AL East Sleepers: Boston Red Sox

As the hometown team boasts one of the strongest starting nine in the American League, it can be difficult to detect sleepers among the pack. Don’t be fooled, however. They are there and prepped to support an elite cast looking to avenge last season’s early playoff exit.

Though few of the positional starters offer much potential as true “sleepers”, considering the number of All-Stars and MVP candidates among them, the pitching staff contributes much of the excitement on this front. With youngsters and rebound contenders among the lot, an already superb rotation and bullpen could receive a few significant boosts from numerous sources.

SP Clay Buchholz

After the light came on last season, it never seemed to go out. Finally hitting his stride at the Major League level, he was able to lay fears about his potential to rest. Though not a groundbreaking season by any means, Buchholz’ performance went a long way toward stabilizing the ailing rotation during August and September.

Looking forward to 2010, Buchholz should comfortably take the place of the 5th starter – possibly 4th, depending upon the performance of Daisuke Matsuzaka – expectations he should have no problem fulfilling…

10 questions of regression for 2010

With trucks heading to Florida yesterday it’s a good time to look at the questions for what the Red Sox hope will happen in 2010. With breakouts and new levels of performance there is always the possibility of regression. That can also include getting better as you return to the mean. What are the top ten possible regressions for 2010?

10. Can Manny Delcarmen find the plate – While Manny never had great control there was an alarming rate of walks in 2009. He walked 5.13 batters every nine innings or more than a batter every two innings. We found the signs of arm problems here and I think that with health he should be better, but a better walk rate is required for him to be a solid contributor.

Is Clay Buchholz’s change-up responsible for lefty struggles?

Clay Buchholz is poised to take another step forward this year as a full-time member of the Red Sox rotation. He spent much of the first half of 2009 dominating Triple-A competition, and finally got his shot when Tim Wakefield experienced injury problems most of the second half.

His “emergence” wasn’t much of a surprise despite his godawful 6.75 ERA in 15 starts and one relief appearance during 2008, as his Fielding Independent Pitching was 4.69 and xFIP (FIP with home runs normalized to park and league data) 4.28 over 76 innings. Those respective FIPs were 4.69 and 4.09, respectively, covering 92 innings in 2009 with a 4.21 ERA all told.

An aspect to Buchholz’s game I don’t think has been made enough of, however, is his inability to pitch against left-handers. Okay, inability is a bit strong, so let’s go clear deficiency compared to right-handed batters.

PECOTA confirms our thoughts on 2010 and Clay Buchholz

This week the PECOTA projections were run through with depth charts and attempted to project final standings based on opening day expected rosters. Obviously trades, injuries and breakout/slumps will change these results, but so far they have the Red Sox at 95-67 finishing in second place. Of course the big surprise is who is in first. PECOTA projects Tampa Bay to finish at 96-66 winning the East with the Red Sox as the favorite for the wild card.

So where are the Yankees? Third place with a record of 93-69 and out of the playoffs. OK so 3 wins separating the three is not something to bet on, but confirms what we have said all along. The Red Sox have changed their strengths, but maintained their ability to win 95 games and make the playoffs.

The Boston Red Sox and What It Means to Spend Wisely

There is a difference between the Red Sox and nearly every other team in baseball – and it’s pretty obvious. How lucky are our home town fans, that our very own Boston squad has significantly more money to spend on players most other teams. Actually, all but one – but who’s counting. Too bad they’re in our division. But that’s alright, so long as we use our resources wisely.

So, what is using our resources wisely?

From the Red Sox’ perspective, it’s much different from most teams. Over the past five seasons, the team’s highest budget was $143 million, registered in 2007. We’ll save spectulating on this year’s budget, which will be quite high, as there could still be some maneuvering left to go, and the value of free agents and draft picks in this economy is yet to be determined. Therefore, we’ll treat 2007 as the team’s theoretical budget through which to speculate on how the team can formulate its spending practices.

Citing the research of analyst Keith Woolner, a theoretical replacement level team would win approximately 44 games. Putting this in perspective, this standard of futility is comparable to the some worst teams of all time, including the 2003 Detroit Tigers (43-119), the 1962 Mets (40-120), and 1952 Pittsburgh Pirates (42-112).

After seeing this, two thoughts come to mind. One, wow, how far have the Mets come since that
disturbingly dreadful inaugural season 47 years ago. The other, what in the hell happened to the 1899 Cleveland Spiders, who found a way to produce a 20-134 record (.130 win percentage) and be doomed to the annals of worst team in MLB history. Ouch. According to the all-knowing Wikipedia, only 3,179 fans attended the team’s first 16 home games…

Evaluating the 2010 team so far

After adding John Lackey and Mike Cameron the team is starting to take shape. Although most think we need to make another move it’s possible we enter 2010 as we stand now. That isn’t very likely if the Mike Lowell trade is completed, but to start I’m going to look at the roster without any third baseman.

