Red Sox in season discussion

sezwho

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"At the end of the day, didn’t throw the ball well and just sucked. I don’t know how else to put it."

Didn't hear it live but sounds like he took ownership to me. I don't mind a little added context about the tipping (or damp balls or whatever : ) as long as they own up. Otherwise everyone just Belichick's it..."Didn't pitch well enough. Didn't manage well enough".
 

mauf

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He said he was tipping his pitches. How on earth is that trying to shift blame elsewhere? It’s an explanation, not an excuse.

Whether he was wise to offer that explanation is a different question. He needs to fix the issue before his next appearance regardless, but telling opposing players and coaches what to look for on film probably won’t help.
 

bosox188

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He said he was tipping his pitches. How on earth is that trying to shift blame elsewhere? It’s an explanation, not an excuse.

Whether he was wise to offer that explanation is a different question. He needs to fix the issue before his next appearance regardless, but telling opposing players and coaches what to look for on film probably won’t help.
I agree, I see it more in the context of someone saying "I'm not living up to the expectations of my job, here's what I think I've been doing poorly and here's how I'm going to try to address it."

I will say that across the MLB it's become quite a common thing for teams to claim they found a guy was tipping pitches after he gets blown up. And it could very well be true, but my anecdotal recollection is that just as often you can point to shit stuff or shit location in those same starts. It's said so often that I think it suffers from "cry wolf" syndrome.

If I search for "tipping pitches" on Google News, just from the past week alone I get hits on articles reporting possible pitch tipping from the following guys with recent poor performance: Hill, Trevor Rogers, Dylan Cease, Merrill Kelly, Tylor Megill, Beau Brieske, Charlie Morton. You could say lot of these guys also have either been suffering from poor command, or mediocre stuff, particularly fastballs, making them more reliant on deception and sequencing.

If teams have become so good at identifying pitch tipping, perhaps the real issue is that you have very little margin for error in your pure stuff or in your command if you want to consistently succeed. If you fix one tip, another pops up a few starts later.
 

Niastri

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I agree, I see it more in the context of someone saying "I'm not living up to the expectations of my job, here's what I think I've been doing poorly and here's how I'm going to try to address it."

I will say that across the MLB it's become quite a common thing for teams to claim they found a guy was tipping pitches after he gets blown up. And it could very well be true, but my anecdotal recollection is that just as often you can point to shit stuff or shit location in those same starts. It's said so often that I think it suffers from "cry wolf" syndrome.

If I search for "tipping pitches" on Google News, just from the past week alone I get hits on articles reporting possible pitch tipping from the following guys with recent poor performance: Hill, Trevor Rogers, Dylan Cease, Merrill Kelly, Tylor Megill, Beau Brieske, Charlie Morton. You could say lot of these guys also have either been suffering from poor command, or mediocre stuff, particularly fastballs, making them more reliant on deception and sequencing.

If teams have become so good at identifying pitch tipping, perhaps the real issue is that you have very little margin for error in your pure stuff or in your command if you want to consistently succeed. If you fix one tip, another pops up a few starts later.
So what you're saying is if you know Randy Johnson is throwing his slider or Pedro is throwing his change, it really doesn't matter if he's tipping, because he is still getting you out. On the other hand, if a smoke and mirrors guy like Hill is tipping, yeah, he's going to get smoked?

Seems reasonable to me. I wonder what would happen if a guy like Koji tipped his pitches, since his deception was such a critical part of his effectiveness as a pitcher. Other guys who are always wild or have such great stuff might not have to worry as much? I know Eduardo Rodriguez had some tipping issues at one point, he had good stuff, but nothing dominant., for instance. How would you test it?
 

bosox188

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So what you're saying is if you know Randy Johnson is throwing his slider or Pedro is throwing his change, it really doesn't matter if he's tipping, because he is still getting you out. On the other hand, if a smoke and mirrors guy like Hill is tipping, yeah, he's going to get smoked?

