The Red Sox have optioned outfielder Jarren Duran to Triple-A Worcester, Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com reports. Righty Tanner Houck will take his spot on the active roster. The Red Sox have yet to formally announce this and any other roster moves that will be made this afternoon.
Duran, 24, is regarded as one of the top all-around prospects in baseball but did not hit the ground running upon his initial call-up from Worcester last month. The 2018 seventh-rounder was plugged in as the everyday center fielder in Boston upon his debut but has struggled to adjust to big league pitching. Through 89 plate appearances, Duran has posted a .221/.236/.372 slash. He’s drawn just two walks in that time and struck out at a whopping 37.1 percent clip to begin his big league career.
The Red Sox surely still view Duran as a key piece to their future. However, with deadline acquisition Kyle Schwarber now in the fold as an option in left field — Alex Verdugo is capable of manning center — the Sox can send Duran back to Worcester for further refinement in a lower-pressure setting. The fact that Boston has slid down the AL East standings in rapid fashion due both to the Sox’ own poor play and the Yankees’ 10-game winning streak surely also adds some pressure to get better immediate results on the field.
Duran appeared in 46 games with Worcester earlier this season and fared quite well, batting .270/.365/.561 with vastly better walk and strikeout percentages — 11.0 and 23.7, respectively — than he showed in the Majors. He’ll need to spend 10 days in the minors unless he’s recalled as the corresponding move in an injury. Rosters can expand from 26 to 28 players beginning Sept. 1, so he could very well get another opportunity in the Majors before too long.
The decision to option Duran today won’t impact his path to free agency or his arbitration schedule. Based on the July 17 date of Duran’s initial promotion to the big leagues, the maximum amount of service time he could’ve accrued in 2021 was 79 days — well shy of a full year of service (172 days). He’s controllable through at least the 2027 season as it stands and would reach arbitration in the 2024-25 offseason. Even if Duran stays in Triple-A for the remainder of the current season, that free agency timeline would remain intact so long as he accrues at least 134 days of service time next season. The Sox would need to keep him in Worcester through late May next year to change that timeline, which seems unlikely.
The kid wasn’t ready rushed up to help. He’ll be fine.
Agreed Pashka. it will be interesting to see if Bloom uses on of his two September call ups for speed. Barring injury, I don’t think so because while he’s explosive on the base path, he wasn’t able to steal a base at will which I was expecting
If Duran comes back as a September call-up, does that time count as MLB service time? If not, it may be that the Sox want Duran to not be on the MLB team at the end of this year because of the possibility of no baseball next year. This is because all major leaguers might eventually be granted a year of service time for next year after not having baseball. So, having Duran be a minor leaguer at the end of this year could prevent the Sox from losing a year of his service to a year there was no baseball. I read that teams may be thinking this way and not want to risk losing service time next year.
Looks like September call-ups do accrue service time. Let’s see what happens.
AITSTYW – Every day on the major league roster counts. His target year for arbitration is now 2025 if he is a Super 2 if he’s not in the top 22 percent in roster days then his arbitration starts in 2026.
The question really is when they option Houck back, will Duran be brought back. We have about a week to go before the Sept call ups, so that plays into also
According to the article, “He’ll need to spend 10 days in the minors unless he’s recalled as the corresponding move in an injury.”
I doubt he will be recalled. He adds very little value right now, and really needs a lot, lot more minor league ABs. And Bloom probably wants to save the service time.
Too bad, kid shows promise and some real speed off the bench. He’ll be back with callups though
Duran, 24, is regarded as one of the top all-around prospects in baseball but did not hit the ground running upon his initial call-up from Worcester last month.
Well, he most certainly did hit the ground running! Trouble is, his hitting ran into the ground.
Too many K’s, bizarre routes to fly balls, unexciting stolen base percentage. Needs a TON of work to even become “meh”. Has some pop. but who doesn’t.
Earlier in his career, looked like he might be a decent 4th OFer, but that won’t work. because the defense is sub-par. Not saying there isn’t talent there, but they called him up waaaaaaaaaaaay too early for a competitive team.
Oh ya, and Verdugo is “capable” of handling center. Again, but not on a team that thinks it’s in the hunt.
“Duran appeared in 46 games with Worcester earlier this season and fared quite well, batting .270/.365/.561 with vastly better walk and strikeout percentages — 11.0 and 23.7, respectively — than he showed in the Majors”.
Wow, exactly how far have major league player expectations fallen to laud a .270 hitter (that’s 27 hits in every 100 official at bats) in the minors with 1 strikeout for every 4 at bats and call him “one of the top all-around prospects in baseball” while flailing in the majors at a .221 rate with 1 in every 3 at bats a K!
Sounds like he needs a hell of a lot of “seasoning” in the minors and if’s one of the top prospects I wonder what the bottom of the MLB prospect lists looks like!
But don’t worry, Pasha2k thinks he’ll be fine! Sorry couldn’t resist!
Now do OBP and slugging and you should find the answer to your baseless criticism if it wasn’t that obvious.
Is there anything worse in baseball than a batting average worshipper? At least it quickly separates the unintelligent from the rest.
I know. Posts like Rocky’s reveal a complete lack of baseball understanding. He’d fit in well on a 1980s call-in show.
Yes there is one thing worse.
Can’t believe I’m again agreeing somewhat with Rocky. Old school looks at batting average, walks and RBIs at the plate mainly and his stats at AAA were ok but nothing great. I’m most concerned about his not learning how to steal a base and his arm for CF which seems as bad as can be.
He’s not an easy player to get a read on. Until this year, he has had almost no power. 3 HRs in college. 1 HR in 80 ABs in the foreign leagues. 1 HR in 90 ABs in the AZFL. It was only this year that he showed any power, and that was mostly at home.
The power is legit, since some of those shots were absolute drives. But I am not convinced that this will translate well into the majors. To me, he looks like a Dalbec type of player. He’s got some skills, but far from a sure thing.
Joe,
he started turning heads last fall in the AZ league I think. Anyway, I still can’t believe his lack of arm strength.
Thanks for explaining what a .270 average was, none of us had any idea.
How many hits does a .240 average work out to be per 100 at bats? I can’t wait to find out.
I gotta agree with you. Yes, I grew up in the 80’s watching baseball. But how is a .270 hitter a great prospect? So if he hit .205, got onbase .400 and slugged .500 he would be a great prospect?? I don’t get. I think it also makes for boring baseball.
OBP and SLG correlate much more strongly to run scoring than AVG does. Yes, a .200/.400/.500 guy belongs in the heart of the order…
Batting average isn’t useless. Contact ability itself isn’t useless, and may become less unimportant as hitters continue to adapt to the heavy use of shifting. The game has always changed from era to era, and right now, it’s Adam Dunn ball.
Batting average is really handy for looking at lower level minor league players. I think if you see average or better strikeout rate coupled with a high batting average, you might feel better about the guy being able to survive against the tougher pitching he’s going to see in AA and AAA.
Interesting take. Never thought of BA that way.
With his speed, if he leads off and can get on base, with hitters behind him he can lead the league in runs scored which I forgot to include in what I believe is importantm
rocky7 – Lots of players came up and started slowly including Ken Griffey Jr. He was a skinny fast center fielder who struggled and he turned out pretty well. There is no way to know how Duran will handle his struggle. Some work hard and make adjustments and some don’t.
