Yes, the non-waiver trading deadline is July 31. That means if Purp is going to do anything, it'll be in about the next 2 weeks.
Guys that should be dealt are Ausmus, Ensberg, Lamb, and Loretta. I doubt anybody will play Ensberg salary but Astros should pay a portion of it and trade him to a team like the Dodgers for a mid level or 2 low level prospects. Ausmus has some value because he is in last year of his contract and teams still believe he is a good catcher. A team like the D-Backs, Angels, or even the Cubs could use him. Lamb, Loretta, and Jennings have the most value and Astros should trade them for around 6 or 7 players that could help rebuild the horrible Astros minor league system. I would put Lidge but only trade him for someone like Jarrod Saltalamacchia.
man...Wandy needs a standing O. One inning without any runs. I don't like this at all, c'mon Wandy I know you can do it.
Kidding aside though, this is the exact reason Wandy isn't a #2 or a #3 starter. A caller on 610 called in a while back and was talking about just why Wandy couldn't be a #2 starter someday, and palilo or whoever was on essentially dismissed that claim off the the bat. Not that I'd envision Wandy being a future #2, but I think if the confidence/poise at home could be translated even HALF the time to on the road, that he'd be a very serviceable #3. At the same time though, for what he brings to the table he's still definitely got a spot in our rotation. If he never gets it on the road, then I guess he never gets it on the road. It'd sure be nice to see Wandy's road record at least hover around .500 and an era of oh... just a little south of 7
Nice weak ass swing at ball four by Burke. Memo to all the Bidge haters that want Burke playing over him: Younger does not necessarily mean better. Check the numbers. Burke sucks.
But we're a second half team. Didn't we flip the switch at the all-star break? How could this have happened? We're supposed to be good now that we're in the 2nd half. First sweep at Wrigley since 1984!
As bad as he has been this year, Burke's OPS is identical to Biggio. His OBP is 20 points higher - given that they are leadoff hitters, Biggio's sub-300 OBP is horrible. Last year, Burke was better in just about every category except that he had a terrible strikeout rate. Basically, right now, they are both terrible. But the organization needs to find out whether Burke is going to get better.
Plus Burke's confidence is shot right now no matter how much he tries to play it off. Getting sent to Round Rock during the season and a lack of constant playing time have shown just how this organization feels about their supposed second baseman of the future.
If he is really that fragile, then down the line he would have flamed out at some other confidence shaking event that would qualify as a minor blip on the radar for a normal human being.
Basically Burke had a good minor league OPS...so the Sabrmetricians will continue to j*zz all over him until he plays his way out of the league at which point it will be the organizations fault for ruining him. By letting that HOF guy block his ascent to mediocrity.
Two problems here: 1.) Since when is OPS a sabermetric stat? It's fairly straight-forward. 2.) No, Burke had a good major league OPS last season. That's also the only season in his major-league career where he's had any kind of reasonable sample size to judge him by. But, go ahead and build strawman arguments against cases that no one has even hinted at making. That's always fun.
I'll check the numbers from the last time each had a reasonable sample size to judge them by (last full season). Burke was better. Check the numbers. By the way, Biggio had a very similar scenario to Burke in the previous inning, with a runner on third and two down. How'd that AB turn out?