Seems reasonable to me. I wonder what would happen if a guy like Koji tipped his pitches, since his deception was such a critical part of his effectiveness as a pitcher. Other guys who are always wild or have such great stuff might not have to worry as much? I know Eduardo Rodriguez had some tipping issues at one point, he had good stuff, but nothing dominant., for instance. How would you test it?
Yes, and I realize that's not exactly a groundbreaking statement. It's just the reason why, while I acknowledge that Hill's pitch tipping statement is a valid explanation and not an excuse, I'm not necessarily taking it as predictive for him moving forward, we'll see. A quick look at the Savant page for that game shows that his curveball, which he threw 40% of the time, had an inch less vertical break and 3 inches less horizontal break compared to his yearly average. So one could also reasonably point to shittier stuff in that game too.

52074
 

scottyno

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They're keeping balls in humidors now. Could be that's the dampness he felt, especially if minor league balls are not stored in humidors. I don't think the MLB and MiLB baseballs are the same to begin with, so different storage practices might only exacerbate the differences.
Triple A and major league balls are the same to start with as of a few years ago, lower levels use a different ball.
 

Daniel_Son

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Starting July 4, the Red Sox won't play a team below .500 for more than a month until August 4 against KC.

July is going to make or break this team.
 

YTF

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Starting July 4, the Red Sox won't play a team below .500 for more than a month until August 4 against KC.

July is going to make or break this team.
It's going to be a tough stretch that as you say may make or break the team, but I'm hopeful and here's why. Leading up to that stretch there are 3 games at home with a struggling Detroit, 3 at Cleveland who is just 1/2 game better than Boston in the standings and three in Chicago vs the hapless Cubbies, so there's a fair chance that the team can pick up a few more games in the WC race. Now lets look at that July 4th to August 3rd schedule. As you say every game (27 of them) is against teams playing better than .500 baseball, but I see a bit more hope in that 7 of those games are against the Rays who are only a game and 1/2 up in the standings with another 4 vs Cleveland and 3 with Milwaukee who at 35-30 are just a half game better than Boston. They've got to actually play the games and play well, but roughly half of that stretch (14 of 27 games) is against teams that are similar in record to Boston.
 

joe dokes

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One thing that has flown under the radar is how much better the defense is than last year. Story has been great, Dalbec is a shitload better than the 1st half last year and both bogaerts and devers are better. Whether that's because story is an improvement next to them or just on them is irrelevant.
And JBJ significantly upgraded 2 positions, rf and backup cf.
 

m0ckduck

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I get that we're trying to find things to analyze, but I find these strength-of-schedule discussions routinely get overblown. The aggregate opponent winning percentage during this recent easy stretch dating back to the May 20 series against Mariners was .412. For the upcoming hard stretch (Guardians through 2nd Yankees series before the break), it's .585. In NBA terms, that's the difference between playing the Raptors and the Spurs. Yes, it matters, and it's likely to show up in the W-L record. But the signal-to-noise ratio is also very low compared to variables within our own team performance. For example, JBJr could go on one of his inexplicable .900 OPS tears for a month and that alone would mostly outweigh the SOS differences.

Edit: to be a bit less lazy about this: the "strong" and "weak" stretches of the schedule cited above are each 24-28 games. A .500 team would expect to lose 4 more games against 585 competition than against .412 competition in that span. A four game W/L swing is indeed big. But the Red Sox themselves have alternately played like a .354 team and a .696 team for long stretches of time. The team's variability right now is much bigger than the whims of the scheduling gods. In any case, four extra losses over the next 24 games due to harder strength of opposition isn't going to "sink" us, as a lot of posters are warning.
 
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Rovin Romine

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I get that we're trying to find things to analyze, but I find these strength-of-schedule discussions routinely get overblown. The aggregate opponent winning percentage during this recent easy stretch dating back to the May 20 series against Mariners was .412. For the upcoming hard stretch (Guardians through 2nd Yankees series before the break), it's .585. In NBA terms, that's the difference between playing the Raptors and the Spurs. Yes, it matters, and it's likely to show up in the W-L record. But the signal-to-noise ratio is also very low compared to variables within our own team performance. For example, JBJr could go on one of his inexplicable .900 OPS tears for a month and that alone would probably outweigh all the SOS differences.
How about we put that in baseball terms?

