This is why the Astros front office has overlooked some questionable strategic decisions in the past. Hinch does an amazing job cultivating meaningful relationships with his players. He is as respected and loved by his players as any in baseball. He also is a very good teacher.
You could practically see wheels turning in Tuckers head those first 3 ABs. Glad he was able to get some results later.
I was looking at the history of 100 win teams. Surprisingly only 4 of the last 31, including last years Astros have won the World Series. Only a handful of those teams were from the same year and I believe they all lost.
Yuli quietly slashing .360/.408/.618 over the last 22 games with 25 RBI. He's been hitting the ball hard most of the year, but over this stretch he finally started getting some lift. Him Bregman and Gattis have been huge with Correa hurt and Springer in a bad slump. Speaking of Bregman, his OPS is now a shimmering .908, good for 9th in the AL. He's doing it with a fairly pedestrian .291 BABIP. Dude is a superstar.
Agree with everything here. Except that Yuli has been doing this quietly. I feel he's been getting plenty of recognition. It would be nice if it would all culminate with an all star roster spot... So the team is 29 over, defending world champs, with the luxury of being able to send out a Tucker-Stassi-Kemp 7-8-9. Man, we are deep. I realize Max is legit, but to be able to develop guys like Tucker and Kemp while still winning at the 3rd highest clip in the league (while missing your second or third most valuable player nonetheless )? Remarkable.
Yuli is recovering from his wrist surgery a lot faster than I expected. His surgery (removal of the hook of the hamate bone) is notorious for causing prolonged power outages due to the altered biomechanics of tendons in the carpel tunnel. Some guys take a few years to get their power back. This is a highly understated development.
Hinch should’ve given springer the day off and kept Gattis in the lineup... don’t like taking the big fella’s bat out of the lineup with the way he’s played
Holy s**t Giolito is having a bad season. I remember at one point he was in legit consideration for the top pick back in 2012.
Springer had a 2 day break a week ago; he's shown some signs of life in the past few games, he needs to be out there.
Tuve & Yuli let Giolito off the hook in the 1st, unfortunately he's gotten his act together since then.
