So long

This is an explanation of the disappearing content from Sox Therapy and an announcement of a new blog, Replacement Level Red Sox (www.replacementlevelredsox.com). Darren, Jose, Matt(bert) and I have decided to start a blog, and we are moving our blogging over there. It’s been great writing here at Sox Therapy, thanks to Jim for giving up the platform and the opportunity, thanks to y’all for making this community a fun place to write. We just felt that we’d like to take a shot at blogging at a ...

Opening Day Roster

Lots of Sox Therapy posts lately but I’ll add another one since with Opening Day just two weeks away I think it’s time we had an Opening Day Roster thread.  Things are starting to fall into shape with injuries and performances clearing up some open questions.  David Ortiz’ injury is the one that’s going to get the headlines but with yesterday’s Boston.com story about Stephen Drew I think we have to acknowledge that our Opening Day shortstop is going to be someone other than Drew.

Now Is the Time to Lock Up Dustin Pedroia

Dustin Pedroia is a 29-year-old second basemen who is signed for the next two years and with a reasonable team option for 2015. Normally, I would be against inking such a player to an extension, but I think I would make an exception for Pedroia. Here’s why:

—First and foremost, Pedroia is the face of the team and a really excellent player. In his first 6 years as a full-time player he’s put up 31.1 fWAR. He’s beloved by the fans, well-liked by his peers, and seemingly has an exemplary work ...

What Projections Say about the Big Trade

The August 2012 trade between the Red Sox and the Dodgers was one of the most fascinating and important moves in the history of the Boston franchise. As such, it’s hard not to revisit it often. And so…

When the Red Sox unloaded the contracts of Adrian Gonzalez, Josh Beckett, and Carl Crawford (and Nick Punto!), they cut about $57 million off their annual payroll (after accounting for the cash paid out by Boston to LA). While it was pretty widely agreed upon that the players were, as a group, ...

Our Big Papi Problem

I really don’t want to think about a Boston Red Sox season where our lineup isn’t anchored by Big Papi.  I am currently not going to, because I think the best interpretation of what we know if that this isn’t the biggest problem ever.  The current shut down, as reported, is not either a major new injury or a failed recovery of the same major injury – it looks like an injury cascade where the Achilles pain led Ortiz to change his stride, which then in turn led to heel problem.  This ...

Jose Ruins Careers at the Fort

I hope everyone in Massachusetts enjoyed the foot of snow last week.  If it makes you feel better it was a bit windy today when I stepped out of the pool and I caught a bit of a chill.  Brrrrr.

I have been able to brave the elements and get to a few Spring Training games so far and as always it is a ton of fun.  The week started on a bit of a maudlin note as I walked through the retired numbers section in front of JetBlue Park and passed Johnny Pesky’s number 6.  John hasn’t been an active ...

John Farrell and the Shift Defense

The largest change in baseball strategy over the last decade has been the radically increased use of the shift defense in the past two years.  This was pointed out in a Bill James Online article by John Dewan early in 2012.  Farrell’s Blue Jays were among the earliest adopters of the shift, reportedly due to the influence of 3rd base coach Brian Butterfield.  Butterfield has moved to Boston with Farrell, and we can expect the shift to make the trek east as well.  He may be actually taking it ...

Spring Training Game Thread

The Red Sox are on NESN and MLBtv.  Right now!

Want to talk about the ballgame?

Shane Victorino and the Stat Heads

Everyone on the internet hates Shane Victorino.  Shane Victorino has a strong statistical profile based on basic stathead number crunching.  This is a conundrum to me.  Let’s take point one as given. For point two, consider VORP.  There is no more perfect stathead stat than VORP.  It reduces all baseball events to simple run value.  It loves OBP and slugging, it doesn’t care about clutch, it only values high-percentage base stealing.  It doesn’t try to quantify defense, but includes a ...

2013 ZIPS Projections for the Red Sox Are Up

Finally, some fake baseball to talk about.

It’s Truck Day!!!

It’s Truck Day!  I know some mock it goshdarn it I love me some Truck Day.  Anything that says “Spring and baseball are right around the corner” is A-OK in my book.

Of course I’m not going to let Spring Training lie.  As always I plan on going down to Ft. Myers to do my part to ruin careers, seasons and even lives.  For the record I was at Spring Training in both 2004 and 2007 so the Sox CAN win despite my jinxing skills.  I’m curious to see how Spring Training is this year. 

Last ...

