"This too shall pass" ---- righting the ship for 2016

[Snodgrass'Muff]

 
I doubt they keep it up to that pace, but yeah, the back end of their bullpen has been pretty great. Being the best hitting team in the division helps, too.

 
Did Toronto get contracted mid season? If so, can we have Donaldson?

 

[alwyn96]

 
Did Toronto get contracted mid season? If so, can we have Donaldson?

 
D'oh! The Jays are so far ahead I imagined they were in a different division. I'm probably not the person to talk to if you want Donaldson, though. You'd probably wind up with Lou Donaldson.

 

[FanSinceBoggs]

.
 

 
If you want to evaluate the quality of a decision, you look less at the result and more at whether the decision was based on a realistic assessment of the situation, that took the available evidence into account, and was arrived at with a rational process. The FO has much more information available to it than we do. That doesn't mean there is no such thing as luck, good and bad.

 
 
 
A flawed process is going to yield flawed results (most of the time).  Consequently, we are on reasonably safe ground in assuming that there is a flawed process in place in the Red Sox front office, a process that has produced flawed results over the last 12-16 months.
 
Sure, it’s possible for a healthy process to yield detrimental results, but this outcome would be the exception rather than the rule (rationally).  When there is a repetitive trend of flawed results, we can be certain, or almost certain, that there is a flawed process behind it.  The Red Sox must identify the flawed process within the organization and change it.  We might be talking about overhauling the sabermetric group, making changes to the scouting department, or making high level changes (removing Cherington or Farrell or both).
 
You wouldn’t expect a healthy process to yield detrimental results on a consistent basis.  As such, results provide us with an unambiguous lens into an organization’s processes.  Poor results are strong evidence that something has gone awry with an organization’s decision-making procedures.

 

[Rasputin]

A flawed process is going to yield flawed results (most of the time).  Consequently, we are on reasonably safe ground in assuming that there is a flawed process in place in the Red Sox front office, a process that has produced flawed results over the last 12-16 months.
 
Sure, it’s possible for a healthy process to yield detrimental results, but this outcome would be the exception rather than the rule (rationally).  When there is a repetitive trend of flawed results, we can be certain, or almost certain, that there is a flawed process behind it.  The Red Sox must identify the flawed process within the organization and change it.  We might be talking about overhauling the sabermetric group, making changes to the scouting department, or making high level changes (removing Cherington or Farrell or both).
 
You wouldn’t expect a healthy process to yield detrimental results on a consistent basis.  As such, results provide us with an unambiguous lens into an organization’s processes.  Poor results are strong evidence that something has gone awry with an organization’s decision-making procedures.

I'm going to be brief because I'm going to bed, but there's a lot of wrong here.

The implication that the team has had nothing but bad results in the last 12-16 months is just wrong.

The assertion that poor results are indicative of a flawed process is only true if the results are of a sufficient sample size. They aren't.

The assertion that detrimental results are the exception rather than the rule is only going to be true when you have perfect or near perfect information. That's never going to be true of baseball. The most perfect front office imaginable is still going to get bad results fairly often because they have imperfect information.

And because luck is a huge factor that everyone likes to pretend doesn't exist in baseball.

You will never have an unambiguous view of the front office's processes. There is easy to much noise in the process for that. At best, you're going to have to look at long term trends and 12-16 months is very definitely short term.

We've had two last place finishes in the last four years and we're looking at a third and that sucks, but they have all come for different reasons, many of which weren't foreseeable.

This front office has given us three titles. The transition from the last great red Sox team to the next one has been rockier than anyone wanted, but even so, we won a title in the middle of that transition.

We have very good, very young players ready to form the core of the next great red Sox team. We have a stacked minor league system. The outlook for the next ten years out so is very positive. It's not time to make stupid decisions because of short term troubles.

 

[Rasputin]

I've had enough of Joe Kelly in the rotation. He's got the stuff to be an impact arm in the bullpen. He should go there, stop trying to have three pitches, and kick some ass.

 

[Rovin Romine]

.
 
 
 
 
A flawed process is going to yield flawed results (most of the time).  Consequently, we are on reasonably safe ground in assuming that there is a flawed process in place in the Red Sox front office, a process that has produced flawed results over the last 12-16 months.
 
Sure, it’s possible for a healthy process to yield detrimental results, but this outcome would be the exception rather than the rule (rationally).  When there is a repetitive trend of flawed results, we can be certain, or almost certain, that there is a flawed process behind it.  The Red Sox must identify the flawed process within the organization and change it.  We might be talking about overhauling the sabermetric group, making changes to the scouting department, or making high level changes (removing Cherington or Farrell or both).
 
You wouldn’t expect a healthy process to yield detrimental results on a consistent basis.  As such, results provide us with an unambiguous lens into an organization’s processes.  Poor results are strong evidence that something has gone awry with an organization’s decision-making procedures.

 
People are upset about the underperforming teams of recent years.  But again, you can't discount the WS win.  I'd much rather have 2013 along with the two years to either side of it, than have a more middle of the road team each year.  If you want that follow the Jays. 

 

[ivanvamp]

I've had enough of Joe Kelly in the rotation. He's got the stuff to be an impact arm in the bullpen. He should go there, stop trying to have three pitches, and kick some ass.

The problem with Kelly is this: it's not like he is great the first time through the lineup, only to get hit hard later on. If that were the case, I could see him being a lights out reliever with his incredible stuff

No, Kelly gets absolutely crushed RIGHT OUT OF THE GATE. Last night: triple, triple, double, HBP.

I mean, he gets lit up early, all the time (not every single time obviously but a lot). That doesn't I still confidence that he can be a shut down, late inning reliever.

I really don't get it. He throws 99 and has a nasty slider. But guys simply do not miss his mistakes. Every mistake he makes gets absolutely destroyed.

 

[Otis Foster]

D'oh! The Jays are so far ahead I imagined they were in a different division. I'm probably not the person to talk to if you want Donaldson, though. You'd probably wind up with Lou Donaldson.

Throw in Clifford and you've got a deal.

