Gose was routinely hitting the mid 90's, and had a wicked breaking ball. His control must have been abysmal even in non game situations for the team to give up this early. They must have come to the conclusion there was absolutely no way we were gonna be able to keep him on the 25 this season, so may as well give reps to guys that we can.
Hell no, I don't feel anything like that. I don't want to be a champion, I want to be the champions. I want the entire baseball world angry at the sight of us, moaning "not these f**king guys" after we win. I want to taste the salt on reddit every time we add another great player. I want yearly articles in Dallas about playing for second place. I want fans to try and hate without any real ammunition. You can tell they want to talk s**t..but they got nothing. We did the hard part, now comes the fun part.
Right, there was really no reason to give him more innings, and they've either seen enough on the side to want him back or not.
I agree with some of this. But what has really changed is expectations. Although there was no doubt we had a very good team last year, there was no mandate or imperative that we win it all. This year, especially with all the media and home based hype, anything less than a spectacular year may be deemed as failure. Individual players will be thrown under the bus by some during cold streaks and regression like never before. Under performing players will get no mercy.
I'm expecting the exact opposite. Correa can have a bad streak in 2018, but people will be heckled more than ever if they suggest moving down World Champion Correa down in the lineup.
I said by some. There will be some cooler heads that react more appropriately, sure. And some guys will be virtually immune to this like Correa and Altuve. But you can bet your life savings that guys like Giles, Sipp, Smith, Rondon. McCullers, Hoyt, Martes will be skewered to a pulp if they dont perform.
Some people will freak out, but no more than normal and likely less than last year here. One of the benefits of being an Astros subforum on a Rockets forum is that the riff raff typically go to the Astros forums. I doubt Giles can be "skewered" more than he has. Hoyt and Martes will be in the minors if they don't perform. Sipp is only going to pitch for the Astros if he performs well or in situations that don't matter. Rondon, I can see him getting roasted a little, but I don't see him him pitching much unless he's good. McCullers will either perform well or be hurt.
Well, we will see what happens. I expect a lot more traffic on the Astros board given our WSC statis. But not just this. Expectations are much higher this year and failures are bound to be less tolerated.
Way too early spring training impressions: Impressing: JD Davis Max Stassi Kyle Tucker Derek Fisher Tony Sipp All the starting pitchers Not impressing: Tyler White Tim Fedorowicz Anthony Gose Unsure: Tony Kemp AJ Reed
I would look at the Cubs, who went thru a similar thing winning a WS after years of futility. Last season, they sucked for a lot of it, and no one cared - they were champions. I suspect the same will be true here. Winning a ring buys you a lot of good will for a while.
Cubs fans didnt? If we fall off 11 games from last year to this one and get defeated 4-1 in the ALDS, then I am going to want someones head. Maybe Chicago fans are indifferent to this kind of thing but I am not.
The Cubs lost in the NLCS, not the NLDS. For all of uproar about their slow start they still made the LCS and lost to a clearly better team.
