The other was off a pitcher, in the sense that Cubs' reliever Little deflected what would have likely been a double play ball into no man's land.
Sox to trade for Garrett Cooper, Pablo Reyes DFA’d
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Honestly, it was the best possible "last day" for him if that's what it was...a fantastic stat line even though his two big hits were 1. a weak deflected infield hit that could easily have been a double play, and 2. a hit off a position player where earlier in the count he appeared to be a bit behind on a 55mph fastball (no joke). That's like a Make-a-Wish kid who gets to run for a touchdown against real football players who clear a path.
Lots of really loud "Bobby! Bobby!" chants today, too. Everyone at the game wanted him to do something and he kind of did. It was a nice sendoff if he's ticketed for Worcester.
I was at the game on Saturday. The park was pretty full although at times Fenway seemed to be taken over by Cubs fans. Turning back to Dalbach topic, one of the few times the park seemed to get excited was during Dalbach's at bar with the bases loaded. There was alot of cheering and rhythm clapping and shouting of Bobby's name. I didn't hear that during any other Red Sox at bat. When it was clear that Dalbach had beaten out the infield single, my section actually gave him a standing O. On the one hand it's sad that a chopper off the pitcher's glove would elict such a reaction. On the other hand; it shows the fans were pulling fir Dalbach.
From all accounts, Dalbach is a great teammate and good glove. It's just a shame he couldn't hit and that the Cooper deal was necessary. C est LA vie.
Gotta say, I hope he gets one more crack somewhere…not here. Those AAA stats aren’t imaginary but neither are the ones in an RS uniform. Seems like just maybe change of scenery (NL?) might kick him into gear.
The concept of a AAAA player isn’t exactly crazy but I don’t think it would present like this: massive massive splits. That has me looking back to ‘writers block’ or whatever a hitter might call it.
Don’t mean to keep derailing Cooper’s thread so I’ll move any further comment to Dalbec’s.
Sorry if I missed it, but when is Cooper going to be playing first base for the Red Sox? Today? Or next series?
Sounded like he would be in Boston today. I'm not sure Cora has ever started a new acquisition the actual day he arrived (Bobby is in the lineup). I'd guess Tuesday vs SF.
Won't be today. They've put the lineup out for tonight and Dalbec is starting at 1B. Presumably Cooper has to get himself to Boston before he can actually be activated and put in the lineup. Have to think that will be Tuesday when the Giants series starts.
Not that it matters now with the series done, but on the broadcast last night, the crew from ESPN mentioned that there was an understanding among the teams that Cooper wouldn't be available until after the series wrapped up. In a deal where one team receives an MLB player and the other receives nothing but cash, that makes a decent amount of sense from an "operating in good faith" standpoint.
As to the deal itself, I'm glad that they did it. It was nice to see the organization actually look at a team that is pretty nicely outperforming - especially given the rash of injuries - and do something to address one of the major problems for a change. Basically telling the team that the organization thought so little of what they'd done as to continue trotting out Bobby Dalbec in a regular major league role would have been quite the slap in the face.
I'm sure (hope at least, have heard nothing to the contrary) that Dalbec is a good guy and a good teammate, but continuing to give regular at bats to guys that probably shouldn't be in the majors (Valdez, Hamilton, Dalbec, Reyes) when something could be changed for just a miniscule amount of money (in baseball terms) would have been a horrible look.
Reyes is out... loved the person - energy and passion... on the field though - not sure at MLB level
I don't know how I feel about that. I liked Reyes better than Valdez and Hamilton (I'm sure I'm in the minority)
Agreed. I guess he offered positional flexibility, but that doesn’t really help when you aren’t particularly good at anything. And he’s not a kid—this is what he is.
seems like Valdez could at least have some upside. Hamilton hasn't shown much. I liked him last year, but Reyes has been really bad this year and is 4-5 years older than either of the other guys. Makes sense to me to do it this way, though I'd shed no tears over Hamilton being DFAd either
Honestly, between Reyes, Hamilton, Dalbec and Valdez they're all pretty much the same level of who cares, because they shouldn't be on the active roster of an MLB team that ostensibly still has winning the World Series as it's goal anyway.
Technically I think Reyes has the least control and probably the fewest (if any) options remaining, so I guess he should be the one to go.
Plus, one of the others will be gone once Grissom is activated anyway.
Technically I think Reyes has the least control and probably the fewest (if any) options remaining, so I guess he should be the one to go.
Plus, one of the others will be gone once Grissom is activated anyway.
Valdez has a had a lot of hard hit ball for outs and fill well with Grissom and Reyes is the best non-Rafaella SS on the team. I thought keeping those two was the play.
Once Grissom is back, who does he replace? Would have thought Valdez, but with Reyes gone, I’m not so sure now. Would have expected Pablo to stick around as he seems to profile as a more useful backup IF than Hamilton or Valdez, but who knows. Imagine Reyes could remain in the org if he clears waivers?
Pablo was out of options. I would have thought he’d be the utility infielder until / if Romy returns, but guess not.
best reliever numbers on the team.
Other than BB/9 and WHIP. And H/9
OK, best ERA on the team. And you can't teach that
It probably would have been easier, in terms of keeping assets, to send Hamilton or Valdez or Bobby down and keep Reyes, but let's be honest, Reyes is completely fungible. Romy is probably going to be back sometime soon, and he's got options too, so that's three middle infielders who can shuttle between AAA and MLB. I'd guess we see another one of those guys head down to AAA when Grissom comes backs (Hamilton might be the one to stick as he can field SS (barely), I'd bet).
Reyes, with that in mind, really didn't have a place on the team going forward. Small added benefit of not jerking the kids around, either, sending them up and down over and over again to keep Reyes on the team.
