I personally want Siri called up to eat into some of straw’s playing time. I haven’t seen Siri play much defensively but I know that Straw’s defense going back towards the CF wall is not impressive. Neither are his .214 BA, .555 OPS, and 56 ops+. Straws defense will cost us games in CF and his bat will prevent us from truly becoming an elite offense. Don’t get me wrong... I realize Siri hasn’t been able to breakthrough into the big leagues for a reason... but maybe he’s made some adjustments and clearly has more pop in his bat than Straw. I’m also keeping an eye on Jake Meyers
Luke Scott didn't make it to the majors until age 27. Late bloomers happen. Jared Walsh made his debut at age 25. Siri is still 25.
From Kaplan's q and a from last week The interim Plan B is probably Jose Siri, who is off to a good start in Triple A. Siri can man center field and has some power, but he also has major swing-and-miss issues. So I guess the question is this: Would you rather have Straw, who doesn’t chase and makes a lot of contact but doesn’t hit for any power, or Siri, who strikes out a ton but might run into a few homers? Straw might still be the superior option, especially if the top seven are powering the lineup at an elite rate.
I am stoked Siri is off to such a good start but despite the insane slash line he is still striking out 27% of his pa in AAA. That’s not a playable at the major league level. If Houston were to call up someone to replace Straw I would want Meyers, as he has legit elite defense and has shown signs his bat has improved, even though his 23% k rate probably means he would be a pretty bad offensive player in the majors. Ronnie Dawson is probably the most intriguing option as his offense has more underlying support; he may have actually taken a big step forward and has really high upside. I think they should give Straw another 20 games or so before making a move.
Straw strikes out at a rate higher than most regulars on the team (20%). This is consistent with his previous 2 seasons.
His swing rate at balls is 9th lowest in all of baseball, and his contact rate is 9th best. He does in fact have great discipline and usually puts bat to ball when he swings. Unfortunately he sees a lot of balls in the strike zone because the contact he does make usually sucks. If he had the ability to punish people for meatballs he would be a stud...but he doesn't, and I'm not really sure how much he can improve that.
I get that people are disheartened with Straw's production so far. That is reasonable. Maybe one or more of Siri, Dawson or Meyers has figured it out. But I seriously doubt that the front office is convined of that after a measly 11 games. I doubt that even 20 more games are going to convine them. I think that if you or anyone else is expecting one of them to come up and outperform Straw, they are setting themselves up to be disappointed. After all, of the four, Straw has the highest minor league career OPS. If Straw does not make drastic improvement, I hope the front office makes a change, but I expect it to be from outside the organization, and that leads to whole other set of problems. My guess - get used to Straw's production.
Also, need an update from @Joe Joe, a couple of weeks ago Straw was top-10 or so in MLB in having balls outside the zone called strikes. Yordan was way up on the list as well.
Nice that his swing and miss rate is so low, but that doesn't change that fact that in his so far brief career he strikes out 20% of the time.
Siri - 25 and soon to be 26. His hitting average has been OK, but the power numbers are relatively new. Having missed Pro minors in 2020, his development was somewhat r****ded. Power often comes in the early to mid twenties. In thinking about calling up the hot hand like they did eventually with Alvarez in 2019, he's older and holding back his FA date is probably not a factor. His RF/9 in CF is 2.77 which is higher than Straw's 2.33 so theoretically, he's got the defensive chops as well. So I'm OK with giving him a call-up if he doesn't sit on the bench. I'm generally reluctant to doing this, but the boxes all seem to check.
Yordan has fallen a little, but was still in the Top 25 last I checked. I did not see Straw's name on the screen, but wasn't looking.
Calling up a guy who is striking out 27% of the time (and who 2 other teams have previously released) based on a hot start of <50 PA with a babip >.500 would not be smart.
It's really hard to separate out the latter issue (weak contact) from the former (low swing rate at balls). When you're facing a guy with no power, the pitcher is definitely thinking make him put the ball in play. My guess is he sees more strikes than most hitters as a result. As you said, without the ability to punish hitter-friendly pitches, the pitcher doesn't need to be so fine in painting corners. I would imagine that Straw sees fewer balls as a result, and the ones he does see are more likely to be poor pitches that are further from the strike zone. A guy like Straw is going to see different pitches than a Bregman, or an Altuve. That has to be taken into consideration looking at numbers like the one cited above.
He had a mid to upper 90s FB before an elbow injury took out his 2019 season. I think he's a potential bullpen piece. Fayetteville's Twitter account was nice enough to not mention his 9 walks in those 10.2 innings, which is less exciting.
Baseball Savant. I looked a few days ago when I was mad at an ump. It has changed since last I looked. Alvarez now out of Top 25, but Altuve sneaks in. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/stat...lease_speed&sort_order=desc&min_pas=0#results
Shay Whitcomb hit his first homer of the year for Fayetteville. He's playing 3B for the first time this season.