Too many people want to declare victory or defeat quickly when players come up. Chavis never had a chance but Devers sucked an got lots of time to develop. The team will be the biggest factor as to whether Duran gets the chance to develop as a player or gets crap roles and then tossed aside like Chavis. The front office bias will determine Duran’s future, not his skill set. It shouldn’t be that way but there are certain players they support and others they don’t support. Hopefully Duran will get the Devers treatment not the Chavis treatment.
Duran’s minor league record is very good. He moved quickly to AAA and was only hitting .270 and normally you would be right to suggest he needs more seasoning BUT this MLB team is lacking talent so it won’t make the playoffs and this is a throw away season like last year. It’s a perfect time to bring him up and let him learn how to adjust to MLB pitching. He’s been able to struggle at a level in the minors then come back the next year and do very well. He appears to have what it takes to make adjustments so let him do it at the MLB level.
The only thing that must be monitored is his confidence in the process of making adjustments at the MLB level. If he can handle the failure and what it will lead to then keep him in the majors and let him learn during this wasted season.
KD, lacking talent? Offense is fine. Defense outside of a couple players and pitching need to improve but this is not a throwaway season like last year. They got perhaps the best player in the draft because of last year. Sox are in the playoffs with five weeks to go. You don’t throw away this opportunity.
Dewey – LACKING TALENT BIG TIME!!!
Most good teams have more than 3 excellent hitters and 1 excellent pitcher.
In the Division the Yankees have WAY more talent. Toronto has more talent, TB wins without much talent and now they have Cruz and Franco, only Baltimore lags behind Boston in talent. That means lots of 4th place finishes in the future until more talent is acquired.
I agree that the draft pick was great but it cost fans a miserable team for a shortened season and the wait for that asset will be four to six years..
If the season was over the Red Sox would be in the playoffs. Instead, they will be lucky to stay ahead of the teams close behind them for another week. It is highly likely they will be a distant fourth place after 7 games with TB. And if that doesn’t kill them 9 straight games with the White Sox, Yankees and Seattle will surely bury them.
They’ve been pretenders the whole season playing above their skill level. Take away JD, Bogey, Devers and Sale and you have next to no talent on the team. Verdugo is the next best player and he’s Benny in year 2. He may get better in the future or just be a journeyman outfielder for his career. Guys like Duran and Dalbec give me more hope for the future than Verdugo. Kiki is a league average 2B who had a good year. Vazquez is a better than league average catcher who has had a bad year and may be past his prime. Renfroe was a great surprise and may end up being the fourth best hitter on the team. Is he an all-star? NOPE. Do you see the mediocrity now?
Would adding Rizzo have given them a talent boost? Absolutely. Would adding Semien instead of Kiki given them a talent boost? Yep but that boost went to TOR a divisional rival and Rizzo went to the Yankees and even Cruz went to TB so the competition who was already better than Boston each got a talent boost and Boston just got Sale back. That’s a great talent boost but he was already part of the roster for the future.
Fourth is the current level of talent in the division and fourth is the 2022 level. Fourth gets you no playoff games just more ho=hum seasons. How can you possibly be ok with the current approach to the future?
Bloom threw away the outside chance they had after over-performing for 2/3rds of the season. The fork is stuck in them as seen by the loss today to the hapless Twins. They have to beat the bad teams and break even with the good teams to have a chance and they only took two of three from Texas who sucks and now 2 of 3 from Minnesota who sucks and next is Cleveland. If they don’t sweep they will be on the edge of dropping out of the 2nd wild card with 7 games against TB in 10 days and 3 more with Cleveland as breathers that are must wins.
2 out of 7 against TB will drop them several games behind SEA and OAK and maybe even TOR will pass them at that point. Obviously, they need to keep competing hard but Cora messing with the line-up and mishandling the pitching staff won’t make things any easier!!
Small things like not moving Schwarber to the top of the order then Bogey then JD then Devers then Renfroe then Verdugo then Dalbec then Vazquez then Kiki hitting 9th.. Schwarber went on his tear in the 1 hole. He has a high OBP too.
Sorry Dewey but we disagree on the talent level. No Mookie, no Price equivalent on the pitching staff, no legitimate closer. Lots of holes filled with average performers not above average players like Mookie. Renfroe has been the one big surprise and I appreciate all he’s done. Kiki will never be more than a blah since they passed on Semien and even Cesar Hernandez who would have been better.
The off season needs to see the GM fired and a new one hired who has actual experience at picking up talent through Free Agency. Bloom’s best pick-up when he was in TB (I believe he was a fly on the wall for the deal not the brains behind it) was getting Glasnow and Meadows, two controllable players not free agents!
The missed moves at the deadline is plenty of reason to fire the guy. And ownership needs to get off this austerity kick. Stop adding to your wealth and start adding to the wealth of your fans!! You did it for 20 years!! Why stop now?
rocky7
with vastly better walk and strikeout percentages — 11.0 and 23.7, respectively
==========================================
You’re right, even if not everyone sees it. The strikeouts were too high for someone almost 25 in AAA. His strikeouts projected to be 162/600 ABs. That’s pretty high, and probably translates to 200 Ks in the pros. With too many Ks, and not enough power, no one will ever walk him.
He’s got some talent, but probably needs another year in the minors.
Grady Sizemore? It’s early, I know, I wish him well, but the Sox prospect hype is amusing. Duran is not close to big league ready. Whatever happened to that Betts kid? He seemed legit.
Not a Red Sox fan by any means but they did fine in that trade and did well to move him when they did. He was leaving anyways.
Jeter Downs is having a bit of a lost year, Verdugo seems like your typical nothing-special outfielder, he’d fit in well in Kansas City, but not a starting outfielder for a contending ballclub. Connor Wong is a backup catcher.
Even Betts having an injury-filled down year is twice as valuable as everyone they got for him put together. Red Sox could be fighting for division lead if they’d kept him rather than wallowing around on the margin of a playoff spot. And that’s not even counting David Price’s pitching contributions, which have been solid, and certainly better than most of Boston’s pitchers.
They could have paid Betts market rate. They decided to not even come close in favor of being clever. Jon Lester all over again, except this time with a younger, cornerstone potential HOF-level player.
Wong was just an extra piece, so not a major part of the trade equation. Downs was and is still just a prospect and the lost 2020 minor league season seems to have disrupted player progression, so for now nothing much to say. Verdugo was the rare MLB-proven guy with almost full control, and indeed after putting up 2+ WAR in well less than a full season the year before with the Dodgers he has been worth roughly 3.5 WAR over about one full season total so far in Boston, while being versatile. 5 years of cheap control for a high floor player is VERY valuable, unless one wants to make a sensible trade look worse than it was.
Obviously Boston would be better off just slotting Betts onto the team. But then account for the huge chunk of extra salary.
Then step out of fairly land and remember that Betts is a human being and under no obligation to take what Boston offered him, even an overpay. It’s incredibly presumptive to assume that $X would have kept Betts in Boston as if he were a video game bot. Meanwhile, there are hints (we’ll never really know) that he had in mind to play elsewhere and Boston, shocking I know, acted on that understanding.
Nothing says troll more than declaring that a team was trying to be “clever” when there’s no evidence for that. You just said it because you feel like it. By the way, this was a notably different situation to that of Lester, and you should recall that Boston made Lester a perfectly fine market offer leading into his final season with the team, when his breakout year after a period of relative disappointment juiced his stock back up and made that fine market offer look like a lowball (a misrepresentation that some in the Boston media, being the clickbait turds that some of them are, eagerly ran with).
