2023 Official Astros World Champs Offseason Thread

[Frank Drebin 5,639]

Seems like these deals will hamstring these teams on the back end.  Unless they are really willing to pay serious luxury taxes.

[TonyTexas 10,512]

2 minutes ago, Frank Drebin said:

Seems like these deals will hamstring these teams on the back end.  Unless they are really willing to pay serious luxury taxes.

Who knows what the payroll structure will look like by then. The end of most of those are two CBAs away. 

Edited December 14, 2022 by TonyTexas

[Dutchrudder 11,139]

The big spender teams need to push for a salary floor of 75m+, that way you turn all those shitty teams leeching money off the league into graveyards for your bad contracts. It works for the NBA, the MLB should do the same.  

[Chapo 104]

According to Spotrac, Astros was still paying Greinke last season? 

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/houston-astros/payroll/2022/

[UTexasFight 9,444]

21 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

Who knows what the payroll structure will look like by then. The end of most of those are two CBAs away. 

This is where my head is going… what is the angle the owners are taking and how are they going to use this off-season to try and fuck over the MLBPA at the next CBA bargaining table in ~3.5 years.

 

Edited December 14, 2022 by UTexasFight

[UTexasFight 9,444]

14 minutes ago, Dutchrudder said:

The big spender teams need to push for a salary floor of 75m+, that way you turn all those shitty teams leeching money off the league into graveyards for your bad contracts. It works for the NBA, the MLB should do the same.  

…and maybe it’s this 

[TonyTexas 10,512]

35 minutes ago, Chapo said:

According to Spotrac, Astros was still paying Greinke last season? 

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/houston-astros/payroll/2022/

I never fully understood Greinke’s contract. I know it had a lot of deferred money in it and the Astros were responsible for some of it. But they also got a good amount of cash from the Diamondbacks as part of the trade. 

[Hank Chinaski 6,315]

56 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

Who knows what the payroll structure will look like by then. The end of most of those are two CBAs away. 

Right, and $30mm in 2022 isn’t the same as $30mm in 2032.

The owners know they’re buying depreciating assets; they’re just choosing to spread the cost out over more years. They’re essentially financing the expected production - e.g., Judge needs to produce 36 WAR over his deal (4 WAR/season) for the NYY to get fair value, based on Wulaw’s math. He’ll probably deliver most of that in the next 5-6 years, and he’ll probably deliver much less in the final 3-4 years. So he probably won’t be worth $40mm in those final years, but he probably outperformed his salary over the first half of the contract. I suppose spreading it out is happening to lower the payroll overall for luxury tax purposes. 

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

2 hours ago, hornmpa96 said:

Now that Carlos has his guaranteed contract, I wonder how many seasons he will get to 500 at-bats. In his 2 back-to-back contract years, he hit that mark and had the stats to match. When he’s in the line-up, he will put up HOF numbers.

I don’t think he’s a Jake or anything. Most of his injury history was bad luck of the broken bone due to sudden trauma variety but the back is obviously very worrisome. 
I think he is a worker and driven to be great and I don’t think giving him that money is Going to affect him in a negative way, but that’s one of those things that can’t be known until it’s seen because 350M is so absurdly ridiculous. 

[kevwun 15,788]

Judge could fall off a cliff in the next 3 or 4 seasons though because of his size.  That is why he deal is so scary.

[Js1 85,336]

4 hours ago, MissingInAction said:

So they communicated pitching signals through vibrating butt plugs? 

Real men of genius.

Hold on I’ve seen a video like this

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

1 hour ago, henrygandorf said:

correa is still a guy who's never hit 30 homers or driven in 100.  that's what mvp's do.  that's what middle of the lineup guys are expected to do.  and that's what the other huge contract shortstops have done.  he's also not gonna hit .330 or swipe 40 bases like a trea turner.  he was an mvp candidate because he was the best defensive ss and one of the best overall defenders in baseball.

he'll need to continue that at the hardest position to do so (especially for a big guy) because i don't see his offensive numbers spiking in that lineup or that stadium.

glad he got his money.  glad he's in the nl.  but this contract is not going to be a good one.