 

[Otis Foster]

And I think that despite all the hand wringing now about the off-season, the one thing I must regretted at the time it happened was not signing Miller.  I would have preferred 3 yrs vs. 4, but he got the same AAV as Koji.  Considering the age difference, I would have rather have Miller for 4 yrs than Koji for 2 at the same annual cost (9M).  On top of that, it is quite possible that Miller might have even taken a little less to be in the place where he was able to resurrect his career.

Doubtful he'd have taken less. IIRC, he's a big union guy and wouldn't have wanted to set a precedent.

 

[Sandy Leon Trotsky]

As one of Kelly's biggest defenders.... (I seriously thought he would have a few struggles early on- his April, May were about what I was expecting honestly, and then he would click and groove to a very good season the rest of the way).... I think he's got to be moved to a bullpen role.  I don't get what the matter is with him- such great stuff but yeah, when he makes a mistake- which is too often- they always get crushed.
As far as not being good even one time through a lineup, I think it's still worth exploring there.

 

[snowmanny]

 
People are upset about the underperforming teams of recent years.  But again, you can't
discount the WS win.  I'd much rather have 2013 along with the two years to either side of it, than have a more middle of the road team each year.  If you want that follow the Jays. 

I think you can discount how much credit the FO gets for the 2013 WS title. I give the FO substantial credit for putting together a first place team and I give credit to the players, particularly Lester and Ortiz and Uehara but really lots of guys, and SSS for the title. Would you feel differently about this FO if the team had lost in the ALCS?

 

[Plympton91]

This front office has given us three titles.

 
No, it hasn't.  Theo Epstein left in 2011, and rebuilt the Cubs while the Red Sox fell apart.  Josh Byrnes and Jed Hoyer also were key parts of the front offices that won titles here, and they are also gone.
 
The Ben Cherington front office has won a World Series and been out of the playoff chase before the all-star break in 3 other seasons.  That is the relevant sample size for Ben Cherington.  He doesn't get to rest on Theo Epstein's laurels.

 

[Average Reds]

 
No, it hasn't.  Theo Epstein left in 2011, and rebuilt the Cubs while the Red Sox fell apart.  Josh Byrnes and Jed Hoyer also were key parts of the front offices that won titles here, and they are also gone.
 
The Ben Cherington front office has won a World Series and been out of the playoff chase before the all-star break in 3 other seasons.  That is the relevant sample size for Ben Cherington.  He doesn't get to rest on Theo Epstein's laurels.

I really want to defend Cherington but P91 is right - we have a sizable sample size and the results are not great.

I'm willing to give him more rope because I am convinced that many of his moves were defensible and the team has been the recipient of some bad luck. But the Sox need to begin delivering results next year or Ben has to be held accountable.

 

[OCD SS]

From the standpoint of actually assessing what the FO is doing, what has really changed since Theo & company left? (And in that regard Theo didn't really leave the house in order when he vacated.)

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

I'm going to be brief because I'm going to bed, but there's a lot of wrong here.

The implication that the team has had nothing but bad results in the last 12-16 months is just wrong.

The assertion that poor results are indicative of a flawed process is only true if the results are of a sufficient sample size. They aren't.

The assertion that detrimental results are the exception rather than the rule is only going to be true when you have perfect or near perfect information. That's never going to be true of baseball. The most perfect front office imaginable is still going to get bad results fairly often because they have imperfect information.

And because luck is a huge factor that everyone likes to pretend doesn't exist in baseball.

You will never have an unambiguous view of the front office's processes. There is easy to much noise in the process for that. At best, you're going to have to look at long term trends and 12-16 months is very definitely short term.

We've had two last place finishes in the last four years and we're looking at a third and that sucks, but they have all come for different reasons, many of which weren't foreseeable.

This front office has given us three titles. The transition from the last great red Sox team to the next one has been rockier than anyone wanted, but even so, we won a title in the middle of that transition.

We have very good, very young players ready to form the core of the next great red Sox team. We have a stacked minor league system. The outlook for the next ten years out so is very positive. It's not time to make stupid decisions because of short term troubles.

How is it you're able to discern that 2013 was the result of good planning but 2012, 2014, and 2015 were just a string of run of the mill bad baseball luck?

 

[yecul]

The system is very strong and they have many assets in their control. While BC isn't responsible for all of that he is in charge of the gameplan that led to this accumulation and retention. The Sox could get a frontline starter tomorrow if they decided to move some of their talent. The decision has been made not to do that. Should we penalize them for not making the move while lauding over the same farm that is being protected?

It was interesting to see the Theo/Cub comparison above. They both have a strongly rated system with an emphasis on positional players. The Cubs are a year or two (+) ahead of schedule for obvious reasons and have filled in some rotation gaps via FA and whatnot. The Sox will follow a similar path.
 
Fans get to want their cookies now. I see a team headed by BC that is well positioned to be very good for an extended period of time. I am ok with waiting another year or two to get there and then enjoy the ride.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

How is it you're able to discern that 2013 was the result of good planning but 2012, 2014, and 2015 were just a string of run of the mill bad baseball luck?

 
I don't think 2013 was a result of any better planning than the other seasons.  The case I think Ras is trying to make is 2013 was a lot of good luck, and 2014-2015 has seen a lot of bad luck, but the roster construction/philosophy was pretty much the same each year...filling in holes with mostly short-term value signings aimed at bridging to the next "great" Red Sox team.  In 2013, those signings worked out in spades: Uehara, Victorino, Napoli, Gomes, Drew etc.  In 2014, not so much.  2015...looks bad but I still think returns are incomplete.

 

[BosRedSox5]

From the standpoint of actually assessing what the FO is doing, what has really changed since Theo & company left? (And in that regard Theo didn't really leave the house in order when he vacated.)

 
People seem to forget this. Sure, Theo's last draft in 2011 was pretty good, but 2010 and 2009 weren't... the farm system was bottom third to middle of the pack when he left. 
 
The team was also on the hook for a disastrous Carl Crawford contract, no catcher of the future (a position which Theo never seemed to address as Varitek approached 40 despite stopgaps like V-Mart and Salty holding us over) and no useful top level prospects. 
 
