Pitchers to watch this season?

[Sea Dog 23]

As luck would have it, the Sox are down to two reliable guys in the rotation. Three if you have to squeeze in Crawford. The irony of ironies to the pitching shortage... Bloom will trade their best pitcher, stat-wise in a couple weeks, according to Ken Rosenthal.  That is no surprise to anyone.  It's already baked in to the Tampa/Bloom strategy.  However if Paxton's name was Sale, it would make more sense.

[MongoLikeSox]

As luck would have it, the Sox are down to two reliable guys in the rotation. Three if you have to squeeze in Crawford. The irony of ironies to the pitching shortage... Bloom will trade their best pitcher, stat-wise in a couple weeks, according to Ken Rosenthal.  That is no surprise to anyone.  It's already baked in to the Tampa/Bloom strategy.  However if Paxton's name was Sale, it would make more sense.

The Sox are in an interesting stretch. There is a clear path to them being the #2 Wild Card team before the Braves Series. If they succeed, then they've got a HUGE 2-game set against the Braves and a west coast trip against the Giants and Mariners. The first 2 Mariners games are before the deadline (one by hours). They've got days off on their side, too.

There is no way Bloom gets away with trading Paxton while in that hunt. If they slide back against lower teams again, it's over. If the breeze through the lower teams, but lose badly in the following week against better teams, it's over.

This could be a 2021 situation or it could be a 2022 situation(or what it should have been.)  If anyone covets Paxton, they had better make a nice overture before the end of the AS break to assure getting him.

[MongoLikeSox]

Some news on the Josh Taylor front. He was scheduled to have surgery last week. I think he had it. Lower back, herniated disc. I hope he comes out of it in fine shape. 60-day IL for now.

A few little bits and pieces from some of the lesser known ex-Red Sox pitching staff that I listed in the first post of this thread. 

• Eduard Bazardo made it to Baltimore two weeks ago and did well not allowing a run in two appearances.
• Jake Diekman found the fountain of competence within the Rays Bull Pen.
• Connor Seabold is back his normal self after a few promising starts.
• Jay Groome didn't make the cut at Spring Training for the Padres. His response to that has been an awful 1st half in AAA. The past 2 games looked promising while bringing his ERA down over a run to 8.69. The key win/loss on that famous Hosmer trade will be Corey Rosier vs Groome.
• Franklin German has been DFA'd twice. This guy was a recent minor league reliever of the year for the Red Sox.
• Thad Ward, our 1st Rule-5 loss, had turned the corner by the end of May before running into a brick wall in June. His ERA nearly doubled and is now on the IL.
• Also for the Orioles, Darwinzon Hernandez started throwing strikes in June for AAA and has seen his ERA drop well into the 3's.
• Matt Barnes was off to a decent start, but imploded on June 1st and has been in the 15-day IL ever since.
• Taylor Broadway has shown the Red Sox why the White Sox gave up on him. He was demoted to Portland a short time ago.
• Inmer Lobo finally made an appearance for the Pirates DSL team last week, allowing 1 run in relief. He's what we gave up for Ho Park, one of the most bewildering Bloom moves to date. 
• Austin Davis never recovered from being Alex Cora'd and was released by Houston's AAA after posting a 11.22 ERA in 20 games.
• Ryan Brasier did the opposite, posting a 1.93 ERA for the Dodgers in 8 games so far since being called up last month.

I think we all know most of the other trades, releases and FA losses so far. A mixed bag for sure. A lot of misses by the Red Sox organization as well as some good moves not mentioned above. I don't think anyone needs any more reminders of the good players we lost after watching last night's All-Star game.
   

[MongoLikeSox]

5 days to go! That need to be on the MLB roster Rule-5 draft thing kicks in on the 28th.

Noah Song made his AAA debut last night going 2 innings, 2H, 1R and 3K's.  His A-ball games were OK, but the AA-AAA have been a little bit rough, but not a disaster. 5.40 ERA might be higher than he deserves. Just 6 innings in 3 games. 1.60 WHIP.

I imagine he'll pitch some on Tuesday, the 25th and maybe the 27th if he fails to convince on Tuesday. Then the Phillies decide to dedicate an Active Roster spot for him for the entire rest of the year. BUT, that's not really the decision that needs to be made if it's a borderline call. The Phillies may decide if they can hide him in some mop-up role while continuing to improve without hurting the team. I think the only thing going for the Red Sox is that the Phillies are a game out of the Wildcard spot.

Even if the Phillies pull the plug on the experiment in an effort to bolster their playoff run, Song would have to clear waivers. Who's to say that the last place Royals(or anyone else) don't bite the bullet and snag him because the season is lost? Yup. Not good.

[Sea Dog 23]

I was reading that Boston has recently hired some instructors from the Driveline college level program to work in our minor leagues.  Reportedly they have been able to improve performance and add velocity to a few pitchers coming up.  This could explain the draft of bigger frame pitchers who have shown like low 90s this year, O'Donnell, CJ Wiens, Carlson.

