Wacha actually was ace caliber, at least if we ignore that some of his success was probably pretty lucky. He has to have been one of the best pitching signings of the entire off-season by ANY team, I can't believe anyone is criticizing that move.
Peter Abe: Offseason 23 Bloom or Cora Could Be Gone?
- Thread starter John Marzano Olympic Hero
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The 2004 Red Sox used a 27 year old waiver wire pitcher with a career record of 9-14. The 2007 Red Sox signed a scrap heap player who made 23 starts for them, and were helped by a pitcher whose shoulder was coming apart at the seams. The 2013 Sox signed Ryan Dempster to complement a staff that had a player making a recovery from TJ surgery. The 2018 Red Sox traded for a guy who was coming off his 2nd TJ. The 2021 Red Sox went into the season counting on a player to recover from CoVid-induced myocarditis and Nick Pivetta and Martin Perez and Garrett Richards.
The reality is that the Sox did no wrong by signing Wacha and Hill. It's really weird that people are actually criticizing Bloom for those signings. Bloom had no way to know that Sale would get hit on his hand and later fall off his bike. Or that Eovaldi would be in and out of the rotation all season. Or that both Houck and Whitlock would battle injuries.
I am thinking there's going to be a lot of disappointed fans over the next 5-10 years. Not sure there's any easy way around that given how quickly the realities of the free agent market have changed.
The reality is that the Sox did no wrong by signing Wacha and Hill. It's really weird that people are actually criticizing Bloom for those signings. Bloom had no way to know that Sale would get hit on his hand and later fall off his bike. Or that Eovaldi would be in and out of the rotation all season. Or that both Houck and Whitlock would battle injuries.
I am thinking there's going to be a lot of disappointed fans over the next 5-10 years. Not sure there's any easy way around that given how quickly the realities of the free agent market have changed.
If we fire Bloom, what can his replacement do to accelerate the rebuild? There is really no viable strategy except to do what Bloom has already tried to do, which is taking on money for prospects (Binelas, German). The free agent market is not what it was because the best players aren't reaching free agency anymore, or they're reaching it at age 30/31/32, where they're past their peak. Every team is smart enough to manipulate service time, these days even the best young players reach the majors at 24, allowing for team control for ages 24-29 or 25-30. The Orioles would have had Rutschman under control until 31, but he's going to gain a full year of service time this year because he's been really good. But even so, he'll become a free agent after his age 29 season.
Going into the ALCS last year I felt the one advantage we had was Cora vs. Dusty Baker as a manager. If you look back at that series, I think you could argue that Baker did an exceptional job and probably outmanaged Cora. Of course it helps when your starting pitchers are lights out, that makes any manager look smart.
Having said all that, I really like Cora and I don't think you can blame the disappointing season on him. He was dealt a lousy bullpen, no 1st baseman and little depth. Add in the injuries and it's hard to compete with that. If one of Cora or Bloom had to go, it would be Bloom and it would be no contest. Bloom excels at the value signing and those decisions are going to make him look smart. But ultimately you need to do well on the tough decisions and he hasn't excelled there. His hand may have been forced on the Betts trade, and I think ultimately we may have dodged a bullet by not extending him, but it doesn't mean he won that trade. Trading for Schwarber was a great move, but it wasn't followed with the 1st baseman that they actually needed or the bullpen help that they also needed. Extending Barnes after 2 good months was a mistake. Trading Renfroe made sense. Trading Renfroe for Bradley did not, time may tell on that trade with the other components though so I'll give that one a pass. Injuries haven't helped, but Story hasn't exactly been a slam dunk. His defense very well may justify a sub-.300 OBP, but as his biggest signing to date, I'm not impressed yet. Trading Vazquez hurt, but not running up the white flag with other pieces was just puzzling.
The Sox are going to spend money this offseason. If Bloom is at the helm, this should be his last chance to make free agent acquisitions, put out contract extensions, etc that will meaningfully impact the big league roster. If the tape recorder was off, I'm sure the front office would admit that 2021 was an aberration and they didn't expect to be two games from the World Series.
Of the 162 games that year, do you know how many games the members of the 2004 Boston Red Sox starting staff didn't pitch? One. Abe Alvarez started that particular game.
Three of the top four pitchers on the 2007 staff started more than 30 games and pitched 190 innings or more. Curt Schilling was the one member of that team that didn't. The fifth starter was a mix of Jesus Tavarez and a young Jon Lester.
The 2013 Boston Red Sox had four starting pitchers that made 27+ starts and threw more than 160 innings.
The 2018 team had four starters that made 27+ starts.
Know what else these teams had? A very good bullpen.
The 2022 Boston Red Sox have one player that is projected to make over 27 starts (Nick Piveta), no one else is going to. And to make matters worse, they have a shit bullpen.
