The "problem" is that the Astros are stuck with him. There is really no choice but to keep scheduling him every 6 days. They can have a long/bulk guy ready every start in case he doesn't go long. But that's a problem if there isn't an offday because the bullpen is already short if its in a 6 man rotation. Everyone besides fans have, for years, said it would be higher injury risk in the bullpen and he must remain a starter and that's makes sense to me. But I'm questioning every medical decision/answer the Astros have given.
I wish I shared your optimism. His FB is down 3 mph and the movement is diminished. Even when he’s been effective his FB is not what it was before he got hurt. It’s not just erratic command from start to start that’s common for pitchers returning from a long absence. It’s a lesser physical ability.
I’m not saying it’s impossible but there’s a much higher chance you DON’T want to see Lance on the mound game 3 than you will want to see him. His stuff has diminished and he has always walked way too many guys. If you’re averaging a 91 mph fastball as a right handed starter, you better be able to pinpoint it. He will definitely have starts where he will be really good moving forward because he can still generate swing and miss with his breaking pitches but I wouldn’t bet on him becoming consistent enough to where you would ever feel comfortable with him starting a playoff game.
Let him get good over there... not anywhere near Daikin Park or Constellation Field. And Fayetteville is not hell.
It's just a strange world that we live in A world where Astros fans believe in Hummell, and want Lance off the team, one bad outing after shutting down the Dodgers
His last four games he's gone 17.1 and given up 18 earned. They said he was up to 94 during his rehab. Not sure where that stuff went. He can't be a playoff starter the way he is pitching. He should be in the bullpen and you have to hope arrighetti comes back strong and more importantly you have to trade for a starter.
He got hurt winning games and rings for the Astros Sucks for him and sucks for the Astros but he earned everything he has including his spot on this roster and his bank account. MLB rules. Lance did what he needed to in order to be guaranteed a spot on this roster. He may never start another playoff game but he will continue playing in regular season games. On any given day he has potential to be the best option to start and that's not going to change as long as guys like Gusto and Gordon are in the rotation.
Nah. I don’t believe any player deserves an MLB roster spot if they aren’t good. Their contracts are guaranteed and that’s fine, pay them, but like we saw with Jose Abreu, at some point it becomes clear the person is no longer worthy of a roster spot. I don’t think McCullers is quite there yet, and he may level out and be worth rostering thru the remainder of his contract. But thru 10 starts, he’s not an MLB caliber pitcher overall and if he doesn’t show more consistent quality over the course of the rest of this season he should be cut loose. Gordon and Gusto have been clearly more effective overall than McCullers this season.
He's started 10 games. He gave up 0 ER in 3 of them. I'm 100% continuing to roll with Lance, despite the 3 bad starts he's had.
For Lance, it was oh he just can't pitch against the NL Central... to he can't pitch at home... to he can't pitch period.
Gusto has gone 6+ innings 3 times in 12 starts and in one of those 3 he gave up 5 earned. So only 2 "quality starts" in 12 starts Even if you back it down to just finishing 5 innings, he has only done so in 6 of his 12 starts. In fact he had a string of 5 starts where he gave us 4, 2.1, 4.1, 3.2 and 4.1 innings Gordan has gone 6+ innings 1 time in 10 starts. Now he has gone at least 5 in 8 of 10 starts so for a back end starter at least he has given some innings. Problem is even in those 8 starts he has given up 3 or more runs in 4 of the 8. So if you take out the fact that no one expected anything from him at all and just looked at his performance, he has given you 4 good starts in 10 outings Lance has gone 6+ 3 times in his last 6 starts, and given up 1, 0 and 3 earned in those starts, so half of his last 6 starts have been as good or better than all but one start by Gordon and 2 starts by Gusto I think a lot of people already had it in their mind that Lance was 100% wasted money before he came back and are just ready to move on. Lance has been far from great, but as I showed earlier very few come back from major surgery and are really good right away. But as inconsistent as Lance has been, in no world have Gordon and Gusto been "clearly more effective" than Lance
6 innings, 1 run And even in the numbers you give, 8 baserunners in 6 innings isn't bad against one of the better offenses in the game Command is always something that takes a while for pitchers coming back from major surgeries, so if you expected him to come back and just throw strikes then your expectations are the problem
Yep He has had 5 awful starts. Gave up 7 without getting out of the 1st against Cincy in his 2nd start, 8 in 3.2 against the Cubs and the 5 run stinker against the rangers. In his other 7 starts he has a 2.57 era He has a long way to go, but he was never going to be a front end starter, or even mid rotation starter, in his first 10 starts back. For most pitchers coming back from major surgery in the middle of a year it's the next year before he is all the way back.
It’s pretty funny the pretzel twisting you’re doing to try to justify McCullers as a good MLB SP. His fb velo is bottom of the barrel. He’s walking almost 6 batters per 9. Giving up 2 HR per 9. There’s room for optimism, given his previous success all those years ago and the intermittent flashes of effectiveness he’s shown this season, but there’s no case to make that he’s been anything other than horrid on the whole this season, and that if he continues to pitch as he has so far, he will continue to be an overall detriment to the team. I don’t think anybody, least of all me (who has a signed Greeneville Astros McCullers Jersey hanging in his office) wanted or expected Lance to fail once he came back. But watching his struggles and frequent complete failure to give his team any chance to win has been one of the more painful experiences of my sports fan life, and the overall numbers don’t lie.
He had terrible command before the surgeries. His last full season he had a 4.21 BB/9. You having the expectation that he is suddenly going to start throwing strikes is the problem. I said it before in a GDT and I'll say it again right here - I have considerably more faith in Brandon Walter than I do LMJ the rest of the season. He's the one throwing strikes and has very good advanced stats to back it up.
I don't see how anyone can have watched the totality of LMJ's starts so far and is left with the impression that this is going to be our game 3 starter. Just look at his statcast page. I don't even think Lance has as much confidence in himself as The Beard does. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/lance-mccullers-jr-621121?stats=statcast-r-pitching-mlb
