Hey Dusty maybe Abreu wouldn't have hurt his back if you actually sat him every now and then and let Diaz play 1st base occasionally. Same with Maldy. He has the 2 oldest and worst position players on the team playing the most. Baffling.
That was Diaz, they are both dog s**t at framing. At least Diaz doesn't suck at everything else on top of it.
Maldy should not be a starting catcher (especially for a team that has other offensive gaps) and Dusty makes bad decisions. I still find posts like the one you are quoting and ones that complained Abreu should have pinch hit funny because they pretty clearly are people looking for things to complain about.
The Astros shouldn't be a team that has many other offensive gaps. The Astros are easily a Top 5 or 6 offensive team even with the injuries (not counting Brantley) if Diaz was the primary catcher and Chas and Meyers started 95% of the games when healthy.
Not even hyperbole. The Astros are 2.5 games back of the division, Diaz in 255 PA put up 1.7 BWAR. Martin Maldonado in 292 PA put up -0.7 WAR. Giving all of Maldy's PAs to Diaz results in a 2.5 BWAR swing, which makes up for the entire division lead. Can't wait for the team to fight for their season in the dumpster that is Tropicana Field, where dropping two in a row like they did in 2019 ends their season.
That's good in theory, but 1) no C plays 100% of games. Even the youngest most durable play less than. 80% so 20% of Maldy's PA would need to stay with him or go to a 3rd C. 2) If Diaz played C 100% then his PA as DH would need to he subtracted. Overall that would make the swing closer to 1.5 instead of 2.5.
I'd just point out that Diaz's WAR is getting penalized heavily for his time at DH in WAR calculations even if one doesn't take into account that Diaz has been a piss poor DH. Diaz is probably got about 1.4-1.5 rWAR at catcher assuming he hits at all positions the same in 122 PAs and about 0.2-0.3 elsewhere (considering most players experience a DH penalty and Diaz has been actually a negative player at DH, the 1.4 rWAR is a way low estimate of his actual production at catcher). If Diaz and Maldy just swapped time as catcher, that would put Diaz at 3.4 rWAR at catcher and Maldy at -0.3 rWAR or about a 2.4 rWAR increase at the catcher spot.