Theo rightly deserves respect as one of the Red Sox all time great executives, but he made a huge mess of the Sox in 2011 and then left because he didn't feel like staying to clean it up. Francona (arguably the league's most respected manager) was fired in the aftermath and the team was set up for disaster before the 2012 Dodgers trade happened. 

Ben deserves criticism, a lot of his deals haven't worked out, but people build up Theo as better than he was and ignore the mess he left behind.

 

[Otis Foster]

I'm not it's a question of building bridges while the young pups mature. Rational fans can accept that. I do think it's a question of bad major league scouting.
 
Panda so far is a disaster (emphasis 'so far'). Hanley is doing what he's supposed to do at the plate, but not in the field. He's a DH in waiting and in the interim, his offense is zeroed out by his defense. Kelly has become 2015's Rex Barney and Craig is sampling Pawtucket's better restaurants. Masterson is like a spud left in the oven too long. Porcello is struggling. Miley is what he was advertised as, but a decent 3 needs better 1s and 2s ahead of him. Buchholz is down again. The bullpen is a mess, outside of Tazawa and Koji.
 
In the meanwhile. Beltre continues to play well for Texas (allowed to leave because the RS misjudged Middlebrooks), Miller is lights out for the Yanks and Lester and Lackey are performing well for their respective teams.
 
Every trade or FA signing is a gamble.We need to be prepared for failure or struggles in any given case. When we look at a string of under-performing veterans who were brought in from other teams, and former RS who would have filled gaps here flourishing somewhere else, we're entitled to conclude that something's wrong in the system.
 
For me, BC is on very thin ice. There's quite a difference between fighting for the last wild card slot, and reposing in the root cellar.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

I'm not it's a question of building bridges while the young pups mature. Rational fans can accept that. I do think it's a question of bad major league scouting.
 
Panda so far is a disaster (emphasis 'so far'). Hanley is doing what he's supposed to do at the plate, but not in the field. He's a DH in waiting and in the interim, his offense is zeroed out by his defense. Kelly has become 2015's Rex Barney and Craig is sampling Pawtucket's better restaurants. Masterson is like a spud left in the oven too long. Porcello is struggling. Miley is what he was advertised as, but a decent 3 needs better 1s and 2s ahead of him. Buchholz is down again. The bullpen is a mess, outside of Tazawa and Koji.
 
In the meanwhile. Beltre continues to play well for Texas (allowed to leave because the RS misjudged Middlebrooks), Miller is lights out for the Yanks and Lester and Lackey are performing well for their respective teams.
 
Every trade or FA signing is a gamble.We need to be prepared for failure or struggles in any given case. When we look at a string of under-performing veterans who were brought in from other teams, and former RS who would have filled gaps here flourishing somewhere else, we're entitled to conclude that something's wrong in the system.
 
For me, BC is on very thin ice. There's quite a difference between fighting for the last wild card slot, and reposing in the root cellar.

 
I think you're mis-remembering the bolded a bit.  Beltre was let go because they preferred to pursue Gonzalez and believed Youkilis could handle a transition to 3B.  When all that went down, Middlebrooks was coming off a season at Salem (high-A) where he hit .276/.331/.439 and struck out 25% of the time.  He wasn't a factor at all in letting Beltre walk.

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

 
I don't think 2013 was a result of any better planning than the other seasons.  The case I think Ras is trying to make is 2013 was a lot of good luck, and 2014-2015 has seen a lot of bad luck, but the roster construction/philosophy was pretty much the same each year...filling in holes with mostly short-term value signings aimed at bridging to the next "great" Red Sox team.  In 2013, those signings worked out in spades: Uehara, Victorino, Napoli, Gomes, Drew etc.  In 2014, not so much.  2015...looks bad but I still think returns are incomplete.

So teams like the Cardinals, they're just luckier than the Red Sox?

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

"From the desk of John Henry: hey sorry for giving you negative financial returns three out of the last four years. I assure you that in order to move back to our winning ways we have removed the people responsible for this performance. Namely, the black cat, the janitor who broke that mirror, and Juan Nieves. Full steam ahead."

 

[wade boggs chicken dinner]

 
People seem to forget this. Sure, Theo's last draft in 2011 was pretty good, but 2010 and 2009 weren't... the farm system was bottom third to middle of the pack when he left. 
 
The team was also on the hook for a disastrous Carl Crawford contract, no catcher of the future (a position which Theo never seemed to address as Varitek approached 40 despite stopgaps like V-Mart and Salty holding us over) and no useful top level prospects. 
 
Theo rightly deserves respect as one of the Red Sox all time great executives, but he made a huge mess of the Sox in 2011 and then left because he didn't feel like staying to clean it up. Francona (arguably the league's most respected manager) was fired in the aftermath and the team was set up for disaster before the 2012 Dodgers trade happened. 

Ben deserves criticism, a lot of his deals haven't worked out, but people build up Theo as better than he was and ignore the mess he left behind.

 
The team Theo runs has won 61, 66, and 73 games up until this year.  Theo has had the good fortune of (up until this year) not having to sign a marquee free agent, having high draft picks, and letting his kids play without the final win-loss record being of any import.
 
And - IIRC - there weren't many people on this board weeping and gnashing their teeth when Theo left based on his own free agent miscalculations.  They were more worried about what compensation we should get.
 
I don't think Ben is a perfect GM - I would have had him get even more prospects from Lackey and Lester since to me prospects are a numbers game - but the one thing I applaud him for is not trading off our top prospects.  I am excited to see a mostly homegrown Red Sox team, whether or not the prospects flame out or become superstars.  It's just a more interesting way to follow a team over the long-term.

 

[Otis Foster]

 
I think you're mis-remembering the bolded a bit.  Beltre was let go because they preferred to pursue Gonzalez and believed Youkilis could handle a transition to 3B.  When all that went down, Middlebrooks was coming off a season at Salem (high-A) where he hit .276/.331/.439 and struck out 25% of the time.  He wasn't a factor at all in letting Beltre walk.

 
You're correct. Apologies to all. Yet another reason not to rely on memory. Still Beltre would have looked pretty good on the RS, and we could have avoided Panda.

