The Astros are perennially among the best teams in the league. our 26th man is probably better than most teams 16th. And I believe we have prospects that are better too.
True, but to be fair, Dubon is far from our 26th man. And what type of return do you think you would get if you put Dubon on the market? Personally, I don't think it would be a prospect any of us have ever heard of, and some of us go pretty deep into prospect lists
Im not sure this is still true (if it ever was). The Astros are among the best teams in the league because they’ve had 4-5 of the 50 best hitters in baseball and 2-3 of the 30 best pitchers in baseball every year. Yes, they’ve combined that with good depth but the bulk of their production has come from the top 10 or so players on their roster. Their current 40 man roster has 2 waiver claims (Sousa, Ortega) who were passed over by most teams in the league plus 3 guys (Martinez, Coleman, Cabbage) who were acquired for peanuts. Then there’s a handful of guys (Mushinski, Dubin, Bielak, Blanco, Salazar, Hensley, and Julks) who profile very similarly to guys who pass thru waivers or bounce around the league on the fringes of the 40 man. Combine that with 4 underwater contract guys (Abreu, McCullers, Graveman, Montero) plus Singleton and 17 guys on their 40 man have values that range from very little to negative surplus value. You can argue that Houston’s FO is more savvy than the rest of the league, but that remains to be seen with the current FO.
Cabbage has a couple strong supporters in the Astros organization that have sway. I think they give him a legitimate chance... and he may make it over some others because of upside.
So you're saying we're not likely to sign Bellinger?? Bc that's hogwash if so. I want Bellinger goddamnit.
So you're saying if we could get his production last year slotted into CF and hear him have to field questions and apologize about '17 at his presser you'd pass on that?? Doubt it.
Those staffs ahead of the Astros can count their WAR while the Astros advance deep into the playoffs. it is such a futile exercise to project WAR for a staff, especially with so many injuries and pitchers trying to bounce back. The bottom could fall out on the Astros or any team really........ but Ill roll with Verlander, Valdez, Javier, Brown, France, McCullers, Garcia, Urquidy as all possible rotation guys and the pen is made for the playoffs.
Over 2,700 innings pitched....... over 200 wins.... an amazing 72% winning percentage.... a career era of under 2.50! ten time all star.... three time Cy Young award winner and an NL MVP..... lead all of baseball in WAR three times...... 80 career WAR at only 35 years old.... lead the league in wins 3 times, in era 5 times, FIP 4 times...... Post season....... almost 200 innings pitched..... era of 4.50...... That has to be the most marked difference ever between post season and regular season for a player that has a full season of post season work. Seriously----- he has a 15 year big league career and only had an era over 3 once, and a career era of under 2.50 and the guy turns from Sandy Koufax into mid 30's Doug Fister in the post season, and it gets worse the deeper into the series.
It has nothing to do with any of that. Personally I don't think his past opinions or comments are relevant any longer, and his production would be a great fit. It's all about $$ and contract length. For any feasible contract, even if his market falls apart and he has to settle for the absolute lowest anyone could have projected for him, its too much considering Bregman, Framber, and Tucker are likely walking and Altuve could too. Anything over 3 yrs and $75M drastically hurts this team IMO and he IS getting at least $100M and 4+ years.
2 completely different seasons in one. This team has plenty of top-line talent to win a World Series. But to get there it needs to have enough depth to get through a 162 game grind winning 56+% of their games and finish healthy. Yes, without question to the first Maybe on the 2nd?
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/te...n-astros-owner-jim-crane-payroll-18650864.php Crane is well aware that many whose hearts belong to the Astros have called him cheap. “I don’t know where they get that from,” Crane said. “We try to make good decisions when the time comes. You always try to keep a little powder dry.” … “(Hader’s) one of the best in the business, if not the best right now,” Crane said. “And he’s young. He’s still only 29. So, we didn’t think there wasn’t a ton of risk. “Five years is a lot of years for a reliever, but he’s been stable and pitched well and doesn’t have any arm problems. So again, knock on wood, I think he adds a dimension we didn’t have.” The Hader signing doesn’t mean Crane is about to go on a wild shopping spree. But the luxury tax isn’t the hard line it seemingly has been in the past. “We’ll have a payroll over the competitive balance tax (threshold) this year,” Crane said. “People said we would never do it. I never said we would never do it. I said we’d do it at the right time when we think the circumstances warranted that. “We’ve got the revenue to do it.” Crane said he’ll get updated numbers at an upcoming staff meeting, but the Astros have already sold nearly 22,000 season tickets, a team record. In Crane’s first year as an owner, the team averaged less than 20,000 fans per game. According to spotrac.com, the team’s money on the books for 2024 payroll is the third highest in MLB at more than $246 million. “We’ve moved it up there, top five on the top line,” Crane said. “We probably can’t catch some of those big teams, but, again, we spend our money wisely. “We’ve got a great fan base that supports the team. It’s really about the revenue to be able to keep the payroll up.” Ah, with revenue through the retractable roof at Minute Maid, that leads to the question of will second baseman José Altuve, who is entering the final year of his contract, be a one-team Astros legend? “Oh, we hope so,” Crane said. “Yeah, we’re definitely in discussions now, and we’d certainly like to keep him here. That’s going to be up to him.” Alex Bregman, another veteran star who has one year remaining under his current deal, is a different story. Not that I’m psychic, but my read is Crane sounds a bit more optimistic that a deal can be worked out with Altuve, who turns 34 in May and made his debut in the Astros’ farm system in 2007. Bregman, who turns 30 next month, debuted in the majors in 2016 and became a full-time starter at third base the next year, when the Astros won their first World Series and began their record run of seven straight ALCS appearances. “He’s another good one,” Crane said. “A little younger, a little different circumstance. It depends on whether he wants to test the market, or he’ll sign a deal with us, but we’ll definitely make him an offer. “The guys that have gotten away — the big names (Carlos) Correa, (George) Springer and (Gerrit) Cole — there were various reasons why we didn’t sign those guys. Some of it was money, some of it was age, some of it was career path and that sort of thing, and what they wanted to do to test the market. “Look, you’re not going to be able to sign ’em all, but we’ve made some big signings. And we’ll continue to balance that with the guys coming up. The objective there is to put a winning product out there every single year and be in contention. And we’ve been pretty consistent with that.” … Most importantly, Crane starts and ends every State of the Astros interview with his mission. “We’re shooting for another World Series,” he said. “You can go down the line and plan, but the bottom line is we’re focused on ’24 and trying to win the World Series. “The ultimate goal is to win the World Series. So that’s what we’re focused on now. And I think we have a good chance this year.”