The Bourn Possibility

Michael Bourn is still out there, and there’s no telling who’s going to bring him in. Although you always have to be careful making such assumptions when Scott Boras is involved, it’s starting to look like he’s not going to get the kind of megadeal he’s looking for. So, at what point might he make sense for the Red Sox? This is a really, really good player, who’s probably a good bet to give you about 3-5 WAR. If he could be had for 3-5 years for $15M per year or less, he’d be a very nice ...

Close Reading Rainbow

The big Francona/Shaughnessy tell-some book on Tito’s tenure in Boston will be available for purchase in a week, so its juiciest sections are getting the usual pre-publication flogging on sports media.  It looks like Sports Illustrated will be publishing longer excerpts soon, but a few bits have been made available already.  (The best run-down is probably in Gordon Edes’ piece on ESPN Boston.)  My reaction is mostly that if this is the worst that Shaughnessy could coax from Tito, then Tito is ...

Minor Help

Not So Nasty Nate made a comment the other day about the Sox’ lack of depth on the corners that resonated with me.  I got to thinking about some players who are a bit off the radar and might contribute in 2013.  I’m pretty geared up for my Spring Training trip (52 days!) so count this as a little list of non-big name guys I’m hoping to check out somewhat closely while I’m there (thus ending their careers in the process).  Plus, a thread that isn’t all-Hall of Fame all the time seems useful;

Brock Holt: The Prize at the Bottom of the Box

Of all the people involved in the recent six-player trade between the Red Sox and Pirates, Brock Holt has received the least attention. But Holty, as he’ll surely be called by an unimaginative teammates, deserves some attention, and not just because he sounds like he should be making movies with Chest Rockwell and Dirk Diggler.

Holt’s a middle infielder who, at age 24, hit .338 last year in AA/AAA/MLB. That’s after he’s quickly climbed through the minors while putting up a .317 average (with ...

Have a Therapeudic New Year!

Remember when someone (Joel, I think) suggested that we needed to rename Sox Therapy because, wait for it, being a Sox fan was so darn awesome? Remember that? Do you freaking remember that? How long ago was that, about 30 years? Wait, what, it was just a couple of years ago? Damn, that sword of Damon-cles sure came down hard!

With all the horribleness of the past year plus, things have been getting pretty heated around these parts lately so I thought it’d be a good time for a fresh start. To ...

Why Gonzo Being Gonezo is um…. Goodzo

In a couple of different threads about the big Nick Punto trade, I’ve argued, without a great deal of detail, that the Red Sox being rid of Adrian Gonzalez’s contract was a positive in its own right. With the snow falling outside and everyone in the house under the weather, now seemed like a good time to sneak away into a secluded corner and expand on this a bit (especially since no one asked).

Gonzalez is owed about $132M over the next six years. Looking solely at his WAR numbers, he seems ...

A Hundred Fifty Million Dollars for This

Feel free to read “this” either uninflected as if followed by a colon, or in italics with a full sneer.

The Sox have pretty much completed their 25-man roster.  There’s a small chance they’ll trade Ellsbury, and there’s a good chance they’ll trade a catcher and a reliever (or relievers) to clear up some logjams.  They might add a 1B/LF type for the last spot on the bench and let Jerry Sands have another year in AAA, and they could add a platoon LF in place of Nava or Kalish.  With ...

New Rule: Three Years

With the signing of Ryan Dempster to a 2-year deal, it seems pretty obvious that the Red Sox had one hard and fast rule that guided what they did this off season: no deals of more than 3 years. Every story on Hamilton indicated that the Sox wouldn’t go more than 3 years for him. Anibal Sanchez looks like he’s going to sign a very reasonable 5-year deal, but the Sox never appeared to be in on him. Buehrle/Johnson/Reyes would have almost perfectly filled their needs, but those players instead ...

Everyone Else in the AL East is Terrible

I figure most of y’all saw that SG did his first run of team projections based on CAIRO and showed a four-team dead heat in the AL East.  The Sox at 84 wins trailed ever so slightly the Yankees at 85 and the Rays and Jays at 86.  While it’s of course too early, it seems pretty unlikely that anyone’s going to project to run away with the AL East.  The Yankees could still remember that they’re the New York Yankees, but they seem pretty locked in to this unnecessary two-year rebuild.  The ...

Let’s Look at Josh Hamilton and Three Years

So the big rumor is that Seattle and others are trying to get Josh Hamilton to sign for three years. And the big reaction has been, “If anyone signs him for that, it should be my team!” That presents a couple of issues. First, even if Hamilton signs for three years, only one team is going to get him, and everyone else is going to be mad at their team. Second, what would constitute a good three-year deal?

