No Chemistry
by 75bandwagon on Aug 7, 2009 12:39 AM EDT
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What had happened to this team?
I'm really trying to get my arms around what has happened to this team. Hindsight is obviously 20/20, but it's fair to say that the ''two pitchers for cheap'' experiment has failed miserably. Is Theo just chalking this team up for the rest of the season? Martinez is a great fit for the clubhouse and has done some good things thus far, but we got him so that Lowell, Varitek and Ortiz could get more rest? That is definitely not a good sign. And we didn't get Halladay, Lee, or Hernandez, but we managed to sign Paul Byrd to a minor league contract? What kind of non sense is that? You have to start really wondering about the future of this team when you see Youkilis playing in left field. This team is in a lot of trouble. We had the tradable players and the payroll to beef up our pitching staff and we weren't able to do it. I know that I'm going to get hammered with emails telling me why we couldn't get any big pitchers at the trade deadline, but where there is a will there is a way. And now to compound everything, it looks like Ortiz may have been doing steroids a few years ago. Like my headline says; No Chemistry.
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sometimes i wonder
if youre a yankee fan in disguise trying to spread negative thinking
Why am I more scared of the Rays than I am of the apocalypse?
I'm all Sox fan
I’ve been seeing a lot of this ’’optimism’’ all year. I get pounded out here because I most ly post when we lose…..RIGHT!!!!….And we’ve been doing a lot of that lately. Can you honestly tell me that with the trade deadline gone and the team that we are now fielding every night that we are going to overtake the Yankees or even win the AL wild card? I have to say that it’s not looking good for us.
One of the things that I’m seeing is that we don’t have a true superstar on the field right now. Youkilis and Pedroia are good players and are all stars, but I can’t put them in the category of superstar just yet. In the past we had Nomar, Manny and Ortiz along with a core of good scrappy players like Nixon, Mueller, Bellhorn, Damon, etc. We had the cinderella mentality back then; the teams of ‘99, ’03 and ’04. The teamwas a buzz saw that went through everyone. Their was no adversity to deal with that year and the players who came up with that team got used to it. I know we made a great comeback in the ALCS last year, but I still believe that was only because Tampa wasn’t as great as everyone thought they were. And if we hadn’t been banged up it would have been a different story. I think Theo might have seen that too and thought he could win without having to spend a lot of money during the off season. The theory had merit, but if you were following the team closely you could sense problems early on. Losing 6 out of 8 to start the season; Ortiz and Drew not doing anything at the plate; never solving the problem at SS; Lowell never getting back to to even 90% after his surgery; the Dice K debacle. This was not a recipe for success and Theo Epstein did nothing to try and fix it. Once again, if you’re going to tell me that the best we could do for our pitching staff was to sign Paul Byrd to minor league contract then the front office needs to take a good look in the mirror. And now that we got rid of Masterson who do we have that can give us long relief? And we’re going to need a lot of that now. Traber showed what he could do and I wasn’t impressed. Once again, no chemistry. Get well soon, Rem Dog.
No chemistry? More like no analysis
One of the things that I’m seeing is that we don’t have a true superstar on the field right now.
I’m not sure what this means. What is a “true superstar”? How do you measure that? Pedroia was the MVP last year. Josh Beckett and Jon Lester are two of the best pitchers in baseball. Kevin Youkilis is hitting .310 AVG/.423 OBP/.576 SLG (.999 OPS/.425 wOBA). Is Mark Teixeira a “true superstar”? He is hitting .288 AVG/.383 OBP/.567 SLG (.950 OPS/.403 wOBA). How about Evan Longoria—.272 AVG/.359 OBP/.529 SLG (.888 OPS/.375 wOBA)—is he one too? I’m asking because Youk is better than both this year. What criteria are you using to judge a “true superstar”?
Does a team need “true superstars” to win? I don’t think so. The 1979 Red Sox had 4 Hall of Famer—Fisk, Rice, Yaz, and Eckersley—and two excellent players in Lynn and Evans (Lynn had an OPS of 1.059 that year), and still missed the playoffs. Lynn in his prime certainly was a “superstar”, as was Rice, etc.
We had the cinderella mentality back then; the teams of ‘99, ’03 and ’04. The teamwas a buzz saw that went through everyone. Their was no adversity to deal with that year and the players who came up with that team got used to it
The 1999 team certainly wasn’t a “buzzsaw”, and the 2003 Sox had some pitching and managerial problems. In 2004, the team overcame tons of adversity. From May 1st to July 31st, they went 41-40 while waiting for injured players to return. Had this sire been around in ‘04, I’m sure you would have been posting nearly every day—until August.
I gotta go 'cause I'm probably definitely gonna nod out again.
by Drugs Delaney on Aug 7, 2009 9:31 AM EDT up reply actions 4 recs
rec'd
"Ninety percent [of my salary] I'll spend on good times, women, and Irish whiskey. The other ten percent I'll probably waste."
-Tug McGraw
On Da Hop.
"Hating the New York Yankees is as American as apple pie, unwed mothers and cheating on your income tax." -- Mike Royko
by sox-inda-south on Aug 7, 2009 4:49 PM EDT up reply actions
Rec'd.