The 100 runs and 100 RBI is as much about lineup construction and order he it’s in as anything, but the 30 HR thing needs to change for him to unlock that MVP contender thing. He’s got plenty of power. He’s got plenty of power even to The big part of the park.  What he doesn’t do is pull the ball nearly enough, especially in the air. If he unlocks/figures this out he can get to 40 HR and be an MVP type. If he tries to live in the big part of that graveyard in SF it will go very very very badly for him. 
will be interesting to see if he makes this transition. 

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

53 minutes ago, Chapo said:

According to Spotrac, Astros was still paying Greinke last season? 

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/houston-astros/payroll/2022/

That deferred money I believe was paid in full by the diamondbacks. When Greinke came over they paid something like 30 or 40M for him. Think it was the deferred amount, even though the Astros  owned the contract. 

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

11 minutes ago, Hank Chinaski said:

Right, and $30mm in 2022 isn’t the same as $30mm in 2032.

The owners know they’re buying depreciating assets; they’re just choosing to spread the cost out over more years. They’re essentially financing the expected production - e.g., Judge needs to produce 36 WAR over his deal (4 WAR/season) for the NYY to get fair value, based on Wulaw’s math. He’ll probably deliver most of that in the next 5-6 years, and he’ll probably deliver much less in the final 3-4 years. So he probably won’t be worth $40mm in those final years, but he probably outperformed his salary over the first half of the contract. I suppose spreading it out is happening to lower the payroll overall for luxury tax purposes. 

Yep. Also, and this is what I wanted to see with Correa, it makes sense to stack up the salaries and dead money and push it as far back as you can. Because, when your stars aren’t stars anymore you will go into the Astros from 2006-2009 period where you went from every year playoff team to 85, 80 and 75 win team. You use that opportunity to bottom out instead of chasing playoffs. You can have a Kobe 2012 season where the fans get to say goodbye and then eat all that bad money, bottom out and start over. This extends the real WS window another 3-5 years at the cost of being horrible instead of fringe playoff contenders when it all wears off. As

you see from our rebuild horrible is what you should want if you have the right people in place. 

you have to hope the fans are understanding and loyal and will support you in doing this. I feel like this organization has that bond with the fans and can always count on them to support the team when they reasonably try to win.

The only way that doesn’t make sense is if you believe  you can contend forever in a mid market like Houston if you are smart enough. That doesn’t seem possible to me but it’s 8 years in and still going strong for another 3 at least so who knows. 

[Hank Chinaski 6,315]

8 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

you have to hope the fans are understanding and loyal and will support you in doing this. 

Honestly, 2012-13 were awesome. The new regime had a clear plan (and it was the only reasonable plan), Altuve had just come up, Springer was close…and you could go to games for free and sit wherever the hell you wanted. I went to so many goddamn games those years, sat a few rows behind the dugouts, and spent money only on peanuts and beer. They gave away tickets at work all the time. It was actually great.

As a cheap, grouchy, claustrophobic introvert, I fucking loved MMP with 4,000 people in it (compared to the 38,000 that were there in the two games I went to in ‘22, my first at MMP since I left Houston 6 years ago).

Edited December 14, 2022 by Hank Chinaski

[henrygandorf 29,191]

24 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

The only way that doesn’t make sense is if you believe  you can contend forever in a mid market like Houston if you are smart enough. That doesn’t seem possible to me but it’s 8 years in and still going strong for another 3 at least so who knows. 

depends on strategy and $ allocation.  we put money into scouting and central american academies because that shit works.  we try to buy out arbitration while letting other guys walk.  we try to trade for missing pieces that can help position us for success and we know the value of our own players.

lots of people say, "the astros don't sign long free agent contracts."  what they mean to say is, "the astros don't need to sign long free agent contracts."  this isn't an accident, this is how we were built by people who knew what they were doing.  

we could use a new gm soon.  and if we let crane do it, it's because stearns is coming in a year.  this has to be the case.

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

25 minutes ago, Hank Chinaski said:

Honestly, 2012-13 were awesome. The new regime had a clear plan (and it was the only reasonable plan), Altuve had just come up, Springer was close…and you could go to games for free and sit wherever the hell you wanted. I went to so many goddamn games those years, sat a few rows behind the dugouts, and spent money only on peanuts and beer. They gave away tickets at work all the time. It was actually great.

