About a week or so ago when the latest glimpse of the continued turmoil in Venezuela hit US television, it dawned on me that this might be impacting Altuve’s performance. We all know Altuve has a big heart. One would think this is impacting all Venezuelan players, but maybe him a bit more.
It’s possible maybe, we don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes with his family back home. I mean, his home country is in shambles, and clearly there is something wrong with the guy right now, so it’s not a ridiculous stretch to connect those dots. Who knows? Maybe. Maybe not. Something ain’t right!
Career BABIP: .337 2019 BABIP: .224 Getting under the ball a bit too much this year as evidenced by high IFFB %. He’ll fix that and have a few weeks on fire as his BABIP normalizes.
no biggie. if he can get 12 consecutive hits, he would be back at batting .297 but for right now, Altuve makes me appreciate Carlos Gomer(z)
Small bump...There is actual internal discussion amongst management that Altuve is distracted by Venezuela. I don’t know if anything has come from Altuve himself but this isn’t a non issue to the Astros. So as ridiculous as I thought this thread sounded initially, there may be some reality to it.
No idea if it truly causing his problems this year but the situation is bad and getting worse daily with no resolution in sight. Was he close to Valbuena and Castillo? My gf is down there right now visiting her family and helping out with a kids hospital. She was visiting the hospital and was going to pay for one of the kids recovery from malnutrition there and the next day he died. This happened a couple days ago. It’s just beyond tragic to see. Maybe there is some survivor type guilt he is feeling now. Hopefully the situation gets resolved soon.
I do know Altuve's parents still live there, and he chose not to go back in the offseason for the first(?) time in his career.
Well, I certainly agree it's not just baseball that's affecting Altuve IMO. Imagine the pressure of a team guy like Altuve, who now has a contract ($30M/year) that requires him to play at an MVP level otherwise he'll essentially be letting the team down. I'm sure the more he spiraled down below .300, to .270, .250, .230... unprecedented lows each time, the more pressure he felt like he was hurting the team, the more pressure he felt to get a hit, right now, at this at bat, at this pitch... Then of course, there's the whole ugly fan thing when players with newly signed huge contracts don't perform at the highest levels, from Bryce Harper to Chris Paul... that's a whole other kind of pressure that borderlines on bullying that I'm sure starts to weigh on players. Thank goodness Altuve's such a lovable guy that it hasn't gotten there, but there's no way he doesn't see it happen to other players. To think you're letting your fans down to the point of contempt, resentment and at its worse, snark... Really, the injury was just about the only way he was going to be forced to let go of needing to get a hit in the worst way. As he said, the one thing that mattered through his injury was that the Astros were still winning, and that he said it took the pressure off of him of needing to return sooner - get that hit right now or else the team will lose. Of course, with Springer's injury, some of that pressure is back, but I have the confidence Altuve has calibrated to handle it, and his MVP contract, and I'm there to support him as long as he's an Astro.
Fellow Venezuelan, Marwinning, is also struggling. If the turmoil is truly affecting Jose, hopefully he's able to deal with it better because there's no end in sight. There's also a chance he was playing through injury. Return healthy vs the Cubs.
Unlikely. Reminds me of the time when Yuli made fun of Yu Darvish and some folks were saying that would affect his and the Astros performance in the WS since the media and fans were upset. These players are superhuman and are able to block out all sort of nonsense happening in the real world.
Interesting article on the hell that Venezuelan players are dealing with: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2839887-fear-texts-and-bodyguards-how-mlbs-venezuelan-stars-cope-with-unrest-at-home Also, I had no idea that almost 8% of MLB players were Venezuelan.
