JD Davis was robbed of the High A player of the month award. All he did was put up a ludicrous 1.308 OPS thanks to an .842 slugging. He missed a few games (played in 19), but still put up 27 RBI and 10 HR. His overall post all-star break numbers include 16 HR in 53 games and a .974 OPS He's 2-3 today including a double, and his OPS has climbed over the .900 mark. Luis Cruz spun a gem for Fresno - 7 shutout innings with 9 Ks, scattering 4 singles with no walks. White and Duffy were both 0-4
Well Appel might not turn out to be anything close to the hype he had. But Martes has the look of an Ace; a guy most of us did not really notice till this year. Like they say you win some and you lose some. Marlins are probably kicking themselves for trading Martes, Marisnick, and Moran, Alvin with the pick that allowed us to scoop Cameron from the Diamondbacks.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Matt Duffy named PCL MVP. Only the fourth <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Astros?src=hash">#Astros</a> minor leaguer in history to win it</p>— Chandler Rome (@Chandler_Rome) <a href="https://twitter.com/Chandler_Rome/status/639568442618572800">September 3, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
so, he has us shedding serious salary by 2017?? only person we'd be paying is keuchel. what would our payroll be? $50MM?? obviously it's impossible to predict a specific free agent signing, but i guarantee there will be some. that's a fun, young rotation, but not realistically one that's going to win championships starting in 2017. not sure if he considers 3 years a "long-term" contract, but unless kazmir completely falls off a cliff the rest of the way, they are going to look to re-up with him or make a push for david price. it makes no sense for them not to. we are in our contention window now, and our payroll is infinitesimal.
That is so unbelievably exciting. The fact that this team is this good with this low of a payroll along with as much minor league talent as there is makes things look as good as they ever have for the Astros going forward. We finally have the GM we have needed since Hunsicker left. This team will have tons of options, as long as Crane shows he is willing to spend money. Seeing the way attendance has started increasingly significantly, I would think he will be willing to try everything he can to win. Add in a stud hitter and dominating pitcher, and this team could be a World Series favorite next year. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the only major piece of our team with free agency coming up anytime soon is Keuchel. So that's the only money we have to worry about giving up.
Jim Callis isn't going to predict what players from outside of the organization are going to be playing for us.
The Astros might - and likely will - look to lock-up some of their young studs long-term over the next several years. My guess is that the team, generally, will not be big free agent spenders. I think their MO will be to find contract year additions at the deadline (like they did this year) that provide them payroll flexibility moving forward.
