Sox Therapy: And Breathe

On the morning of May 30th the Red Sox (and the rest of us) woke up in Boston, looked out the window and saw the rain pelting down.  When the game was postponed and rescheduled for the following Monday the Sox were facing a fairly daunting 17 game stretch.  At that point the Sox had faced a fairly pedestrian schedule and took advantage to muster a 32-20 record that left them a game out of first place behind the Rays.  But the next day would begin a test, 4 in Houston, 3 in the Bronx, 1 with the ...

Sox Therapy: Feeling a Draft

Next month the Sox will make their highest draft pick since 1967 when they picked third (Mike Garman so y’know it’s not an automatic).  Many names are flying around, some familiar (Jack Leiter, Kumal Rocker) others not (Henry Davis, Jordan Lawlar, Marcelo Mayer) but at draft time I always like to look to past as prelude to the future.  Rather than try to tell you something about players I have at best seen in passing I’ll tell you to go Sox Prospects or Baseball America for all the gory details ...

Sox Therapy: Getting There

They got there in the end.  The Sox wound up arguably their sternest test of the season to date with a 4-3 record during this challenging road trip through Houston and Miami.  Sorry, New York, I get the teams with one World Series this century mixed up sometimes.

Anyway where was I? Oh yeah, an uneven but ultimately successful road trip.  Losing three in a row then taking the next four is not necessarily the ideal way to finish up 4-3 (it can be a lot of fun though) but as noted, they got ...

Hall of Merit: Most Meritorious Player: 1938 Results

Congratulations to Ray Brown, our 1938 Most Meritorious Player!

Player Name	pts	ballots	1sts
Ray Brown	107	8	3
Mel Ott__	106	8	2
Arky Vaughan	95	8	2
Hank Greenberg	81	8	0
Jimmie Foxx	81	7	0
Josh Gibson	76	6	1
Buck Leonard	48	6	0
Bill Lee	48	5	0
Joe Cronin	43	5	0
Stan Hack	26	3	0
Hilton Smith	23	2	0
Johnny Mize	22	3	0
Martin Dihigo	16	2	0
Red Ruffing	14	2	0
Ival Goodman	12	2	0
Ernie Lombardi	10	1	0
Harlond Clift	9	1	0
Bill Dickey	9	1	0
Joe DiMaggio	8	1	0
Bill Byrd	6	1	0

Hall of Merit: Most Meritorious Player: 1939 Discussion

The Yankees swept the Reds in the World Series. The Kansas City Monarchs defeated the St. Louis Stars in the Negro American League. The Baltimore Elite Giants defeated the Homestead Grays in a two round Negro National League playoff.

Vote for 10.

Player				bWAR
Joe DiMaggio			8.4
Johnny Mize			7.7
Arky Vaughan			5.8
Bill Dickey			5.5
Ted Williams			6.7
Jimmie Foxx			6.9
Dolph Camilli			6.4
Lonny Frey			6.5
Ival Goodman			5.3
Ken Keltner			4.4
Bob Johnson			6.6
George Selkirk			5.8
Harry ...

Sox Therapy: The Return

On Saturday at about 7:10PM Nate Eovaldi will bring his left foot back, then forward raising his knee above his belt, then propel his body towards home plate whipping a baseball at a speed up to 100 MPH to Christian Vazquez or Kevin Plawecki.  37,731 people, give or take, will respond happily, or maybe sadly, or maybe mildly indifferently.  It is that last piece of information that is so important.  37,731 people.  Full…bleeping…capacity.  100% of all available seats and standing room areas ...

Hall of Merit: Most Meritorious Player: 1938 Ballot

For 1938 each voter should rank the top 10 players from all leagues combined.

Balloting is scheduled to close at 4pm EDT on 2 June 2021. Please let me know if you want your preliminary ballot counted as your final ballot.

Anyone can vote, even if you do not normally participate in Hall of Merit discussions. If you have never participated in an MMP election, just post a preliminary ballot in the discussion thread by 1 June 2021.

For detailed rules see one of our previous ballots.

Sox Therapy: Questions Being Answered

In English soccer the mark of the elite is the ability to get it done “on a cold rainy Wednesday in Stoke.”  I don’t know if a “warm windy Thursday in Dunedin” is quite the same but last night’s game had a bit of a feel to it.  I still firmly believe the Sox are a .500 team but they are answering questions at every turn.  One of the marks of the Francona Era was the ability of the club to rebound from disappointment.  Obviously some of that was the talent in place but the ability to put it ...

Sox Therapy: Finally Lining Up the Minors

At long last minor league baseball is back in full swing!  There have been some changes since we were last here in September of 2019.  The Pawtucket Red Sox are now the Worcester Red Sox, the Lo A Greenville Drive are now the Hi A Greenville Drive while the Hi A Salem Red Sox are now the Lo A Salem Red Sox.  Most heartbreakingly for your faithful correspondent the SS-A Lowell Spinners are no longer a Red Sox affiliate.  I can’t overstate how many wonderful nights I had at LeLacheur Park ...

Sox Therapy: Tap the Brakes

Even by Sox fandom standards the emotional mood swings around this team have been pretty impressive.  In 31 games it’s gone from;

“good lord they suck, Bloom is terrible” (0-3)
“they are back! Cora told us we should have listened!” (9-0)
“look at all the problems, they gotta this straightened out before it falls apart.” (9-10)

Inhale.

Exhale.

OK.

They have played 31 games and at 18-13 and since the big winning streak have looked like the .500 team most observers pegged them as.  They have ...