Other than the fact that it's baseball and you shouldn't need a reason... This is the last season in the National League for the Astros The youth movement in full effect (JD Martinez, Jason Castro, Jose Altuve, Jordan Schaffer, etc) ... It's spring. It's baseball. WTF else do you need?
Potential on the current roster? 1) J.D. Martinez 2) Jose Altuve 3) Jason Castro Bud Norris is probably the most proven young player.
[rquoter]The Astros trimmed their Major League roster by five more players Wednesday morning, reassigning infielders Angel Sanchez, Scott Moore and Brian Bixler to Minor League camp, optioning right-hander Enerio Del Rosario to the Minor Leagues and releasing infielder Joe Thurston. They’re down to 34 players in camp.[/rquoter] With Angel Sanchez and Bixler gone, it looks like Downs and Gonzalez will be the 2 backup IF. Wallace is the other IF, but hard to imagine Downs going anywhere, and Gonzalez is the only other SS besides Lowrie.
Surprised about Bix. Thought he may have played his way onto the team. Perhaps they are giving Marwin the rest of the spring to decide if he's worthy of being on the 25 all season, and if not they can easily call Bixler back up. Maybe they see a higher upside in Marwin even though he's hit poorly this spring? Is there a deadline to decide on Rule 5 guys?
No deadline. Rule 5 guys are offered back to their original teams at any point during the first season when the new team wants to take the player off their active roster. Unless a Rule 5 guy is just that god awful terrible, crappy teams should be giving them every chance possible. Bixler may be a useful replacement-level player but the Stro's are correctly focusing on upside.
I wonder if they will also keep Cruz. He started off terrible, but went 5.1 innings without giving up a hit before giving up 2 walks, a hit, and a run yesterday.
Cruz would be the 12th pitcher on the 12 man squad. The question becomes ... Can the Astros survive Cruz pitching 20-40 innings this season? Those likely would be mop-up innings, so I think the answer is yes.
The thing about Cruz is that he is already 25, and we will have to cut loose somebody else. Most likely the guy who would have had the final bullpen spot, which would be Sosa/Harrell in the most likely scenario. Maybe they would consider cutting Lyon, but I doubt it.
Everytime I try to watch the 30 Clubs in 30 Days: Astros episode on MLB Network it is never on because the live baseball games are screwing up their timeline, it's really upsetting me.
I DVR'd it. You aren't missing much, but here is a link to watch them online: http://mlb.mlb.com/network/promotions/30_in_30.jsp Edit: Apparently only shows segments
John Lannan was optioned to the minors today by the Nats. Flat out amazing. I'd trade Happ for Lannan and save the Nats $3M. Sheesh.
Yep. It will be a huge surprise if they are drafting higher than, say, three or four in next year's draft. They have to be the leaders in the clubhouse to draft #1 overall again.