23 games against the 2021 Houston Astros v. 23 games against an even weaker 2021 Minnesota Twins.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/AL/2021.shtml
 

BaseballJones

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Or in 2022 terms...

23 games against Toronto (currently at .578) vs. 23 games against Baltimore (.439).

Though what's funny is that Boston is just 3-5 against Baltimore.... so who knows what will happen?
 

m0ckduck

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How about we put that in baseball terms?

23 games against the 2021 Houston Astros v. 23 games against an even weaker 2021 Minnesota Twins.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/AL/2021.shtml
Well, the reason I didn't is precisely that we routinely underestimate the variance of baseball. There's a stubborn idea that the 2021 Astros almost always win and the Twins constantly lose... but this isn't how baseball works. Comparing it to a lower-variance sport helps put this in perspective.
 

joe dokes

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Well, the reason I didn't is precisely that we routinely underestimate the variance of baseball. There's a stubborn idea that the 2021 Astros almost always win and the Twins constantly lose... but this isn't how baseball works. Comparing it to a lower-variance sport helps put this in perspective.
And that variance is further exacerbated by the chance of catching a team at a "bad time" (Angels) or going up against Babe Finch (Ohtani).
 

Rovin Romine

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I get that we're trying to find things to analyze, but I find these strength-of-schedule discussions routinely get overblown. The aggregate opponent winning percentage during this recent easy stretch dating back to the May 20 series against Mariners was .412. For the upcoming hard stretch (Guardians through 2nd Yankees series before the break), it's .585. In NBA terms, that's the difference between playing the Raptors and the Spurs. Yes, it matters, and it's likely to show up in the W-L record. But the signal-to-noise ratio is also very low compared to variables within our own team performance. For example, JBJr could go on one of his inexplicable .900 OPS tears for a month and that alone would mostly outweigh the SOS differences.

Edit: to be a bit less lazy about this: the "strong" and "weak" stretches of the schedule cited above are each 24-28 games. A .500 team would expect to lose 4 more games against 585 competition than against .412 competition in that span. A four game W/L swing is indeed big. But the Red Sox themselves have alternately played like a .354 team and a .696 team for long stretches of time. The team's variability right now is much bigger than the whims of the scheduling gods. In any case, four extra losses over the next 24 games due to harder strength of opposition isn't going to "sink" us, as a lot of posters are warning.
How about we be a lot less lazy. Who is saying four extra losses in the next 24 games will "sink" us?
 

YTF

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I get that we're trying to find things to analyze, but I find these strength-of-schedule discussions routinely get overblown. The aggregate opponent winning percentage during this recent easy stretch dating back to the May 20 series against Mariners was .412. For the upcoming hard stretch (Guardians through 2nd Yankees series before the break), it's .585. In NBA terms, that's the difference between playing the Raptors and the Spurs. Yes, it matters, and it's likely to show up in the W-L record. But the signal-to-noise ratio is also very low compared to variables within our own team performance. For example, JBJr could go on one of his inexplicable .900 OPS tears for a month and that alone would mostly outweigh the SOS differences.

Edit: to be a bit less lazy about this: the "strong" and "weak" stretches of the schedule cited above are each 24-28 games. A .500 team would expect to lose 4 more games against 585 competition than against .412 competition in that span. A four game W/L swing is indeed big. But the Red Sox themselves have alternately played like a .354 team and a .696 team for long stretches of time. The team's variability right now is much bigger than the whims of the scheduling gods. In any case, four extra losses over the next 24 games due to harder strength of opposition isn't going to "sink" us, as a lot of posters are warning.
Is this the current aggregate winning % of those opponents?
 

Rovin Romine

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Is this the current aggregate winning % of those opponents?
The other side of that is weird.

