Winning us a great deodorant. I don't see any downside to playing Dezenzo at 1b, Whitcomb, in LF, and Leon in RF because the chances are they won't be worse, it is nearly impossible to be much worse, and there is a chance they could be better. But the truth is that to do that they would need significant regular playing time. That's 33% of your starting lineup and defense. That's a lot of change and chance when the team is winning now. Change always has an element of uncertainty and is therefore feared. I do think Dezenzo and Leon sitting on the bench more than 3 games in 10 is a mistake though. Get them reps or send them back to Sugar Land.
Oh wow… I did not know Rafael Montero accepted being outrighted to the Space Cowboy's…. It’s refreshing to see him stick it out with the Astros, because there might still be some gas left in him, but he just needs to follow the advice the Astros brass offers him. According to what I’ve seen some say, is he is too stubborn to heed the Astros advice.
The minor league rankings are out. And the Astros came in with the worst Minor league system, again. Even the writers of these team ranking systems of minor league are perplexed at how the Astros keep chugging out pro after pro. 30. Houston Astros 2024 preseason rank: 27 2023 midseason rank: 30 2023 preseason rank: 27 2022 midseason rank: 30 Top 100 prospects: None Baseball's most baffling farm system never has placed higher than 27th since we started ranking all 30 systems in 2020, yet the Astros have played in the last seven American League Championship Series and had at least one player receive a Rookie of the Year vote in the past five seasons. Spencer Arrighetti, Jake Bloss, Zach Dezenzo and Joey Loperfido all have contributed in Houston this season, though Arrighetti and Loperfido graduated and Bloss and Loperfido went to the Blue Jays in a deal for Yusei Kikuchi. Their best prospects are a pair of potential 20/20 guys (outfielder Jacob Melton, shortstop Brice Matthews) and the best catcher in the 2024 Draft (Walker Janek).
These rankings are based on top end talent and largely ignore depth and even moreso they ignore team’s ability to maximize whatever talent they do have in their system. I’ve been a little surprised all these sites haven’t been quicker to realize and adjust. I would also be very interested to see an analysis of total farm production over the last 5 years.
Now *that* would be interesting. WAR from the farm over X years, you could even break it down into what they did for you + what they did for someone else if traded.
It would be pretty easy to just look at them and figure it out... Bal/KC/AZ recently off the top of my head. There's several teams who have been up and down, and there's more than that who have been in perpetual rebuild mode.
I shower every player the astros graduated in the last 7 or so years. It wouldn’t be hard to figure out how much WAR they had. I can do it tomorrow if you bastards are too lazy.
Coaching and development matters. Can have the best high ceiling talent but pair them with White Sox, Blue Jay, or NY coaching...