When you have either a strong starting staff or a strong bullpen, by all means dumpster dive. There are some treasures to be found. But you can't blow your entire wad on three oft-injured or old pitchers and claim "bad luck" when they get hurt (and in some cases never throw a pitch for you).
And is it "really weird" that anyone would criticize Bloom on the performance of this team? They're five games under .500, they're in dead last six games behind the Baltimore Orioles. I find it really weird that Bloomers like yourself can't wrap your head around a bad offseason. It happens to everyone. It's not a moral failing, he gambled and lost. Have you watched this team this year? Aside from June, they've been awful. How can you look at this team and say, "Yeah, we're a contender. If we stick to the exact same plan, next year is going to be different"?
Hill and Wacha are good pitchers, WHEN THEY PITCH. They went literal weeks without pitching. The reality that the "Sox did no wrong" is wishcasting at its worst.
I still can't figure out who Bloom could have brought in to be an adequate replacement for $30M worth of Chris Sale. Can you help me identify him, considering the financial restraints? Bloom did a very good job within that framework.
But..... if there are posters here that think Bloom did not/can not do any wrong that I haven't read those. I'm defending what I think was a good job. He REALLY shit the bed when it came to the Renfroe move and I'm willing to stick my neck out and say that Binelas won't pan out to anything more than AAA.
I also don't think his approach to the bullpen was bad at all either.
First base? I think he could have done better but I can see where his defenders stand on sticking with Dalbec and Shaw considering that from all appearances they are committing long term to a guy who should be with the ML team right now and should be pencilled in to start '23.
All in all I'd give Bloom a solid B considering the complete circumstances and restraints.
If there were significant financial constraints, why was the team allocating a decent amount of salary to Bradley, Paxton, etc? Spending that on a Rodon or Gausman would have been ideal. Or, commit to Whitlock and Houck in the rotation and keep Ottavino or something. I dunno. Good news is Bloom gets to try again with the pitching staff this off-season.
Kinda easy to point to championship teams and say "see, that's how you do it" as if good health and durability is something you can fully control. The phrase "easier said than done" comes to mind.
That 2004 rotation in particular was fluky in how healthy they were (it's not like they all had perfect track records of health). One nitpick to your point about them, but there were five starts by guys who weren't in the Opening Day rotation: 3 by Byung-Hyun Kim when they tried to bump Arroyo, 1 by Alvarez in a spot start in a double-header, and 1 by Pedro Astacio in garbage time at the end of the year. Still an unreal run of durability and good fortune. Even in otherwise healthy seasons, pitchers will occasionally miss a turn with illness or little nicks and twinges. To have a season with none of that (until the playoffs anyway) is rare as fuck.
I looked into this a few weeks ago (think I posted about it) the last time pitcher health was discussed, and just about all the notable free agent pitchers signed this past off-season (so available to the Sox) have spent time on the IL this season. Whether it was Scherzer or Kershaw or ERod or Stroman or Gray or Wacha or Hill. Signing a guy with a track record of good health, or spending more on a "better" pitcher, is still not a guarantee he'll remain injury free.
Part of Bloom's job is to make trades. I don't know whom he could have acquired to be a starter on the Sox, but there were deals that were done over the winter between other teams. That probably means giving up a promising prospect, which it doesn't seem like he wants to do. That's his call. I don't think it's the right one, but we'll see about that. As far as which free agents he could have pursued, PiaB listed a couple of good ones.
As for the bolded, I think that scottyno is going to be very sad once he figures out you have him on ignore.
Which year did they see him throw 9 good to very good starts to end the season? He was on a short leash every outing in 2021 since he came off TJ surgery. He hadn't shown anything post-TJ surgery that suggested that he was capable of being a healthy and effective pitcher.
I didn't cherry pick those teams. Lex did. Which I'm not sure why he did because that doesn't really help his argument at all.
And you're right about Kim. Both he, Pedro Astacio and Alvarez started five games between them. Sorry about that.
You keep making the argument that Bloom's signings of Wacha and Hill were failures, and further criticized for dumpster diving. My point is that every team does some amount of dumpster diving, and in the past it has worked out really well for the Red Sox. If posters like yourself cannot figure out why I chose those specific teams, it's not my problem to explain it further.
You've since moved the goalposts on your argument to "posters keep saying Bloom has done no wrong", but that's an argument I've never made nor has anyone else here. I will simply continue to point out that Bloom was brought here by ownership specifically to focus on building via the draft and creating a strong farm system. And all his moves have been in support of that directive from ownership. Whether ownership and/or Bloom plan to follow that directive as strictly this coming offseason remains to be seen.
I posted this elsewhere, but basically: I find it incredibly hard to rate Bloom. As we all know: they got within 2 wins of the World Series last year and they will finish in last place this year. Chalking last year up to "good luck" doesn't feel fair, nor does writing this year off entirely due to "bad luck."
