As much as we like Raffy's upside there's a definite downside to him too. IMO Raffy got off easy last night with the error that was charged to Valdez. While I'll agree that Valdez shouuld have handled that throw, at the same time the throw shouldn't have been in a place that made Valdez stretch like a 1B.
As a second downside, as 5GG mentioned, he looks like he's trying to hit a 500 foot-er on every swing when he demonstrated in ST that he can go to LF.
And downside #3...Is anyone other than me tired of watching him jog to first base on anything that he assumes is going to be an automatic out? IMHO at the minimum he should at least be making it look like he's TRYING.
Like most everone, I like his offense but the downsides make me want to tear my hair out - what's left of it.
It's a mere moment in a man's life between the All-Star game and the Old Timer's game.
-Vin Scully
That may be, but then who are you taking out of the OF. Then who are you going to replace Raffy at 3B with no spending allowance from JH. I haven’t seen anything from Raffy either that would lead me to think Raffy would be a plus defender at 1B like one poster keeps calling for on here. Once again the Red Sox are just player the cards they dealt themselves, such doesn’t lead to a good defensive team.
Blah! Both of those guys are paid for their hitting, and their defense is secondary. Devers hits. Yoshida doesn't.
The Sox right now have plenty of good defensive outfielders and at least two, O'Neill and Duran, who are also hitting.
These are the six Sox positions player with positive WAR's: O'Neill 0.6, Duran 0.6, Devers 0.3, McGuire 0.2, Wong 0.1, Story 0.1.
Yoshida and Rafaela are both 0.0.
Abreu is -0.1, Dalbec -0.1, Casas -0.1, Reyes -0.2, and Valdez -0.3.
Yoshida is just adapting to his new role as DH!
Championships since purchase by John Henry group: Red Sox 4 Yankees 1
The Red Sox are 8-1 in their last 9 postseason games against the Yankees.
I can't even comment on the streak-busting shitshow I saw at Angels Stadium last night. It featured all that is exciting about this team; 14K's, 3 hits , egregious defense on the left side, many many 3-2 counts followed by 5 foul offs leading to Whitlock's departure in the 5th. Not a shutdown pitch in Whitlock's repertoire.
3 missed calls at 2B by bumpire , although each call benefitted the Sox until 2 were overturned. A streak ending loss where the opponent scored on terrible defense by Devers and Reyes . 6 walks , including 2 to a guy( Shanuel) hitting .091 and 2 to Moniak hitting exactly .000 so far.
On the other hand, overall the BP kept the Sox in position to win and Duran got the 1 RBI, plus a great catch in left to save runs. Detmers schooled Casas and Reyes , both of whom were clueless.
Detmers is pretty good. I was actually happy we scored a run off him.
Championships since purchase by John Henry group: Red Sox 4 Yankees 1
The Red Sox are 8-1 in their last 9 postseason games against the Yankees.