As much as it pains me to say it, the Rangers rotation should be pretty sporty this season....assuming Darvish can get and stay healthy.
The thing about#6 starters is, they usually need to be prospects or an out of nowhere veteran. Somebody who can be kept in the minors until needed.
Darvish is a beast, but I think Hamels is overrated. If Lance repeats last season, or 1/2 is on par, and I like our backend better.
What aboout their rotation would be so great. Darvish if healthy should be awesome, no doubt about that. But Hamels wasn't awesome last year, merely good. The rotation after those 2 is mediocre at best.
That's just crazy talk. One is a perennial all star and former ROY and MVP (Yes, I know about the drugs...but he's still pretty damn good). The other has 8 career ab's in the majors.
I'm not sure how the offense (or the team) has improved since the end of last year. We lost some depth in Lowrie. We lost some a starter in Carter, and are hoping Singleton can replace him, but there's no evidence that will be the case. Then we have another set of minor leaguers, which look promising but might or might not work out. We haven't solidly improved in any given area. Just looking at the team we had at the end of the year - which was playing 0.500 baseball for the last few months - to now, our rotation has less depth (Kazmir), our bullpen is stronger (Giles), and our offense hasn't really changed.
Our offense has changed. More experienced team and a healthy Gomez and Springer do wonders for this team.
There is a lot of evidence Astros had very bad sequencing at end of last year. Talent wise, the team likely isn't much better outside first base, but should expect better performance. There is evidence, projections, that Singleton will produce as well as Carter did last year, but that isn't really a high bar. Reed is projected to be even better. There is no guarantee projection is accurate, but inaccuracy can go both good and bad.
This is of course assuming no major injuries. Our CF posted a .670 OPS. I expect Gomez to be a huge improvement over that. Our RF posted a .740 OPS. I expect Springer to be 70-100 points better than that. Our 3B posted a .710 OPS. I think full season platoon of Valbuena and Marwin/Duffy will be better. We didn't platoon Valbuena early in the season, and his numbers suffered facing LHP so much. Our production from 3B was elite once we started platooning. Plus a full season of Correa. 1B is the one major question mark, but I really don't think we get much worse production out of the position then Carter gave, one of Singleton/White/Reed or maybe Duffy will be productive. We may have even upgraded if one of them breaks out. As for losing the games. History shows the run differential is a strong predictor of future success. I think we suffered from a little bad luck.
As for losing Lowrie, he was part of the struggles. He was terrible upon his return, so I don't even consider him a loss, Marwin is better.
I haven't heard any names. All I was told other than the Astros have had a lot of talks with the Brewers, was that the Astros believe Braun can get plenty of at bats in the outfield, DH and believe he can play first well. My guess would be that they keep the outfield the same poaching at bats at first and DH or if anyone is dealt it is Gomez.
I think the potential of Darvish and Hamels at the top is super solid...but you've convinced me, and I would rather think they'll all just flat out suck! :grin:
No one can predict health, much less assume everyone will be healthy for an entire season. 2016 could prove out to be healthier or not compared to 2015. This is my assessment as well. Agreed.
Weren't the Blue Batting Practice Jersey's suppose to be the Sunday game uniforms? Why did they decide to not wear them anymore? Also, the Astros used to wear the orange caps on Saturdays and they don't.
Wandy Rodriguez gets $1M when in majors, plus $3M incentives on Astros deal — @JonHeyman Astros sign LHP Edwar Cabrera — @MattEddyBA
I think he could play first. I'm surprised that the Brewers didn't move him there this year to replace Lind. They have a gigantic black hole now at first. I'm not surprised with Stearns in Milwaukee that they have had talks. I shared this on a Brewer forum that I frequent (I grew up a Brewers fan) and they want AJ and Moran in return for Braun. I doubt that would be a doable deal. But who knows.
Delusional. I know you are just relaying info from their fan base, but if they think that Braun is worth a top farm system's #1 prospect, they are are surely to be disappointed when he is in fact traded.
I won't pretend to know too much about Braun - but a 31-year old that posts .285/.356/.498/.854; 130 OPS+; 3.8 WAR isn't going to come cheap.
