Stats

2004 playoffs cooked him for good, but my god was he awesome every night.

Crawford's HR issues suck, but has a much better base to work with than Sandoval, imo. 2023-24, his xERA was run lower, K% 3 points higher, BB% 4 points lower, and he's just a far more valuable asset to the Red Sox, 3 years of control vs. 1 year.

I don't know how everyone sees the current pitching depth, but this is how I do. Been seeing people expecting Oviedo to be in the bullpen, which seems crazy. I don't think this whole group makes it to Fort Myers.

They will both be in triple-a developing, both have a lot of that left to do imo

Oviedo came back from surgery with a supercharged fastball

for better pitchers, Garcia wasn't moving the needle at all

if they do something big at the winter meetings, I'll do a winter reset post and discuss these moves, reset the roster, and what i'd like to see the rest of the winter.

I don't think they would have done it if they weren't fine with a two-year thing, but he seems to me like very much an extension candidate now, if they can get 1 or 2 of his FA seasons in exchange for lifetime security.

Oviedo vs. Anthony

Long time Johan Oviedo fan, but he still needs to put it all together. Occasionally looks like a monster, and has lots in the tool chest.

Perfectly fine using Garcia here, I thought he was being considerably overrated. Wouldn't be surprised if Arias gets used the same way this winter.

With Mullins going to the Rays, it got me looking at his page, and made me think his path is basically the worst possible outcome for Duran.

I don't think it's the case, but not crazy to think he needs to at least stall his BABIP, or start to hit more homers.

AL East projected starting rotations by AAVs

$96M - Yankees
$87M - Blue Jays
$70M - Red Sox
$18M - Orioles
$15M - Rays

For each of the last two seasons, Baseball Pro's flagship pitching metric, DRA-, has rated Sonny Gray and Framber Valdez equally. Gray has rated better than every other pitcher who has been mentioned as a trade or free-agent possibility this winter.

I thought the last line of the Breslow press briefing was the most interesting. "If there are opportunities to leverage areas of depth – maybe outfield, maybe some of the starting pitching – to address other areas of need on the roster, then we’ll have to consider doing that."

152 pitchers threw 500+ 4-seam fastballs last year, only Gray's averaged glove-side cut. Only two pitchers had worse results with it, and only two had worse expected results (inc. Buehler). They may just delete those and divvy them up between sinkers and his breaking balls.

Obviously a yearly must-listen guest. The Campbell and Arias comments were the most interesting to me. The Tolle and Early critiques sound very much like what we've discussed since their debuts.

If asked this morning if I would do this deal on the spot, I'd have said yes. I presume they are not likely to sign a top FA pitcher now, but will be involved if controlled pitchers hit the trade block. If they strongly reinforce the lineup and this is it, fine, if it's Bregman and bit parts, yuck.

If asked this morning if I would do this deal on the spot, I'd have said yes. I presume they are not likely to sign a top FA pitcher now, but will be involved if controlled pitchers hit the trade block. If they strongly reinforce the lineup and this is it, fine, if it's Bregman and bit parts, yuck.

PutAway% with 2-strikes in 2025

1. 27.7% Sonny Gray
2. 26.1% Christopher Sanchez
3. 25.8% Garrett Crochet
4. 25.8% Zach Wheeler
5. 25.4% Tarik Skubal

Heat map of well hit balls against Gray the last two years.

doubtful they sign someone now, but a cheap controllable starter trade still seems very much in play

There was a lot of grossness following Crochet in the rotation last year. Sonny Gray is not gross, especially at 1/$21M. Sox are clearly improved in the rotation.

Relevant post

Ranking the Red Sox’ top 10 prospects, and the biggest questions we have about each - The Boston Globe Just two of the team’s top 10 prospects were identified that way a year ago.

And here’s my annual @bostonglobe.com companion piece to my top-10 prospect list, examining a key question facing the development of each of the Red Sox top 10 prospects: www.bostonglobe.com/2025/11/24/s...

Weighted game score from Savant, based on all games started in the last 1000 days, with more weight given to the most recent starts. Bello peaked at 50.7 in mid-August before sliding back. Pedro holds the peak record of 69.3 in May 2001.

Last year, the Red Sox went $8M over the CBT threshold. They could have spent $32M on top of that to reinforce the roster, with no other penalties besides a few million in taxes.

Right now, they could spend $80M, with no other penalties, if they wanted.

I’m not the biggest Bo Bichette guy in the world, but if the Sox called up and asked if he’d play 2B for the next 8 years or whatever and he was interested, it would be malpractice not to pursue.

Heyman's college season ended with a broken arm on a hit by pitch, which caused him to slip in the draft, but was paid overslot money to sign. Baseball America had him ranked #127 prospect in 2025 draft.

Bernardino, Winckowski and Murphy were projected to throw 150 innings and combine for 0.2 WAR in 2026.