Verdugo is quite a bit better than a nothing-special outfielder. If the Sox don’t want him, the Dodgers would probably be happy to take him back (though not for Betts). Had he not been hurt, the 2019 season might have ended differently for the Dodgers.
Andrewyf – You hit it on the head. Verdugo is a nothing special outfielder who was sold as a bright star. About the best thing you can say about him is that he has a positive attitude but he isn’t a great hitter for average, doesn’t have great power, doesn’t steal bases and got surpassed by Renfroe as the best glove in the outfield. I think that qualifies him as nothing special. Solid but nothing special. Making an all-star game could change that opinion because the fans see him as nothing special when they voted the last two years.
RedSoxu571 – The Red Sox made hundreds of millions because of Mookie. Do you think paying him would have been a real strain on the pocket books of the ownership group? I don’t consider anything Andrewyf said as the comments of a troll. I completely agree with him.
If memory serves me the word low-ball is associated with many Red Sox offers over the last 20 years. Also, HOME TOWN DISCOUNT. Doesn’t it piss you off that a team making that much profit plus having it’s organization value increase by over a billion should put that many players in the awkward position of having to take a home town discount? I think that sucks. You are making money hand over fist and you go cheap on so many Red Sox players who just want a fair compensation for their work?
When you think about why people don’t like playing in Boston when the fans are great, the city is great and the ball park is great you must always go back to a racist ownership that behaves like misers. Stop asking for home town discounts and pay your employees at a fair rate. So you only make $450M instead of $500M that year. Should anyone being thinking OUCH that $50M must really hurt? Or should they think about the Red Sox greats that end up in another town?
It pisses me off that anyone would look down on the Sox. They made mookie a 300 million dollar offer that he rejects for 50 mill more in LA. And the Sox are considered cheap? Get real. Those big deals barely ever work out. Lindor looks amazing btw lol. Verdugo looks like a really good ball player. He won’t ever be mookie but he gives us the chance to build an actual team. Not Bryce Harper and a bunch of low end players. It was a tremendous move to deal mookie
silversteel – Stop thinking like the Red Sox is a family, it’s a massive corporation with hundreds of millions in profits and the profits grew dramatically because of Mookie. You think a $300M contract when you are worth at least $360M is a smart move for Mookie? Go back to your boss and tell him you want 17% below market value as your pay!!!
Big deals barely ever work out? You have no comprehension of baseball and how long term deals work. The gains come in the early years when the player performs above the money value and then time passes so the money value decreases by 3 to 7 percent annually and the player needs to perform less to break even. By the end of the contract the team has received more value than cost paid even when the last two years in a 10 year deal aren’t close to where the player started in year 1.
Lindor gets a 10 year deal and you use it as an example because the first season is filled with injuries and lower numbers than expected? What if he’s an all-star the next 9 years? My point is it’s too early to evaluate it.
AROD had two contracts and he made good on both. Pujols, Trout and even Miggy all made good on long term contracts. Remember, you have to count the overage in performance the early years to balance out the shortage in the later years and you have to discount the money over time.
Long term deals with stars usually turn out fine. Mookie will make this LAD contract look like a smart move. Year 1 he finished 2nd in the MVP vote. Year 2 injuries have hurt his performance. Year 3 should be key to his future success because he had a career year in Boston twice and then regressed the next year but when you add the two years together he was worth the big bucks.
The MOOKIE deal is the worst in 100 years. Verdugo isn’t a building block he’s a complimentary player in return for a building block that wanted out due to racism. Without building blocks like Mookie (who was homegrown for Pete’s sake) you have an average team that will provide average results. In a division with stellar teams except Baltimore the Red Sox are pegged for fourth until they dump Bloom and find a GM with balls enough to tell ownership to stop hoarding the huge profits and reinvest in their ball club like DD did.
NOBODY is looking down at the players they look down at a racist ownership group, an inept GM and a cheating manager. We all love the players. Yes, we debate their strengths and weaknesses but we all love the players and support them.
Jon Lester all over again
=========================
Not even close, imo. Lester all but begged the RS to extend him. Larry wanted to get cute and was jealous that Cherington got all the credit for 2013. So he was going to show the ‘kid’ how it’s done, by insulting Lester.
It’s not as big a loss as it seems, since Lester did run down as he aged, but anytime a player’s opening bid is ‘you’re going to have to rip this jersey from my back’, then I want to re-sign the guy.
And Betts wasn’t coming back.
Good luck to the Dodgers after year 4 of Mookie’s Contract. Huge overpay that is going to turn into what the Albert Pujols contract looked like for the Angels on the back end. The only problem I had with the Trade with the Dodgers was not getting a quality Starting Pitcher in the package.
All these 10 + year contracts taking players into their 40 are so ridiculous. Heck, Mike Trout’s contract is already starting to look like an albatross too… he can’t stay on the field/ hurt often.
I would do the trade again even without Wong or Downs. Mookie is great but wanted to leave and the Dodgers had the moving forward budget not Boston. Had the Sox re-inked him, they would have been hamstrung for years on signing others.
KD, you’re out in space on Mookie. He was never staying. AV is solid. Can play all three outfield positions and has been a .300 hitter as a Sox. The team doesn’t need a line up of home run hitters. He plays with passion and is exactly what the team needs as a two or seven hitter.
KD, don’t include PED users in evaluating contracts. For every one you say was great, there are more that didn’t work out for the team. Add in no team could stay above the tax base forever (Bowie Kuhn wouldn’t have allowed teams to avoid taxes with trades allowing the old team to fully pay in exchange for better prospects and I think the next CBA should correct this loophole) due to non-salary penalties.
deweybelongsinthehall
I would do the trade again even without Wong or Downs.
=============================
I said from day 1 that the correct return for one year of Mookie was 5 years of Verdugo. I wanted more, and got more, but I’d have made that trade even-up.
In parts of three seasons with LA, Verdugo had a 3.0 WAR in only 488 PAs. That works out to 4.0/650. For minimum wage, that’s huge.
Or, the way I like to assess these things is, for the same price as Mookie & Price, you could have Verdugo & Cole, plus $10M in spending money;. I think people really underestimate how much you can buy with $30M+.
Dewey – You’ve got some unusual responses tonight.
Justifying Verdugo by saying we don’t need stars is just bizarre to me. That’s exactly what they had in Mookie and what they don’t have in Verdugo. During Verdugo’s 5 years of control the Red Sox will not win a ring. With Mookie it would have been far more likely as he proved in LAD last year after they couldn’t win a ring in over 30 years.
If Verdugo was not involved in the Mookie deal he would be an enthusiastic outfielder with slightly above average hitting and fielding skills and modest speed. At his price he would be fine as a complimentary player. The problem is the Red Sox gave up a super star to get him and didn’t replace the super star talent level. Thus you must compare Verdugo to Mookie and it’s a joke. He’s more than a huge step down from Mookie the perennial all-star. Verdugo doesn’t have the talent to be an all-star.
So lets get back on planet earth. If Mookie wasn’t staying because of the racism then the payroll has $27M more dollars going forward. That $27M bought the team 30 or 40 utility players or average to below average pitchers? How is it a GM can’t figure out that if he loses huge talent he needs to replace it? The money can be pulled from the excessive profits being made but you have to have the balls to ask for it. Apparently, Bloom is without balls. That certainly is grounds for firing him. Fans should run him out of town for lack of performance during his 2 years.
