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Baseball Primer Newsblog — The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand Friday, December 16, 2022Do You Really Want John Henry To Sell The Red Sox? - Over the MonsterMy biggest complaint about John Henry is his impatience and quick firing of GMs. A top franchise needs stability at the top. The owner needs to hire a good GM and then give him the runway to execute his long-term plan. Otherwise, there will be no consistency. GMs, even the ones with good long-term plans, get forced into short-term moves to keep critics at bay and to keep their jobs. Those short-term decisions usually undermine their plan. For a GM to build with a long view in mind, he has to know the chance that he’ll be around in five years is good. To that end an owner has to provide the needed stability AND cover by getting out in the press to explain the team’s vision. The team’s actions then need to match those words. With four Red Sox championships in this century, John Henry has a successful track record to point to that demonstrates his ability to build winners. He is squandering his credibility in that regard by not being up-front about the team’s plan and by not taking the short-term heat from the team’s decisions. As a result, he’s losing the confidence of his passionate, but reasonable, fans. As for Chaim Bloom, Dan O’Dowd nails the issues with Bloom in this segment. (I wanted to embed the video but it seems MLB doesn’t have that option any more.) At the root of any team’s success is having the best possible player evaluations. I don’t care how much money the team spends; I don’t care about the effectiveness of their player development; and, I don’t care if their economic models are perfect. If a team doesn’t properly evaluate players, it can’t win over an extended time period. That was true in Branch Rickey’s day; that was true when the Yankees were dominant in the 50’s; that was true when the Orioles excelled in the 60’s and 70’s; that was true when the Braves won in the 90’s; and, it’s true now during the Dodgers current run. A team NEEDS to evaluate players well or it fails. Chaim Bloom’s plan seems good (such that he’s explained it) but his talent evaluations simply haven’t been good. The proof is in the play of his acquisitions and in the standings, which are the ultimate judge of of a team’s decision making. Now, I haven’t given up on Bloom and the Red Sox yet, but I’m tettering. Hopefully, some self-examination of their player evaluation process will lead to some changes/improvements to the way they evaluate players. Otherwise, the team will continue to flounder and the blood demands from the most impatient, unreasonable Red Sox fans will continue to spread to the rest of the fan base.
jimfurtado
Posted: December 16, 2022 at 10:20 AM | 15 comment(s)
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1. Steve Balboni's Personal Trainer Posted: December 16, 2022 at 01:41 PM (#6109749)I loved the idea of trading Renfroe - it was a great example of "selling high". When the return was JBJ (who was making more than Renfroe was going to make, despite being one of the worst hitters in baseball in 2021), I was like:
1) Bloom must have a plan for somebody to play RF;
2) Bradley is going to be the 4th outfielder, providing tremendous defense in CF and RF, spotting him ABs against the right opponents, pinch-running, etc.;
3) These two prospects must be sneaky-good
Alas:
1) There was zero plan for RF;
2) Bradley played way too much, and was awful;
3) The prospects are not particularly good.
Hamilton may be the best base-stealer in all of baseball, but he is a 25-year-old who just spent the season in AA hitting .251/.338/.402, and is, at best, an average defender.
Binelas is younger, but he is a bat-first corner infielder who hit .166 in AA to finish 2022, striking out almost 40% of the time there.
Bloom seems to overvalue marginal minor-league prospects - our 40-man roster has a ton of guys who are neither bad enough to let go through waivers without Pittsburgh or Cincinnati or somebody picking them up for free...nor good enough to help the major-league team. The 40-man currently includes:
Wilyer Abreu and Enmanuel Valdez (both picked up for Christan Valdez at the deadline)
Connor Seabold (picked up in the Workman deadline deal)
Franklin German (picked up in the Ottavino salary dump)
Josh Winckowski (picked up in the Benintendi trade)
Connor Wong (who was part of the Mookie trade; until yesterday, Jeter Downs was on the 40-man, too, depsite being awful the last two years, and he was another part of that trade)
Roberto Hernandez. Hudson Potts. Jacob Wallace.
I'll give Bloom Whitlock and Pivetta - tremendous values in both transactions. But too often, Bloom seems obsessed with adding depth to the minor-league system. We don't need more depth, at this point; we need major-league players to come out of the system. That Renfroe trade was so unbelievably poor. If he had simply non-tendered Renfroe, it would have been better for the team, because JBJ was worse than anything we could put out there; the prospects are nothing; and not paying JBJ in 2022 would have singlehandedly put the Red Sox below the luxury tax - which would have improved the comp draft pick we're getting for losing Bogaerts, and increased the international draft pool money we could spend. Just awful evaluation on multiple levels by Bloom.
If a team is 100% committed to a rebuild, commit. Playing lip service to competing and then not making moves that help your team win suggests you are lying or are incompetent.
Exactly:
1) The only way Bloom could begin to justify this trade was if he thought Binelas and/or Hamilton were severely undervalued prospects. It is increasingly clear that is not the case. Why is Bloom acting like the Red Sox have to take chances like this to find undervalued assets to this extent? This isn't Tampa or Pittsburgh...this is Boston! They have plenty of money. Ownership has English Premier League team; they just bought the Pittsburgh Penguins; they own a NASCAR team; they are currently lining up with Lebron James to own the expected NBA expansion team in Las Vegas after James retires.
2) Henry and the ownership team were obviously not always like this. In fact, until 2019-2020, they really were never like this. Have they stretched themselves out too thin financially (see above...)? Do they think the fan base will continue spending money to see the team - that the franchise has a ton of capital with the fans after the four WS titles? Or is it possible that the Dombrowski-era signings of guys like David Price and Chris Sale were a bridge too far?
Sure, Sale's been a bust. But that's just $30 M of what should be a $230 M payroll every year. You can do a lot of baseball good with $200 M.
And/or Schwarber.
You do realize that this is all just surpassingly stupid, right? During the 20-year period you have wanted him gone, the Sox have been one of the premier teams in the entire league. By some very important metrics, the very best of all. It is almost impossible that a different owner would have been better.
Since things like "winning" are clearly unimportant to you, what exactly do you want from an owner?
You are like an economist that has successfully predicted 10 of the last 2 recessions.
The Yankees have made the playoffs all but 4 times since 1995 yet I guarantee there are lots of people who wish their current owners would sell. I know there are Blue Jays fans sick of corporate ownership (which I see as the most boring & stable ownership - never in the headlines, just set a budget and let the baseball people deal with it unless red ink starts flowing then they switch who runs it). Baltimore once LOVED its active owner, then he got too active and things went south fast. Just the way it is.
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