 

[BosRedSox5]

 
I think you're mis-remembering the bolded a bit.  Beltre was let go because they preferred to pursue Gonzalez and believed Youkilis could handle a transition to 3B.  When all that went down, Middlebrooks was coming off a season at Salem (high-A) where he hit .276/.331/.439 and struck out 25% of the time.  He wasn't a factor at all in letting Beltre walk.

 
To be fair though, they misjudged a lot of players. Maybe he just got mixed up.

Thinking Youk could handle a move back to 3B was a big leap and didn't really pay off for a Gold Glove 1B. They misjudged Andrew Bailey, Mark Melancon, Josh Reddick, Joel Hanrahan, Josh Fields, Ryan Dempster, Jose Iglesias*, A.J. Pierzynski, Edward Mujica, John Lackey, Allen Craig, Joe Kelly, Justin Masterson, Alex Wilson, possibly Pablo Sandoval and Rick Porcello...

I mean, to address some of the broader questions the Sox have been wrong a lot, and it doesn't feel like they're just unlucky. 
 
 
 
 
 
*I probably wouldn't undo the Iglesias trade but the organization thought he'd never hit... and they were wrong. 

 

[Rovin Romine]

I think you can discount how much credit the FO gets for the 2013 WS title. I give the FO substantial credit for putting together a first place team and I give credit to the players, particularly Lester and Ortiz and Uehara but really lots of guys, and SSS for the title. Would you feel differently about this FO if the team had lost in the ALCS?

Ah. But we *did* win the WS. Would you feel differently about the team if Porcello/Napoli got their shit together and we were at .500?

 

[Super Nomario]

Perhaps I should reiterate that my interest is in the thinking and process of the FO: I believe that they think that it is quite a bit different to lock up $150-200M on a pitcher over 30 vs $100M on a position player for his age 28 - 32 seasons. I think that's easily defensible when you consider the overall cost to production trends of both populations; what makes it harder to defend is Pablo going out and shitting all over the hot corner (and what is nearly impossible is debating long term deals after not even a full year).

Staying out of the massive contract space isn't a strategy in and of itself - it's a constraint on strategy. The FO still had to acquire players, and they have gotten a bunch of different players in a variety of ways. They've signed old players to short deals (Uehara, Pierzynski, Dempster), traded for young vets (Miley, Porcello, Cespedes, Kelly, Bailey), gone for reclamation projects (Sizemore, Masterson), handed jobs to youngsters with limited track records (Bradley, Vazquez, Betts, Bogaerts, Middlebrooks), and signed vets to moderate contracts (Victorino, Napoli). At times they've played glove-first guys, and at times they've traded those guys away and played bat-first guys. I can't identify a model or process here - they haven't consistently gone for young players, or built from within, or built a great defensive team, or built the pitching around the bullpen, etc.
 
I think there's been a decided effort to acquire young vets over the past year due to the talent dearth in the 25-29 age range, but that was kind of a change of direction from 2012-2013. And it's been pretty much a spectacular failure, in part because teams are reluctant to give up their prime talents if they're really good. The other problem is that they've acquired low-strikeout pitchers and then backed them with a pretty bad defense, which is the sort of thing that makes me wonder where you're coming from when you talk about things like "plan" and "direction."
 

The bottom line is they didn't go cheap on 3b, which was a position of weakness in the system and in baseball as a whole; but everyone has decided that that would've been a reasonable plan after seeing what Pablo has given the team this year, conveniently ignoring the howls that would've greeted this idea in the offseason and ignoring that this leaves a big hole to fill in next year's squad. Even if the pitching hasn't worked out, that's something where there's a better market this year (and maybe a chance to scoop someone up for less than premium prices); that isn't the case for 3bmen.

A lot of the Sandoval criticism is hindsight, but there were quite a few nay-sayers concerned with Sandoval's consistency and weight. I gave the FO the benefit of the doubt that they did their homework, because otherwise why would they commit so much money when they've been avoiding long-term deals? But things have played out even worse than the nay-sayers thought, and it makes me concerned about the rigor and approach they take in talent acquisition.
 

To put it another way, the process is like counting cards; things might not go your way on the draw, but that doesn't mean that your plan isn't sound. I'm not really worried about the FO changing tack due to fan handwringing, but I'd like to see a more nuanced discussion of the direction rather than knee-jerk reaction.

It may also be like counting cards in that, if you're bad at counting cards, it's worse than not trying to count cards at all.

 

[BosRedSox5]

 
And - IIRC - there weren't many people on this board weeping and gnashing their teeth when Theo left based on his own free agent miscalculations.  They were more worried about what compensation we should get.
 
I don't think Ben is a perfect GM - I would have had him get even more prospects from Lackey and Lester since to me prospects are a numbers game - but the one thing I applaud him for is not trading off our top prospects.  I am excited to see a mostly homegrown Red Sox team, whether or not the prospects flame out or become superstars.  It's just a more interesting way to follow a team over the long-term.

 
Right, at the time most people thought it was a good break... that it was time to part ways. It seems like there's this revisionist history going on where people see the looming juggernaut that Theo built in Chicago and the recent last place finishes for the Red Sox and are remembering Theo as a Titan of baseball who we should have held on to. 

I agree, I'd like to see a mostly homegrown team too. While an all homegrown lineup like 1988 seems unrealistic in this day and age, developing your own players allows you to do so much in terms of roster creation.

On that same note, while hindsight's 20-20... the Red Sox traded Josh Reddick away for Andrew Bailey. The team seemed to absolutely whiff on both players. Reddick won a Gold Glove and put up a 5 WAR. Bailey flamed out. Some players take a while to develop. Imagine if the Red Sox had Brett Gardner. It took him a while to fully develop into a major league regular. Would the Red Sox be as patient with an outfielder like him? 