As a cheap, grouchy, claustrophobic introvert, I fucking loved MMP with 4,000 people in it (compared to the 38,000 that were there in the two games I went to in ‘22, my first at MMP since I left Houston 6 years ago).

It’s ok for a year or two.  I had fun at a couple games I went to every year being able to spread out in good seats and take my family of 5 to see major league (ish) baseball for $20. 
not being on TV was the bitch of the deal then. Made it a lot harder to follow/less fun. 

[Chapo 104]

As long as Bagwell is not the GM, we be fine for the next 2 years. Then you need to rebuild the entire infield except for Pena, and thats a hell of a task.

[Make em eat Taco Bell 1,549]

55 minutes ago, Chapo said:

As long as Bagwell is not the GM, we be fine for the next 2 years. Then you need to rebuild the entire infield except for Pena, and thats a hell of a task.

the international talent from Wizard of Oz , underrated players at criminally low prices, kept the dream going.   How did Houston lose Oz to Miami? Is that true?  Empire takes another hit. 

[Pimphand 5,749]

3 hours ago, kevwun said:

Judge could fall off a cliff in the next 3 or 4 seasons though because of his size.  That is why he deal is so scary.

If by scary you mean the best shit ever then yeah it is scary AF.

[kevwun 15,788]

Well yeah.

[Gourmand 7,774]

2022 sucked in a lot of ways for me personally, but the Astros 2022 season was unforgettably awesome and I look forward to adding more of these in the future. 

[uoftorange 1,386]

6 hours ago, Pimphand said:

I should have excluded the Bonilla rule I mean 1mm dollars isn't much to the Mets today season by season.  I'm talking about the JuanGone, Pujols, Cabrera, and now insert about 10 new massive deals after this off-season level. 

Astros did it this year with 12.5MM/yr to Grienke still owed for the next 3-4 years

[HtownHorn 14,681]

Another thing about Correa, his body is going to get beat up more having to play normal defensive positioning. He has maybe 2-3 years left at SS before he will have to move to 3B or 1B.

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

1 hour ago, HtownHorn said:

Another thing about Correa, his body is going to get beat up more having to play normal defensive positioning. He has maybe 2-3 years left at SS before he will have to move to 3B or 1B.

They better hope it’s 3B or they lose a lot of value at 1B…

[henrygandorf 29,191]

3 hours ago, HtownHorn said:

Another thing about Correa, his body is going to get beat up more having to play normal defensive positioning. He has maybe 2-3 years left at SS before he will have to move to 3B or 1B.

he also has to play outside a lot. mmp shelters our guys. target prob wasn’t great for him either. 

[BornOrange 1,441]

8 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

 As you see from our rebuild horrible is what you should want if you have the right people in place. 

you have  to hope the fans are understanding and loyal and will support you in doing this. I feel like this organization has that bond with the fans and can always count on them to support the team when they reasonably try to win.

The only way that doesn’t make sense is if you believe  you can contend forever in a mid market like Houston if you are smart enough. That doesn’t seem possible to me but it’s 8 years in and still going strong for another 3 at least so who knows. 

If we have the right people in place we should never get to horrible. McLane let everything go to shit.

 

[BornOrange 1,441]

6 hours ago, Make em eat Taco Bell said:

the international talent from Wizard of Oz , underrated players at criminally low prices, kept the dream going.   How did Houston lose Oz to Miami? Is that true?  Empire takes another hit. 

Apparently Oz had issues with Click. Probably one of the reasons Crane didn't keep Click.

[BornOrange 1,441]

8 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

he also has to play outside a lot. mmp shelters our guys. target prob wasn’t great for him either. 

Good thing San Francisco is in sunny California and doesn't have any cold, wet night games.

[WBT 20,571]

5 hours ago, BornOrange said:

If we have the right people in place we should never get to horrible. McLane let everything go to shit.

 

That's what the national media seemed to miss in their omg the tanking astros are ruining baseball stories.  By the time Crane took over the major league roster and the minors were really, really bad.  What was the alternative?

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

6 hours ago, BornOrange said:

Apparently Oz had issues with Click. Probably one of the reasons Crane didn't keep Click.

Yeah- that should have gotten Click canned right away. 

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

6 hours ago, BornOrange said:

If we have the right people in place we should never get to horrible. McLane let everything go to shit.

