Sounds like they need a 3B. Trade Bregman for prospects, and bring up Valdez at 3rd. Bregman can play 2nd for them next year.
I think they will to and they should. Maybe a little cheaper, unless he wins the batting title, which is possible.
Yea, I don't think he will get 16 million a year again. The upcoming free agent market isn't great for outfielders. Astros won't be in the Judge sweepstakes and the Mets probably bring back Nimmo. I don't think the Astros want to give Benintendi a multi year deal when he is an even lighter hitting version of Brantley. After that you are talking about Conforto, Gallo, Haniger, Joc Pederson, and Will Myers. I'll take Brantley on a short deal. Conforto needs to come back at the end of the season and perform before I'd take that risk. Gallo makes Bregman's OPS+ look good. Haniger can't stay healthy. Joc Pederson is having a nice year in SF. He will be looking for his big payday if he keeps this up. Will Myers is trash. Also, if we are filling spots with rookies I'd still prefer Lee to replace Castro and possibly Matijevick and Jones to replace Yuli over Leon replacing Brantley in LF since Leon just strikes out way too much. The caveat to that would be Emanual Valdez continues to rake, gets called up to the majors, and rakes in MLB..... True, but a .384 OBP and a 135 OPS+ do mean something...
Well. All of a sudden it looks like Yuli might be coming back to life. .767 ops over his last 15 games and now has homered 2 games in a row. Houston might not have to do anything at all at the deadline.
Yeah, i should have kept the pondering to myself a few more days... For the record, i never said i would do it. I said i would consider it depending on the circumstances and one of them was Rendon being healthy which now officially looks cooked... I anticipate a brock osweiler type deal for the Angels to unload him...
Expensive trash for cheaper stinkier trash? Not if we're trying to win... Adell is a flier at this point... maybe Whitley for him would be fair...
I think the way to go is 1B and move Yuli to the Dubon role... He'll still play a bunch and i feel easier to find a stopgap at 1b for a couple years than centerfield... the position ages better... probably cheaper prospect cost...
The more I've thought about it, the more I would like a Mancini trade, even if Yuli is able to maintain his recent performance, there's just no chance I would risk 1B being an offensive dead spot with CF and C already having issues. Injury/performance insurance for 3 of our everyday hitters, platoon AB's with Brantley and either way we always have a quality pinch hitter for Maldy late in the game. While I'm generally conservative on wasting prospects for potentially minimal gain (if we're healthy and Yuli's producing), the potential major gain if his regular AB's are needed would be worth it.
Mancini would love the opportunity to play for a Ring. JS think about it Elias would know our Farm and we could get Mullins aswell
I actually have followed these young prospects from Sugar Land. I would love for 3-4 major roster spots going to these guys next year but it would probably mean a step down in W-L format year or two. I would not mind that if it meant a reset and a young 2019 like team again in 2024 or 2025. Buy I don't see the team risking lesser competitiveness in Altuve's( and likely Bregman's) last 2 seasons. Let me add that with Alvarez, Tucker, Pena, Framber, Garcia, McCullers and Bregman and Altuve this team would still very likely be a playoff team just possibly not a top 2-3 seed in the AL and serious WS contender
They’re not moving on from Bregman or Altuve. But there’s plenty of opportunity to work in younger players. Certainly the drop off from Aledmys Diaz to somebody like Valdez or Leon wouldn’t project to be too costly if at all. And I am pretty high on Matijevic and Jones such that I don’t think there’d be much drop off from Gurriel if they replaced him internally. Castro is pretty worthless at this point so it’s hard to envision Lee or Diaz or Berryhill being worse. Brantley is the one I think would hurt not to replace with a more proven commodity. None of McCormick, Siri, Leon, or any of the other LF options project to be the surefire above-average hitter Brantley is. Barring a major adjustment from Leon to get his k rate down or a further breakout from somebody like Julks or Dirden or Wilyer Abreu, I would look for Houston to find a multi-year option in LF. But doing that would still leave room for up to 3 new young players on the position player side.
