That sucks. Feel so sad for George. I was excited to hear the ovation when he was announced. So far, he missed last year's road trip to Houston. I hope the injury ends up being only minor and we do see him play after all.
Sandoval having a great start to the season with the Angels. Hated that trade the day that it was made and it may end up helping the Angels make a run at the division this season.
I did not like that trade at the time either. Sandoval is a good pitcher and it was pretty easy to project him to at least a BoR SP at the time of the trade for 1/2 a season of Maldy. Ugh. Next to Hader and Phillips, Sandoval was the prospect I hated seeing go out of all the prospects Houston has traded away over the last 7+ seasons.
Looking at last season, he is on a very impressive streak. Like he's at least Framber Valdez level already.
Former Astros in Top 100 in position player fWAR so far this season: 44. Springer 52. Straw 56. Teoscar Hernandez Pitchers: 8. Musgrove 17. Sandoval 29. Hader 52. Houser 88. Greinke
Of this list that ones that actually hurt me are Teoscar, Sandoval, and Hader. Teoscar was a tall price for less than a half season's worth of a LOOGY. I love Maldy, but back in 2018 McCann was still our primary catcher and we could've gotten Maldy in free agency for cheap that offseason. Hader...well, we all know the effects of that one. What's common on all of these?? Luhnow moves, our resident blemish-free, never had a bad move, wish we still had him GM. (By the way, I wish we did still have him, but not EVERYTHING he did was gold).
I HATED including Hader in the Gomez deal. Hader and Whitley are the only 2 pitching prospects since 2008 that I thought could be legit aces. Hunter Brown is inching toward that level. I also really didn’t want Houston to trade Nottingham or Phillips, although I understood why Luhnow did that at the time. But I would have had Hader as untouchable. I didn’t have Sandoval as untouchable but thought it was a big overpay for 1/2 a season of Maldy. Musgrove and Teoscar have both been a lot better than I ever expected them to be. I expected Musgrove to top out as an SP3-4 and Teoscar to be a bench OF. I was ok including Musgrove for Cole and even though I didn’t particularly like it, I didn’t have a major issue with giving up Teoscar for a rental RP. I have always thought something was weird about them trading Stassi and figured it had something to do with Verlander. That’s just rumor though. But they did not get fair value for him.
I thought Teoscar would hit but would be almost unplayable in the OF putting a hard cap on his value. While he hasn’t been an elite fielder by any stretch, he has been able to perform adequately enough and of course has hit well. Agree on Musgrove. Seemed like an Urquidy type who suppressed walks but didn’t have TORP stuff. Wasn’t Teoscar also moved due to Rule 5 concerns or am I confusing him with someone else?
Roster crunches were big factors in Houston trading both Hernandez and Laureano. Laureano is another guy who totally exceeded my expectations. Dramatically. On both sides of the ball.
Marisnick is one of my favorite players to watch play, ever. I really thought he was gonna have 2-3 really good years after leaving Houston but he didn’t.