NYY 7 x .750 = 5.25
TOR 3 x .578 = 1.734
CLE 3 x .550 = 1.65
TBR 7 x .547 = 3.829
CHC 3 x .375 = 1.125

If you weigh, its 13.588/23 = .590.

Not that the whole thing makes a ton of sense anyway.
 

m0ckduck

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How about we be a lot less lazy. Who is saying four extra losses in the next 24 games will "sink" us?
Well, two posters upthread referred to this stretch as the one that will "make or break us". And, in the How to get back in this thing thread, there's a reference to it as "the meatgrinder." (To be clear, nobody specifically said that 4 extra losses would make or break us-- my point here is that this stretch that some people view as decisive should only be expected to produce 4 extra losses relative to the easy stretch we just finished.)

Is this the current aggregate winning % of those opponents?
Edit: I added opponent winning % per series, then divided by the number of series. But RR did the correct adjusted numbers (weighting for shorter and longer series) above and came to virtually same result for the "hard" stretch.
 

Rovin Romine

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Well, two posters upthread referred to this stretch as the one that will "make or break us". And, in the How to get back in this thing thread, there's a reference to it as "the meatgrinder." (To be clear, nobody specifically said that 4 extra losses would make or break us-- my point here is that this stretch that some people view as decisive should only be expected to produce 4 extra losses relative to the easy stretch we just finished.)


Edit: I added opponent winning % per series, then divided by the number of series. But RR did the correct adjusted numbers (weighting for shorter and longer series) above and came to virtually same result for the "hard" stretch.
Fair enough. But your basic premise is still that the inner volatility of the Sox matters more than the quality of opponents?
 

YTF

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Fair enough. But your basic premise is still that the inner volatility of the Sox matters more than the quality of opponents?
Which is part of the reason that I asked about the aggregate of the opposing teams winning % during the "soft" part of the schedule. Was that taken previous to that stretch of games, before each series or at the end of the stretch. If it was the latter, the Sox had a profound effect on that.
 

sezwho

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One thing that has flown under the radar is how much better the defense is than last year. Story has been great, Dalbec is a shitload better than the 1st half last year and both bogaerts and devers are better. Whether that's because story is an improvement next to them or just on them is irrelevant.
And JBJ significantly upgraded 2 positions, rf and backup cf.
I agree we haven’t mentioned the improved D much as it seems to have been more of an emphasis in team building than I thought. For example, it looks to be a conscious choice to use JBJ over Renfroe and not just a way to buy prospects. Also, it hadn’t really occurred to me that the improved D by X and Devers was somehow driven by Story…they both just seem to be making more plays.
 

Harry Hooper

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I agree we haven’t mentioned the improved D much as it seems to have been more of an emphasis in team building than I thought. For example, it looks to be a conscious choice to use JBJ over Renfroe and not just a way to buy prospects. Also, it hadn’t really occurred to me that the improved D by X and Devers was somehow driven by Story…they both just seem to be making more plays.

Here's an article on the pre-season work by Devers and Bogarts on D: https://theathletic.com/3329910/2022/05/24/red-sox-bogaerts-devers-defensive-homework/

Just before Thanksgiving and days before the MLB lockout began, the Red Sox gave Xander Bogaerts and Rafael Devers some homework.

The team had just completed individual player meetings entering the offseason, and the focus area was the same for Bogaerts and Devers: defense.
 

burstnbloom

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It's a pretty small sample but the defensive improvement for Xander appears to a thing. Savant has him at 0 outs above average, which is 16th best in the league at SS, right with Franco and Baez. He was -10 last year. Devers is also at 0 OAA after finishing last year at -12. He's tied with Bregman for 12th among 3b. They have essentially been average defenders this year after being well below average last year.
 