The point of a three-year deal is that you’re getting the best years, and if the player ...

All-Around Players: Still Undervalued

The most recent Sox free agent news on the twitters is that the Sox are the favorites to sign Shane Victorino.  Robothal reports they’ve offered 3/38, pretty much identical to the Napoli contract.  The 2012 free agent market featured a bunch of players who produce value at the plate, on the bases, and in the field, without being particularly elite in any aspect of the game.  Victorino remains unsigned, while Upton and Pagan signed for 5/75 and 4/40, both less than I was expecting. 

Sign Mike Napoli (to a reasonable contract)

It’s been twitter-reported by Jim Bowden that the Sox are in on Mike Napoli but he wants a fourth guaranteed year before he’ll sign.  I assume Napoli is looking for a contract in the range of $10-15M per season.  I’m not so much sold on that fourth guaranteed year, as Napoli is a bad body hitter with old player skills.  But I’m going to get to the part where I contradict myself later.  I begin with the case for Mike Napoli.

First, he’s one heck of a hitter.  Napoli has hit ...

Full Count » For John Farrell and Juan Nieves, a working relationship 25 years in the making

Sounds like a perfect fit for the Red Sox.

That track record and the level of comfort between him and Farrell convinced the Sox that Nieves was the top choice among the four finalists (Rick Peterson, Randy St. Claire, Steve Foster and Nieves).

“We felt like we had four strong candidates that came in, each with their own talents and abilities, but we felt like Juan’s match to the staff that we currently have in place was a very good one,” said Farrell. “There’s a number of pitchers who ...

Keury De La Cruz And Shiny New Toys | FanGraphs Baseball

A nice write-up on Keury De La Cruz.

Entering the 2012 season, Red Sox prospect Keury De La Cruz was a relative unknown after two years of modest production in short season baseball. At 20, De La Cruz burst onto the prospect scene by posting a .308/.352/.536 line in the South Atlantic League before earning a late season promotion. Is De La Cruz a legitimate prospect? Sure, but the amount of hype he has received due to coming out of nowhere is a phenomenon repeated every winter. The names change, ...

Three Outfielders

Josh Hamilton is pretty widely considered the lone star outfielder available this offseason. Even fans and pundits concerned about giving him a six-year deal seem pretty convinced that on a shorter deal, he’s the cream of the crop. However, the advanced stats have refused to go along with this narrative. In fact, there are two other outfielders, both almost exactly the same age as Hamilton, who will be available on much cheaper deals: Angel Pagan and Shane Victorino.

Here’s the big picture, ...

Everyone is an injury risk

Darren’s last post made me reflective.  I’ve definitely been in a sort of instinctive cringing position evaluating possible Red Sox free agent and trade targets.  Everything has gone wrong for the Red Sox recently with their major league acquisitions.  It’s not crazy that I’d react that way.  But there is a point at which it gets irrational, at which it detracts from analysis rather than adding a useful anti-fanboy factor.

I think this is particularly important with regard to ...

The Only Thing We Have to Fear Is… Everything

Over the last two seasons, the Red Sox have played some pretty brutal baseball. It was torture to watch them choke away 2011, and 2012 was so bad that it made it hard to even care. But even worse than just having to endure these two crudsuck seasons, the Red Sox failures have instilled a lasting fear in their fans: everything that they do, every decision that they make, will be wrong. And not just a little wrong, not ‘dealing for emerging star Coco Crisp only to find out that he’s actually ...

Meet the New Boss

The Red Sox have reportedly completed a trade for John Farrell to manage the club next year, and most likely into the future.  Expectations for 2013 are relatively low, and the Sox have committed talent to acquiring Farrell, so it seems likely this is our manager for a few years.  Farrell, of course, was the Red Sox pitching coach from 2007-2010 before Toronto hired him to manage their club.  I wanted to take a quick look at Farrell’s managerial stats from Toronto, to see what sort of ...

2013 Payroll and Roster: Money for Something

The offseason has already begun for the Red Sox with managerial interviews scheduled.  I have no opinion on these interview, as it seems like the Red Sox are mostly interviewing the traditional class of “yeah, he’s probably a guy who’ll get a managerial job” plus some former Sox coaches.  This is an upgrade over the ridiculousness of the Valentine search, and pretty much anyone with coaching experience above the Babe Ruth level would be an upgrade over Valentine in the dugout.  But ...