Good to see you’ve upgraded your splits to include wOBA, Drugs.
@bs_uf15bosox9be The Original Gameday; Learn to use SB Nation
Mostly post when we lose?
I haven’t seen any posts from you after our wins (of which we have way more of than loses).
I still think the Yankees are playing over their heads right now. Their pitching has been too good lately and should come back down. Look at Joba last night, if you call that a good game for him then you need to go reevaluate your definition of good. We had nearly as many people on base as they did, some people just didn’t come through with a hit when we needed it but we were two or three hits away from winning that game IMO even with our horrendous pitching. And like I have said before, baseball is a game of a fail rate of over 60% in most cases. Even the best players like Pujols fail 55% of the time.
What was our biggest problem going into the trade deadline? Smoltz and our lack of offense. We have pitching depth they just need to use it. Call up Bowden or make Dice-K work a little harder. Offense was our biggest problem after the All-Star break, we couldn’t hit we couldn’t do anything so he went and got a hitter, a pretty good one, not the one I wanted but one we needed. As you can see Halladay never went because they were asking too much and Cliff Lee did cost the Phillies a big chunk of their top 10 prospects just not the ones they values a lot because they needed pitching and their positional prospects were being held up by the players on their current roster. We did make a tremendous offer to Seattle for Felix, a very young, very talented pitcher but they turned it down so yes Paul Byrd is the best he could do. But he may very well pull off a waiver trade before it’s all said and done.
You always sound like you want this team to be run by a Steinbrenner, we have a lot of very good talented stars in this game. Jon Lester and Josh Beckett form maybe the best 1-2 in all of baseball, Youk, Petey, Ells and VMart are all extremely talented hitters and all but one play Gold Glove caliber defense. Star power doesn’t win championships, look at the MFY since 2000, star power has created more problems than championships. The Mets, Cubs? Star power but no results. Sox? We’ve had a great mix of veterans and young talent that has propelled our team to 2 championships this decade.
"We are not normal, We are Legends. People will tell their kids about us." - Deon Butler before Ohio State Game 2008.
One issue with the whole post:
Ells = “extremely talented hitter”? Give him a few more seasons to work on his discipline.
@bs_uf15bosox9be The Original Gameday; Learn to use SB Nation
I say stupid things when I’m in a rage. I think I meant to put another name in there but after this weekend god help me I can’t remember who.
"We are not normal, We are Legends. People will tell their kids about us." - Deon Butler before Ohio State Game 2008.
It happens.
At least you only say stupid stuff when you’re angry.
@bs_uf15bosox9be The Original Gameday; Learn to use SB Nation
Chemistry is overrated and I believe doesn’t has as much to do with winning as we like to think.
When there is a will, there is alway a way. However, the FO didn’t acquire Halladay, Hernandez or Gonzalez for the same reason I don’t spend $50K on a top cell phone. I don’t think it’s worth that much and spending that money would severely limit my ability to purchase other things I need and want.
Yeah I’m sure Dustin Pedroia goes up to bat and just thinks, “I really hate Nick Green, I’m just going to strike out this at bat”. Or when J.D. Drew fields a ground ball in the outfield he goes, “Screw Manny Delcarmen, I’m just going to lightly toss this ball back into the infield instead of trying to get the guy at the plate.” Yeah, those are some serious chemistry issues.
by Gnick on Aug 7, 2009 10:16 AM EDT reply actions
Chemistry = Winning
Its a very simple equation, really. When teams win, their players appear to get along better, based on the micro-fraction of their lives we see. When teams lose, their players look more uptight.
It’s like Ebby Calvin “Nuke” Laloosh says: “I love winning, y’know? It’s like… better than losing.”
I will say that I certainly feel under-rewarded for the effort, though.
Rock me, sexy Jesus...
by nuthinboutnuthin on Aug 7, 2009 11:03 AM EDT reply actions
This happens to teams, even good ones.
Unless you’re the 2001 Seattle Mariners, you will go through bad stretches. This “terrible streak” that we’ve all been worrying about has amounted to a 15-15 record since the beginning of July. That is certainly not good, but the 2004 team was at .500 for the whole first half of the season.
So which team will we see for the next 30 games? I don’t know. But I think the June version (18-8) is more likely than the July version.
"Ninety percent [of my salary] I'll spend on good times, women, and Irish whiskey. The other ten percent I'll probably waste."
-Tug McGraw
Or can we change their names?
I’m not sure I like seeing someone named “t.williams9” being so baseball-dumb.
@bs_uf15bosox9be The Original Gameday; Learn to use SB Nation
NO CENSORSHIP!
(except for trolls)
Instead, hammer ’em with the knowledge until they smarten the @#$% up.
Man I love that tuna casserole.
See, the problem there is most of them think they're right.
@bs_uf15bosox9be The Original Gameday; Learn to use SB Nation
Red Sox are in a slump right now
Its early august and we got beat up at Fenway park. Lets get them back when they come to Fenway park. This team went thirty scoreless innings and nothing like that will happen again. Yankees got lucky when the Red Sox were down
coming up for air and about to attack loser Republican radicals
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