[MongoLikeSox]

Noah Song Update!!!  Phillies DFA Song

Noah Song bombed his final AAA appearance. The Phillies are in a battle for a playoff spot, so they decided they cannot afford to add him to the Active Roster.  Here's the nest week.

#1: Phillies have until the trade deadline to trade him. THAT team will have to keep him on their active roster from this moment on. Beware of teams like the Royals, Nationals, etc, who can afford such a thing. I would do make that move in a NY Minute.
#2: If he is not traded, he will be placed on waivers. Any team claiming him will be subject to the same active roster requirements.
#3: If he clears Waivers, the Phillies have to offer him back to the Red Sox for $50k. The Red Sox would NOT have the same MLB Active Roster restrictions. He just becomes a minor leaguer that we do not have to protect until November.

Resolution by week's end?

I've gotta work out the math, but I'm not sure what the date is that other teams that might claim him would not be possible to make him active for the minimum Active Roster time requirements. 

[MongoLikeSox]

Some small updates.

Wacha and Eovaldi found their way to the IL this past week.

Bazardo bombed in his brief stint with the Orioles last week and ended up getting DFA'd then traded to the Mariners.

First hurdle cleared for the Noah Song saga. Phillies were not able to trade him. He will be put on Waivers today. Hopefully we get him back. Keeping fingers crossed that Friday brings good things to us.

Jay Groome's turnaround is continuing with another quality start on Sunday. 3 QS's of his last 6 with a 3.89 ERA over that stretch. That's the good part. He still bombed in one of those starts and the overall command is still low, throwing about 60% strikes. The BA Against over that stretch is in the 260's. Clearly not good enough to convince the Padres to stay put and not go after Hill. 

[longgame]

When Song goes on waivers, do the teams have to deal with the Sox if they claim him or with Philly?  And he has to go straight on to their25 man roster, correct?

[Sea Dog 23]

When Song goes on waivers, do the teams have to deal with the Sox if they claim him or with Philly?  And he has to go straight on to their25 man roster, correct?

Song is officially our property today, he was unclaimed off waivers. Since he was exposed by Boston on Rule 5, and now unclaimed, he does not have to be  the on the 26 man or the 40 man right now. 

However in December, as I understand it, he has to be placed on the 40-man, or be exposed on the Rule 5 again.  However ever team in the league has evaluated him, but he could have a breakout season in August somewhere from Greenville to Portland.  Another chapter in the young man's life.

[MongoLikeSox]

He would have to stink it up to not get drafted again. If he does anything resembling his Navy days, we'll keep him. I imagine we'll stretch him out some in Greenville or Salem before Portland? 7 weeks left, IIRC?

Edit - Straight to Worcester.

[longgame]

Arroyo DFAd in related move.

[MongoLikeSox]

Now one of the Sox friendly beat reporters on the Athletic is suggesting that Song will actually be heading to Greenville in the next couple of days. I'm very curious to know how they plan to use him in the short and long term. They might be as curious as I am. I hope they start ramping him up to being a Starter, but that's a complete reversal of what the Phillies were trying to do. 

[SeaBeachFred]

Arroyo DFAd in related move.

Never a Cora favorite, the guy was jerked around by our worthless and overrated manager for almost three season while players less talented were constantly being run in and out of the lineup so Christian could never get settled in.  In fairness to the manager, it did seem that the guy was very injury prone and missed many games during that stretch, but the guys  that were kept over him, including that 160 hitter they got at the trade deadline certainly won't hit or field nearly as well in the coming two mon ths.  Congrats Cora, once again you showed your shallowness and favoritism.  Hopefully by God's grace you and that worthless bum in charge of Play Opps will both be jettisoned together.

[MongoLikeSox]

On the Matt Barnes front, I found this in the Marlin MLB Page. Kind of old news, but I don't recall seeing it before.  Likely done for the season.
"Barnes, who has been at home in Connecticut following left hip femoral acetabular impingement surgery on July 25, and will travel to Miami next week to continue his physical therapy. He was transferred to the 60-day IL on July 28 as the corresponding 40-man roster move for the acquisition of David Robertson. The recovery timeline before Barnes can resume baseball activities is three months, meaning his season is likely over, unless the Marlins make a deep postseason run. Barnes slipped on the mound in mid-May against San Francisco, which led to the hip impingement. "

[MongoLikeSox]

I listed 41 pitchers at the beginning of this thread. These were moves that started just prior to the 2022 deadline through on into Feb just before the 2023 Spring Training. A few weeks ago, I took the approach of looking at the list as a categorized collection of pitching decisions. A Micro look, if you will, of the Red Sox' brass had made in an effort to revamp the pitching staff going 2023.

I took the approach of Wins and Losses. I added ties as I quickly realized many of these guys were not as clear cut as hoped. Admittedly, I was surprised to come up with a winning record of 21-16-6. Not all decisions carry equal weight despite what they have seemingly thought over the years. For Example, the "Loss" in losing Eovaldi was not balanced out by the "Win" gained by DFA'ing Connor Seabold. Nor does this list address the Macros. Strength in numbers verses quality of less.

