power.
Carlos Asuaje (2b) lost his starting job and was sent back to the minors a little over a week ago.
I thought Margot would adjust to the league quickly and it looked like I was right last year but he's been a train wreck this season. He has a ton of potential. I thought he was always underrated as a prospect because he was in the stacked Redsox farm system, but I thought he'd develop into a 110-120 OPS+ hitter at the CF position. He is still only 23 so time is on his side but this year is bad.
 

tonyarmasjr

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Aug 12, 2010
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No love for Tim Federowicz? Made his Astros debut last night against the Sox and chipped in with a double and a run. OPS of .991 in 113 AAA PA thus far.
 

sean1562

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Sep 17, 2011
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Travis Shaw playing really really well so far and isn't a FA until 2022. Thornburg for Shaw is starting to look like one of the worst Red Sox trades in years.

edit: yes, sorry, "definitely one of the worst" is probably more accurate haha
 
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Rovin Romine

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Travis Shaw playing really really well so far and isn't a FA until 2022. Thornburg for Shaw is starting to look like one of the worst Red Sox trades in years.

edit: yes, sorry, "definitely one of the worst" is probably more accurate haha
201 games, .858 OPS, at least average defense. Plus, these are his prime production years - he'll be 32 in 2022.

Worse than Suppan/Lyons for Sanchez/Gonzalez? Maybe.
 

Cesar Crespo

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201 games, .858 OPS, at least average defense. Plus, these are his prime production years - he'll be 32 in 2022.

Worse than Suppan/Lyons for Sanchez/Gonzalez? Maybe.
Depends how long Shaw keeps it up for. He strikes me as a guy who won't age well a la Kevin Youkilis but Youkilis was still productive up until age 32. Shaw is 28.

If you go by WAR, he's actually an MVP candidate in the early going this year. dWAR loves him at 3b this year, although it loves him every year.
 

donutogre

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Jul 20, 2005
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Looks like Clay is going on one of his splendid half-season runs before his body inevitably falls apart.

I truly don't wish ill for the guy, but man was he frustrating to watch. I think given the length of his Sox career and the potential he flashed, he might have been harder to watch than Dice-K.
 

67YAZ

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Dec 1, 2000
8,729
Went to a Chicago Dogs game yesterday, a brand new American Association team. They are managed by none other than Sox legend Butch Hobson. He got tossed in the middle innings arguing balls & strikes. Despite that (or because of that?), the Dogs came back to win 6-5 for their first ever home victory.

The Dogs have killer uniforms, hope that helps them stay afloat. Attendance yesterday - an absolutely perfect early summer day in a brand new stadium - was light.

 

Rovin Romine

Johnny Rico
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Depends how long Shaw keeps it up for. He strikes me as a guy who won't age well a la Kevin Youkilis but Youkilis was still productive up until age 32. Shaw is 28.

If you go by WAR, he's actually an MVP candidate in the early going this year. dWAR loves him at 3b this year, although it loves him every year.
Well there's also the Thornburg side of the deal. Value 0 - not a single pitch yet.

Bagwell/Anderson gets thrown out there a lot as the worst modern trade for the Sox, but while bad, people forget that Anderson significantly contributed and Bagwell's entire career wasn't irrevocably controlled by the Sox.

Anderson came over on Sept. 2, 1990. The Sox were 6.5 games ahead of Toronto and looking at the post season. They squeaked into their post season berth one game ahead of Toronto on Oct. 2. Anderson appeared in 15 games that final month and only gave up 3 runs. So it's not a stretch to say that trade cemented a post season berth.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

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Bagwell/Anderson gets thrown out there a lot as the worst modern trade for the Sox, but while bad, people forget that Anderson significantly contributed and Bagwell's entire career wasn't irrevocably controlled by the Sox.

Anderson came over on Sept. 2, 1990. The Sox were 6.5 games ahead of Toronto and looking at the post season. They squeaked into their post season berth one game ahead of Toronto on Oct. 2. Anderson appeared in 15 games that final month and only gave up 3 runs. So it's not a stretch to say that trade cemented a post season berth.
That's not really true at all. There are a lot of people who have written about Andersen's contributions to the 1990 Boston Red Sox and many of them say that he had little to no influence on the Red Sox' chances at all. In his book, The Big Book of Baseball Blunders (which is a really good read), Rob Neyer goes through the month of September 1990--in particular the games that Andersen played--and has come to the conclusion that the Sox probably would have won the AL East without him.

You should check it out.
 

trekfan55

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The Shaw/Thronburg trade looks terrible not only for the fact that Thornurg has not thrown a single pitch for the Sox, but also because they then signed Panda, and later had to promote Devers too early. With Shaw holding the position they can either trade him at a higher value this year at the deadline (or may DDski trades Devers) or this offseason. Or maybe move Devers to 1B.

Of course, Thorburg looked like a dominant reliever and passed a physical. He did not contribute because of an injury, not because he was a complete failure like say, Eric Gagne.
 