As far as PEDs go you are so archaic in your thinking about their impact it’s not worth the time reciting the facts to you again. The ball is the highest correlation to HRs not PED use. The data shows PEDs had no impact on HRs. Open your mind to the facts and stop the misguided hating.
I listed several players whose contracts were good ones and you don’t list any that were bad ones but you say there were without actually sighting ONE!! Simple finance explains the imbalances in the early and late years and anyone who bitches that the late years make the contract bad needs to go back to school and study simple finance.
JB – Stop quoting WAR it’s meaningless. It’s a fabricated number based on averages not real results. Use simple logic.
WOULD YOU RATHER WIN A RING or HAVE FIVE CONTROLLABLE YEARS OF A SLIGHTLY ABOVE AVERAGE PLAYER? That’s a no brainer to most except NYY and LAD fans. They’d rather have the 5 years and no ring. For NYY fans it has been over a decade and LAD waited over 3 decades until they got Mookie to put them over the top. Always take the solution that leads to a ring.
Poor interpretation of baseball data seems to be your forte. Farm Systems should be measured by their contribution to the MLB team not prospects that MIGHT someday contribute and more talented players that cost more are always better than cheaper less talented players when you are a big market team making hundreds of millions in profit.
Redsoxu571 – Excellent response. I don’t agree with Verdugo being much more than an every day cheap player like Benny was before the coaching staff helped him beef up and get traded. Downs if you dig deep into his minor league numbers you’ll yawn. Very ho hum for a guy who was taken in the first round. He had 12 good games in 2019 at AA because they played a pathetic team with no pitching. His 12 games far surpassed his nearly 200 previous games in the minors but was used by poor baseball analysts to move him from obscurity to 44th on the prospect list. If you follow the politics of how players are rated you’ll understand why he was traded shortly after the ridiculously high ranking.
He’s not proven he can hit AA pitching so facing AAA pitching and him hitting below .200 makes perfect sense. That’s on Bloom for promoting him too soon in hopes of creating an illusion as to how good he is. Downs may some day figure out AA pitching and deserve to be at AAA but his inability to thrive at the lower levels of the minors certainly raises questions as whether he can thrive at the MLB level. Great exit velocity and lots of walks don’t make for a good hitter, they simply provide some indication that if the hitter has decent hand/eye coordination they might be a star down the road. It’s now been several years and Downs has shown below average hand/eye coordination. That’s usually a leading indicator to a player that will not star at the major league level.
FYI…. love your animosity toward Boston writers without a clue and/or behaving like puppets. Great insight!!
Funny, people are optimistic about prospects for every team and get excited about them, but only Boston seems to need to apologize for “prospect hype”. His arrow was pointing up at an accelerated rate and in a year when most exciting prospect call-ups have underwhelmed (all hype I guess???) that got him a bit of extra attention, but nothing unwarranted given his profile.
It’s no surp[rise that rookies have largely struggled in 2021. There was no minor league season in 2020.
Winter prediction: Bad teams will sell low on some of these players while good teams will happily scoop them up.
“…the sox own poor play & the Yankees 10-game winning streak surely adds some pressure to get better results on the field.”
I’ll bet it does.
Tell ya though…I want to see the Yanks put as much distance as they can between themselves & that sox/A’s/Jay’s scrum as we can.
3 good, playoff caliber teams battling for one spot. Exactly what Manfred wants, uh?
At the moment I think the sox’ll hold onto that second Wild Card spot. Have fun playing the damn Ray’s in the WC game.
Tip of the cap to the Yankees. So resilient and so resourceful. We’ve been looking up at you guys for decades mostly. Sox had a couple World Series wins but way too many last-place finishes as well.
I like the direction of the current regime and picking their spots with the money before they make a big splash when they think the team is ready. But yes the Yanks are always in front of us. They get it done some way somehow even through adversity.
Have you been awake this century?
Absolutely. I’m especially awake this season and right now. Have you seen the standings?
Gary – The Yankees averaged more than $30M a year higher payroll than the Red Sox since 1988. The reason we have beaten them so badly in the last 20 years has been the Red Sox ownership commitment to staying close to them in spending and actually outspending them in 2 or 3 of those 20 years.
That era ended when they fired DD. Now, the Yankees spend nearly $`100M more than the Red Sox and pickup expensive players at the deadline because they want to win. That’s no longer the case in Boston. Get used to finishing fourth. That’s the future under this ownership mindset of cheapness. The profits have not disappeared for the owners and the value of the organization hasn’t dropped but the ownership stopped spending!! You can’t compete with the Yankees if you stop spending. It’s that simple.
Tampa Bay owns you
Yanks have won 12 of their last 13 series’ (plus a make up game Vs the Angels). We’re riding a 10 game winning streak, the hottest team in the AL, etc.
& we are *still* 4 back.
Man. Those guys. Pretty good ballclub, serious.
They remind of some scrappy little player, with no outstanding talent, but is always on base in a one-run game. You can’t get rid of the MF’rs.
I go to the Red River for waterfowl a few times/year. It is one of the 4 rivers in the world that flows south to north. As such, it is a bit unnerving. Sure, I’m merely on a river. But everything is just a little bit off.
That is how I see the damn Ray’s.
Sure. It’s just baseball. But it all seems just a little bit off; all that shifting, openers, all LH lineups, etc.
When Alex Cora heard this, he replied “we have to get better,” which is all he ever says.
FatChance65 – He’s a robot and they didn’t give him a brain!!!!
Alex Cora rehire was a massive mistake
But he will surely get votes for the Manager of the Year award, right?
JB – Cheater of the Year maybe. Manager of the year? If he does it’s a testament to how f’d up the system is. He’s got one year left on the coerced contract he got from ownership. After that he’s gone unless he has more crap to hold over the head of ownership!!
I hate to admit it but the Red Sox are done. Good night.
Quick note, the worst mistake was to give Matt Barnes that new contract midseason. He went back to being Matt Barnes of years past. He was doing so well why did they screw it up?
Small sample size
I don’t believe that the sox are “done” for a second.
The sox are much more willing to punt a season than are the Yanks. That being acknowledged, they were in a pretty good spot at the deadline & thusly were rather modest buyers.
Yet the top half of their lineup is fire. They have 4 above average starters & Sale coming back. Some good complimentary players.
sox are going to be a tough out. Bet.
Like the Yanks, they have another run in them.
Good post, but the back end of the Red Sox bullpen is in trouble. Adam ottavino is slipping and Matt Barnes is back to being Matt Barnes. Garrett Whitlock was an incredibly lucky pick up but he’s not been through the wringer before so he could cough it up anytime also. Fingers crossed.
Let’s see if this team has any resilience. There was a players-only meeting yesterday morning we’ll see how that plays out with the “energy” Factor and the “get serious about things” Factor.
Merci. Yeah, I thought Bloom would do more with their ‘pen.
But no. They are not built to win bullpen battles.
Still, their starters are going to keep you in most games. & they can put up a bunch of runs in a hurry too.
sox & Yanks should really have emulated the Dodgers this deadline.
What do you mean? He went out and got Robles and Davis. And they’ve been … Robles and Davis.
Sigh.
Aside from ’20, Cash always builds good bullpens.