Daniel_Son

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So after another needlessly close 9th inning, it's become clear that we need to improve the bullpen. Danish and Brasier seem like obvious DFA targets. Do we wait for Sale to come back and displace Hill to the bullpen? Who's on our radar to target at the trade deadline, if anyone?
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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So after another needlessly close 9th inning, it's become clear that we need to improve the bullpen. Danish and Brasier seem like obvious DFA targets. Do we wait for Sale to come back and displace Hill to the bullpen? Who's on our radar to target at the trade deadline, if anyone?
I'm not sure how much stock to put in the ninth innings this weekend. The Cardinals are a really good hitting team. They're going to get to even good bullpens on occasion. At this point, they've got 3-4 guys who have emerged as fairly reliable guys: Houck, Schreiber, Strahm, Davis (Friday's outing not withstanding). And two or three who are replacement level who you can get by with most of the time if they're covering middle/late innings with a sizeable lead (or deficit). If you can upgrade one or two of those guys via trade, great. If not, there are still a couple internal options to explore before panic time arrives. One is Sale bumping one of the other starters to the pen. The other likely sooner option is Josh Taylor. He's supposed to being a rehab assignment this week, which could have him activated sometime next week.

I think with the extra wildcard, it's going to be tougher to make trades until we get closer to the deadline, so it will be worth while to wait out Sale and Taylor before expending resources on external solutions. There just aren't enough teams clearly headed for sell-mode right now that a good deal is there to be had. Doesn't mean Bloom shouldn't be and won't be looking in the meantime, I just don't think we should expect much just yet.
 

Petagine in a Bottle

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I don’t think Hill to the bullpen makes much sense, esp. with Taylor due back at some point. You can’t have four or five left handlers in the pen.

RH relief has to be the primary trade target, though. 1b and OF help seem possible, too.

Whitlock to the pen has to be an option, especially if Sale returns.

As far as targets…Dillon Tate, Alex Lange, Will Vest, Michael Fullmer, Scott Barlow, Paul Sewald, Penn Murfee, Diego Castillo, Anthony Bass, Wil Crowe, Dave Robertson, Alexis Diaz, and Daniel Bard seem possible.

Dalbec, Downs, Winckowski, Crawford, Seabold seem like the kind of players to Sox would love to trade; along with lower level prospects, I assume.
 

Daniel_Son

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I'm not sure how much stock to put in the ninth innings this weekend. The Cardinals are a really good hitting team. They're going to get to even good bullpens on occasion. At this point, they've got 3-4 guys who have emerged as fairly reliable guys: Houck, Schreiber, Strahm, Davis (Friday's outing not withstanding). And two or three who are replacement level who you can get by with most of the time if they're covering middle/late innings with a sizeable lead (or deficit). If you can upgrade one or two of those guys via trade, great. If not, there are still a couple internal options to explore before panic time arrives. One is Sale bumping one of the other starters to the pen. The other likely sooner option is Josh Taylor. He's supposed to being a rehab assignment this week, which could have him activated sometime next week.

I think with the extra wildcard, it's going to be tougher to make trades until we get closer to the deadline, so it will be worth while to wait out Sale and Taylor before expending resources on external solutions. There just aren't enough teams clearly headed for sell-mode right now that a good deal is there to be had. Doesn't mean Bloom shouldn't be and won't be looking in the meantime, I just don't think we should expect much just yet.
I mean it's not just this weekend though, the Sox leads the majors in blown saves. The bats have been putting up significantly more run support than they were at the start of the season, but in tight games, these implosions are going to lead to losses.

Maybe Taylor + whoever Sale displaces from the rotation is enough. I'd love to see them grab Bard, Lange, or someone else having a similarly good season at the deadline. But those are the big, costly candidates; I'm just wondering if there are any under-the-radar candidates you guys have a bead on.
 

YTF

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I don’t think Hill to the bullpen makes much sense, esp. with Taylor due back at some point. You can’t have four or five left handlers in the pen.

RH relief has to be the primary trade target, though. 1b and OF help seem possible, too.

Whitlock to the pen has to be an option, especially if Sale returns.


As far as targets…Dillon Tate, Alex Lange, Will Vest, Michael Fullmer, Scott Barlow, Paul Sewald, Penn Murfee, Diego Castillo, Anthony Bass, Wil Crowe, Dave Robertson, Alexis Diaz, and Daniel Bard seem possible.