Cesar Crespo

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Dec 22, 2002
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The Shaw/Thronburg trade looks terrible not only for the fact that Thornurg has not thrown a single pitch for the Sox, but also because they then signed Panda, and later had to promote Devers too early. With Shaw holding the position they can either trade him at a higher value this year at the deadline (or may DDski trades Devers) or this offseason. Or maybe move Devers to 1B.

Of course, Thorburg looked like a dominant reliever and passed a physical. He did not contribute because of an injury, not because he was a complete failure like say, Eric Gagne.
This is not accurate. They signed Sandoval (and Hanley) in the offseason of 14/15, long before Shaw was traded and before he made his ML debut. Hell, I'm pretty sure they didn't even move Shaw from 1b to 3b until 2015. The fact they started Shaw over Sandoval at 3b was actually a really big story around here too. They traded Shaw because they believed his 2nd half performance of 2016 was more of what to expect, and were wrong.
 

trekfan55

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This is not accurate. They signed Sandoval (and Hanley) in the offseason of 14/15, long before Shaw was traded and before he made his ML debut. Hell, I'm pretty sure they didn't even move Shaw from 1b to 3b until 2015. The fact they started Shaw over Sandoval at 3b was actually a really big story around here too. They traded Shaw because they believed his 2nd half performance of 2016 was more of what to expect, and were wrong.
Well, I stand corrected. I thought I had the dates right.
 

Cesar Crespo

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Dec 22, 2002
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Well there's also the Thornburg side of the deal. Value 0 - not a single pitch yet.

Bagwell/Anderson gets thrown out there a lot as the worst modern trade for the Sox, but while bad, people forget that Anderson significantly contributed and Bagwell's entire career wasn't irrevocably controlled by the Sox.

Anderson came over on Sept. 2, 1990. The Sox were 6.5 games ahead of Toronto and looking at the post season. They squeaked into their post season berth one game ahead of Toronto on Oct. 2. Anderson appeared in 15 games that final month and only gave up 3 runs. So it's not a stretch to say that trade cemented a post season berth.
I don't think the Shaw trade is close to worst trade ever, but I don't think it's far off from being worse than the Freddy Sanchez one, and another season or two of this type of production makes the Shaw trade worse. At least if you would prefer the dollar bill over 2 players worth 70 cents or w/e. The Sanchez trade had some shenanigans attached to it too, though I don't recall the specifics.

I also think the Josh Reddick trade is in the same group as the Suppan/Sanchez trade.

With the Bagwell trade, I'd just break it down to it's a lot harder to find a Bagwell than a Shaw, or a Josh Reddick. When the Shaw/Reddick trades work out better for the other team, kinda just have to shrug it off...and to stop trading positional players for MRs (although the Kimbrel trade is looking like a huge heist atm). You want some of the players you trade away to actually be successful.
 

Van Everyman

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Apr 30, 2009
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I also don’t remember too many people (anybody?) pining to keep Travis Shaw after 2016. Like, JD Martinez is a better player than Travis Shaw will ever be but I’m not sure anyone would call the Astros releasing him one of the “worst” moves the team made.

You use the information available to you at the time. Shaw had really (IIRC) had only a small sample size of playing time (late 2015, first few months of 2016) that indicated he was anything more than a replacement level player. At best.
 

TheoShmeo

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It’s unpopular to say anything negative about Tito but I put some of the blame for the Reddick deal on him. There were so many games when he played the estimable Darnell McDonald over Redick in the season before the trade when I recall thinking, along with many others on SoSH, that Darnell must have had pics of Tito in compromising positions with small farm animals. It just made no sense given Reddick’s apparent upside. That he was wrongly deemed expendable thereafter is less hard to understand in that light.

What Travis Shaw is doing in Milwaukee does make me throw up in my mouth but I can’t pretend that I had any better instincts. Shaw’s performance in the majors exceeded his production in the minors, his second half production looked like a return to what many expected him to be and Thornburg looked like a nice get.
 
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Rovin Romine

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That's not really true at all. There are a lot of people who have written about Andersen's contributions to the 1990 Boston Red Sox and many of them say that he had little to no influence on the Red Sox' chances at all. In his book, The Big Book of Baseball Blunders (which is a really good read), Rob Neyer goes through the month of September 1990--in particular the games that Andersen played--and has come to the conclusion that the Sox probably would have won the AL East without him.

You should check it out.
Anderson provided 22 innings of quality relief in the final month. All other things being equal, the Sox won the division by a single game.

While one can't definitively say Anderson or any other single player was responsible for the difference between winning and not winning:
1) replacing Anderson's innings with whomever would have been lowest on the bullpen totem pole (who was demoted/released for Anderson?) wouldn't have helped.
2) you'd also have to factor in bullpen usage - i.e., how did having Anderson available to pitch multiple innings compare to his not being there.
 