I understand that Chapman has had some absolutely Mesmerizing Meltdowns this season. But this Yankee bullpen will be a formidable weapon this October.
It’s an excellent mix of high end, Big Name guys, very good multi-inning guys, hard throwing kids, & couple good matchup relievers.
Come the playoffs this pen’ll go 6+ deep.
Bet.
Cash leaned from the ’17 deadline. He was playing CBT games then too. Traded Warren for “cap” room. Didn’t address the loss.
This year he did the same with Cessa.
But: he added Joely & Holmes this time. So good.
Excellent GM.
Ducky – A Yankee fan screwing with Red Sox fans. The Red Sox are done!!
They play TB 7 times after they finish with CLE and MIN. THEN they have to play SEA, CWS and NYY for 9 games They have 9 easy games against CLE and BAL which can give Red Sox fans hope but they simply won’t do well against good teams since they lack the talent that Bloom divested them of.
This is all on Bloom based on his position as GM. If ownership is forcing him into all his bad decisions then he needs to grow a pair he’s destroyed the competitive talent level of this team. They rank 4th in talent in the AL East. That’s where they’ll finish!!.
Oh, man…
I sure have. This – however – is not one of those times. For a multitude of reasons, I think the sox are better than Oakland, the Jays, & Seattle.
So I expect they’ll be in the playoffs. Don’t think they’ll necessarily be an easy out either.
Even with Barnes being well less than certain, we still have enough offense and starting pitcher to survive. But come playoff time, if we don’t have a good Barnes, or a reasonable facsimile thereof, we have an issue.
And I know, with complete certainty, that I am wrong when I say this, but part of me says to make Whitlock our closer. He’s already our MVP.
Ducky – One look at the Red Sox remaining games tells you they will finish behind OAK, SEA and TOR not to mention NYY or TB whoever ends up in second place in the division.
Right now with a depleted talent level the Red Sox can compete when Sale and Eovaldi start. Once they are pulled, the games over.
Also, the 3 hot first half hitters are no longer hot and the rest of the team is so weak that they can’t possibly score enough runs to beat the good teams left on their schedule.
Here are their upcoming series:
3 at CLE – Need to sweep but likely to go 2-1
4 at TB – Need to go 2-2 but likely to go 1-3 or 0-4 if Sale loses
3 vs CLE – Again need to sweep but 2-1 is more likely
3 at TB – Need to win 2 but will be lucky to win 1
3 at CWS – Need to win 2 but will be lucky to win 1
3 at SEA – Need to win 2 but will be lucky to win 1
3 vs BAL – Need to sweep but likely to win 2 of 3
2 vs NYM – Need to sweep but if DeGrom is back this could be 1-1
3 vs NYY – Need to sweep but it’s more likely they will be swept
3 at BAL – Need to sweep but likely to win 2 of 3
Now look at this schedule which suggests if all goes well they win 14 of 30 remaining games listed. Does that sound like a record that will beat out teams that are within a couple of games of them today? And what if the games don’t go well and they go 10 and 20? They could finish 5 games back of the pack of team you said they will beat!!
So, you think getting a contract extension in season, rather than living up to an established history of being streaky as his mechanics/feel come and go, is what led to Barnes’s recent struggles? Interesting theory!
I think guys perform better in contract years. I truly believe that.
But the only way that works is if you ignore the 7 games after he signed, and had a 0.00 ERA. You’d have to think that he forgot about his extension for 3 weeks, then remembered it, and then tanked as a result.
JB – Barnes is all about pressure. As the season goes on the pressure to win increases and that has an adverse effect on what we like to call a CHOKE ARTIST like Barnes. Contract or no contract he’s not a closer because he chokes in the clutch moments. He’s got a 12 to 6 curve ball. That alone should prevent him from closing because of the number of times he bounces it trying for a strike out. He’s an extra base waiting to happen in extra innings when he bounces it past the catcher. He has been in the wrong role for a very long time like Devers but crunch time always weeds out the pretenders and it has with many of the relievers that Boston procured that did well when there was no pressure.
Barnes doesn’t make enough money to be worried about his contract. If he goes to free agency, he’ll still make millions and that should be plenty to live off of!! Do you think players really stress over $4M vs $2M? They suck at that level so they should be happy they are millionaires!! If the swing was to be something over $10M then I could see the contract year affecting their performance. Barnes is simply not reliable in the clutch.contract or no contract!
I hate the way Cora used him. Despite having reverse splits throughout Durans career in the minors, Cora decided he wasn’t gonna play him against lefty’s right from day one. He’d also go days in between starts. He had been hitting much better of late making loud outs. There was a game recently where he went 1 for 5 but lined out 3 times. But then doesn’t play again for 3 days. That’s no way to get a hitter in a rhythm. Cora is a big factor in the Sox woeful play since the deadline and don’t get me going on the front office
jdodge22 – You are right and Cora is a moron and a cheater!!
Another manager blaming the young players who they can manipulate rather than crappy veterans who they are afraid of. The red Sox failure is good payback for rehiring a cheater.
Duran got his feet wet at the MLB level but a stint in Worcester will give him regular AB’s instead of rotating with Schwarber, Verdugo, and Renfroe
I genuinely don’t understand how Duran is ranked so high on every prospects list all of a sudden. He’s an almost 25 year old slap hitter with suspect defense. Duran’s power numbers in AAA this year were completely inflated by playing in an extreme hitters park that especially caters to lefties. Aside from his plus speed Duran doesn’t bring much to the table
Well first of all while Duran may have been a slap hitter in the low minors and just used his speed to get hits he was never really a highly regarded prospect despite hitting for high average. He was convinced by the Boston brass that he needed to add power and went through a swing change and added loft to his swing.
While it is true that Worcester is a hitters park he still was hitting for legit power and crushing the ball at AAA. The problem he has now is the big league pitchers are throwing him fastballs up and his uppercut swing he can’t catch up. He will need to learn to lay off that pitch to be successful in the big leagues. He is a fantastic athlete with a very high work ethic. He will be just fine but he needs to be somewhere that he gets at bats every day and he is going to get that right now in Boston.
Did the AAA ballpark radically suppress his strikeouts? I suspect that any missing power in MLB has a lot more to do with struggling to barrel up the baseball against MLB pitching than it does ballpark effects.
No, the fact that he’s a very average hitter who was no longer facing mediocre AAA pitching is why his strikeout rate went up in the big leagues. A simply look at Duran’s career numbers, his stature, and swing paint a very clear picture that he has below average power and only showed signs of hitting for power while playing in a bandbox in AAA
Ronk325 – First time reviewing baseball numbers? Wow did you miss the mark. Maybe the idea of a .300 hitter means nothing to you because you are one of the idiot metric guys that think OBP is all that matters because you don’t understand OBP is mostly BA and some Walk Rate.
The guy came out of Long Beach State and rapidly progressed through the minors. He dominated at low A and A in 2018. In 2019 he dominated in Hi A and then struggled at AA. In 2020 with no minors he played in the Puerta Rican Winter League and the Carribean Series with mixed results. Did very well in the Carribean Series and not so well in the PRWL.
2021 in Worchester he shows his power and it costs him 30 points in his average but he’s making adjustments to have both a high average and power. What’s not to love about the guy?.
Let me ask you? You read his stats and make a comment like “a simple look at Duran’s career numbers, his stature, and his swing paint a very clear picture that he has below average power blah blah blah.
