I'm not so sure. I'm guessing Dayton Moore probably has a woody for Soler and his tools/potential. He's a prototype RF and is still very highly thought of by some. He's surplus for the Cubs so they can get away with dealing him for one year of Davis. They still have young outfield options left like Almora, Jimenez, and Happ.
http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/...giolito-reynaldo-lopez-in-chris-sale-bid.html The Nats offered up their top two pitching prospects in Giolito and Lopez along with their top position player in Robles for Sale. It obviously wasn't enough. Also... http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/12/carlos-gomez-rangers-progressing-toward-deal.html Gomez to re-sign with the Rangers for a year and 11.5 million dollars.
So looking at the big picture ... Sale & Bregman off the table for good ... WSox in full fire-sale mode ... We still desperately need another premium SP ... Our heavy flirting with EE indicates lack of total confidence in Reed locking down 1B ... Luhnow's first big Intl FA offer went to another WSox vet likely on the block ... Astros still have a cupboard full of good prospects, of whom CHI is surely very familiar at this point ... What would it take to pickup SP Quintana & 1B Abreu in a trade? I've seen the idea floated on here before, so apologies if this is all retread discussion, but I haven't seen specific packages mentioned anywhere Bregman is out for everyone else if he wasn't in for Sale Springer doesn't make sense for a rebuilding team looking to unload their own GG RF Eaton If fact, any available vet Astro makes very little sense for CHI (McHugh, Gattis, Fiers) WSox would surely be looking for 5 of our Top 10 prospects at minimum Reed is obviously the starting point as natural replacement at 1B Just last spring he was among the top 2-3 1B prospects in the game coming off his MiLB PoY season in 2015 He remains our best hitting prospect Martes would surely have to be included as another Top 30 prospect in baseball and our clear top P prospect Musgrove, Fisher & Daz are/were also among our Top 10 prospects and have been included in various Top 100 lists recently Does Reed + Martes + Musgrove + Fisher + Daz get it done? That's 2 Top 25 types (like they just accepted for Sale) with star potential + 2 Top 50-100 guys ready right now + 1 high-ceiling gamble on a very young but supremely talented teenager a few years away If so, I think I'd make that deal Adding 2 potential 2017 All-Stars in their prime without touching Bregman, Tucker or Whitley improves the present without sacrificing the future completely Reed is instantly upgraded to his potential ceiling with the proven Abreu Same with accelerating Martes' All-Star future into the present All-Star Quintana Musgrove's loss is somewhat mitigated by the Morton sigining Fisher's future LF job has disappeared overnight with Reddick, Beltran & Aoki now in the fold Daz could end up being the biggest loss, but he's at least 3 years away and far behind Kyle Tucker already However ... There are some unresolved issues with such a deal: - CAN ABREU BE TRADED WHILE IN ARBITRATION? Abreu opted out of 3yrs left on original FA deal, so he's now in ARB system Is it even possible to move a guy without a deal in place? I saw something about Colorado inquiring, so I'm guessing he's not immovable pre-ARB settlement This article projects him to earn around $12M in ARB for 2016: http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/10/jose-abreu-arbitration-2017-salary-whitesox.html Over his 3 full MLB seasons, Abreu ranks 7th among 1B in total WAR from 2014 to 2016 Rizzo & Goldy are the top 1B in all of MLB, but still a few years away from signing mega-deals that could each top $250M total Freeman ($21M), Miggy ($28M), Votto ($22M), and EE (?) will all earn nearly double what Abreu seems likely to get in ARB next year Abreu could be a great bargain at that price if accurate If his 2-yr slide continues, we could non-tender after 