Good news on Puma... http://brianmctaggart.mlblogs.com/a...s-surgery-no-ligament-or-meniscus-damage.html
Did Berkman lose weight in the off-season? Or, is it my imagination? I was just looking at a picture of him and it seemed his face looked slimmer and his gut was less noticeable. I hope Berkman doesn't start really slow because of the knee surgery. I want to see him put together a consistent season where he doesn't slump for entire months at a time.
Berkman is essentially the face of the franchise. You don't just jettison the guy, especially considering the fact that if he performs over the next few years like he has been in recent years, he will likely be a Hall of Fame candidate.
It's being reports by the Chronicle that he lost 12 pounds in the off season. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/justice/baseball/6899990.html
Ellijah Dukes got cut from the Nationals today. Any interest on the astros part as maybe a 4th outfielder?
Astros makes cuts as well ... a note wrt Elijah Dukes, Few surprises as Astros cut 12 from roster By ZACHARY LEVINE Copyright 2010 Houston Chronicle March 17, 2010, 2:13PM KISSIMMEE, Fla. — The Astros cut 12 players from their major-league spring training roster Wednesday morning, none of whom was expected to earn a spot on the ballclub. Pitchers Fernando Abad, Evan Englebrook, Chia-jen Lo, Matt Nevarez, Polin Trinidad, Jose Valdez and Henry Villar were cut. Outfielders Brian Bogusevic, Yordany Ramirez and Alex Romero, infielder Wladimir Sutil and catcher Lou Santangelo were also cut before workouts began Wednesday morning. Lo and Santangelo were non-roster invitees and were reassigned to minor league camp. The rest of the dozen were optioned to minor league camp except for Romero who was given an unconditional release, making him a free agent. “A lot of the guys need to get consistent work, so they’re going to go down to the minor league level and get consistent work,” manager Brad Mills said. “With Alex, it’s an opportunity for him to get on maybe with another ballclub ... It just didn’t look like it was a fit here, so maybe it will be a fit somewhere else.” The moves followed the second of three split-squad days, when more players are required to fill rosters Forty-four of the original 57 players remain in camp, and the race for fifth outfielder is down to Cory Sullivan and Jason Bourgeois as well as Edwin Maysonet, who will begin to receive some time in the outfield in spring training. “We think at some point in time, Bogusevic and Ramirez are going to be good big league players and help us, but we felt that in this point in time, the guys who were still here, Bourgeois and Sullivan and (Jason) Michaels are ahead of them,” general manager Ed Wade said. Wade did not rule out some more outfield choices being added as teams release players. He said, however, that the Astros did not have interest in Elijah Dukes, just released by the Washington Nationals. The Astros’ only previous cut had been to outright infielder Jose Vallejo to Round Rock. Vallejo will miss at least a majority of the season with severed tendons in his throwing hand as a result of a kitchen accident. zachary.levine@chron.com
I'd be interested if they think the locker room is such that he could chill out on the off-field incidents. But unlike when Carl Everett came here.. this team is gonna have a decent amount of young guys + a first-time manager. Don't know that it'd be the best situation. But I can't judge whether he'd fit in that sense or not.. so I'll just say yeah, give him a shot if you can get him in cheaply
Manzella strained his quad & is out for 7-10 days. Hopefully this is not a lingering issue because the Astros have virtually nothing else at SS.
i'm guessing the answer is no unless they were to buy out moehler or something like that, but is there any chance casey daigle makes the opening day roster? he's had a lights out spring. would be nice to have constant camera pans to jenny finch every game.
My sons select Coach and I were talking about that while watching him this weekend. He mentioned he was married to Jenny Finch then mentioned he had coached him when he was 13.
Oswalt to Houston for hamstring eval...supposedly nothing serious at all. Then again, Roy is the ultimate tough guy with things like this.. http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/spring2010/news/story?id=5031345
I think its too late. If they were going to trade him it should have been after 2006, maybe 2007. If you were to trade him now, you'd be lucky to get back anything of value back.
that's nonsense. if he's healthy at the trade deadline, he's trade-able, and he would fetch decent value at minimum. period.
I hope that if Lance Berkman has to start the season on the DL that Chris Shelton gets to start instead of Blum. Blum is okay but provides no power and clearly not starting material as we saw last year. Shelton has always hit at the big level and could be a good temp. solution at 1st. This offense needs some big hitters cause I don't expect them to get a lot of production from the catcher or shortstop.
Should be an interesting season. As always, I have blind hope that we'll compete, but this is the first year where I'm not putting much stock into making a push at the playoffs. Just glad to see us getting our farm system back to a respectable level.
I sure hope J.R. can finally put things together at the major league level. Seems he's stuck at that AAAA position, but who knows. He'll be given a great opportunity this year to show what he's capable of, so we'll see. Shelton has opened some eyes this spring training, but I still think we should let Blum play first to open the season. No need to throw Shelton out there on opening day. On the other hand, one of the brightest spots of spring training (besides the obvious with Hunter playing so well) has been Chris Johnson. Has been playing extremely well, and is actually walking a bit, which is a surprise. Hopefully he can compete for a spot next season, or replace Feliz if we happen to trade him at the deadline.