 

Some of that is baked in. You pick last for a decade and make trades for today in your competitive window and tomorrow becomes more difficult. Maybe not dumpster fire bad that we had but that shit takes its toll. 

[texashorne 1,178]

28 minutes ago, WBT said:

That's what the national media seemed to miss in their omg the tanking astros are ruining baseball stories.  By the time Crane took over the major league roster and the minors were really, really bad.  What was the alternative?

Signing free agents and continuing to be be 10 under .500 in perpetuum. 

[BornOrange 1,441]

15 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Some of that is baked in. You pick last for a decade and make trades for today in your competitive window and tomorrow becomes more difficult. Maybe not dumpster fire bad that we had but that shit takes its toll. 

Since the draft is so hit-and-miss, a good front office should be able to find good value even when drafting at the end of every round. 

Also need to continue making good decisions in the international market.

Finally, make good decisions on which youngsters to keep and which to trade.

[Dondrysdale1 363]

10 minutes ago, BornOrange said:

Since the draft is so hit-and-miss, a good front office should be able to find good value even when drafting at the end of every round. 

Also need to continue making good decisions in the international market.

Finally, make good decisions on which youngsters to keep and which to trade.

Of the players we have traded in the past few years are musgrove and hader the two with the most success? We dfa’d jd right? Has Beer or any of the others sent in the Greinke deal panned out?

[Snake Diggity 4,624]

3 minutes ago, Dondrysdale1 said:

Of the players we have traded in the past few years are musgrove and hader the two with the most success? We dfa’d jd right? Has Beer or any of the others sent in the Greinke deal panned out?

Ramon Laureano and Teoscar Hernandez have been pretty good.  Max Stassi, JD Davis, Tony Kemp, Josh Rojas, Jose Siri, Myles Straw, Bryan De La Cruz, Enrique Hernandez, Patrick Sandoval, Vince Velasquez, and Jordan Lyles should all be meaningful contributors next season.  But yeah, Hader and Musgrove are pretty easily the 2 who have produced the most since being traded.

[formermav43 4,606]

I think Rojas has been the only one to really do anything out of the Greinke deal.

[The Dog 44,051]

5 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

Hader and Musgrove are pretty easily the 2 who have produced the most since being traded.

Musgrove was basically the same pitcher for the Pirates that he was for us. San Diego saw something and figured him out so he's now good.

Then they got Hader and he was bad for them.

[UTexasFight 9,444]

Cionel Perez would have been nice to have had last year …but considering his position, saying that is equivalent to someone like Musk saying “having an extra $1 billion on top of the $300 I already have would be nice”

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

49 minutes ago, BornOrange said:

Since the draft is so hit-and-miss, a good front office should be able to find good value even when drafting at the end of every round. 

Also need to continue making good decisions in the international market.

Finally, make good decisions on which youngsters to keep and which to trade.

Yes and no. The good front offices find productive players later in the draft. The stars typically are picked early. It’s like recruiting- not all 5 stars but, but most of your stats were well known before hand. It’s a real disadvantage for star creation  (of draftable players). It’s not an impediment to filling out the roster with productive major leaguers, IMO. 
i think the cardinals are the best example of this. They haven’t been bad in forever, they’ve made the playoffs a bunch, but they haven’t had young stars which are necessary to be able to spend in other places to supplement to be a real contender/favorite to win the WS. 
If you could tell me we could win 2 of the next 3 titles and then sell Brown, Yordan, Peña and whoever else we had to start the process over again I’d take that every day over a decade of winning 85-92 games. Your mileage may vary. 

Edited December 15, 2022 by Wulaw Horn

[BornOrange 1,441]

To be clear, I wasn't saying we had made bad trades, just that we need to continue making good choices in the prospects we trade away.

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

3 minutes ago, BornOrange said:

To be clear, I wasn't saying we had made bad trades, just that we need to continue making good choices in the prospects we trade away.

I think Whitley was the only really valuable chip we held onto that didn’t hit. And even there I still have a little hope he hits. Some guys just get it later. I feel like if he does hit though it will likely be after a change of scenery and organizations. 

[The Dog 44,051]

 

(he forgot to flip Breggy and Yordan)

[Hank Chinaski 6,315]

38 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

I think Whitley was the only really valuable chip we held onto that didn’t hit. And even there I still have a little hope he hits. Some guys just get it later. I feel like if he does hit though it will likely be after a change of scenery and organizations. 

