Why is Altuve on your bench? Because Dusty didn't play him when he was injured the last several days with a heel issue?
Altuve is on the bench to simulate a great starter getting rest. I expect Yordan, Bregman, Tucker, and Altuve to have an average wRC+ at or above 130 going forward. Altuve's current 138 wRC+ seemed the best choice as an average proxy. I could have used Tucker, the 2nd best choice, instead and the answer would have changed to 102 (instead of 101). Edit: Overall, the moral of the story is the same. If Diaz catches, the Astros play the guys that best hit with him, and either Dubon or Meyers, the Astros offense should be great. Assuming a great starter rests once every 12 games or so, Maldy is used as catcher, and Julks plays a third of the time, the Astros offense should still average out to be Top 5 offense.
Very concerned Looks like he's got a tired arm, which is messing up his mechanics. I'm no pitching coach but his front shoulder appears to be flying open.
Urquidy is clearly not a AAAA guy but wasn't good enough to pitch in the playoffs last year. He is a very good #5 starter that every team needs during the season but not in the playoffs. He gives up too many HR and his hitter vs stats have declined each of the last 3 seasons. France is actually showing me something. He has graduated from AAAA guy but is still not a MOR starter. He doesn't strikeout enough guys and his K/BB is too low. He allows too many baserunners to be better than a #4 guy. Still way better than I would have even predicted his ceiling 2 months ago.
Can you imagine what a robo ump would do for Altuve's walk rate? Altuve would either get more walks or more in-the-zone pitches to hit. Win-win. Astros fans have been so fortunate to have first ballot HoF 2Bs to root for ... Morgan, Biggio and now Altuve.
This series with the rangers could be the most important regular season series Houston has had since 2016. They have a chance to come out of it only 1 game back in the division having one 6 straight, or come out of it 8 games back with their odds of winning the division almost nil. Huge series that might shape their deadline approach.
After last nights game Yainer Diaz is back to having a better pitcher ERA than Maldonado, which is absolutely astonishing considering he's exclusively caught our worst pitchers. I've long since stopped trying to decipher what the Astros think they are seeing from Maldonado that they aren't seeing from others, but as usual it hasn't showed up in the results.
Urquidy is the guy you want to have on the roster just in case something goes wrong in the playoffs. He doesn't have great stuff, but he aure can turn it on a and play under pressure as his WS stats would show.
World Baseball Classic + Starter from Opening Day + No 6-man Rotation... There may be value in skipping a turn in the rotation
I’m not a fan of robo umps. I’m just not. maybe give each team 2 strike/ball challenges a game or something along those lines.
"Wasn't good enough to pitch in the playoffs last yr"?? He was behind JV/Framber/Javier + LMJ. No idea how effective he'll be this year but when JV and Cole both wet the bed, not once but TWICE against WASH in the WS, Urquidy won a game on the road.
That's what they'll do, pitchers/hitters/catchers will be able to challenge. They won't have full robo umps
