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2019 Houston Astros Thread

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My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer 3 weeks ago. Tomorrow she starts her treatment. She's been a wreck ever since the diagnosis. I mentioned a few pages back how a friend of the family manage

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Dondrysdale1

Dondrysdale1 363

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, Seasick Sailor said:

Why? We only carried three last year because Gattis was technically a catcher. What value does Stubbs provide on the playoff roster?

Supposedly a great arm, speed and a left handed bat. Not advocating for it. Just giving the pros of including him. I think depending on who we play the roster could shuffle a bit. I could see smith being added to a series vs the Yankees but not being rostered in a series vs twins heavy lefty lineup.

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HtownHorn

HtownHorn 14487

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14 minutes ago, Seasick Sailor said:

Why? We only carried three last year because Gattis was technically a catcher. What value does Stubbs provide on the playoff roster?

It allows Hinch the flexibility of being able to pinch hit and run for the catchers, and not worry about what happens if the backup gets hurt.

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Seasick Sailor

Seasick Sailor 3747

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13 minutes ago, Dondrysdale1 said:

Supposedly a great arm, speed and a left handed bat. Not advocating for it. Just giving the pros of including him. I think depending on who we play the roster could shuffle a bit. I could see smith being added to a series vs the Yankees but not being rostered in a series vs twins heavy lefty lineup.

I agree that Smith likely gets added in a series against the Yankees but left off in a series against the Twins.

I can't see Stubbs getting any PT in the playoffs if Chirinos and Maldonado are healthy, and I don't think you leave off Tucker, who at this point has 30 HRs and 24 SBs in AAA, for a third catcher who likely won't see the field. 

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Dondrysdale1

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2 minutes ago, Seasick Sailor said:

I agree that Smith likely gets added in a series against the Yankees but left off in a series against the Twins.

I can't see Stubbs getting any PT in the playoffs if Chirinos and Maldonado are healthy, and I don't think you leave off Tucker, who at this point has 30 HRs and 24 SBs in AAA, for a third catcher who likely won't see the field. 

Again, wasn’t advocating for the move but someone asked the question Why he would be included.

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Seasick Sailor

Seasick Sailor 3747

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3 minutes ago, HtownHorn said:

It allows Hinch the flexibility of being able to pinch hit and run for the catchers, and not worry about what happens if the backup gets hurt.

Yeah, but if a players gets injured in the postseason, you can replace him. The only catch is the replaced player is ineligible for the current series and the next series. 

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Guadaloopy

Guadaloopy 10923

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18 minutes ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

We won’t carry three catchers on the playoff roster.

People need to read this, then read it again, ponder it for a half second, then accept it as reality.   No way this team carries three catchers.  Evan Gattis is the only reason it was a possibility the last two years.  And he wasn’t really a catcher in 2018.     

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Guadaloopy

Guadaloopy 10923

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9 minutes ago, Johnny Sack said:

Reddick has been awful in the playoffs.  He has a long track record in them.  

Robbing a three run yack has the same net effect as hitting one.  No reason not to carry a little defensive prowess, especially with this lineup.  And Reddick is hardly without hope at the plate.  

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Johnny Sack

Johnny Sack 8397

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27 minutes ago, Guadaloopy said:

Robbing a three run yack has the same net effect as hitting one.  No reason not to carry a little defensive prowess, especially with this lineup.  And Reddick is hardly without hope at the plate.  

My grandmother could make those easy ass catches at the MMP right field fence.  It’s like bragging about dunking on an 8 foot goal.  

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Guadaloopy

Guadaloopy 10923

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26 minutes ago, Johnny Sack said:

My grandmother could make those easy ass catches at the MMP right field fence.  It’s like bragging about dunking on an 8 foot goal.  

It may be recency bias, but I don’t recall a lot of other Astro right fielders taking runs off the board along MMP’s right field fence.  

