I think with the state of the team that's just Luhnow's strategy. He's trying to find value. I have no problem with it right now. When the team has a chance for a .500 season then I think the strategy changes. Well, let's hope.
Thus, like I said... Wandy was never as bad as Harrell has been. And the key was he eventually improved... Not steady regression like Harrell. You say to wait till they consistently fail at this strategy, whereas I am asking them to prove success at continuing to give unproven/undeserving guys 2nd/3rd/4th chances simply because this is a "bad team anyways." (And they haven't found that guy yet amongst Wallace, ankiel, Humber, Harrell, etc.) The main point is that there are better starting candidates than Harrell on this roster now, and I feel they should get these innings now.
I think we need to give credit to the guys in the ground (coaches) that see these guys up close and often. If the braintrust was absolutely convinced Harrell had no future with the club, I just have to think he wouldn't be here. It may be the case where they see the potential, but have doubts about it manifesting consistently, which is where I suspect we are. Like I said in another post, when Appel or someone else in the minors is ready, something will give.
I'm all for that... that they "know" better... but then it can't also be that "they're just looking to see if there's a possibility that a guy may stick or have a chance, while things are so low-pressure". Most of the time, when they're giving these guys more opportunities that aren't "earned", its because of the latter. Having guys like Trevor Crowe, Jake Elmore, Jimmy Paredes and Brett Wallace all get more than 100 AB's last year was not simply them "knowing better" than everybody else, or believing that these guys had something special... it was to see if they had anything salvageable against MLB competition (and none of them did). Same goes for the Ankiel and Humber signings. I understand this organization is in the unique position to experiment, and have non major leaguers put on a major league uniform... but I don't think it should be at the expense of other players who are already on the active roster, who certainly do deserve a fair shot.
Well, the three "generational" players of this era are Pujols, Cabrera and Trout... and they made their debuts at 21, 20 and 19. Using this more to illustrate that despite how chock-full our farm system is with talent as a result of sucking... the odds are that only Correa fits the mold of becoming an all-star/franchise type player (and even then, he likely will spend more time in the minors than any of the above players did).
Recent MVP's Ryan Braun was 23 Buster Posey was 22 Joey Votto was 23 Dustin Pedroia was 23 Justin Morneau was 22 Ryan Howard was 24 Miguel Tejada was 23 Lance Berkman was 23 Recent Cy Youngs Max Scherzer was 23 R.A. Dickey was 26 David Price was 23 Cliff Lee was 24 Brandon Webb was 23 Chris Carpenter was 22 Randy Johnson was 25 Roy Oswalt was 23 Johan Santana was 21 (was only up early because he was a forced Rule V callup) Puma and Roy O didn't win the awards, just thought thery we're worth noting. Obviously not all of the stars come up before 21, it's more around 23. The only one of our major prospects that are heading over that threshold is Springer, and he should have been up last year at 23 but we know this situation.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Tonight's <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Astros&src=hash">#Astros</a> lineup vs. Angels. No Puma or Oswalt. <a href="http://t.co/IgbsmPlXgi">pic.twitter.com/IgbsmPlXgi</a></p>— Houston Astros (@astros) <a href="https://twitter.com/astros/statuses/452576408011694082">April 5, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Really quiet around here tonight. Guess most folks got better things to do on Friday night? Berkman and Oswald in the booth tonight (first 2 innings). Pretty funny tales to tell, especially one about Ausmus.
100% One of the very, very few positives to how bad the Astros are right now is that there are so few people at the games that almost completely empty sections kill the wave off pretty easily.
I see you selectively left off the majority of the last few MVP winners and CY Young award winners who were all 21 or younger when they made their debut. Additionally, most of the guys you mentioned were one-and-done as MVP winners. Not as critical about the age that pitchers make their debut... typically their arms are ready, or they're not... and if they are ready, you're wasting valuable pitching years by stashing them (as most pitchers do have a finite amount of elite pitches in their arms before they tail off, or injury). Pujols, Cabrera, Bonds, A-Rod, Kershaw, Haladay, Grienke, King Felix, Sabathia.... I stand by the comment that most all-stars make their debuts by age 22.
I have to agree...around the 6th inning I believe was when they started doing it. I may be wrong but I think they only did it while the Astros were pitching too. Liked the ceremony, I missed those two guys.
Good ceremony. Sat with and spoke to Mike Trout's parents... very nice people. His father and I spoke a little about Springer.
Found myself looking at the scores and being happy when I saw the Reds and Cubs lost..... Damn still not used to the AL life.
They're only one year apart. Wandy came up as a 26 year old and struggled for 3 straight years. Harrell breakout 2012 was as a 27 yr old. He's 29 now.
If you adjust for league differential, Wandy was probably worse his first two years than Harrell was last year. But even ignoring that, Wandy was never as good as Harrell was either. Wandy had two sucky years and nothing good. Harrell had one sucky one and one pretty good one - he's at least shown potential. If you look at the splits in 2012, pre-ASB, he went 102 innings with a 4.56 ERA. Post-ASB, he went 91 innings with a 2.87 ERA. It may have been a fluke, but its a big enough sample size that it's worth figuring out if last year was just a bad year or who he really is. If you look at his peripherals last year, there's a lot that was way out of line with his career minor league stats (whereas 2012 fit with them), so there's at least some evidence to suggest that he could be better this year - how much better, who knows. But from an asset-management standpoint (which is at the heart of the organization's core philosophy), when you give up on Harrell, you are doing so permanently. If you start Harrell and he fails, you can bring up option B. If you start with option B and he fails, you probably cannot go back to Harrell. So it makes sense to start with Harrell and then move on from there.