I grouped them into categories of decisions roughly resembling basic acquisition paths. To summarize, we scored very well with the who to dump categories. We scored horribly in the who to let walk via Free Agency while going 50/50 in Free Agency Acquisitions. We did very well in whom to keep when looking at the individuals, but we badly over estimated the positive impact that group would have on the season.

Anyhow, it was good fun and a nice diversion to the reality of dealing with a Real Estate disaster. (bah!!!)

************************************************************
***********  The Results Are In *********************************
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Free Agents Market  - 3-5 
Incoming!!! (2-2) (Kenly Jansen, Chris Martin, Corey Kluber, Joely Rodriguez)
Fire in the Hole!!!  (1-3) (Matt Strahm, Michael Wacha, Rich Hill, Nathan Eovaldi)  We showed up 3-5 in the Free Agent Won-Loss column. It was never that simple to begin with for Wacha and Strahm. 2 of the 3 old guys pitched well last year as did our two best Starters from '22. Having Jansen and Martin sure kicked ass at the end of games, though. Imagine this team with the 2022 bullpen? Yikes

The Injured -  1-1-1 (James Paxton, Chris Sale, Josh Taylor) A couple of other names could have been on this list, but I reserved this group for the obvious missed season(s) or otherwise been injured forever. Both Sale and Paxton gave us more than we feared we would get. Alas, both missed 10+ starts each and have #4 Starter ERA's when the brass expected more. Taylor ended up needing surgery in KC. It would have been a victory, but his counterpart might be in this group next year.

Can't We Coach? - 0-2 (Jake Diekman, Ryan Brasier) Turns out to be a "no" in these two cases. Funny, Cora suggests that it was more rest that made Brasier pitch well for the Dodgers. Wrong as rain. Very little difference in usage between the Dodgers and Red Sox. Diekman did well two teams later.

We Gave Up On (Youth Division) - 4-0  (Jay Groome, Connor Seabold, Eduard Bazardo, Franklin German) I thought we goofed the Groome decision.

Gave Up On (Veterans) -  4-0 here, too, unless you score one less because we traded for Bleier. (Austin Davis,Sawamura,Matt Barnes,Richard Bleier)

Too Much of a Good Thing? -  1-1-1 (Noah Song, Thad Ward, Andrew Politi). The Sox were proud to lose 3 pitchers to the Rule 5 draft because of the awesome depth. Puh-lease! One of the highlights of the season was getting Song back whom Dombrowski made sure slid back another 1/2 year of development. Politi was returned to us while Thad Ward pitched his way to the bottom of the BP with a 6.27 ERA in 26 games.

Dumpster Dumps & Clusterf**k Trades - 0-0-6 (Wyatt Mills, Theo Denlinger, Jake Reed, Taylor Broadway, Inmer Lobo) I know the math doesn't add up. Real record for me is 1-4-1 Some things Math nor Science can explain, and religion don't want no part of this group. One is still injured and on our 60-man IL, which means he'll be on our 40-man Roster all frigging Winter long if we intend to have him pitch at the end of 2024 - and that's a huge stretch. One we decided he needed to pitch in AAA because his AA 4.70 ERA in his previous organization was monster-good. That, and a similar promotion worked out so well for Jeter Downs.  Now we're trying him to get back to the fountain of 2022 A+ ball. One we DFA'd without fanfare nor anyone noticing. That was actually not a bad thing overall given the way the rest of the offseason went. Case in point? Sure - the last two were involved in Chan Ho Park deals. You can't make this up.

There's a reason they call it AAAA baseball - 0-1-1 (Zach Kelly, Caleb Ort) In all fairness, Kelly might yet prove himself if the poor guy could keep his elbos from shredding.

The Future is HERE! (40-man division) - 0-1-2 (Bryan Mata, Brandon Walter, Chris Murphy) Aside from chronic arm issues and disasterous AAA debuts, this trio was designed to save the day as needed in 2023. I'm not sure who're the ties or who's the loss. Two of them did help at least a couple of times.

The Future is HERE! (MLB division) - 3-0  (Josh Winckowski, Brayan Bello, Kutter Crawford) I think all three did as well as could be hoped for. No, they were not aces or near #2 starters like we needed, but still did well.

Dumpsters smell like rose gardens - 1-0 (John Schreiber) If I had only known about Benardino last Winter.

Now We Know Who is Who:  2-1 (Tanner Houck, Garrett Whitlock, Jake Pivetta) The incumbants who just did not fit elsewhere. We all knew Houck was going to have trouble establishing himself as a mid-range Starting pitcher and they made sure that was self-prophethized. We all knew Garrett was best in the pen, and not so late at that. We all know Jake Pivetta ended 2023 as he did 2022. Reliable, but up and down. Whitlock gets the Loss here just because they expected so much from him. Can we offer a Tim Naehring Award?