2024 Red Sox Season Thread

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

This is a bad team. Still a game above .500, but that's mainly because of a soft schedule to start the season. Yeah, there are some good pieces, and they'll probably put together a few good stretches, but overall they're just not very good. Not awful, like Oakland or Miami, but pretty bad. I'm sticking with my prediction of 70 wins.

[celticsclay]

This is a bad team. Still a game above .500, but that's mainly because of a soft schedule to start the season. Yeah, there are some good pieces, and they'll probably put together a few good stretches, but overall they're just not very good. Not awful, like Oakland or Miami, but pretty bad. I'm sticking with my prediction of 70 wins.

Yeah and Story was a significant loss if just for his defense and average offense. I don't expect Crawford, Houck or Whitlock to be great starters throughout the year either, though they have started strong.

[Phantom255x]

My interest level is already dwindling with this team. It was a pretty cool start the first ten games, but yeah against the better teams they are just gonna get outclassed often. And frankly, I just don't feel the need to tune into a 2.5 to 3 hour game just to see our guys making misplays, dropping balls, botching routine plays, all while our lineup does practically nothing while having to rely on the likes of Hamilton, Dalbec, etc.

And look at the crowd + ticket prices the last two games. Yeah the home opener was mostly full and ticket prices were decent, but that's because it was the home opener. Fenway was only like half full the past two nights and you can get tickets for as low as $10. And even in the last two nights I'd say a good 40% of the fans were also Orioles fans. Sad.

[Redz]

They were a house of cards.

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

This is a bad team. Still a game above .500, but that's mainly because of a soft schedule to start the season. Yeah, there are some good pieces, and they'll probably put together a few good stretches, but overall they're just not very good. Not awful, like Oakland or Miami, but pretty bad. I'm sticking with my prediction of 70 wins.

Yeah and Story was a significant loss if just for his defense and average offense. I don't expect Crawford, Houck or Whitlock to be great starters throughout the year either, though they have started strong.

I think the good start was mainly due to poor competition, and I don't expect Crawford, Whitlock, or Houck to keep this up. The biggest deal with Story being out is missing his defense, but let's face it: this is a bad defensive team even with Story.

[Phantom255x]

This is a bad team. Still a game above .500, but that's mainly because of a soft schedule to start the season. Yeah, there are some good pieces, and they'll probably put together a few good stretches, but overall they're just not very good. Not awful, like Oakland or Miami, but pretty bad. I'm sticking with my prediction of 70 wins.

Yeah and Story was a significant loss if just for his defense and average offense. I don't expect Crawford, Houck or Whitlock to be great starters throughout the year either, though they have started strong.

I think the good start was mainly due to poor competition, and I don't expect Crawford, Whitlock, or Houck to keep this up. The biggest deal with Story being out is missing his defense, but let's face it: this is a bad defensive team even with Story.

Also it's a pretty terrible look that Jansen and Devers clearly came into this season out of shape and not really engaged. Devers is already missing time with some bum shoulder and will miss tonight as well, but apparently it's not enough to put him on the IL (lol...). Jansen statistically has been fine but it's very obvious at some point he's gonna meltdown too. He's gotten lucky but his velocity is barely even hitting 94+ which is what helped make him effective.

And these two are supposed to be a few of our leaders and two of our higher paid guys in terms of AAV.

Devers is making way too much money to be a defensive liability at 3B but unfortunately it's trending towards him becoming a full-time DH soon, but also Yoshida not really being trusted on defense doesn't help either. Only 1 DH spot, and Devers makes 330M while Yoshida 90M.

[Phantom255x]

Lol and infield defense strikes again. This team is allergic to turning double plays. Already down 3-0 in the first inning

[Phantom255x]

Lol and infield defense strikes again. This team is allergic to turning double plays. Already down 3-0 in the first inning

Red Sox in 3 innings have 0 runs, 2 hits, and 3 errors. About to be 0-4 at Fenway Park lol

[Silas]

Nice play from the bench.

edit...wrong thread.

[Roy H.]

Dave McCarty, a first baseman and outfielder on the 2004 Boston Red Sox team that won the World Series, died Friday in Oakland, California. He was 54.

The Red Sox announced his death and said it was caused by a "cardiac event."

McCarty was among the members of the 2004 team who gathered April 9 at Fenway Park to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the World Series and honor Tim Wakefield and his wife, Stacy, both of whom died of cancer in the past six months.

Kevin Youkilis, McCarty's Red Sox teammate, paid tribute to him on social media.

"You never know when it's the last time you will see someone. Grateful to share an amazing 04 Reunion and a flight back home to the Bay Area with Dave McCarty," Youkilis wrote. "A great father, husband, teammate, and friend. Thank you Big Mac for teaching me how to be a Big Leaguer!"

RIP.  Way too young.

[Vermont Green]

I know it is high season for both the Celtics and the Bruins (and really also for the Pats with the draft), but the Sox are about 1/7th the way through the season, 13-10, and their starters have the lowest ERA in the league.  I was expecting starting pitching to be the biggest weakness, the biggest issue.  That take turns out to have been completely wrong, at least so far.