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HtownHorn

HtownHorn 14487

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2 hours ago, Seasick Sailor said:

Yeah, but if a players gets injured in the postseason, you can replace him. The only catch is the replaced player is ineligible for the current series and the next series. 

I'm talking about a scenario where Hinch has to pinch hit/run for both Chirinos and Maldonado, because 1) they are the worst hitters on the team, I would seriously consider PH'ing Greinke for one in a WS game 2) both are slower than mez.

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henrygandorf

henrygandorf 29176

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2 minutes ago, HtownHorn said:

I'm talking about a scenario where Hinch has to pinch hit/run for both Chirinos and Maldonado, because 1) they are the worst hitters on the team, I would seriously consider PH'ing Greinke for one in a WS game 2) both are slower than mez.

they're not great hitters by any stretch, but they're not .080 hitters either.  if you have to pr for one, then the other will have to bat.  i'm assuming you're talking about some sort of extra inning game, so hopefully one of our other stars can pick up the slack.

and if that catcher gets hurt to where he can't play anymore, then yeah, we probably lose that game using...whomever our emergency catcher is.

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formermav43

formermav43 4599

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11 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

they're not great hitters by any stretch, but they're not .080 hitters either.  if you have to pr for one, then the other will have to bat.  i'm assuming you're talking about some sort of extra inning game, so hopefully one of our other stars can pick up the slack.

and if that catcher gets hurt to where he can't play anymore, then yeah, we probably lose that game using...whomever our emergency catcher is.

Well, Maldonado isn’t much better than that. But Chirinos isn’t a bad hitter, especially for a catcher. Assuming a late game situation where they’ve already pinch hit/run for Maldonado, there’s not likely to be an appreciably better hitter left on the bench than Chirinos anyway.

This is moot, though, because, as said, they’re not carrying 3 catchers. They only had 3 in 2017-18 due to Gattis. In 2017, McCann caught every playoff game. Maldonado would have last year if he hadn’t suddenly forgotten how to catch.

Past history suggests they don’t even want to play 2 catchers in the playoffs. 3 would be a complete waste of a roster spot.

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henrygandorf

henrygandorf 29176

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15 minutes ago, formermav43 said:

Well, Maldonado isn’t much better than that. But Chirinos isn’t a bad hitter, especially for a catcher. Assuming a late game situation where they’ve already pinch hit/run for Maldonado, there’s not likely to be an appreciably better hitter left on the bench than Chirinos anyway.

This is moot, though, because, as said, they’re not carrying 3 catchers. They only had 3 in 2017-18 due to Gattis. In 2017, McCann caught every playoff game. Maldonado would have last year if he hadn’t suddenly forgotten how to catch.

Past history suggests they don’t even want to play 2 catchers in the playoffs. 3 would be a complete waste of a roster spot.

yep.

and whomever the backup catcher is, likely doesn't see the game until the 8th at the earliest.

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Dondrysdale1

Dondrysdale1 363

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11 hours ago, Johnny Sack said:

Reddick has been awful in the playoffs.  He has a long track record in them.  

Yet had a clutch hit off Kimbrel that helped clinch the Boston series in 17. He was actually good in that series. He went into a hole against New York and on into the World Series.

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Hank Chinaski

Hank Chinaski 6310

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1 hour ago, kevwun said:

They're gonna trade him in the offseason to make room for Tucker.

I'm really interested to see how this plays out. It doesn't make sense to go into 2020 with Reddick and Tucker, as has been discussed, which is why a lot of people thought Tucker may get moved at the deadline. I'm not sure how many clubs would want Reddick for a year at that salary, but he could be included as part of a larger deal. Or Tucker could get moved (maybe for a starter if Cole signs elsewhere, though that seems less likely if Sanchez is effective down the stretch and Greinke stays healthy). 

Considering all the OFs are currently scheduled to become FAs after next season, you'd think keeping Tucker would be a priority. 