Are you ignorant or just a fan of some other team? The data clearly shows a guy who hits for average and for anyone who criticizes slap hitting as being less valuable than power hitting I say go talk to Ichiro, Boggs, Gwynn and others all the way back to Ty Cobb. You understand nothing about hitting. Read Ted Williams book and figure out what it means to have above average hand/eye coordination and what can be done with that skill which Duran possesses.
Next time bring facts to the debate not bull crap.
It seems like you’re the one using emotion over facts here. Duran had never shown the ability to hit for power before he played in Polar Park. That’s a fact not an opinion. Comparing a guy who’s almost 25 and getting sent back down to AAA to several of the best contact hitters to ever play the game is laughable
Actually Ronk that is simply not a true statement. Duran never showed the ability to hit for power until his swing change. He showed plenty of power in the alternate site during the Pandemic shortened season. He showed plenty of power in the Olympic trials he showed plenty of power in the Puerto Rican World Series. Duran is not a little guy and he has plenty of natural strength it just took a swing change from a slap hitter to lift in his swing to take advantage of that natural strength and power he has. He has only had 89 at bats in the big leagues calling him a bust well that’s just ignorant. Let’s give the kid some time to see if he can adjust to the high fastball I think he will and yes Ronk he will hit for power in the big leagues.
Ronk325 – You actually need to read before you respond. It’s all about hand/eye coordination. Power hitting develops in players at various times. A swing change to increase power was implemented and it worked. That’s a very common occurrence in baseball and the player often loses points on his average when they make the adjustment. He didn’t lose his superior hand/eye coordination that accounted for his many years above .300.
A player changes his stance and approach and you over=rule the specific change because you think a ball park is power friendly? That’s laughable.
Players have tried to change their approaches to improve their power for years. I remember when YAZ did it prior to the 1967 season. If he had played at Polar Park you would have discounted his achievement too!! That’s what makes your comments laughable.
Sox mishandled his playing time. Could never get in a rhythm.
What happened to the “Travis Shaw is a dumb move by Bloom” crowd?
Answer: They’ve moved along to complain about something else. These people never admit they might be wrong.
Plus I read something about Anthony Rizzo hitting two home runs in his first two games as a Yankee.. but hitting .171 since.
Many fans have no patience. Mike Schmidt batted .196 in 132 games as a rookie with 18 HR, 52 RBI, and .697 OPS. The next year he went 36, 118 and .282 with a .941 OPS and leading .546 slugging percentage. For a Red Sox example, there’s Dwight Evans, who was .223/.320/,383 as a hyped rookie.
Mike Schmidt’s APBA card was quite interesting after that rookie season. APBA cards taught me the value of OBP way before it was a thing.
Those game cards were significantly more sophisticated than the numbers we found on baseball cards and Who’s Who in Baseball.
I recall Gene Tenace being one of the first players mentioned as having great value because he walked a lot. Before that, we didn’t hear much about it. When Ron Hunt had 50 HBPs in 1971, he also walked 58 times and had an OBP of .402. Yet nobody talked about the value connected to those 108 free passes. We were told that Hunt was some kind of nut because he didn’t mind getting drilled by pitches. But he scored a career-high 89 runs that year despite being a slap hitter with pedestrian back-of-the-baseball card stats.
It’s also interesting that Schmidt’s rookie struggles coincided with Steve Carlton’s letdown after his spectacular 1972. If not for that, the Phillies might have won the NL East instead of the 82-79 Mets. As it turned out, the Phillies finished last but were only 11.5 games out of first.
My first year playing APBA was 1968. We had draft leagues and played it a lot for about 6 years or so. It made you look at statistics differently, trying to predict what cards would look like before they came out. It was interesting playing it on the 1968 season and then later on the 1970 season. Big difference in the game over those two years.
Some of those baseball game creators were way ahead of the curve. I have never read any interviews with those people but would like to. Funny story: In the mid-70s, Paul Simon was interviewed on an early sports talk show, I think hosted by Bill Mazer. Simon used to play a baseball game, probably Strat-o-Matic. He mentioned that he’d listen to real games on the radio while playing his game, and how he’d be amazed when the player batting in his game would simultaneously be batting in real life. I often had that same experience.
Starting in 1972, I used to play a baseball dice game called Program Four. It was sent to anyone who wanted it for free. Included in the instructions was information on how to create player cards, which I had to make myself. I played a spring training to see how realistic it was, made some tweaks (to cut down on triples, for instance), and wound up playing an eight-team, 72 game season for four straight years. Before year two, I found platoon stats for players and began rating them lefty and righty. I also came up with a way to rate pitchers according to workload, with relievers and most starting pitchers becoming less effective as an outing wore on. By doing that, I started to learn that it was better to replace pitchers before they lost their effectiveness. The problem was I didn’t do it nearly enough. Since I was trying to be realistic, I would often leave starting pitchers in too long just like real Major League managers did. Often, I wound up cursing myself for my pitching decisions. I should have paid attention to the data on the cards I created. In fact, I should have fired myself for not doing so.
Five years ago, I was going through my junk prior to us moving and incredibly found and kept that game. I’d like to play it but my wife gets on my case for not doing my chores as it is. Rolling dice and providing my own play-by-ball would not be a good look.
GaryWarriorsRedSox
Plus I read something about Anthony Rizzo hitting two home runs in his first two games as a Yankee.. but hitting .171 since.
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If you want to get a true chuckle out of sports, then you need to read the Boston writers. I will admit that I’d have liked to have added Rizzo, but just not at the price the Yankees paid.
But Schwarber/Shaw have way outplayed Rizzo so far. But the Boston writers are still writing articles about Rizzo. I still like the guy, but Boston writers are two weeks behind on everything.
JB – Schwarber/Shaw have WAY outplayed Rizzo so far?
The Yankees haven’t lost since they got Rizzo. Please explain since this is actually a team sport how they paid too much for a guy who has energized a lagging team into not losing ONE game?
You can’t see the forest through the trees dude!!
Do you really think his numbers are more important than his leadership, energy and attitude? I’ll take the guy who turns the team to winning over two guys who have no position to play but have a couple of HRs while losing to two weak teams like MIN and Texas!
The last time the Red Sox had a guy with Rizzo’s impact? HIS NAME IS BETTS!!!! And before that? HIS NAME IS PAPI!!!
That’s why you don’t get rid of Betts for this s=show!!
KD17
JB – Schwarber/Shaw have WAY outplayed Rizzo so far?
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It’s not remotely close. It’s a .691 OPS against a combined maybe 1.150 OPS?
And you are commingling causation with correlation. The NYY are 20-4 since picking up Heaney, but he still has a 6.23 ERA.
JB – Outstanding argument!! You are right with respect to the meaning of your two math terms. But you forgot key elements of causation.
Think about what I wrote. Rizzo’s leadership and presence in the dugout is the causal factor not necessarily his batting average. His defense has also been outstanding. Heaney on the other hand has won because the offense has out scored their opponent when Heaney pitches. Heaney – NO CAUSATION so I completely agree. RIZZO – CAUSATION but no correlation between his average and wins only a correlation between his presence in the dugout and wins..
Nicely done JB but you must include intangibles in causation. Papi was always far more than his batting average. All reports I’ve read and watched on the MLB channel support the fact that Rizzo is a huge influence on the chemistry of the Yankees, just like he was with the Cubs.