 

[Yelling At Clouds]

A lot of this "evaluate the front office" discussion has centered around the recent offseason acquisitions, specifically Ramirez, Sandoval, and Porcello, on whom they're going to be spending $60 million next year (unless a trade gets announced before I finish typing this). I'm starting to wonder if the real issue isn't that they decided to open the vault for those three guys - defensible decisions, though not beyond criticism - but rather the decision to open the vault at all after 2014. In other words, I'm wondering if the real killer was that they misjudged the players they already had on hand - there was a lot of risk on this roster before you get to Sandoval adjusting to new expectations and Ramirez trying a new position. And I don't think all of the disappointing performances from 2014 holdovers should have come as total surprises. 

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

 
To be fair though, they misjudged a lot of players. Maybe he just got mixed up.

Thinking Youk could handle a move back to 3B was a big leap and didn't really pay off for a Gold Glove 1B. They misjudged Andrew Bailey, Mark Melancon, Josh Reddick, Joel Hanrahan, Josh Fields, Ryan Dempster, Jose Iglesias*, A.J. Pierzynski, Edward Mujica, John Lackey, Allen Craig, Joe Kelly, Justin Masterson, Alex Wilson, possibly Pablo Sandoval and Rick Porcello...

I mean, to address some of the broader questions the Sox have been wrong a lot, and it doesn't feel like they're just unlucky. 
 
 
 
 
 
*I probably wouldn't undo the Iglesias trade but the organization thought he'd never hit... and they were wrong. 

Maybe you could show your work? A list of players stamped "wrong" tells us virtually nothing. Are you taking any context into account? When you say they were wrong about Reddick does it matter that they were looking to compete that year and were trying to build a high obp offense? Reddick had a .305 obp in 2012 and a .307 in 2013. Rev has a great thread about how that approach built on itself and how the more high obp's you carried the better the lineup performed as a whole. Just because Reddick turned into a good player eventually, that doesn't mean they're wrong about him.

I could break down a number of other players from your list similarly, but you should get the point. If you are going to declare that the front office was wrong you need to put some effort in and show why you think so and address the potential weaknesses in your position.

 

[irinmike]

Trying to convince Red Sox fans, that everything will be all right, at this point in another futile season is hopeless.  There are way too many missteps taken by the evaluating staff, and the minions of our GM's office.  We have Joe Kelly because the Cardinals were astute enough to pedal him to us and take away one of our "problems" at that time John Lackey.  However currently John Lackey is pitching quite well for St. Louis, while Kelly is struggling mightily.  Of course there are many other cases of misdirection one could conjure up for discussion.  But for now the Cardinals continue along without skipping a beat as yearly contenders with their front office and managerial staff.  While the Red Sox utter the familiar cry of, "wait until next year".  

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

I could break down a number of other players from your list similarly, but you should get the point. If you are going to declare that the front office was wrong you need to put some effort in and show why you think so and address the potential weaknesses in your position.

 
Here's the thing - before 2012, 2014, and 2015, everybody was generally pretty happy with the state of the team. Some weird moves notwithstanding (I don't know anybody except fans of 2009 Brad Penny who were excited about the Masterson signing), the Red Sox were picked to finish in first or close to it. National media, the publicly available projection systems, the consensus was the team had a breadth and depth of talent that was good enough to keep them competitive. It wasn't, and they weren't. I haven't seen a legitimate explanation for that. Ascribing something to "luck" is like believing in magic. The performance of the vast majority of players for the Red Sox over the past 3/4 years has been not just bad; it's been far below what was expected. Where are the over-achievers on this year's team? Brock Holt? and...?Who were the over-achievers on last year's team? Burke Badenhop? Jon Lester? "Luck" evens out. When you have ~40 players on a team, about half should be above their projected performance and about half below. When you have 39 players coming up tails, that's not "luck."
 
At this point, with one of the worst win-loss records over the past four years, it's really not incumbent on the people saying that this team has been bad to show their work. The prior right now is that the team sucks and the front office and coaching staff aren't up to the job. It would be far more interesting to hear reasonable explanations about why all of the available predictive models for this team have failed so spectacularly and why so many players since 2012 have underperformed. 

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

It's incumbent on anyone making an argument to show their work. And you are assuming that luck has to play out and even out over the course of an individual season. I'm not sure there's a good reason to make that assumption. I'm not making the argument that all moves are good until proven bad, I'm saying if you are going to declare a specific move or player evaluation a miss, you should do more than just declare it and move on. Using a declaration without any evidence to support it as support for a larger argument compounds the problem.

 

[Rasputin]

How is it you're able to discern that 2013 was the result of good planning but 2012, 2014, and 2015 were just a string of run of the mill bad baseball luck?

What makes you think that's the case?

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

It's incumbent on anyone making an argument to show their work. And you are assuming that luck has to play out and even out over the course of an individual season.

Of course it's not a single season, it's the totality of Ben's work since he's been in charge. Are there other teams you can think of who've had such a string of "bad luck", or is it just the one you root for?

 

[Otis Foster]

It's incumbent on anyone making an argument to show their work. And you are assuming that luck has to play out and even out over the course of an individual season. I'm not sure there's a good reason to make that assumption. I'm not making the argument that all moves are good until proven bad, I'm saying if you are going to declare a specific move or player evaluation a miss, you should do more than just declare it and move on. Using a declaration without any evidence to support it as support for a larger argument compounds the problem.

 
 
I'm sorry, I don't agree. We're all judged by results, and here the the results speak for themselves. Whether applying hindsight or what should have been a best judgment based on facts on hand at the time the decision was made, their scouting of major league personnel has resulted in bad decisions much more frequently than good ones.
 
I suspect that what is often called 'luck' is more often intuitive judgments, which can't be explained in totally logical terms and apparently contradicted (or not supported) by then-known facts,. Some of these calls seemed logical at the time but turned out wrong. That can happen. When it happens a disproportionate number of times, that suggests something else is at work. Pure 'logic' will let the FO off the hook too easily. The rationalization is OK, but the judgment is bad.

 

[OCD SS]

Luck isn't magic, it's just a more convenient way to discuss randomness and the outcomes of (ridiculously) complex interactions. This is baseball we're talking about; we have to have a way to talk about accumulated performance.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

Of course it's not a single season, it's the totality of Ben's work since he's been in charge. Are there other teams you can think of who've had such a string of "bad luck", or is it just the one you root for?