Cesar Crespo

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Dec 22, 2002
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You use the information available to you at the time. Shaw had really (IIRC) had only a small sample size of playing time (late 2015, first few months of 2016) that indicated he was anything more than a replacement level player. At best.
Or, to put it in more favorable terms:
First 167 games: .266/.328/.476 in 641 PA
Last 43 games: .177/.241/.283 in 137 PA

He also had a mixed track record in the minors. There were plenty of people who thought he was an average 3b, but that the trade was still a good one. I was one of them. I doubt anyone thought Shaw would be this good, and that Thornburg would have 0ip, though.
 

trekfan55

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I don't think the Shaw trade is close to worst trade ever, but I don't think it's far off from being worse than the Freddy Sanchez one, and another season or two of this type of production makes the Shaw trade worse. At least if you would prefer the dollar bill over 2 players worth 70 cents or w/e. The Sanchez trade had some shenanigans attached to it too, though I don't recall the specifics.

I also think the Josh Reddick trade is in the same group as the Suppan/Sanchez trade.

With the Bagwell trade, I'd just break it down to it's a lot harder to find a Bagwell than a Shaw, or a Josh Reddick. When the Shaw/Reddick trades work out better for the other team, kinda just have to shrug it off...and to stop trading positional players for MRs (although the Kimbrel trade is looking like a huge heist atm). You want some of the players you trade away to actually be successful.
As for the bolded, it is one thing to trade for a "proven closer" like Kimbrel is, and quite another to trade for a setup man. Yet even those backfire heavily, such as the trade for Bailey (who was known to be fragile) and the trade for Hanrahan (he was good and he also came with Holt so...). At least in each of those trades it was not about getting a two month rental for a good position player.

And yes, I agree. Trades such as Beckett/Lowell for Hanley are win/win and work out for both teams. For me the biggest problem is that bullpen arms are becoming the new "get" in today's market. Cleveland rode a bullpen all the way to Game 7 of the WS. Good middle relievers are fetching higher prices in today's market. I think DDski saw this and tried to trade for cost controlled setup men in Carson Smith, and Thornburg. Failed twice with injuries.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

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Anderson provided 22 innings of quality relief in the final month. All other things being equal, the Sox won the division by a single game.

While one can't definitively say Anderson or any other single player was responsible for the difference between winning and not winning:
1) replacing Anderson's innings with whomever would have been lowest on the bullpen totem pole (who was demoted/released for Anderson?) wouldn't have helped.
2) you'd also have to factor in bullpen usage - i.e., how did having Anderson available to pitch multiple innings compare to his not being there.
I'm going to quote Neyer exactly as he written it in his book and let you determine whether these 22 innings were quality:

"After the trade, the Red Sox won eight games by three or fewer runs. In four of those games, Andersen did not pitch. In two of them, he pitched both briefly and ineffectively. So the case for Andersen's difference-making really comes down to two games. On September 7, he pitched three innings of scoreless relief in a game the Red Sox eventually won with a run in the bottom of the eleventh. And on September 21, he earned a save--his first and last with the Red Sox--with two scoreless innings in a 3-0 game."

Bolded emphasis mine, if Morgan thought that Andersen should pitch in only half of the eight games the Sox won by three or fewer runs, how valuable was he, really? Two of these games, it sounded like he didn't do very well at all, which also could bring up the point that maybe the Sox beat the Blue Jays by three games that year, maybe four without Larry Andersen?

So the "22 innings of quality relief" is really five. If you think those handful of innings are worth Jeff Bagwell, I don't know what to tell you. And BTW, the Red Sox beat the Blue Jays by two games that year, not one.
 

Rovin Romine

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I'm going to quote Neyer exactly as he written it in his book and let you determine whether these 22 innings were quality:

"After the trade, the Red Sox won eight games by three or fewer runs. In four of those games, Andersen did not pitch. In two of them, he pitched both briefly and ineffectively. So the case for Andersen's difference-making really comes down to two games. On September 7, he pitched three innings of scoreless relief in a game the Red Sox eventually won with a run in the bottom of the eleventh. And on September 21, he earned a save--his first and last with the Red Sox--with two scoreless innings in a 3-0 game."

Bolded emphasis mine, if Morgan thought that Andersen should pitch in only half of the eight games the Sox won by three or fewer runs, how valuable was he, really? Two of these games, it sounded like he didn't do very well at all, which also could bring up the point that maybe the Sox beat the Blue Jays by three games that year, maybe four without Larry Andersen?

So the "22 innings of quality relief" is really five. If you think those handful of innings are worth Jeff Bagwell, I don't know what to tell you. And BTW, the Red Sox beat the Blue Jays by two games that year, not one.
First off, I don't believe I ever said anything so absurd as: "I think those handful of innings are worth Jeff Bagwell." Why do you think I'm staking out that position?

Secondly, the quote by Neyer does not address the two specific issues I raised about: a) replacing Anderson with the pitcher in the system that was just not good enough to make the cut otherwise (i.e., the one who would become the worst man in the pen), and b) the effect of Anderson on other pitcher usage, including resting other relievers.

Neyer (whom I generally enjoy reading) has a job - to write articles with hooks. But, asserted in an article or not, some things are just too speculative to have a definitive answer, as much as we might like to arrive at some particular conclusion.