The bullpen hasn't been so good.  16th in the league in ERA, 6 blown saves and 7 losses.  Neither of Martin and Jensen have been up to expectation so far.  I get the feeling that the bullpen will settle in and be fine.  But so far, it has not been very good.

Hitting, we are 16th in OPS, 12th in runs.  Not terrible.  Defense is a big issue.  BOS has given up 19 unearned runs.  The next closest team is CWS at 14 unearned runs.  BOS leads the league with 21 errors, NYY second most with 19 errors.  So not only are there a lot of errors, they seem to be leading to a high amount of unearned runs (not all errors are created equal).  The errors and unearned runs seems fixable.

[celticsclay]

I know it is high season for both the Celtics and the Bruins (and really also for the Pats with the draft), but the Sox are about 1/7th the way through the season, 13-10, and their starters have the lowest ERA in the league.  I was expecting starting pitching to be the biggest weakness, the biggest issue.  That take turns out to have been completely wrong, at least so far.

The bullpen hasn't been so good.  16th in the league in ERA, 6 blown saves and 7 losses.  Neither of Martin and Jensen have been up to expectation so far.  I get the feeling that the bullpen will settle in and be fine.  But so far, it has not been very good.

Hitting, we are 16th in OPS, 12th in runs.  Not terrible.  Defense is a big issue.  BOS has given up 19 unearned runs.  The next closest team is CWS at 14 unearned runs.  BOS leads the league with 21 errors, NYY second most with 19 errors.  So not only are there a lot of errors, they seem to be leading to a high amount of unearned runs (not all errors are created equal).  The errors and unearned runs seems fixable.

I’ll admit a month into the season they are doing a lot better than I expected. I certainly did not think it was possible they would potentially be above .500 by end of month. It is even more impressive when you consider devers has missed a handful of games and story only played a few. All that being I still don’t really trust that this pitching staff outside of bello will be that good. Like Crawford is in his third full season and has a .60 era. His first two years he was at 5.4 and 4. Has he really become
One of the best pitchers in baseball? Have we played mostly poor offensive teams? Do we now have the greatest pitching coach ever? I don’t know what to think. What really stinks though is I feel like I can’t fully root for this teams success. The owners are not trying to win and are just trying to line their pockets. If the Red Sox do find some diamonds in the rough and have a good year it will only embolden them to do this next year and the year after.

[BudweiserCeltic]

I know it is high season for both the Celtics and the Bruins (and really also for the Pats with the draft), but the Sox are about 1/7th the way through the season, 13-10, and their starters have the lowest ERA in the league.  I was expecting starting pitching to be the biggest weakness, the biggest issue.  That take turns out to have been completely wrong, at least so far.

The bullpen hasn't been so good.  16th in the league in ERA, 6 blown saves and 7 losses.  Neither of Martin and Jensen have been up to expectation so far.  I get the feeling that the bullpen will settle in and be fine.  But so far, it has not been very good.

Hitting, we are 16th in OPS, 12th in runs.  Not terrible.  Defense is a big issue.  BOS has given up 19 unearned runs.  The next closest team is CWS at 14 unearned runs.  BOS leads the league with 21 errors, NYY second most with 19 errors.  So not only are there a lot of errors, they seem to be leading to a high amount of unearned runs (not all errors are created equal).  The errors and unearned runs seems fixable.

Doesn't help that we're fielding practically a team from the minors at the moment. Not only are we leading the league in unearned runs, but last I had checked about 30% of the runs scored against us were unearned, second worst team when I verified was about 20%.

Where are you getting your unearned runs stats from? Last I checked a couple of days ago we had 26 with the Mets coming second with 18. Unless I'm misunderstanding what an unearned run is.

I don't know how sustainable our starting pitching is, but our defense and bullpen has been a disaster as you've pointed out. I'm not sure how fixable that is at this point. We just got no players ready to step up because Fenway Sports Group didn't invest on this team during the offseason.

[Phantom255x]

The frustrating part is, the Sox will beat bad teams, get outclassed vs the elite teams and probably just stroll to around 78-82 wins. Not enough for playoffs but just enough to "stay in the mix" and "be competitive" according to ownership and other outlets. And then make no mistake, we'll repeat the process in 2025 while adding some new prospects into the mix with no guarantee they'll pan out either.

I'm actually starting to think this ownership group is never going to go past the luxury tax again, until they decide to finally sell and then the new owners will. They were extremely stingy with finances this past offseason even though they are still like 30M below the LT. Insanity.

Even with the rotation doing extremely well, it's just hard to feel excited about this team or care much.

[Goldstar88]

The frustrating part is, the Sox will beat bad teams, get outclassed vs the elite teams and probably just stroll to around 78-82 wins. Not enough for playoffs but just enough to "stay in the mix" and "be competitive" according to ownership and other outlets. And then make no mistake, we'll repeat the process in 2025 while adding some new prospects into the mix with no guarantee they'll pan out either.

I'm actually starting to think this ownership group is never going to go past the luxury tax again, until they decide to finally sell and then the new owners will. They were extremely stingy with finances this past offseason even though they are still like 30M below the LT. Insanity.

Even with the rotation doing extremely well, it's just hard to feel excited about this team or care much.

Seems like the Red Sox and Patriots are currently using the same business model. Guess as long as People continue to go to the games, why change it?