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Ben Clemens FanGraphs Chat - 5/18/26

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Ben Clemens

2:31

I think that has an aggregate effect, and that that effect might even be bigger now that everyone is just max on all the time

baseball players work HARD now

fanoftheman

2:31

ballpark totchos are 100% my new-age baseball snack winner

Ben Clemens

2:31

um, I was not aware of this food but yes please

small e

2:31

How much did Craig Breslow actually build a historically bad hitting roster that is less than the sum of its parts, and how much is just catastrophic underperformance from too many load bearing hitters?

bosoxforlife

2:32

A quarter of the season has been played and what has surprised you the most? i didn't expect the Red Sox to be awful and unwatchable but the Cardinals being so much better than everybody anticipated is at the top of my list.

Austin Metzger

2:32

If you were running the Red Sox, are you blowing it up at the deadline (Gray, Duran, etc.) and looking at the future? (Anthony, Mayer, etc.)

Matthew VanWinkle

2:32

Under Alex Cora the Red Sox averaged 3.65 runs per game. (I'm throwing out the last 17-1 win because a lot of those runs came in garbage time, some of them against a position player pitching.) Under Chad Tracy they've averaged 2.89 runs per game. And yes they haven't had Anthony recently but it's not like he was setting the world on fire before he got hurt. Seems like the problems here run deeper than a thoroughly fired offensive coaching staff.

Ben Clemens

2:32

So, I hunted around for several related Sox questions so that you can all feel solidarity

2:33

I think it's hard to pin all of this on Breslow for sure

I thought the work he did on the pitching staff this winter was quite good in fact. I would note that they came into the year with less depth in the infield than anywhere else, though

and like.... their infield has wildly underperformed expectations

2:34

it's hard to pin Duran turning into a pumpkin on Breslow, for example

even if you think that he probably should have had another backup option to Durbin and Story

2:35

but really, what, we're gonna blame Breslow for Marcelo Mayer and Roman Anthony combining for 0.4 WAR at the quarter pole?

2:36

this is just a perfect storm. team with a weak point has a catastrophic player failure at that weak point with no good backups, and at the same time plenty of the load-bearing places we all THOUGHT were just too good to fail also fail

Blue Jays fan

2:36

Davis Schneider has 8 batter-initiated successful ABS challenges in less than half the plate appearances of the leaders (Altuve and Garcia with 9). No question, just an observation of a short hitter with a good eye who was getting crushed at the top of the zone with bad calls prior to this season.

Oaktown Blues

2:36

Funny, Ben had never heard of totchos, but I've never heard of a Fuku sandwich

Ben Clemens

2:37

oh yeah, fair. It's standard fare at the two stadiums I've gone to most in teh last decade, I'm probably overrating it. It's basically an upscale version of a Chik-Fil-A sandwich

shandykoufax

2:37

Oh so when Matt Chapman chokes drew gilbert he’s “adding secret value” and “making his team better”, but when Jonathan papelbon chokes Bryce Harper he’s “bitter” and “attacking a teammate”

Ben Clemens

2:37

if you were trying to have the funniest comment of the chat, you can just stop now, the contest is over

Hello, Human Resources?

Schmegs

2:37

If an RP has to face three batters or finish an inning before being removed what happens if they face one batter and that ends the inning but then they come out for the next inning. Can the RP be removed after one batter of the second inning (their second batter total) because they finished and inning or do they now have to face a third batter because the inning isn't at an end?

Ben Clemens

2:37

they now have to face a third batter

EccentricATLFan

2:37

It's college softball instead of baseball, but worth highlighting Texas Tech's comeback against Ole Miss on Saturday. Not just coming back from 8-0 in the final regular inning, but also for the fact that, prior to then, not a single NCAA softball tournament game saw a comeback win from a team down 8+ runs out of 640 prior instances. Such a fun comeback to watch.

Ben Clemens

2:38

8-0 in softball is like 20-0 in baseball

that's wild

bosoxforlife

2:38

Munetaka Murikami and Kazama Okamoto have 27 HR's between them and the woeful Boston B__ms have all of 33 from the entire roster. These two power hitters were available on the cheap this past off season. More than any other of his numerous mistakes, failing to recognize that home runs are required to score runs in today's game is the reason Breslow has to go.

Ben Clemens

2:38

Well, okay.... I'd be with you except for the fact that a lot of the guys we all expected to hit homers aren't

2:39

I do agree that the Durbin style profiles are not stable in modern baseball

I believe that that was the big discussion we had here around his acquisition - the Brewers basically didn't buy that he was as good as the projections because he had the unstable profile of a no-homers dude

2:40

and that yeah, maybe the Sox have relied on that too much in the aggregate? But one of Breslow's big acquisitions this winter leads the Sox in homers

Mike

2:40

Hey Ben, I’m a longtime mariners fan who moved to the east sf bay and became an avid as fan until recently because of reasons. Also like to catch a giants game once in awhile. My question for you is…*checks standings*…what have you been cooking for dinner lately?

Ben Clemens

2:40

hahaha

2:41

um.... hey I still find the Giants and A's fun to watch on TV, and particularly to go to in person

but I've made some good ones recently!

I highly recommend this salad:
https://www.bakedbymelissa.com/blogs/recipes/green-goddess-salad?srslt...

2:42

it sounds weird, it's a chopped salad made by a cupcake blog? But we make this, eat it by dipping tortilla chips into it, absolutely delicious

just put in a big Weee order so I think that hakka-style eggplant is going to be on the menu this week

2:43

and I don't know if you've ever tried Goodles, which are like protein-packed noodles that are supposed to be very easy to make - but we start with a box of those sometimes and then just mix in a fancy side to turn it into a meal that feels very extravagant

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