2024 Spring Training Stuff

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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Will mostly be MiLB-related I'm sure, but there will also be some crossover.

Pete Abe was watching some guys do some things today.

View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1755251893981651199


Patriots do need a QB.

View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1755256534823518252


Good to keep the pitchers separated from others.

View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1755259725371920411


Bello in TBSOHL.

View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1755296234590388465


Putting our '23 draft picks to work.
 

Ale Xander

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Oct 31, 2013
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Am I the only one more looking forward to Spring Training than the Regular Season?

1 week to P&C reporting
12 days until first full-squad work out
16 days until game with NU
17 days until first "real" ST game (Orioles @ Sarasota)
18 days until first "real" home ST game (Twins, Split-squad)
19 days until first "real" home, full-squad ST game (Phillies)
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
15,255
Am I the only one more looking forward to Spring Training than the Regular Season?

1 week to P&C reporting
12 days until first full-squad work out
16 days until game with NU
17 days until first "real" ST game (Orioles @ Sarasota)
18 days until first "real" home ST game (Twins, Split-squad)
19 days until first "real" home, full-squad ST game (Phillies)
I don't think Spring Training has ever been the thing I'm most excited about, but was definitely a lot more exciting 15 years ago when I lived in St. Pete.

Thx for the key dates!

This should be the full schedule. Last home game March 24th against the Braves, last games against the Rangers on the 25th & 26th in the Rangers home stadium, Globe Life.

https://floridagrapefruitleague.com/teams/boston-red-sox/
 

zenax

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Apr 12, 2023
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March 14, 2000, City of Palms Park in Fort Myers: Pedro Martinez and five other Red Sox pitchers combined in pitching a perfect game against the Blue Jays.
I was there and felt that I was the only spectator who realized what just had happened: the first perfect game in spring training (well, there was one by the Phillies in 1909 but it was against Trinity College, Durham, NC) .
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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Pete Abe's updates today include Kutter, Whitlock & Houck pitching, & the latter 2 pitching to O'Neill.

View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1755990604327125480


View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1755995913330262471


& a Pete Abe side note...

View: https://twitter.com/PeteAbe/status/1756026511444832424


This all seems mostly technically correct. I was pushing for a Kenley trade before it was cool because I think he's going to fall off & it's good to flip expiring, diminishing assets as high as you can... buuuuuut, not spending to within a safe buffer of the tax would be kind of embarrassing if it comes to pass.
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
15,255
View: https://twitter.com/tylermilliken_/status/1756435012130349061


Red Sox players/prospects reported to already be down at Fort Myers:

Brayan Bello
Garrett Whitlock
Tanner Houck
Kutter Crawford
John Schreiber
Tyler O’Neill
Ceddanne Rafaela
Reese McGuire
Brennan Bernardino
Bryan Mata
Brandon Walter
Marcelo Mayer
Roman Anthony
Kyle Teel
Nazzan Zanetello

Just the names I’ve seen out there. Garrett Whitlock and Tanner Houck have already thrown live BPs (@BGlobeSports).
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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Free food and lodging on a ML salary, plus training and a chance to show off your Skills? I’m surprised more of them aren’t there in January. Or December.
A lot of them are there a ton in the off season. Most of them wouldn't be on a non-comprehensive list like that, though.
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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Cora on Justin Slaten:

“Slate, today, the stuff was really good. He threw cutters and the breaking ball and the fastball. It was fun to watch,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora told reporters Thursday in Fort Myers after Slaten threw live batting practice at JetBlue Park. “He was somebody who is opening eyes right away. If we can harness the stuff in the zone, then great things are going to happen.”
https://nesn.com/2024/02/justin-slaten-opening-eyes-early-red-sox-spring-training/
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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What does that mean?
I hope it doesn’t mean he’s gonna be traded
TBSOHL is The Best Shape of His Life.

If you're asking what it means that Henry & Bobby D had a solo meeting...no clue. Henry wouldn't be the guy talking to him if it's about a trade, though. Maybe they've just gotten to know each other over the years.
 

LogansDad

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Alamogordo
They sure have put together a group of prospects with beautiful swings. ATM may collectively break the pretty swing scale together.
 

joe dokes

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Teel's a year late to go the Pudge Rodriguez (full-timer at 20) route. I'm ready.
 