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kevwun

kevwun 15647

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Posted (edited)

I think if they were interested in trading Tucker, it would have happened at the deadline.  If he wasn't part of their future plans in the outfield, they would have kept Beer and Rojas instead.  They very well might have to make Reddick part of a larger deal because his salary isn't very attractive like you say, but I think it's definitely going to happen.

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Gut Wagon

Gut Wagon 8052

Posted
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1 hour ago, Soliver465 said:

Below is a link to salary information for all professional sports (Astro specific link), I like Reddick, but $13 million for next year is pretty steep.

 

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

 

Hopefully that will help his wife endure the unspeakable horror of having her bestie leave H-town because Tyler couldn't get it done on the field. Oh, the challenges of being an MLB diva. 

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UTexasFight

UTexasFight 9380

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MrBurnsExcellent.gif

 

Kaplan on Sanchez and Strom/ Astros work only just beginning

 

 

As soon as the trade was consummated, baseball evaluators everywhere pinpointed why Aaron Sanchez was the next Astros reclamation project.

 

Sanchez spins his curveball at an elite rate but probably didn’t throw it enough while with the Blue Jays. He also relied heavily on two-seam fastballs, even though his four-seam fastball better complements his curve.

 

By Houston altering his pitch usage, the 27-year-old former first-rounder with the electric right arm could go the way of Collin McHugh, Will Harris, Charlie Morton and Ryan Pressly. It was only four seasons ago, after all, when Sanchez was an All-Star and the AL’s ERA leader for Toronto.

 

Yet no one could’ve anticipated Sanchez — the worst starter in baseball this season by ERA (5.76) and WHIP (1.618) — pitching the first six innings of a combined no-hitter Saturday night in his team debut. The performance only furthered the narrative about the Astros’ perceived magic touch with pitchers, even if suggesting that they fixed Sanchez is overstating and oversimplifying the situation.

 

Each of these things can simultaneously be true:

 

Sanchez had turned a corner in his final two starts for the Blue Jays, in which he combined for 16 strikeouts and zero walks in 10 2/3 innings against the Indians and Rays.

In his Astros debut, Sanchez threw 28 curveballs among his 92 pitches. His 30.4-percent curveball usage was the highest of any start in his major league career but not by an exorbitant amount. He had three starts earlier this season in which his usage exceeded 27 percent. (His overall curveball usage with the Blue Jays this season was 22 percent, a career-high.)

Sanchez flipped his usages of his four-seam and two-seam fastballs in Saturday’s start. He threw both of his fastballs with the Blue Jays but leaned much more so on his two-seamer ever since he learned to throw it six years ago in High A. Brooks Baseball credited Sanchez with throwing exclusively four-seamers in his Astros debut, but Sanchez said he mixed in two-seamers in the outing. Statcast credited him with 30 four-seamers and 18 two-seamers.

The Seattle offense he faced Saturday has a miserable .134/.241/.255 batting line in August. The Mariners’ .496 OPS for the month is more than .100 worse than the next-worst team. (Sanchez will make his next start against another last-place team, the Orioles, on Saturday in Baltimore.)

Astros pitching coach Brent Strom has hardly even gotten to work with Sanchez yet. They met last Friday afternoon, when Sanchez first joined the Astros at Minute Maid Park on the eve of his start. But Strom went on temporary leave after Saturday night’s game, when he was hospitalized and underwent surgery for a gastrointestinal issue. First-year bullpen coach Josh Miller, formerly the team’s minor league pitching coordinator, has occupied Strom’s post since Sunday morning.

After years of practice, the Astros have seemingly mastered their system of introducing new pitchers to their data-driven approach. When a pitcher first arrives, he will meet with Strom, Miller and the four analysts that accompany the team from Day One of spring training through season’s end: director of advance information Tom Koch-Weser, coordinators Antonio Padilla and Tommy Kawamura and special assistant Oz Ocampo.

 

The team attempts to not overwhelm the pitcher with information at first, though to some it can feel like overload depending on the team from which they came. It starts as an open dialogue, with the Astros stressing to the pitcher why they were acquired, what they view as their strengths and their areas for improvement and with the pitcher offering feedback on what he views as his strengths and weaknesses.

