Was very impressed by the Diaz/Brown battery, if anyone else was watching did you notice Brown shake off Diaz quite a bit? It was subtle like Diaz was giving him every option quickly and Brown would nod to what he wanted. Seems like Brown and possibly Javier (who for whatever reason doesn’t work well with Maldy) should be obvious Diaz days.
Except that they do have that option because their goal is not to have the best record or stats or their ideal team on April 10th. It's so bizarre that people who've been watching the Astros for the last 6 years still don't seem to have a basic understanding of the team's philosophies or approach. Multiple GMs and managers have favored Maldy over an assortment of other catchers; and we all probably agree that the Astros' brain trust over the last many years is pretty damned smart in their decision-making. But fans still can't seem to wrap their heads around the idea that the Astros might see something that they don't.
Actully Luhnow and Hinch always had starting catchers who could hit..at least a little, and Dana Brown got on the job too late to do much with the roster. What we do know is that Click and Dusty love Maldonado.
I can't wrap my head around Maldy getting the majority of the starts , no matter how good his game prep is or how good he is with the pitching staff.
Maybe consider that 36 year old Maldy isn't the same guy as 30 year old Maldy- his offense went from bad to probably historically awful, his fielding went from ok to shitty, his framing continues to have the Astros as one of the most poorly umped teams in the league costing us runs by the basketfull, and his one skill (gamecalling) is completely and totally narrative driven and doesn't show up on metrics where we would expect to see it. Also, and I will say this for the 1000th time- the pitcher calls his own game. The catcher makes a suggestion. It's merely a suggestion. The pitcher throws what he wants. It's like a caddy and tour pro. The PRO ALWAYS MAKES THE DECISION. The Caddy is merely along for advice and suggestion. Same with pitchers. It's their game and their responsibility. Hell, now that they can initiate through pitch com I bet there are some guys that are completely calling their own game. Also- everything Seal Clubber said.
I thought I was going to disagree with you because Luhnow acquired Maldonado to be the primary catcher twice. But looking back at 2015-2022, 2019, 2020, and 2022 were the only seasons they didn’t have a catcher who could hit: 2015 Conger/Castro 2016 Gattis 2017 McCann/Gattis 2018 McCann/(Stassi had a good year too) 2019 (Chirinos had a good year but wasn’t a good offensive player overall) 2020 (Maldy had a good year with the bat) 2021 Castro 2022 (they probably didn’t expect Castro to get hurt or for Vazquez to not hit) So that does make me think if Diaz or Lee doesn’t get established they will go add somebody. Sal Perez would be a great target.
Their goal better damn be not to get buried before Altuve gets back. Also- even if the long term goal is not to be really good on April 10th how does burying Diaz on the bench help? How does trotting Maldy out there for 120 games when he's a freaking fossil help the goal of being better down the stretch. It's illogical and irrational. It's akin to the nonsense with Dubon as the personal CF for JV last year. It's Dusty being absurd. I assume Brown is going to make a move here somewhere. If he didn't value the bat there we'd see Korey Lee and not Diaz up. This is typical Dusty pig-headedness.
Chirinos always hit well for a catcher, 2019 was right in line with normal. He never went into a season with a catcher that wasn't expected to contribute anything offensively
You’re not wrong with your points. I’d just point out the rotation is still pretty inexperienced/young. Every starter is still in their team control years, most just barely in their arb years. I can definitely picture wanting a steady, veteran catcher guiding them. The other two options on the roster are rookies. If it were the Mets rotation, I’d expect everyone one of those starters to be able to adjust to whomever is behind the dish.
It really doesn't make any sense for Sal Perez to stay as a KC royal. There is no way he fits any timeline of theirs that makes sense- he's a huge drain on their meager resources- and although a fan favorite they don't draw flies, so what's the point? It's outdated thinking to hold onto a guy like that- they only question should be do they want to give him away to whoever will take the salary off their hands or would they prefer to buy some higher quality prospects by paying a good portion of his salary. If the ownership was acting intelligently and in good faith it would be the latter and they ought to be able to sell that to their fans.
We aren't strapping him to a rocket and firing him into the face of the sun (this is my dream plan for Dubon and Maton). He's still around. He could still, you know, help with the game planning and suggestions and do what he does right now which really amounts to coaching type stuff. I have heard it suggested that he wouldn't do that if he wasn't getting the lions share of the playing time which seems incredibly suspect and selfish and behavior I wouldn't care for on my team, personally, but if his professionalism wouldn't allow him to contribute wherever he can I'd suggest the team could DFA him and he could get an early jump on retirement as I don't believe he has any market in MLB- which was pretty clearly demonstrated the last time he was a FA. I wouldn't ever suggest 2 rookies without a veteran in the clubhouse. You'd have to pick up a guy around the scrap heap. I would suggest that whoever you pulled from that heap would be pretty indistinguishable from St. Maldy, genius game caller.
It's where you use your eyes, gut feel, and intuition to evaluate a player rather than simply relying on results provided thus far.
How have you seen enough to make that really high iq assesment? or is this a love at first sight eye test??
Dubon is getting starts because of his defensive abilities only. It doesn’t hurt that he’s not striking out as much. Guys get a book on hitters after their first run through the league. Whatever they have on Hensley now hopefully is just early season jitters or whatever. But he hasn’t had the same plate awareness that he showed in a brief stint last year.
More like the "We all know Dubon will settle in around a .650 ops, optimistically, so I'd rather see my 5 year old out there than Dubon, might as well see what Hensley can do, bc he looks to have a higher ceiling than that" eye test.
Please stop acting like he is Ozzie Smith defensively. He's completely overrated in that regard. Sure, he has Bill Obrien style versatility, but that's not something to brag about.
He slept has 5 walks and he’s also been punched out a couple times on some pretty outrageously bad calls. I believe he will be just fine with OBP. If he can drive the ball at all he will be a really good offensive player.
Lunhow went out and got Maldy, let him go, and then went back and got him again after realizing how much they wanted him (he talked about this). In both of his postseasons with Hinch, he started a decent number of playoff games (more than your average backup catcher). In 2018, he started 6 of their 8 playoff games.