JM3

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They sure have put together a group of prospects with beautiful swings. ATM may collectively break the pretty swing scale together.
Fangraphs interview with Teel. Not going to quote a lot of it, but pretty interesting breakdown on catching & plate approach among other things.

Laurila: How do you balance data and instincts?

Teel: “Defensively, I think instinct is the most important. At the same time, being able to combine the two to create the elite pitch-caller is what I’m really striving for. Learning data — studying how it works — will help me toward that goal.”
Teel: “I would say that my power will showcase as time goes on. That’s something I’m continuing to develop. I’ve been working on getting behind the ball a little more, and looking to lift it a little bit more than I did in college. At the same time, I don’t want to take away [from] my … bat-to-ball skills. That’s a big part of what’s made me a good hitter.”
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/red-sox-prospect-kyle-teel-on-developing-as-a-catcher/
 

LogansDad

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Alamogordo

nighthob

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Oh I coined that phrase a couple of months ago. And hopefully it will get a lot of use over the next 8-10 years.
 

Petagine in a Bottle

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Well, the Sox do have a long history of breaking camp with a random control challenged southpaw. Bobby J. Jones, Justin Thomas, Javier Lopez…
 

LogansDad

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Alamogordo
That is a really fun and excellent article, and I would encourage anyone who doesn't think that coaching can have an effect on Major League Baseball players to check it out.
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
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Ok, have a few quotes (thx @LogansDad).

Apparently there's a pitching group text which I need to get invited to which is known as the Run Prevention Unit...

The participants included Willard, new pitching coach Andrew Bailey, who’d been hired just weeks before, bullpen coach Kevin Walker, game-planning coordinator Jason Varitek and analysts Dave Miller and Devin Rose.
But yeah, I was right, it's worth the read.

What does it look like to overhaul a pitching program?

From the outside, it’s pitchers throwing live batting practices on the second day of camp, more than a week earlier compared to previous years. It’s music blasting on the backfields to simulate game action. It’s creating games within the game to enhance the level of competition from the get-go and break up the monotony of spring training drills. Points, prizes, glory, it’s all on the line. A series of leaderboards printed out and tacked to a bulletin board inside the front door of the Red Sox clubhouse show some of the early frontrunners.

From the inside, on a more granular, analytical level, it’s honing in on exactly what the pitchers needed to change. Perhaps overhaul is too strong a word; the basics have been here, but Bailey and his group have reined in the focus.
Will just post one more, but it's very in-depth & what I was hoping for.

“This isn’t my system, this is our system,” Breslow said. “So I can have a conversation with Justin or a conversation with Andrew and then a week later they are making a presentation and it’s like, ‘Yes that’s exactly how I’m seeing these things,’ so I think everyone is taking what has worked in their past lives and meshing that with new ideas and new perspectives that are brought in by others and so I think what we’ll end up with is the optimal mix of those perspectives.”
 

LogansDad

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Alamogordo
I don't know if I need our potentially most powerful right handed hitter who has been oft injured doing stuff like that, but it's fun to watch anyway.

I feel like I read some things in the past about him being something of a malcontent in the clubhouse, but everything I have seen of him this spring he seem engaged with the other players and the coaches, and he seems like a good dude to root for so far.

(And based on a few minutes of research, it honestly seems like it might have been a Marmol problem in St Louis and not an O'Neill problem: https://fansided.com/2023/04/05/cardinals-drama-tyler-oneill/)
 

JM3

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Dec 14, 2019
15,255
My ranks...

1. David Hamilton SS - #64
2. Nick Yorke 2B - #11
3. Mark Contreras CF - #157
4. Corey Rosier LF - #38
5. Nathan Hickey C - #31
6. Mark Koloszvary DH - #214
7. Chase Meidroth 3B - #22
8. Niko Kavadas 1B - #83
9. Phillip Sikes RF - #95

Helcris Olivarez - #42
Zack Penrod - #36
Brian Van Belle - #60
CJ Liu - #76
Nathan Landry - #137
Zach Fogell - #187
Gabriel Jackson - #124
Jordan DiValerio - #231