 
So you are arguing that 39 of the ~40 players or so that have been acquired in 2012, 2014 and 2015 have "come up tails?" Define coming up tails. Then show how each player fits into that description, because I don't buy that. Back up your claim with something or you're just doing what bosredsox5 did. Just looking at the roster closely I can already debunk that ratio. Holt, Koji, Victorino, Gomes, Napoli-1, Drew-1, Carp, Peavy, and Ross would all buck that trend to some degree. I also wouldn't buy the argument that Hanley has been a net negative or that Miley has been less than expected. I know that this is the part where you'll point out that you didn't include 2013, so this is the part where I'll say that you can't just omit it from the discussion. It's part of the sample size and if you are looking to exclude arguments of bad luck, we should exclude an argument of good luck in 2013 and include those players.
 
We agree on Holt being a positive, but after that there's Koji who has been phenomenal any way you look at it. 1.09, 2.52 and 2.52 ERAs in his time here with peripherals to match. Victorino earned his contract in 2013 whether you look at it from a win-value perspective (which is dicey) or just at his individual contributions to that regular season and playoff run. He was instrumental in them winning that title and that has a ton of value. Gomes was an enormous weapon off the bench in 2013 (109 wRC+) and provided surprisingly good defense in left. Napoli was one of their best hitters in 2013 and 2014. He's been atrocious this year, so the second contract may turn out a net negative, but at best he'll be a wash for the deal signed two winters ago. The 2013 contract was a great sign, though. 129 wRC+ and stellar defense at first in 2013, 124 last year. Drew had a 109 wRC+ in 2013 with above average defense. His second contract was a waste, but that first one was a good investment. Mike Carp was probably the best pinch hitter in baseball in 2013 with a 139 wRC+. Peavy stabilized the rotation in 2013 and had one very good start in the playoffs and one solid/good enough start. And David Ross provided the solid defense and veteran leadership that he was acquired for behind the plate.
 
Like with most teams, there have been hits and misses. I think people are jumping the gun on Hanley, Porcello and Panda by dismissing them as "misses" already, but that's one we can resolve just yet so I won't get into them here. Regardless, the narrative that is being spun that Ben's additions to the roster have been almost universally bad just doesn't hold up and neither does the "3 last place finishes in 4 years" story. In 2012 and in 2014 they were a middling team that pulled the plug at the deadline and emptied out the major league roster. Neither team was on pace to finish last and so describing them as a last place team as though that's what the entered the season as, or even were when the trades were made is disingenuous. This is the first team under Ben's care that actually looks like a last place caliber team out of the gate and that is a distinction that many people on the "Fire Ben!" train seem to want to ignore.

 

[plucy]

Does Ben provide enough pushback against business ops to allow him the flexibility to adjust the roster according to needs and performance? It seems to be the issue that did Theo in.

Despite salvaging the team with the Punto trade the Red Sox are following the same plan since the 04 championship: build a team for a five year cycle with heavy investment in acquisitions and extensions supplemented by the arrival of prospects and mid-course adjustments if there are failures in the initial wave. It worked in the 2007-10 era but not since (13 was a larger adjustment to the Punto trade but was not the new direction in player acquisition).

So my question is, was it Cherington's plan to acquire $400MM in contracts through trade, FA and extensions or was he following a team directive? If it was the latter, and he was forbidden from spending on TOR pitchers, where could he have spent the money? (Ok, 2 questions).

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

 
I'm sorry, I don't agree. We're all judged by results, and here the the results speak for themselves. Whether applying hindsight or what should have been a best judgment based on facts on hand at the time the decision was made, their scouting of major league personnel has resulted in bad decisions much more frequently than good ones.
 
I suspect that what is often called 'luck' is more often intuitive judgments, which can't be explained in totally logical terms and apparently contradicted (or not supported) by then-known facts,. Some of these calls seemed logical at the time but turned out wrong. That can happen. When it happens a disproportionate number of times, that suggests something else is at work. Pure 'logic' will let the FO off the hook too easily. The rationalization is OK, but the judgment is bad.

 
I'm not sure what you are disagreeing with, but it doesn't appear to be my post. Where did I ascribe anything to luck? All I'm saying is if you are going to make a claim about a player or about some players, back it up with something. Starting with the default position that "they were wrong" because the team is currently playing like shit is lazy and leads to shitty posting. The onus isn't on one side or the other to provide evidence when making claims. It's on all of us. If you disagree with that, then we have a fundamental difference of opinion about this community and I doubt we're going to come to an understanding.

 

[DJnVa]

People can explain it away all they want--but from 1934 on, the Red Sox have had 4 seasons with a winning percentage of .440 or under (I picked .440 because that's where they are now). If they don't finish above that mark, that would mean in the past 80+ seasons, only 5 times would they have been this bad, including 3 of 4.
 
And yes, someone can come point out how the season isn't over.
 
The last time they had back to back seasons this bad was in the early 30s.

 

[DJnVa]

 
 This is the first team under Ben's care that actually looks like a last place caliber team out of the gate and that is a distinction that many people on the "Fire Ben!" train seem to want to ignore.

 
This is revisionist history at it's finest.
 
92% of people that voted in the preseason pegged this team for 85+ wins. More people voted for 100+ wins than voted for less than 80. You went with 90+.
 
At what point were people saying this looked like a last place team out of the gate? Because to me, "out of the gate" means as the season starts. And that clearly wasn't the case.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

 
This is revisionist history at it's finest.
 
83% of people that voted in the preseason pegged this team for 85+ wins. More people voted for 100+ wins than voted for less than 80. You went with 90+.
 
At what point were people saying this looked like a last place team out of the gate?
 
We got it wrong. Ben get it wrong. Unfortunately, he's the one that has people to answer to about that.

 
I'm talking about how they played out of the gate. This team has been shitty since the season started. More so than any other team under this ownership. They started 9-5 and it's been all downhill since. So "out of the gate" might be the wrong way to phrase it. Maybe "they have looked like a last place team by the end of April" would be better.
 