2017 and walk away If he rebounds to his rookie MVP form, we'd still have him under control for 2018 & 19 making far less than market value Those rumors of decline also seem to be greatly exaggerated for the 30 year old slugger He has actually been remarkably consistent as a contact hitter, but the power has eroded somewhat Still, his absolute worst base-line season still looks like what we are praying AJ Reed can still become some day: Worst Season Output vs (Career 3-yr AVG) 145 (153) G / 556 (598) AB 176 (179) H / 32 (34) 2B / 25 (30) HR 67 (78) R / 100 (103) RBI 39 (46) BB / 140 (132) SO .290 (.299) BA / .820 (.875) OPS 2.8 (4.0) WAR Even at his worst, Abreu is basically Chris Carter with a BA about 100 points higher I'll take that all day for $4M less than what we just paid Colby Rasmus - WHAT WOULD YULI, GATTIS, FIERS BRING BACK IF FLIPPED IN SUBSEQUENT DEALS? By keeping Bregman while adding Reddick/Beltran/Aoki/Abreu, Yuli becomes the odd man out He is 100% Infielder (Hinch confirmed this very recently) and I cannot see him learning LF at 32 in his first full MLB season The only way he gets regular ABs is by playing Beltran mostly in LF so Yuli & Abreu can play DH & 1B full-time This seems foolish and counter-productive to ask of a 40 year old expected to be a key playoff contributor Plus I still think this club is better off playing Jake's Glove everyday over Aoki's bat, but with Yuli still around, neither will play much at all This would also drastically cut into ABs for Gattis, who has been mentioned as available in trade rumors lately I'm totally fine retiring the underwhelming DH Gattis in favor of exclusive backup C2 Gattis for 2017 At $5.2M, even if he only gets 250 ABs over 60 games, he still provides value to the club in such a role that would be missed and hard to replace But Yuli at $14.4M only makes sense if he's getting 500 ABs, so he would have to be moved I'd be curious to see what either could fetch in a market already flooded with older, position-less, unemployed power DH types I still don't get the Aoki deal, and would kill to unload his $5.5M salary, but I won't even pretend a willing buyer exists for such a pricey waiver claim Then there is Fiers He is projected to make $4.3M thru ARB Since Luhnow chose not to non-tender him (as I expected), he must feel Fiers still has value to someone as a stop-gap starter I just don't see a place for him on the 25 any longer The rotation is already 5-deep with better players in Keuchel, LMJ, McHugh, Morton, Musgrove (assuming he's not traded) With Martes & Paulino also right around the corner, he might already be our 8th-best SP in 2017 He has never pitched well from the bullpen as a flyball pitcher that gets hit often and hard Fiers could be an expensive disappointment next year trying to fill the swing-man role Feldman held last year And he's probably still only our 3rd best option for that role currently, behind the much cheaper Devinski & Feliz Assuming we were able to find takers for Yuli & Fiers, adding Quintana & Abreu would basically be a salary wash for 2017 We could still use another LOOGY as insurance for Sipp, but those are the easiest trades to make mid-season as needed Sale would have been nice, but I would certainly go to war with this squad next season: My Projected Astros Opening Day 2017 25-man Roster $124.2M Total Payroll LINEUP (13) $78.8M 2B Altuve - 4.7 LF Reddick (L) - 13 3B Bregman - 0.5 SS Correa - 0.5 DH Beltran (S) - 16 CF Springer - 4.7 Arb1 1B Abreu - 12 C1 McCann (L) - 11.5 RF Marisnick - 1.1 Arb1 $64M UT Marwin (S) - 3.6 Arb3 C2 Gattis - 5.2 IF Kemp (L) - 0.5 OF Aoki (L) - 5.5 $14.8M STAFF (12) $45.4M S1 Quintana - 7 S2 McCullers - 0.5 S3 Keuchel (L) - 9.5 Arb2 S4 McHugh - 4.6 Arb1 S5 Morton - 7 $28.6M R9 Giles - 0.5 R8 Harris - 2.5 Arb1 R7 Gregerson - 6.3 R6 Devinski - 0.5 R5 Feliz - 0.5 R4 Sipp (L) - 6 R3 2nd Lefty TBD - 0.5 $16.8M
That wasn't an either/or deal. They were in position to get Hamels after they had already made the Gomez trade.