BUT, to answer your questions:
1) I'm not upset with the "Dollar Store" approach to *some* of the rotation, lots of teams are successfully doing the same (the Twins, Rays, Dodgers, Giants, etc.). I'm mostly upset with the James Paxton signing given how successful almost all of the cheaper options have been this year (not just Tyler Anderson and Martin Perez, but Kluber, Lyles, Archer, Cueto, etc.). For a team that was desperate for pitching depth and fell out of contention in part because they were forced to start AAA players throughout the summer, I think that signing in particular sacrificed competitiveness in 2022 for the sake of the 2023 roster.
2) Hindsight is 20/20, but Carlos Rodon was available this offseason on a 2 year, $22M AAV contract. At the risk of restarting too many well worn arguments here, simply not signing Paxton for $10M + not trading Renfroe ($7M) away for JBJ ($17M) basically would have paid for Rodon. If the 2022 Red Sox had Renfroe in RF and Rodon in the rotation all season, that's 6 extra WAR and a realistic shot at the postseason.
(Note, however, that many of the other 2-3 year SP contracts already look iffy -- Alex Cobb, Alex Wood, Steven Matz, etc.)
Anyway, all that said, I'm glad that Bloom and Cora are coming back next year. For an organization with the most World Series titles this century this organization has not had a lot of stability in the front office or the clubhouse in the past decade, and I think this group clearly deserves another offseason and season to see how things develop.
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Rodon's deal is a bit more complicated, it is 2/44 but he can opt out if he hits 110 innings this year (which he did), so if he had gotten hurt or been terrible, the signing team would still have him for 2023, but if he is very good (as he has been), then he will opt out.
Also I think it's a mistake (frequently made by many posters/writers, sorry for singling out this post) to assume that just because a player signs with one team for a certain amount that they would have signed anywhere for that same amount. For one thing, if BOS matched the SF deal, maybe SF goes higher? Maybe Rodon wanted to go to SF for some specific reason?
Sure. But the JBJ/Paxton money, if not spent on Rondon, could have been spent on *somebody* that was far more likely to help a 2022 team that had obvious holes, and a reasonable expectation of contending for a postseason spot.
Yes, sorry I was being a little casual with the terms of the deal. And thanks for singling me out for not predicting an alternate universe.
No, I get what you're saying -- who knows, maybe Rodon didn't want to pitch in Boston or the AL East at all. But -- to respond in kind -- we also don't know that Rodon wouldn't have signed a similar deal in Boston for a few million more than his deal with the Giants. That's the inherent problem with all of these hypotheticals (and it's why I didn't suggest Kershaw or Verlander, both of whom signed 1-year deals to stay with their longtime franchises).And anyway, this was basically my point -- and the point I was responding to from the original poster (essentially "Well how would you have spent $20-25M last offseason?"):
Show me exactly where I said that the signing of Wacha and Hill were failures. Because I have continually said that they're not bad signings and they've pitched well ... when they've pitched. They were both out for a considerable amount of time at the same exact time which completely torpedoed any momentum this team had going from June into July.
I don't know how you can give the signings of three pitchers, who were given multi-million dollar contracts and have made a combined 35 starts, "Perfect. 10/10. No notes." I've seen tougher Kindergarten teachers.
He had a 149 era+ in 9 starts throwing about 5 innings a start. There was no reason to think he wasn't healthy, and someone that does that over a full season is a very effective starter.
But the first cluster were dumpster divings that worked out. Would anyone here have been shocked if they all were terrible? No.
The Rodon is, as you admit, also hindsight.
But yeah... the Paxton signing I'm 50/50 on. Wasn't my favorite but I can also clearly see the reasoning for the signing. Again- the only move that I think Bloom REALLY failed at was the JBJ/Renfroe deal. The lack of 1B production grades out at a C because I can see the reasoning, along with the Paxton. Bullpen construction I'd give him a B and his moves to add depth to the rotation I'd give a A- actually. But Bloom gave me an apple when he came into class so I'm biased.
He pitched 42 innings in nine starts all of which he was essentially an opener. There was even discussion on this board about leaving him off the post-season roster since he couldn't go deep into games. He hadn't proven himself to be close to the type of starter that you can rely on for a 162 season. He and Paxton were in the same category in that anything that they could give the Sox was a bonus.
Sorry, maybe I'm confused, but isn't that my point on the dumpster diving signings? There were many SPs available who were a) even cheaper than Paxton, b) healthy in March 2022, and c) pitched well this year. It's not cherry picking one or two -- most of the veterans who signed 1-year deals paid off for their teams (including Wacha, of course, to Bloom's credit).
