Ok, Tucker pulled mid-game, Alvarez scratched just before 1st pitch...hard to believe that's a coincidence.
I am just as much excited about our prospects as the next guy or gal. But with as young as our ML players are, you've got to keep them prospects moving up; if there isn't room in the big league club, trade them. As long as it's fair value, it's good for the game. Hoarding and holding back major league ready talent isn't ideal.
Not bad at all. I've watched several good to great ballplayers who weren't that athletically gifted, but they were smart. Smarts goes a long way.
Intelligence is a great equalizer, that's what fills quality rosters. You only have a handful of elite players in the league who have both smarts and gifted natural ability.
Tyler White just hit a grand slam for Fresno, his 15th homer of the year. The Astros' farm clubs have hit 14 homers with one game left on the schedule tonight.
Didn't get out of the 6th and almost 100 pitches? He'll fit right in on the Big League club. I'd say he should be on the same track as McCullers.
Kemp is hitting .336! That's actually just 9th in the PCL. Reed hit #16 tonight. Moran has another XBH (double) with a pair of walks -- curious if he'll start to get any more prospect buzz.
Call me crazy but a 0.30 era is enough to pique my interest, at least until the Peter Principal kicks in.
@tellitlikeitis White deserves more attention from major league GMs, and from fans too. Most people wrote him off when he slumped horribly in May/June/July last year. But they tend to forget that he returned to the Astros and hit for an OPS of .896 as a September call-up, and is now sitting on OPS of around .865 for the season in AAA. He's also used this season to get practice at all four infield positions. This puts him in a position to conceivably take over Marwin's utility role if Marwin simply gets too expensive for the club to keep (or regresses, or gets injured). There is also just an intangible quality about White's psychological makeup that I think makes him very valuable going forward. He deserves to be playing big league ball somewhere, so perhaps he gets traded this month; or, if Bregman gets moved (not that I am advocating that), then perhaps Gurriel will move to his natural position of 3B and White will take over at 1B/DH.
Tyler White is not a replacement for Marwin, he's a corner IF and that's it. And he's debatably tolerable at those 2 positions.
Got the save in his Fresno debut: 4 IP, 4 H, 2 BB, 4 K Dean Deetz went 5 innings and allowed a 2-run homer to Dan Vogelbach, the only scoring play he gave up. He allowed 1 other hit, walked 2, and struck out 6.
Fresno has got to have one of the best batting lineups in AAA. One can see each of the position players on a MLB roster and performing well enough to be an everyday player.
It is a stacked lineup. It also means guys like Kemmer (141 wRC+) and Garcia (hitting .342) get completely overlooked. Houston has the luxury/problem in filtering through those guys. They'll get to keep the 5-6 best guys who will provide tremendous depth next season. Unfortunately it means that the other 3-4 guys will be in the majors with other teams (via waivers, trade, or Rule 5).