Martes is one. Was really highly rated at one point.

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

14 minutes ago, Hank Chinaski said:

Martes is one. Was really highly rated at one point.

Yep. Forgot about him. He was never as valuable as Whitley or Tucker at their peak but he was definitely a top 50 to maybe top 20 guy at the top. He could have headlined some big deals. 

[The Earl of Texas 3,132]

Mega-deals are a bad idea mmmkay. Love to see our competitors grossly over-spending and over-committing. May work out for them, but chances are low when you view the “mega-deal environment” in a vacuum.

[LCHorn 2,620]

4 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Some of that is baked in. You pick last for a decade and make trades for today in your competitive window and tomorrow becomes more difficult. Maybe not dumpster fire bad that we had but that shit takes its toll. 

Unfortunately that wasn’t the case under McLane.  I was an avid Baseball Prospectus reader since it’s inception in 95 or thereabouts when it was clear there was strategic advantages available that ran counter to conventional baseball wisdom.  Pretty much all the easy shit had been adopted broadly in MLB by 2005 or when the down slide started for the ‘Stros (I may be off a few years but I was in Iraq then so my fandom was on pause).  
 

The Astros basically sucked because Drayton ignored the developmental process and absolutely refused to allow the team to operate like the Pirates or Rays and trade for expiring free agents to generate 1st round picks. He also wouldn’t spend on Venezuelans once they lost first to market advantages there but still had the highest profile training academy.  It was maddening and the only reason the beat writers proffered was that he didn’t want to piss off Selig.  

It’s so much harder now because you basically HAVE to tank with the caps on draft pick and amateur free agent bonuses.  For a time, baseball was the one sport where a brilliant David could beat a dumb Goliath year after year but no more.  

[rvm96 1,643]

17 hours ago, Make em eat Taco Bell said:

the international talent from Wizard of Oz , underrated players at criminally low prices, kept the dream going.   How did Houston lose Oz to Miami? Is that true?  Empire takes another hit. 

Why are you making this post like it just happened?

[Wulaw Horn 19,070]

18 minutes ago, LCHorn said:

Unfortunately that wasn’t the case under McLane.  I was an avid Baseball Prospectus reader since it’s inception in 95 or thereabouts when it was clear there was strategic advantages available that ran counter to conventional baseball wisdom.  Pretty much all the easy shit had been adopted broadly in MLB by 2005 or when the down slide started for the ‘Stros (I may be off a few years but I was in Iraq then so my fandom was on pause).  
 

The Astros basically sucked because Drayton ignored the developmental process and absolutely refused to allow the team to operate like the Pirates or Rays and trade for expiring free agents to generate 1st round picks. He also wouldn’t spend on Venezuelans once they lost first to market advantages there but still had the highest profile training academy.  It was maddening and the only reason the beat writers proffered was that he didn’t want to piss off Selig.  

It’s so much harder now because you basically HAVE to tank with the caps on draft pick and amateur free agent bonuses.  For a time, baseball was the one sport where a brilliant David could beat a dumb Goliath year after year but no more.  

Yeah, closing up shop in Venezuela, when you had a competitive advantage, was quite possibly the dumbest move any MLB team has ever made. 
The refusal to sign over pretend slot was definitely sold as a sop to Selig But I think it was just Drayton being penny wise and pound foolish. He just hated the idea of spending any money on anything that might not hit- which is how he viewed each individual draft picks instead of viewing them as an aggregate investment that would be worthwhile if you hit on one or two picks a year. 
Agreed that now the game is waaaaay tougher to beat. You only have a couple really dumb franchises around in Colorado and maybe Cincy and/or Pittsburg but the later two aren’t incredibly dumb, just run of the mill unimaginative and boring. 
Colorado is dumb, but they do have a 1 of 1 issue with the massive elevation. 

[Snake Diggity 4,624]

2 hours ago, The Dog said:

 

(he forgot to flip Breggy and Yordan)

If they really didn’t add anyone else I would expect the “everyday lineup” would have Meyers in CF with McCormick in LF and Yordan DH’ing.  Hensley/Diaz would probably be on the roster but I think they’d play less than Meyers.