 
On July 31, 2014 the Red Sox were in last place, with a 48-60 record (.444). They finished the season 71-91 (.438). 

 
Yep, I was wrong about last year. Even still, the 3 out 4 talk is erroneous. The worst you can say is that this team has been out of it at the deadline for two straight seasons, which is a far cry from "last place team in 3 of the last 4 years" which conveniently downplays the fact that they were the best team in the majors in 2013.

 

[DJnVa]

 
Yep, I was wrong about last year. Even still, the 3 out 4 talk is erroneous. The worst you can say is that this team has been out of it at the deadline for two straight seasons, which is a far cry from "last place team in 3 of the last 4 years" which conveniently downplays the fact that they were the best team in the majors in 2013.

 
It doesn't down play that at all. But the fact remains that it's very possible that the 2012, 2014, and 2015 will be 3 of the 5 WORST Red Sox teams by winning percentage in the last 80 years.
 
Hell, even worse that that is this: should the Sox finish at .440 or below, then the 3 WORST records of the last 50 years will have come in the last 4 seasons. The 3 worst Red Sox teams in 50 years...all since 2012.
 
 

 "last place team in 3 of the last 4 years"
 

 
Now, with the caveat that this year isn't over, you keep arguing against this--but it will be an actual, documented fact. You seem to be saying something that is 100%, demonstrably true isn't true.

 

[jscola85]

 
I'm talking about how they played out of the gate. This team has been shitty since the season started. More so than any other team under this ownership. They started 9-5 and it's been all downhill since. So "out of the gate" might be the wrong way to phrase it. Maybe "they have looked like a last place team by the end of April" would be better.
 
 
Yep, I was wrong about last year. Even still, the 3 out 4 talk is erroneous. The worst you can say is that this team has been out of it at the deadline for two straight seasons, which is a far cry from "last place team in 3 of the last 4 years" which conveniently downplays the fact that they were the best team in the majors in 2013.

 
Do you feel better saying that?  Perhaps a better way to frame it is this.  Since the start of 2012, the Red Sox have gone 281-305, or .479 baseball.  A 3.6 year track record of playing like a 78-win team with a $180M payroll seems like some serious overall under-performance.  It's great that 2013 happened.  2012, 2014 and 2015 also happened though, and 2016 barring some big bouncebacks or Punto Trade 2.0 seems challenging to assume the team will materially outperform that 78-win pace as well.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

 
It doesn't down play that at all. But the fact remains that it's very possible that the 2012, 2014, and 2015 will be 3 of the 5 WORST Red Sox teams by winning percentage in the last 80 years.
 
Hell, even worse that that is this: should the Sox finish at .440 or below, then the 3 WORST records of the last 50 years will have come in the last 4 seasons. The 3 worst Red Sox teams in 50 years...all since 2012.
 
 
 
Now, with the caveat that this year isn't over, you keep arguing against this--but it will be an actual, documented fact. You seem to be saying something that is 100%, demonstrably true isn't true.

 
I'm saying that the context matters and writing off the 2012 team as simply a last place team is missing the forest for the trees. The details are important if we're trying to forecast what's down the road for the organization. People keep trying to simplify it as much as possible so they can just say "Bad organization" and move on, but baseball is anything but simple so I don't see the value in trimming away context like this.
 

 
Do you feel better saying that?  Perhaps a better way to frame it is this.  Since the start of 2012, the Red Sox have gone 281-305, or .479 baseball.  A 3.6 year track record of playing like a 78-win team with a $180M payroll seems like some serious overall under-performance.  It's great that 2013 happened.  2012, 2014 and 2015 also happened though, and 2016 barring some big bouncebacks or Punto Trade 2.0 seems challenging to assume the team will materially outperform that 78-win pace as well.

 
All I'm saying is we can't just ignore 2013 if we're trying to evaluate the front office and we shouldn't be looking for simpler ways to break down Cherington's time at the helm. A lot of posters are taking the shortest and easiest path toward criticism and it's leading to a lot of reaching like the post above decreeing the Sox as being wrong on a pile of players without a single shred of evidence to support it in an effort to paint the front office as "being wrong a lot." (Whatever that means...) Or the post claiming 39 out of 40 players have come up short of expectations over the period of 2012, 2014 and 2015.
 
As for 2016, I don't think it's as bleak as some here, but they certainly have work to do. I don't think it will require another Punto trade, though. Not even close.

 

[DJnVa]

 
I'm saying that the context matters and writing off the 2012 team as simply a last place team is missing the forest for the trees. The details are important if we're trying to forecast what's down the road for the organization. People keep trying to simplify it as much as possible so they can just say "Bad organization" and move on, but baseball is anything but simple so I don't see the value in trimming away context like this.
 

 
Okay, I'll tell you what--I'll amend. If the Sox finish under .440 then 2 of the worst 3 seasons of the last 50 years are the last 2 years.
 
Also, please don't ascribe motivations to my thinking on the organization. Many people disagree with you and you are doing a disservice to them by writing off their POV as a "simplification". All the "deep thinkers" aren't on one side of this argument.
 

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

 
So you are arguing that 39 of the ~40 players or so that have been acquired in 2012, 2014 and 2015 have "come up tails?" Define coming up tails. Then show how each player fits into that description, because I don't buy that.

Just like with any set of data that has process and measurement error, we have to develop some kind of statistical model to separate out how much of the team's underperformance (which underperformance I assume we can all agree as a fact) is due to "luck" (i.e. process variance) and how much is due to poor predictive models or poor performance. One way to do that is just look at the expected number of wins before each of the past four seasons and compare it with the actual number of wins. I'm going to assume that three of the four will be quite outside the range of predicted outcomes, but nevertheless only provide four data points and therefore can't say much overall.

Or we could look at every single game-player performance as semi-independent events to estimate overall underperformance, but you'd have to get into some autocorrelative term and I'm not getting paid enough to do that. Or we could generate estimates of mean/variance for al of the players who have played for the Red Sox since 2012 and see how whether the predicted outcome differed significantly from the observed performance. See above.