Dalbec, Downs, Winckowski, Crawford, Seabold seem like the kind of players to Sox would love to trade; along with lower level prospects, I assume.
Whitlock's future seems to be as a starter, but I think that Whitlock to the pen is a strong possibility as I think the team still has a innings limit in mind for him and he would fill the need they have for a strong right hander. If Taylor comes back and pitches as he did last year and Whitlock joins him in a month or so this would be a huge boost to what has been a season long puzzle. Six of the eight slots filled by Davis, Strahm and Taylor from the left and Whitlock, Houck, Schreiber from the right doesn't seem too shabby ATM. That's an awful lot or trust to place in guys without a ton of MLB experience, but to date they've all earned that trust. I'm guessing there's not much getting around Barnes getting one of the remaining two slot's and Paxton's return will displace someone. Odd man out ATM would be Hill.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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I mean it's not just this weekend though, the Sox leads the majors in blown saves. The bats have been putting up significantly more run support than they were at the start of the season, but in tight games, these implosions are going to lead to losses.

Maybe Taylor + whoever Sale displaces from the rotation is enough. I'd love to see them grab Bard, Lange, or someone else having a similarly good season at the deadline. But those are the big, costly candidates; I'm just wondering if there are any under-the-radar candidates you guys have a bead on.
Correction: they are #2 in MLB in blown saves, behind Tampa (15 to 14). They have just 5 blown saves (2-2 record) in their last 38 games (26-12). Blown saves is an inexact stat to begin with in terms of how well it measures anything, but most of their blown saves came in bunches when the team was struggling mightily in all phases. Since they've been in their winning ways, the pen has been pretty good overall just like the offense and starting pitching.

That's not to say they can't upgrade. They can always stand to upgrade and improve. But it is hardly a desperate or season-ruining problem right now.
 

scottyno

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I mean it's not just this weekend though, the Sox leads the majors in blown saves. The bats have been putting up significantly more run support than they were at the start of the season, but in tight games, these implosions are going to lead to losses.

Maybe Taylor + whoever Sale displaces from the rotation is enough. I'd love to see them grab Bard, Lange, or someone else having a similarly good season at the deadline. But those are the big, costly candidates; I'm just wondering if there are any under-the-radar candidates you guys have a bead on.
A lot of that has to be a function of playing so many games in April where the offense scored like 1-3 runs. If the offense is never adding on after they get a lead then the bullpen has to be perfect or they're going to end up with a blown save.

While they were blowing saves in April the pen was actually pretty good, with a 3.23 era. They struggled in May with a 4.57, but boucned back in June with a 3.33 before today.
 

mauidano

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Sox Updates: Chris Cotillo
Red Sox updates: * Arroyo, Kiké will need rehab assignments but could return by weekend. Whitlock close too. Eovaldi not so much. * Houck still unvaccinated and will miss Toronto trip * Cora joked that City Connect unis are to help team store sell them. Likely 3 straight days
 

BaseballJones

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Just to give people some idea of how this is going....

After games on May 8, the Red Sox were 10-19 (.345), and were 10 games out of first place behind the Yankees, who were at 19-8 (.704). At that point, the Sox were on pace to win 56 games and the Yankees were on pace to win 114.

Since then, the Sox have gone 27-12 (.692), which is a pace to win 112 games in a 162-game season. And they've LOST 3.5 games in the standings. That's because the Yankees have gone 31-9 (.775) over this same period of time, a pace to win an unimaginable 126 games in a 162-game season.

That's right. The Red Sox have been playing at a 112 win pace since May 8, and they've lost 3 1/2 games in the standings to the Yankees.
 

jon abbey

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Just to give people some idea of how this is going....

After games on May 8, the Red Sox were 10-19 (.345), and were 10 games out of first place behind the Yankees, who were at 19-8 (.704). At that point, the Sox were on pace to win 56 games and the Yankees were on pace to win 114.