Just another Red Sox hype train prospect. That really just an below average player
Yup 89 at bats and you can call him bust.
I remember that being the same with some dude with a fish for a last name. Super hyped up and then he revealed how overhyped he was during his first callup and that was it for him.
Yup, Randy Bass never got going. 😉
Tim Salmon !!!!!
I think he meant Trout. Pretty good pitcher from the WS.
HidekiMatsuimalemodel
Just another Red Sox hype train prospect.
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It’s amazing just how many fans think that the Red Sox are the force behind ranking players. These players are ranked by BA, BP, MLB.com, FG, etc. We have no influence over that.
While I agree that he is over-ranked, that has nothing to do with the RS.
JB – You turn coat!!! Duran isn’t over-rated!! Were you confused and thinking Downs? Then you would be right.
If Bloom gives Duran the same opportunity that was given to the Butcher of Boston he’ll be fine!! In year 2 Devers sucked but they kept throwing him out there to make errors and he did and he hit .240 and still got to play. Give Duran that level of devotion and he won’t end up like Chavis and Benny who both got screwed by the front office for being DD guys. I sure hope Duran isn’t seen by Bloom as another DD guy. If it weren’t for all his home runs Bloom was ready to throw Dalbec on the DD guy trash heap and jettison him to a team that would appreciate him. I hope the DD guy name tag doesn’t get attached to Dalbec either!!
Agree, Vazquez, Bogaerts, Devers, Betts are a short list of other recent busts. Only happens in Boston too, remember when they brought up Greg Bird? Gary Sanchez is the new Johnny Bench!
Remember when Banuelos was supposed to be a multiple Cy Young winner?
So…61 ops+ and -0.2 war and we’re already concerned over service time?
Yes, nothing like taking the information-sharing and journalistic web site to task for reporting on the service time status of a prospect when he is moved up or down, same as the site always does. It’s not as if even a single person is interested in such information.
StudWinfield – Dude get a clue!! You don’t bring up Duran and let him struggle to show off his OPS+ or a bull crap number like WAR. You bring him up and let him take his lumps during another Bloom induced wasted season. The Red Sox let Devers play in 2018 when he hit .240 and might as well not have worn a glove to his position he was so bad but in 2019 it paid off (unfortunately not the glove part!).
Throwing Duran in the deep end is exactly what they should be doing with Duran and Dalbec because they are the only chance for the talent level to rise in Boston since Bloom has no idea on who or how to get real added value players. Not complimentary players like Renfroe, Verdugo and Hernandez but added value all-star level players like Semien, Scherzer or a dozen others he didn’t even attempt to go after.
It’s that type of talent that will change the Bloom induced problems currently plaguing the Red Sox. Lack of talent kills a team’s chances for winning rings. Losing Mookie and Price then Benny and even JBJ at this point lowered the talent level. That was replaced with Renfroe who has proven to be a good complimentary player but no all-star, Verdugo yet another complimentary player but no all-star and Cordero a guy who sucks. Duran taking one of the three spots accelerates his growth and the opportunity for Boston to add an all-star level player to their talent mix. It will take a few years but why wait? Just like why wait when it comes to rebuilding a great team by having Bloom GM? It’s like the organization is on pause and some fans still think things are improving because a few stars from the past have had good years The Red Sox are no better off on the field today than in January. The biggest add came from the 2020 ineptitude and that’s their draft pick which single handedly turned the farm system rating from crap to top 10!!! That’s not something Bloom should take credit for it’s the silver lining in clouds that still hover over Boston since DD was fired..
The talent level is down and the results are down so oust Bloom and get somebody whose first act is to go to ownership and say enough of this s=show I’m going to sign 3 stars this off=season that will significantly raise the talent level of this team and it’s going to reduce your profits a bit but once the sustained winning happens you’ll get a lot of it back from playoff TV money, merchandising and Ring Ceremonies!! Sound familar? It should. It’s what DD did and backed it up with a ring.
At 24 and hasn’t figure it out by now. When will he. Yes there’s late bloomers. But at 24!
Judge is a recent one. Granted, Judge has a skill that Duran lacks. I don’t mean necessarily the power, but the strike-zone judgement.
Judge has judgement but maybe Duran has endurance.
Look at all the great recent Blue Jays sluggers (Bautista, Encarnacion, Donaldson) who didn’t break out until they were all almost 30. Look at Nelson Cruz, who wasn’t even an MLB regular until his late 20s, and is now over 40 and still one of the premier sluggers in the game. Look at Mike Yaz’s big breakout last season at age 30.
Late bloomers in MLB really aren’t all that uncommon these days.
Seriously? Duran is 24 because he played in college. He moved through the minors quickly but COVID disrupted his growth. He changed his approach to hitting in attempt to hit for power and he got promoted from AAA with a .270 average but more home runs than usual because his MLB team sucks and it makes sense for him to adjust to MLB pitching rather than AAA pitching since it doesn’t change the outcome for the MLB team. The outcome was determined when Mookie was given away.
Bring him back and let him learn to adjust to MLB pitching. The season is over and fast=tracking his development will help prevent him from spending unnecessary time in the minors at AAA. Downs is hitting below the Mendoze line in AAA and people complain because a talented prospect gets brought up early and doesn’t light up the scoreboard? What a complete screwed up perspective to criticize what Duran has done this year.
Take a breath and put this into perspective. A crap team with some good young talent and you want to berate the good young talent because they weren’t stellar when they first show up in the majors?
Devers hit .240 in 2018 and he sucked terribly on defense but he got a chance to prove himself so give Duran the same chance and even if he runs a few bad routes to balls he’s not going to make two dozen errors like Devers.
Lay off Duran, he’s done fine and will improve. He needs to learn the process for adjusting to what pitchers are doing to him. What better place to do it than on the MLB team that is going to finish fourth in their division. If Duran is destined to be the next all-star level farm system player then the sooner he makes his adjustments the better off the ball club will be.
Good stuff, KD17. The lack of a minor league season in 2020 was a huge blow for prospects.
I actually like what I saw with Duran…. you cant teach speed and he has dynamic speed. Yes… he needs work at plate discipline, which is why he was striking out a lot….When he learns not to chase the high heat out of the zone he will be fine. he had 89 at bats… people need to calm down and stop over reacting…. Jeter struggled mightily when he first came, so did Pedey Laser Show. He will be fine as the everyday CF’er next year… get him everyday at bats to work on some things in Triple A for now.
Cooper – Excellent comment. Age is irrelevant when judging players since it’s the opportunity to play at the MLB that starts the measurements whether a player is succeeding. Having played more in the majors (ie experience) doesn’t get trumped by a young age. Experience in MLB games dictates how fast a player is progressing.
For some reason fans and ownership give some players the chance to be in the majors and fail and others they pass on almost immediately. Devers got opportunities not seen by many Red Sox over the last 100 years. Why? Because the organization wanted the PROGRAM that he played in to keep close ties with them so it’s a big source of Latin players.
Chavis was just the opposite. Never allowed to start ahead of a flailing Devers, Chavis was thrown into a utility role rather than given a fair chance to outperform Devers who had a disastrous YEAR 2. We don’t want Duran or Dalbec to end up like Chavis due to a massive lack of support by the front office and ownership. Give the two youngsters a fair chance and then recognize by the end of Year 2 not sooner that they may turn out really well but evaluating them before the end of year 2 is premature.