Another way to look at it is to treat single season performances as independent events. This seems reasonable because seasons have a lot of clear baseball-related meaning to them. Players stay about the same age in a single season. Most injuries suffered affect a player for about one season or less. All players on the same team have the same travel schedules, opponent quality, coaches, etc. For a lot of reasons, estimating player performance in a single season feels like a simple but meaningful way of evaluating front office and management decisions. So what I'm proposing is you look at all of the players and all of the seasons from 2012-2015 and give them a "heads" if they over performed (defined however you want, Zips or Steamer seems like a reasonable starting point), and a tails if they underperformed. I'd suggest Zips or Steamer because I assume they're calibrated such that the expected value for all players are a little low half the time and a little high the other half - that is, they are unbiased estimators of player performance.

Once you have tallied all player-seasons as either heads or tails, you count them up and test for significance. If you want me to do this, I will try to find the time. As a shorthand, I'm suggesting that there are usually about 40 players who make a meaningful contribution to team performance. That gives us a total data set of 160. If more than about 90 player-seasons were under, that suggests more than just random variation. Do you really feel comfortable saying that you could come up with 70 player-seasons over the past four years that were over performances?

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

... And if you're worried about effect size, then limit "heads" or "tails" to players who were more than 1 WAR away from their predicted value.

By the way, I'm saying this as somebody who appreciated all the moves of the past few seasons. I think I was down for about 80 wins coming into the season. My sense, having watched way too many games this season, is that this team and last year's team underperformed because they weren't preparing for the games. I look at Bogaerts and I see a guy who clearly put a ton of effort into learning how to play short and to hit the other way, and it's paid enormous dividends. Then I watch a ball that's hit two thirds of the way between Hanley and Mookie and Mookie catches it. Then I see a guy get thrown out at third on a grounder to short. This team plays so much stupid baseball. They have as much talent (maybe short a couple good bullpen arms) as any team in the league. So why do they suck so much? It's not because a bunch of bloops have fallen in against them - that's bad luck.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

 
Okay, I'll tell you what--I'll amend. If the Sox finish under .440 then 2 of the worst 3 seasons of the last 50 years are the last 2 years.
 
Also, please don't ascribe motivations to my thinking on the organization. Many people disagree with you and you are doing a disservice to them by writing off their POV as a "simplification". All the "deep thinkers" aren't on one side of this argument.
 

 
Short of a fire sale, I would be surprised if they finished below .440. Moving Koji would hurt, but I'm expecting better performance ROS from Panda, Hanley, Papi and Porcello and more growth from Bogaerts, Betts and Rodriguez. The mitigating factor is Buchholz seemingly being lost for the rest of the season, so I don't expect them to have a monster two month stretch, but they could go .500 the rest of the way.
 
And I didn't ascribe motivations to your thinking and I certainly didn't assume that all simple thinking is on the other side of the debate or that all people on the other side are doing it. I very specifically cited two posts as examples of what I was talking about and said a lot of people are doing similar things when posting. I think that bears out with a rereading of the most active threads on the main board right now over the last few days.
 

Just like with any set of data that has process and measurement error, we have to develop some kind of statistical model to separate out how much of the team's underperformance (which underperformance I assume we can all agree as a fact) is due to "luck" (i.e. process variance) and how much is due to poor predictive models or poor performance. One way to do that is just look at the expected number of wins before each of the past four seasons and compare it with the actual number of wins. I'm going to assume that three of the four will be quite outside the range of predicted outcomes, but nevertheless only provide four data points and therefore can't say much overall.

Or we could look at every single game-player performance as semi-independent events to estimate overall underperformance, but you'd have to get into some autocorrelative term and I'm not getting paid enough to do that. Or we could generate estimates of mean/variance for al of the players who have played for the Red Sox since 2012 and see how whether the predicted outcome differed significantly from the observed performance. See above.

Another way to look at it is to treat single season performances as independent events. This seems reasonable because seasons have a lot of clear baseball-related meaning to them. Players stay about the same age in a single season. Most injuries suffered affect a player for about one season or less. All players on the same team have the same travel schedules, opponent quality, coaches, etc. For a lot of reasons, estimating player performance in a single season feels like a simple but meaningful way of evaluating front office and management decisions. So what I'm proposing is you look at all of the players and all of the seasons from 2012-2015 and give them a "heads" if they over performed (defined however you want, Zips or Steamer seems like a reasonable starting point), and a tails if they underperformed. I'd suggest Zips or Steamer because I assume they're calibrated such that the expected value for all players are a little low half the time and a little high the other half - that is, they are unbiased estimators of player performance.

Once you have tallied all player-seasons as either heads or tails, you count them up and test for significance. If you want me to do this, I will try to find the time. As a shorthand, I'm suggesting that there are usually about 40 players who make a meaningful contribution to team performance. That gives us a total data set of 160. If more than about 90 player-seasons were under, that suggests more than just random variation. Do you really feel comfortable saying that you could come up with 70 player-seasons over the past four years that were over performances?

 
So you are predicting that on average, 39 out of 40 players have under performed each year when compared to projections? Because that's what you started with and that kind of hyperbole is what I'm arguing against. If you are amending that to suggest that the split would be more along the lines of 90/70 over 4 seasons I'd be interested to see the results of a look like this, but as it's your position, I'll leave it to you to do the legwork. You'll also need to come up with an error bar for it as it's not really fair to draw the line at the exact comp as being ~5% above or below is probably just normal variance and should count as a "heads.".
 
It may turn up less than 70 seasons of positive results, but I wouldn't be shocked if it turned up more. This year alone I'd bet on Bogaerts, Betts, Koji, Eduardo, Holt, Pedroia, Miley, De Aza, Hanigan, Buchholz, and Tazawa are all good bets to be in that margin for error or above it and this is probably the worst season of the four. You're likely to have a lot of players from the 2013 roster coming up heads as well, so that's a pretty good start. When you consider that the 2012 squad was 53-51 on July 31st of that year, there are very likely a good number of players who will also come up heads for that season as well.
 
And that doesn't mean the front office is above reproach or that they haven't made any mistakes worth criticizing, but the last 3.5 seasons haven't been as bad as some here are suggesting.