 

The Astros kick off spring training by holding a similar analytics meeting with every single pitcher, even the longest tenured members of the organization, within the first week of major league camp. These individualized development plans extend to the minor leagues, too.

 

“The open dialogue, the two-way street, multiple people working behind the scenes to bring out the best version of that player, it’s our obligation and we take that really seriously,” Astros manager A.J. Hinch said. “From the minute that the guy is in the organization, we’re starting that relationship and starting to build that trust to where we feel like we can make you better.

 

“With the success stories that we’ve had over the last couple years, we get vouched for pretty quickly by players. And when players believe, then players can get better quickly.”

 

Sanchez had his introductory analytics sit-down last Friday, a day the Astros had a later report time to the ballpark because of their 2 a.m. arrival back in town that morning. His first meeting wasn’t super lengthy but enough for both parties to gain a semblance of familiarity with one another. There is much more to come.

 

I’m sure we’ll probably dive deeper into some of the things that they see and want to accomplish after I get a couple (starts) under my belt. But that’s kind of what it was, just go out there and pitch,” Sanchez said. “I sat down with (catcher Martín Maldonado) before the game and we just had a good game plan, so everything that happened (Saturday), I’ve got to give a lot of credit to him. Even the other pitchers here, too: (Justin Verlander) and (Gerrit) Cole, bringing me aside the first couple days that I got here and they kind of showed me how they scouted before starts and showed me what they did. I think that helped a lot, too.”

 

Ahead of Saturday’s start, the Astros encouraged Sanchez to mix his pitches more. With the Blue Jays, Sanchez threw fastballs almost 60 percent of the time. But he can command both his curveball and his changeup, so why not throw them more frequently?

 

The Astros are unquestionably a four-seam fastball organization, but they aren’t explicitly anti two-seamer. Dallas Keuchel, Morton, Lance McCullers Jr., Brad Peacock and Framber Valdez are each examples of recent or current Astros who rely on two-seamers. If they had dealt for Marcus Stroman before the July 31 trade deadline, he would’ve still thrown a lot of two-seamers because his is really good. Put in the simplest terms, Houston wants its pitchers to throw the pitches that grade out best on the TrackMan radar-based tracking system more and the pitches that grade out worse less. But every pitcher comes with different strengths and weaknesses to emphasize and neutralize.

 

In Sanchez’s case, the Astros’ efforts to accentuate his strengths are still very much in their infancy.

 

 

 

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Guadaloopy

Guadaloopy 10923

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Posted (edited)

I feel like I am taking crazy pills the way Reddick is being discussed around here.  He’s hitting around .270 and he’s a plus defender.   He’s at .8 WAR for the year so far.   I know everyone’s itching for Tucker to be the Ted we hope he can be, but give Reddick his due.   He is an above-average MLB outfielder in just about every measure.   

Edited by Guadaloopy
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Hank Chinaski

Hank Chinaski 6310

Posted
Posted (edited)
21 minutes ago, Guadaloopy said:

I feel like I am taking crazy pills the way Reddick is being discussed around here.  He’s hitting around .270 and he’s a plus defender.   He’s at .8 WAR for the year so far.   I know everyone’s itching for Tucker to be the Ted we hope he can be, but give Reddick his due.   He is an above-average MLB outfielder in just about every measure.   

It has nothing to do with this year...it is about 2020. It doesn't make sense to stick Tucker in AAA for a third straight year. It can become detrimental to his development. He's as ready as he's going to be now. 

Reddick is a completely average player at this point - he's actually been a below-average hitter this year (90 wRC+), and was exactly average last year (99 wRC+). If Tucker isn't better than 2019 Josh Reddick, he'll be a massive disappointment. Factor in the respective salaries and Reddick is a worse value even if their production was exactly the same. 

Edited by Hank Chinaski
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