The hardest part of making the majors is learning how to adapt your at bats to the league knowledge of how you hit. Devers had a huge whole in his swing in 2018 and fixed it. Chavis had a huge hole in his swing and got shipped out. Let’s hope the huge hole in Dalbec’s and Duran’s swings are dealt with patience. Bloom is struggling to recover talent so we don’t need any more “prior to Bloom” guys tossed in the trash.
The current farm system stars are not Bloom guys but deserve a better opportunity than what was given to Chavis. They deserve Devers treatment!! 2 full years to develop and make adjustments. It’s not as if the team is going to win during those 2 years so let them grow quickly as players and maybe the team will have a higher talent level in 2 years.
Cooper – Nice Pedey reference because he took a blue collar approach to proving himself whereas Jeter was treated like Devers. I like when tenacity and a need to succeed drive a guy like Pedey. I want both Dalbec and Duran to have that chance to prove themselves. Not many get pampered like the Devers and Jeters of the world.
I still can’t believe a guy who was never the best player at his position for 20 plus years gets in the HOF on the first vote. That says volumes about the voting group!! Politics over performance. He always had someone very important in his back pocket like Devers.
Both Dalbac snd Duran bombed. Dalbac should have been sent down at the Allstar Break. The Red Sox are not getting any production from first base. Rizzo was the perfect fit and Chaim Bloom blew that one big time. He needed a pitcher snd relief help and picked up two rag arm relievers. Real bad job when we were so close at the trade deadline. After that the season went into collapse mode. Players know when Management does not respect what they are doing. The same thing happened in 2019 when ownership “Clipped” Dave Dombroski’s wings. When you are in first place you go for it, not sit back and say, “We’ll get them next year”. Players see that.
AL34 – Nice job. I have a slightly different perspective on Dalbec and Duran. Since we all know the team has the 4th best talent level in the division there are only two ways to change that situation.
1 – Bloom and Ownership spend money and get actual talent that is needed not a 3rd DH when you need starting pitching.
2 – The often wrongly criticized farm system produces yet another starter for the MLB Team. Dalbec and Duran fit this action which is necessary for the talent level to improve.
I say give them both a chance like they did with Devers when he sucked in 2018 and they were trying to win a ring, keep both players in the majors and work with them so they learn how to adjust to MLB pitching. Devers turned things around by 2019 after sucking in 2018 and both Dalbec and Duran have the same potential to turn things around and not suck in 2022. Wouldn’t that be a great surprise!! They need talent and if they can make that happen from the farm system DD left Bloom,that would be great!!
I do believe they still need to find a Chapman type player for 3B and trade JD for a top flight SP. Then Sale has a #2, Eovaldi is #3, Houck is #4 and Pivetta is #5 going into 2022. New guy at 3b, Bogey at SS, Kiki at 2B and Dalbec at 1B. Duran in CF, Renfroe in RF and Verdugo in LF with Devers DH.
That team is creeping up on Toronto with respect to talent. If ownership opened up their purse strings then Boston could once again compete with NYY, TB and TOR from a talent level but of course that would reduce their massive profits!!
Chapman’s 162-game bWAR is a ridiculous 6.8. I’d love to find one, but there are not a lot of them out there.
IRT to trading JD for a top-flight pitcher, assuming you mean Martinez, he has no trade value. He’s had a consistent .800 OPS since the end of April. I’d be okay flipping him to save money, and moving Devers to DH, but that only opens up a hole at 3B that needs to get filled. Of course, JDM’s $22M would go a long way to filling that hole.
Triston Casas is legit
Travis Shaw never should of been signed, Tristan Casas should of been given the opportunity Duran was given. The only reasoning not bringing him up made any sense is if the organization settled on Schwarber getting those games at first and they want Casas to get at-bats.
Tristan Casas should of been given the opportunity Duran was given.
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Casas is not close. If he plays a role in 2023, I’d be real happy. The minor leagues are there for a reason. He has an OPS+ of 107 in AA.
JB – Saying he’s not close isn’t a statement you can back up with facts.
Stating that he has NOT mastered AA pitchers is proven by his numbers. He is basically at the same level as Downs except he’s two years younger. Both must prove they can hit AA pitching before going to AAA. Bloom already wasted 2021 for Downs in AAA. He needs to step back and master each level before progressing.
It depends on how pedantic you want to get. I say he is not close, and you say I can’t prove it.
And then you say the numbers indicate he has NOT mastered AA pitchers. Is the fact that he has not mastered AA pitchers not a fact that he is not close to MLB pitching?
I think you are right trading JD for a #2 starting pitcher would be a great idea. I see though the rest of the team slightly different next year. I love the idea of moving Devers to DH I think he commits way too many errors. I’d put Schwarber at 3B though, he really is too slow for the outfield and he did play some games at 3B in Chicago. I would call up Tristan Casas to play 1B it’s next man up time. This way you can concentrate whatever free cash you have in the off-season on this pathetic pitching staff. The only guy in that bullpen that isn’t expendable to me is Whitlock. I got Houck as the future #4 starter behind Sale and Evoaldi and whoever they sign to be the #2. E-Rod is the #5 opening day for me.
kingbum – Good stuff. We need to see if the DH becomes universal. That dramatically changes JD’s value as well as Schwarber’s. Trade them both for young upwardly mobile SPs and take the money saved and fill the #2 SP spot. Then, the pitchers in the JD and Schwarber deals can grow into the bottom of the rotation and maybe ascend from there.
The man needs seasoning in the minors that is quite clear. A 37% strikeout rate is completely unacceptable, you are stranding runners and not moving people around the base pads. Duran does not walk enough or hit for enough power to pull off a .221 batting average, he is not Joey Gallo who despite having a crappy average has a obp .350+ and a ops of +.850 or .900. Duran will not really be a power guy, he probably get ya 15 homers a year, he needs to learn to take pitches and use his speed as a slap contact hitter. Forget launch angles not everyone is Schwarber or Gallo.
kingbum – I say play Duran and Dalbec and let them learn how to adjust to MLB level pitching. If they struggle in 2021 then maybe the lessons learned will pay off in 2022 like Devers when he struggled badly in 2018 and figuring things out in 2019.
With Duran’s speed they need to work on plate discipline, how to steal bases and hitting to all fields. His speed is his biggest asset but they haven’t taught him how to use that top end speed to improve his impact on the game. A 60 steal CFer who hits the ball hard to all fields, whether they are home runs or not, is an outstanding candidate for the future lead-off spot. If he learns the strike zone and gets his walk rate up he’ll be an all-star CFer in the future. If he can’t do it then try the same thing with Jimenez. There is a big difference between speed and effective speed. Right now, he only has speed.
With Dalbec they need to help him with timing mechanisms and strike zone recognition. The power, the swing will generate huge home run numbers. They need him to increase his walk rate out of better strike zone recognition and pitcher fear. They need to help him with off speed by teaching new timing mechanisms that keep his bat in the strike zone longer.
Pivetta, another great Bloom pickup! All he does is drain the bullpen, giving away games in the early innings and then the bullpen having to bail him out every time he pitches. He gave us a lousy 4 innings last night. I’m tired of these garbage pitchers Perez, Richards, and Pivetta they put out there. These clowns should be major league minimum at best, not millions of dollars they are being paid.
And yet 2 days later and Duran is in the lineup… I’m so confused.