Reyes, with that in mind, really didn't have a place on the team going forward. Small added benefit of not jerking the kids around, either, sending them up and down over and over again to keep Reyes on the team.
He's a hit-first 2B who is currently below Mendoza and OPS'ing .436
He would have had a future in the NL as a double switch PH if the league still had pitchers hit.
I don't think he's going to be a worldbeater at second-base, but he's getting killed by BABIP despite an above-average hard-hit percentage. The guy has been the king of deep flyouts this year.
More concerning to me is that his K rate has ballooned from 25 last year to 31 percent, and he hasn't found any of the discipline he displayed in AA and AAA. He strikes me as the kind of guy who just struggles to adjust, and that's borne out in his minor league numbers. It's possible, of course, that he never does adjust to major league pitching. He hasn't been able to lay off curveballs inside or fastballs up or changeups away or... pretty much anything.
I see him as trade-bait because Grissom has far more potential, but it would be bad to ignore what the guy does well.
I believe Grissom will replace Valdez. Hamilton can play both SS and 2B somewhat passably, has breakout speed on the bases also. Then you have Dalbec backing up 1B and 3B. Valdez is essentially a 2B only and barely even that to be honest.
Cooper/Dalbec/Grissom/Hamilton are the 4 guys I expect they will go forward with for now.
So our IF depth charts now look something like this:
3B Devers DalbecReyes Romy Grissom Hamilton Valdez Wong
SSStory Rafaela Reyes Romy Hamilton Grissom
2B Grissom ValdezReyes Rafaela Romy Hamilton Wong
1BCasas Cooper Dalbec Reyes Romy Refsnyder Valdez Wong
In the minors, we have (assuming Dalbec is optioned when Grissom returns, although Valdez and Hamilton are also candidates):
3B Dalbec Westbrook Sogard Meidroth
SS Sogard Simas Mayer
2B Sogard Simas Yorke Mayer
1B Dalbec Kavadas Hickey
3B Devers Dalbec
SS
2B Grissom Valdez
1B
In the minors, we have (assuming Dalbec is optioned when Grissom returns, although Valdez and Hamilton are also candidates):
3B Dalbec Westbrook Sogard Meidroth
SS Sogard Simas Mayer
2B Sogard Simas Yorke Mayer
1B Dalbec Kavadas Hickey
Poor kid went thru Little League with a clear goal in life and then the league has to go change the rule and dash his dreams.
It's entirely possible Pablo clears waivers, accepts a spot in Worcester and clears a spot on the 40 man.
Sorry if this was posted somewhere else but since the start of 2023, BD has hit 5-for-45 (.111) with strikeouts in 57% of his plate appearances against *fastballs*.
View: https://twitter.com/jayhaykid/status/1783906143330296121
He's obviously completely in his own head. The difference between him and Valdez, for example, in how they're responding to bad at-bats, is really striking. Valdez throwing his bat and yelling in frustration, Bobby flipping his bat and muttering to himself. It's kind of sad. I'm not sure either one is better, to be clear! But at least with Enmanuel you can look at his HH% and see a breakout possibly coming for him. Bobby seems to be waving bon voyage at pitches rather than swinging at them.
But guys can have mental breakthroughs just as they have physical breakthroughs. Duran is a nice example. Wilyer's K rate was 41% like two weeks ago and he wasn't hitting the ball very hard, now it's 24% and he's got a wrc+ of like 140. Guy gets hot. I wouldn't surprised to see either of those guys break out this year if given the opportunity.
But with Cooper joining the team and Grissom coming back, they're probably going to be headed back to AAA sooner or later to get regular at-bats.
Yeah, Dalbec can’t catch up to major league fastballs. I don’t think his lack of success is much more complicated than that.
OK, so if I'm correct (and there is a fair chance that I'm not) Casas is transferred to the 60 day IL to free up a spot on the 40 man roster. Reyes is DFAed to clear a spot on the 26 man. That leaves us with an open 40 man slot, yes?
Interesting article I saw that describes the difference between major league and minor league pitching: https://www.mlb.com/news/minor-league-statcast-data-compared-to-mlb
It does. I suspect they'll be keeping that open spot.... open. There's a very real chance they'll still be in the thick of the mix in July and could be looking to bolster the rotation via trade and hopefully slide Whitlock to the pen. Although Dalbec will likely get DFA'd also at some point.... right?
I wouldn't mind seeing Chase Meidroth get a spot on the 40 man. He had a nice spring and is slashing .282/.453/.791 in 95 PAs with WOOstah. He's walked 20 times, has only struck out 9 times and from what I've seen he's a decent defender at several IF positions.
I'm seeing 44 minus 5 60 day ILs here for 39.
https://www.mlb.com/redsox/roster/40-man
Edit...They have Vladimir Guttierez twice. He must be really good.
Super cool thanks. That data set will grow and offer more insights over time I’d imagine as well.
It also makes sense to keep it open in the short run. If there's another injury that does not result in a 60-day IL, they're still a bit thin on replacement players. So maybe the most-appropriate minor leaguer gets added to the 40 a month from now.
I don't imagine Dalbec is getting DFA'd this season. Since he can be optioned, it makes sense to continue to stash him in Worcester if/when he's no longer needed on the big club. At the end of the season, I can definitely see him being a DFA candidate though. They're going to have to get the 60-day IL folks back on the 40-man roster heading into the off-season. I don't see Dalbec surviving past that unless he miraculously figures out how to hit big league pitching this summer.
Probably a bit more, since the statistic wasn't for swinging strikes.
And we've seen him put the bat on 95-6 mph fastballs, literally two days ago.