*Here is the explanation of how I calculated the WAR values I will be using. If you want to skip this just know it’s an average of several projections. For those that are interested I used Bill James projection, Fangraphs new Fans Projection (where available) and CHONE projections. To calculate WAR for Bill James I used his batting runs above average and the CHONE defensive projection since Bill does not project defense. Fan projections already account for WAR and needed no calculation. CHONE is batting and defense above league average. To complete the calculation to WAR for Bill James and CHONE I used CHONE PA to calculate replacement level runs and positional adjustment. Unfortunately this double weights CHONE on PA and defense projections. Once I have calculated the three WAR values I sum the team totals and average them.

Better than 2009

Now that that is out of the way we should get an idea of what are good values. In 2009 the Red Sox had the third most runs scored and their batting runs above average totaled 98.8 which ranked second in the league. This includes the whole team and all season. The good news is that the projections so far are much better than that for our group of 8 (Remember no third basemen). Bill James projects a 133.8 runs above average and CHONE calls for 106.

John Lackey joins Boston in curious move

By all indications, the Red Sox will have John Lackey serving as their No. 3 starter this upcoming season. The right-hander inked a five-year, $85 million deal which is exactly market value for his services.

Lackey is a solid signing for the Red Sox, as long as they don’t attempt to stretch him into an ace. The 31-year old is in the mold of Josh Beckett, Dustin Pedroia and Kevin Youkilis: hard-nosed, fiery people who want to be out there every day kicking butt and taking names.

The five years is a point of contention. Boston has always been steadfast in its refusal to commit extended years to a pitcher. This is Theo Epstein’s first five-year commitment to a free agent pitcher. Jon Lester was his first five-year pitcher, but of course, Lester is six years younger with three arbitration years factored into the contract — so really, only two free agent years were bought out.

That five-year commitment to Lackey scares me, especially when the final year will be when Lackey is 35 years old. Coupled with his injury red flags and contact numbers, and I can’t really figure out what Boston saw in Lackey. Does he have a good chance of repeating his 2009 numbers over the next five years? Yes. But there is an equal chance of something going horribly awry. It doesn’t seem characteristic of Theo to commit this risk to a pitcher. To a position player, sure. But he’s been very good on the pitching ledger, so he’s stuck his neck out a bit with this pact.

Pressing reasons to improve the infield defense

There has been a lot of stress placed on the defense this offseason and that looks to continue with the interest in Adrian Beltre to replace Mike Lowell at third base. Other than the obvious value gained from a solid defense is there another reason to make sure you obtain positive gains this year in defense? I think I found it and it starts with Clay Buchholz.

With Buchholz taking on the number three spot in the rotation there was an interesting number that seemed in common for our top three. That number is groundball percentage, which Buchholz led the team in during his limited appearances at 53.8%. Jon Lester and Josh Beckett have established new career levels above 47% meaning 3 out of 5 starts by the team should have a large amount of work for the infield.

The Science of Selling Felix, A-Gon Short

In our versions of an offseason blueprint the Red Sox could follow (1, 2, 3) one topic that came up fairly often was how realistic or unrealistic our proposed trade packages were for certain players. Let’s recap:

Mike Lowell, Casey Kotchman, Clay Buchholz and key minor league pieces (defined as anyone sans Kelly, numbering two) for Felix Hernandez.

Money comment: Getting King Felix would be nice, but you are crazy thinking Seattle would have any interest in picking up Lowell or Kotchman. Why would they pick up $16+ in salaries? Lowell is going nowhere unless we pay his salary, which is crazy. – MEe

Clay Buchholz, Lars Anderson, Manny Delcarmen, Michael Bowden, two “second-tier” prospects to San Diego for Adrian Gonzalez.

Money comment: Delcarmen is a stiff. Bowden is a stiff. Anderson has done NOTHING in the minor leagues. Clay Buccholz has major league stuff but has yet to prove himself for an entire season. For this you’ll get one of the best young power hitters in the game? I think not!! - Nick

If our proposed deals are not up to snuff, that’s not good. Let’s try to figure out what a proposed deal could, should be.

LAA 7, BOS 6: The End Is Here

That one stings. Jon Papelbon’s ninth inning meltdown ended the playoff journey for Boston, as the Red Sox are swept by the Los Angeles Angels, 7-6.

After leading for the entire game, Vlad Guerrero’s single off Papelbon in the top of the ninth was the culmination of a completely lackluster post-season, the end of a pretty abysmal weekend for Boston sports in general. But… there’s always next year.