Since then, the Sox have gone 27-12 (.692), which is a pace to win 112 games in a 162-game season. And they've LOST 3.5 games in the standings. That's because the Yankees have gone 31-9 (.775) over this same period of time, a pace to win an unimaginable 126 games in a 162-game season.

That's right. The Red Sox have been playing at a 112 win pace since May 8, and they've lost 3 1/2 games in the standings to the Yankees.
This is how the regular season in 2018 felt in reverse. NY started off 45-21 and ended up winning 100 games, but still lost the division by 8 games to BOS.
 

Minneapolis Millers

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This is how the regular season in 2018 felt in reverse. NY started off 45-21 and ended up winning 100 games, but still lost the division by 8 games to BOS.
I’d take NY winning 108 and Boston winning 100 this season. As long as the playoffs work out a little differently.
 

BaseballJones

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Boston is now just 1/2 game behind Toronto for second place in the AL East. I mean, let's be perfectly honest - the division is unattainable barring some sort of miracle/catastrophe (depending on which side you're on). But it sure would be nice to continue playing really good baseball and solidify wild card positioning. Maybe, MAYBE, they can at least make New York feel a little heat at some point. Though even that is a stretch.
 

BaseballJones

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By the way.... how are the Red Sox averaging more runs scored per game than Toronto (4.74 to 4.62)? Look at these lineups:

Boston (min 50 PA):
Vaz 99 ops+
Dalbec 71 ops+
Story 100 ops+
Bogaerts 144 ops+
Devers 168 ops+
Verdugo 78 ops+
Kiké 69 ops+
JBJ 65 ops+
JDM 156 ops+
Franchy 88 ops+
Arroyo 50 ops+
Plawecki 29 ops+

Toronto (min 50 PA):
Kirk 147 ops+
Vlad 144 ops+
Espinal 106 ops+
Bichette 104 ops+
Chapman 94 ops+
Gurriel 108 ops+
Springer 132 ops+
Hernandez 106 ops+
Collins 108 ops+
Tapia 87 ops+
Biggio 97 ops+
Zimmer 24 ops+
Jansen 152 ops+


I mean... Toronto's regular starting lineup has ONE guy with a sub-100 ops+, and that's Chapman at 94. They have three guys at 132 or higher. And their subs - besides Zimmer - are all at 87 or higher.

Meanwhile, Boston has just four starters that are 100 or higher. They have three guys at 144 or higher. They've got 6 guys who get somewhat regular playing time that have ops+ numbers below 80.

It just doesn't seem possible that Boston is scoring more runs than Toronto this year.
 

joe dokes

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 18, 2005
30,238
By the way.... how are the Red Sox averaging more runs scored per game than Toronto (4.74 to 4.62)? Look at these lineups:

Boston (min 50 PA):
Vaz 99 ops+
Dalbec 71 ops+
Story 100 ops+
Bogaerts 144 ops+
Devers 168 ops+
Verdugo 78 ops+
Kiké 69 ops+
JBJ 65 ops+
JDM 156 ops+
Franchy 88 ops+
Arroyo 50 ops+
Plawecki 29 ops+

Toronto (min 50 PA):
Kirk 147 ops+
Vlad 144 ops+
Espinal 106 ops+
Bichette 104 ops+
Chapman 94 ops+
Gurriel 108 ops+
Springer 132 ops+
Hernandez 106 ops+
Collins 108 ops+
Tapia 87 ops+
Biggio 97 ops+
Zimmer 24 ops+
Jansen 152 ops+


I mean... Toronto's regular starting lineup has ONE guy with a sub-100 ops+, and that's Chapman at 94. They have three guys at 132 or higher. And their subs - besides Zimmer - are all at 87 or higher.

Meanwhile, Boston has just four starters that are 100 or higher. They have three guys at 144 or higher. They've got 6 guys who get somewhat regular playing time that have ops+ numbers below 80.

It just doesn't seem possible that Boston is scoring more runs than Toronto this year.
Cora doesn't believe it either, so Bogaerts and Devers not starting tonight.