Bryan Reynolds is who you would trade Garcia for. Great bat with 3 years of control after this year. He can also provide Brantley/Meyers insurance. And, as tough as this may be, he would make it okay to let Brantley walk and take over LF next year (assuming Meyers develops at CF). Verlander/Javier/McCullers/Valdez/Urquidy/Odorizzi rotation
As is proven over and over, the best team every year will still lose to the hot team unless THEY are the hot team in October.
I’m inclined to just keep our wealth of starters as insurance. Sorting them out is the interesting part. Javier was the obvious choice for a bullpen role but that’s not an option anymore. 6 man rotation with Odorizzi in long relief? No clue.
Man, that was fun to watch. Like another poster in this thread, I can't help but feel like the league is eventually going to figure out his fastball. I don't get why it is so tough to hit. When I see 95 straight down the middle to a guy like Trout and he's swinging through it, it is pretty baffling. His slider is pretty good but he doesn't have great control with it and I think it mainly works as well as it does when paired with his fastball. I hope this dominance continues. This is one of those games that was pretty fun start to finish and really makes me want to step back and marvel at just how incredibly lucky we are as baseball fans to get to cheer for this team during this period of history. So easy to get used to dominance and find ourselves spending significant time b****ing about something mundane like micro-decisions from Dusty on lineup assembly. Just sit back and enjoy this unprecedented time in this team's history. We may never see a decade like this again in our lifetime of rooting for the Stros. Take a step back, get some perspective, and just take it all in. This is SO. MUCH. FUN.
At this point, Urquidy will be the odd man out. While there are flashes of better, he is still the only one with an ERA+ under 100. He's the sixth SP when Odorizzi returns and 7th when McCullers returns. I honestly don't know whether he helps the BP with long relief or not. He might need to just work in AAA. Brown and Whitley may also pass him in the pecking order before the year is over. But that means he has the least trade value.
Movement within the Strike Zone, change of pace and pitch selection are the only explanations. Right now, even his misses are competitive pitches that look like they could be in the zone when the batter has to decide to swing. On another topic, will the electronic pitch device open up a new position so someone like Maldonado so he could call pitches as the coach when his body is done? It would be an equivalent of a 1B coach or 3B coach who actually has in play on field responsibilities. We could keep his non hitting and fielding abilities when we move to a new catcher. He could select the pitches and locations electronically as the coach like the other coaches call bunts, hit and runs, etc. PM coach - Pitching Management Coach.
Coaches and managers have been calling pitches from the dugout for years, especially with younger catchers and/or pitchers.
there was an old saying is baseball that say's "you can never have too much starting pitching". So, with that mentality, I'd say leave any trades for next season. I guess if they find some trade partner that they simply can't refuse, Much lime the Jared Cosart trade. But I would not be looking to accommodate inning's, as long as the pitchers know that there is strength in numbers. Because Garcia, Javier, Valdez, McCullers, Urquidy, are all trending up (getting better still) and have ice in their veins.
Cristian "Queso Grande" Javier! When is his next projected start, Wednesday? I'm going to try to make it to the game.
I think people hit him better the third time through the line has more to do with fatigue and command than figuring the pitch out. The ball plays between 3-5 mph faster than it is because of his delivery and when they actually start to see the ball. He has had much better command of his secondary pitches the last few games. He hasn't really walked a lot of people.
I would trade Garcia. He has pretty much hit his ceiling and I don't think he's much better than a mid to upper 3 era type pitcher. Not that he's a throwaway, far from it. Plus he seems to always get his pitch count up and causes you to pitch 3+ innings of relief. You would kill your bullpen with 5 starters like that.
No doubt about it, but I do believe Justin Brooks Verlander is destined to win his 3rd Cy Young and join an elite list of only 11 pitchers to ever do so.