BTW ... does anyone else think it could really become a MAJOR chemistry issue at some point if Altuve heads to Spring Training tied with George as the 11th highest paid Astro next year?!?! He has been the good soldier by not complaining for 2 years already ... but how long can that continue? He didn't hire Scott Boras as his agent this year just to patiently wait out his contract another 3 years, right? I didn't do much digging, but I cannot believe any other top 10 player in MLB, undisputed best at his position by a wide margin, with 5+ years MLB service time as his teams' 1 true franchise player ... is currently making less than half his own teammates I have a feeling once Luhnow has finished his offseason shopping spree, we're going to see a quiet, surprise mega-extension for Altuve right before player report for Spring Training Just like Morey did for Harden out of nowhere once he was done shopping for Ryno, Gordon and Nene Would be a shame to not reward the guy who started the turnaround by carrying the team when he was the lone bright spot during this franchise's darkest days I know he took the security and signed the deal when he didn't have to ... but so did Harden and that didn't stop Les or Morey from taking care of their franchise cornerstone earlier than they needed to
Astros not pushing all in. Just limping in and hoping to hit a straight on the river. I'd rather buy magic beans at this point than be stuck with a nice cow that you cant titty milk every once in a while for a half glass full of whole milk and a chocolate chip cookie.
Completely different scenario. Harden signed a max extension at the time of his trade... and as soon as his Bird rights kicked in, he was able to sign an even bigger extension (that bought out a lot of his already paid years) without much cap ramifications. Altuve had his arbitration years bought out... for a far less amount than he would have gotten had he played it out (what Springer and Keuchel are currently doing).... but at the time of that contract offer, his super-stardom was very much in doubt. It was actually touted as a "gamble" by some here... who figured his free-swinging ways wouldn't have him lasting or excelling this long. Anyways, Altuve will be taken care of... and the good news for the Astros is that if he wants to get paid sooner (and he certainly deserves to), the only team that it can come from is them.
Unfortunately both of those players are likely to require a Bregman type of player as the headliner. Will be (extremely pleasantly) surprised if Houston trades for a true ToR SP. Have a bad feeling they will either make a very underwhelming move or no move at all. They set fans up to believe that McCann/Reddick were precursors to EE/Sale. Instead we get Beltran/Zip.
Starting Nine: Astros 2017 Lineup I’m not sure about you, but all of these early off-season acquisitions have me a little anxious for the 2017 season to begin. Can we just skip ahead to April 3rd or have we STILL not figured out time travel? Actually, I like Christmas. But once Christmas is over, let’s skip ahead to April. With the all the roster changes, it’s anybody’s guess what the lineup will look like in 2017. So I asked the TCB writers to weigh in on how how they would assemble a lineup versus RHP and LHP in 2017. With multiple options at a few positions, there was bound to be some disagreement. There was one thing all the writers agreed on though: whatever lineup Hinch goes with, it will be the most potent lineup Astros fans have seen in a long time. With the additions of Nori Aoki, Brian McCann, Josh Reddick, and Carlos Beltran, Hinch has plenty of options for positioning and lineup in 2017. If you were Hinch, what would your typical lineup look like against RHP and LHP? Using 2016 wRC+ to help visualize this a little bit.
The recurring narrative up until this week was that Houston was going to make a splash and acquire an ace; they also did nothing to quell the EE rumors when they started up. Now this week they are crawfishing and trying to get us ready for the eventual letdown.
Pretty slick. Thinking they will only keep 12 position players. Which would mean against LHP we would see Marwin at 1B (batting 8th), Gurriel in LF, and Beltran at DH. Hopefully Gurriels #s against lefties is a small sample fluke. From the looks of that, Aoki is really expendable due to Gattis being pretty good against righties and lefties (Gattis could DH and Beltran would be in LF). Getting rid of Aoki would make room for a White (or whoever) to have another bat on the bench.
I think the front office really values that Aoki is a different type of hitter than the rest of our lineup. He is so tough to strike out and will provide a nice contrast to many of our boom or bust guys. I doubt they view him as expendable at all.
I don't see how you're blaming the team for aberrant tweets put out by rumor-happy media reporters, likely getting fed leaked/false info from players agents or other parties. If you chose to get excited over a bunch of fluff... its pretty much on you to deal with the disappointment of it all. The teams is not putting out any information or mis-information about their plans. Of course they want to acquire starting pitching, if the price is right. So far, it hasn't been.