As for Rodon, yes, definitely hindsight, but plenty of people were advocating heavily for him last offseason. (See, e.g., here and here and here)
Perhaps we're agreeing on the same issue. Dumpster diving is dumpster diving. Some will work out but I don't think there's any GM or SoSH poster that knows how they will turn out. Bloom did a pretty good job with Hill and Wacha. Yeah it would have been great if he decided to keep Perez! That would have been widely and wildly applauded here. I just don't see where anyone can criticize Bloom for this. Or for having Sale on the roster. Or Eovaldi. The biggest problem of course is that there's been no great starting pitchers developed or cost controlled traded for since Lester for the former and EdRo for the latter. Not having developed that or the talent to deal for EdRo types (not happening any longer) under long term control are what is the biggest issue for the Sox since they signed Sale to a crippling contract.
He threw 89 pitches his first game back and pretty consistently threw 80-90 pitches, that isn't even close to essentially an opener. There was 0 reason to think he wasn't going to be healthy for Apri, putting him in the same category as a guy everyone knew would miss at best a huge chunk of the season when he was signed is laughable,.
Sale pitched in 9 games last season.
In six of them he went either 5.0 or 5.1 innings.
In one game he went 6 innings.
In one game he went 3.2 innings and gave up 10 hits and got pounded.
And on the last day of the season he went only 2.1 IP and gave up 2 runs and got pulled in a must-win game.
He was fairly effective when actually pitching but his lack of stamina was an impediment.
This is revisionist to the extreme. Yeah, he was on a short leash pitching his first games in over a year. But the results were solid if not spectacular. His FIP of 3.69 is better than that of everyone who has started a significant number of games for the 2022 Sox. Watcha has been better, but he's about the only one.
He gave up more hits than vintage Sale, but his strikeout rate was still very high and his ERA+ of 149 was also very good. Yes, this was in a small sample of only nine starts, but there was plenty from his performance after surgery to suggest he was capable of being an effective pitcher.
EDIT: others have gotten to this before me, but the point stands.
He also got lucky in his bad start because despite giving up 10 hits and 6 runs in 3.2 innings, 5 of the runs were considered unearned which saved his ERA+ numbers.
That's fine, but there was no indication at the end of last year or throughout the offseason that he would pitch 5 innings total in 2022. His comeback from Tommy John surgery was fairly standard up until he contracted bonitis this spring.
Good catch. Obviously I don't remember the game, but the play-by-play certainly makes it sound like there was some pretty bad D involved (two errors on the play that scored the four unearned runs). That said, he did give up three straight singles to load the bases, so not like he wasn't having some issues at that point.
Yeah, usually I give slack for errors committed behind a pitcher but 10 hits kind of speaks for itself.
The only thing Sale seemed to struggle with last year, like SJH alluded to, is stamina. Which is not unreasonable considering he had not been on a mound in nearly two years. Stamina should come back with time and repetition. I suspect if his comeback window was shifted back even two months, so he returned in June instead of August, he might have gotten stronger, pitched deeper into games and appeared to be more of his old self by the end of the season (and maybe have been less of a question mark to the doubters).
None of that would have predicted he would break a rib in the off-season or get hit by a line drive in his second start back. It was reasonable to expect more of him for 2022 than five innings.
It was a little more than that. Not only did he struggle with stamina, his first innings were "difficult" which suggested that he was having a tough time getting loose in pen before the game (especially in the playoffs). To me, that was more telling.
I'm not saying that he was a bum, just that expecting him to be anything other than a gamble was overly optimistic.
In those 9 starts his 1st inning was his best by both era and ops allowed, he also struck out 16 and walked 1. His 2nd inning was fine too, so I'm not quite sure what first innings you mean.
In the playoffs he had 1 terrible start, 1 where he struggled but also pitched in and out of trouble before being pulled early, and 1 where he was great through 5 before a lot of things went wrong in the 6th, most of them not his fault.
Sale's first innings last year:
8/14 = 15 pitches, 4 batters: pop-up to SS, K, infield single to 3B, K
8/20 = 11 pitches, 4 batters: pop-up to 3B, double down LF line, K, K
8/26 = 20 pitches, 4 batters: K, walk, K, ground out to SS
9/1 = 16 pitches, 4 batters: HBP, single to RF, fielders choice (SS-2B), double play
9/6 = 26 pitches, 7 batters: K, triple to RF, single to LF, single to LF, K, single to LF, K
9/17 = 18 pitches, 3 batters: single to CF, double play, pop up to 2B
9/22 = 15 pitches, 3 batters: K, K, ground out to 3B
9/28 = 11 pitches, 3 batters: K, K, ground out to 3B
10/3 = 18 pitches, 3 batters: K, K, K
Sure looks like a guy who wasn't having "difficult" first innings that often (only one where he allowed a run). Seems your memory of him might be fuzzier than you think.
Yeah. It's probably more my recollection of his playoff starts, where scottyno notes that two of his three starts started off a little rocky.