I think Gurriel is still unproven. He started out great, but then faded. I hate to see them hand him the everyday start if he sucks against righties in pre-season. I'd much rather see a platoon. Remember Gurriel can also play third when you want to give Bregman or Correa an occasional day off or left if Reddick still can't hit lefties.
I hate that mentality. I hope the Astros are smarter than that. It is akin to handing Brock the QB job just because you are paying him. Gurriel needs to prove himself in the major league. I hope he does, but it would be even better if he was our everyday left fielder and Reed and/or White was our first baseman. Knock on wood, that would give us a plus hitter at every position. No holes 1-9. Not sure there would be a better lineup in baseball.
Reed's make or break moment is coming in these next two months. For better or worse the Astros are too good to exercise much more patience with him. More than his girth last year it was his bat speed that was the problem. Make more hard contact this year and the organization will be satisfied, even if the run-producing results take a while to follow.
I think you misunderstood my point. I wasn't saying that Houston will play him strictly because of his salary. I was saying that Houston wouldn't have guaranteed him that much money if they weren't very very confident that he was going to be a very good player. And not enough time has passed (or track record established) to change their opinion. I agree that if he sucks over the first 3 months of the season they won't hesitate to get rid of him because they are too smart to hang on to a guy just because of his salary.
I really hope he and Reed/White work out. Having Gurriel available for lf against lefties would be a real luxury.
While it took more than 3 months overall, they proved they would cut bait when they did it with Gomez. To a much lesser extent with Singleton as well. They'll move on from a sunk cost, but he'll be given the opportunity to succeed first. In baseball you have to give them time, otherwise you could cut bait with Luis Valbuena, Evan Gattis, or Chris Carter and it be a huge mistake (people wanted them cut, including myself IIRC, after slow starts to the season).
He's had a couple of bad years but so has other astros and most here haven't giving up on them so why not Singleton.
A couple of bad years suggests he had a good year at one point, which he hasn't. And unlike say Marisnick, Singleton brings absolutely nothing to the table besides his theoretical ability to hit, which again we have never seen.
On Hoyt who I expect to make 25-man, http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-most-interesting-new-houston-astro/ In 2016, as a reliever with Fresno, he allowed a contact rate of 54%, 22 points better than the league average. Very nearly half of all the swing attempts missed. That’s nothing short of being a statistical absurdity. We have 15 years of big-league data on FanGraphs. The lowest single-season contact rate is 51%, belonging to 2004 Brad Lidge. The runner-up rate is 56%, belonging to 2003 Eric Gagne. And on this other spreadsheet, I’m looking at a full decade of Triple-A data, and the only contact rate lower than Hoyt’s belongs to 2014 Henry Rodriguez, when he simultaneously walked the world. Hoyt’s whiff rate was extreme, against some of the best hitters in the world. He wasn’t close to that good in the bigs, yet he remained tough to hit. And you could excuse a few jitters.
This is just what I was going to say. Yes, he has had good years at the AAA level, but that is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.
Of all the guys I can think of in the organization, Singleton could use a change of scenery more than any.
