Point of Order: Jones had nothing to do with it, he's hurt and worthless and can't play 2B/SS Goodrum was the backup to the backup IF playing everywhere, just like Robel Aoki was the backup to the backup OF, until he got replaced by who?
The Astros once had a backup catcher with .211 BA, with a .254 OBP and with a 75 OPS+ in 131 PA. Rather than get rid of him, they eventually moved him around before hanging his plaque in the Baseball HOF. BTW, he played on the same team as that other Honduran kid.
At no point was Craig Biggio ever a backup anything. He was a top prospect and started the second he got called up.
OK. Calling him a backup may be a stretch, but I suspect he was called up because he was needed. Yep. Ashby went down and he was a better option than the backup (Trevino?) for regular play. Then backed up Ashby when he returned.
https://theathletic.com/3313446/2022/05/16/houston-astros-pitching-depth-dominance/ Spoiler WASHINGTON, D.C. — It’s the kind of thing you notice from decades in the game and hours watching from the same dugout perch. Astros manager Dusty Baker could tell starter Framber Valdez was a little upset in the seventh inning Friday night. Not because Valdez didn’t pitch well. The right-hander went a season-high 7 2/3 innings in a 6-1 win against the Nationals. It was because Valdez had allowed a run. That is how good things are going for the first-place Houston Astros these days, winners in 12 of 13 games, led by a pitching staff with the kind of surprising depth and dominance no one saw coming. Before Houston’s 11-game win streak was snapped Saturday night, the Astros had thrown five shutouts with a 0.91 ERA — the best over any 11-game stretch in franchise history — to go with a .187 opposing batting average and an 0.88 WHIP. It’s hard to fault Valdez, who currently sports the best starter ground-ball rate (69 percent) in baseball, for wanting a scoreless outing. Starter Luis Garcia had gone five spotless the night before. Justin Verlander went eight in Tuesday’s series-opening win against the Twins and gutted through five scoreless in Sunday’s 8-0 series win over the Nationals. Jake Odorizzi hasn’t allowed a run in his last 15 2/3 innings. “Everyone wants to be the ace,” Baker said. “It’s been impressive, it’s been very impressive.” The Astros, without injured Lance McCullers, have been anchored by Verlander, who is 39 years old, coming off Tommy John surgery and basically hasn’t pitched in two seasons. They aren’t a rotation that strikes out a lot of hitters, ranking 22nd in the majors with 7.55 strikeouts per nine innings (K/9) and posting a 8.21 K/9 rate (21st) including the bullpen. “We’re an outs staff,” said Odorizzi, of a Houston rotation with a middle-of-the-pack 20.9 percent strikeout rate but an ERA (3.00) and WHIP (1.12) that entered Sunday second-best in the American League, with a paltry .221 opposing batting average. “As a visitor at Minute Maid (Park), I know it was a daunting thing of (thinking), ‘I can’t pitch to certain spots or it’ll go out of the ballpark’ but playing there (daily) if you block that out and just execute pitches for outs, I think we pitch very aggressively in the zone to force contact, it allows you to get deeper into games. A lot of (our early success) is our staff aggressiveness.” It’s what Valdez dubs the “attack mentality,” which has enabled Houston early on to exploit a serious strength: its elite defense. The Astros Def (defensive runs above average), according to FanGraphs, is 17.3 as a team. To put it simply, a shortstop with a +10 Def is 10 runs better than the average fielder at shortstop. Houston, as a team, is a dozen runs better than the next American League team (Oakland and Cleveland are both tied at 5.3). The next-closest team in baseball is Arizona and even they’re considerably behind at 11.2. And this comes after losing star shortstop Carlos Correa. The pitching prowess, which includes a major-league best 2.09 starting ERA the past 20 games, comes after losing longtime legendary pitching coach Brent Strom. How is that possible? Multiple people point to Houston’s organizational ethos, which is so streamlined and in lockstep with the big league club that young players aren’t overwhelmed with the transition. The always-blunt Zack Greinke once told a team official when he was in Houston, “When young guys come up here, they’re good.” And he’s right. Jeremy Pena, 24, grades out as one of the best defensive shortstops according to FanGraphs and, prior to dealing with some knee soreness that sidelined him this weekend, had a nine-game hitting streak in which he’s posted a .480 average with two home runs, 10 RBIs and a 1.193 OPS. Valdez, Garcia and Jose Urquidy are all homegrown members of the rotation. So is 25-year-old Cristian Javier, who has been in and out of the bullpen and had a 0.83 ERA before the Nationals lit him up for seven earned runs in Saturday’s start. (Houston allowed more runs in Saturday’s win-streak-snapping 13-6 loss than it had the entire 11 games preceding it.) “Whether it’s jumping from low to High A, or from Double A to the big leagues, we feel like it’s all kind of the same game,” said pitching coach Josh Miller, who has worked for the Astros since 2011. “We try and simplify that for players and have them take it and run with it.” Miller is co-pitching coach along with Bill Murphy, providing a tandem that was mentored by Strom, who was adamant when he left that the pair were ready to succeed. Miller, who previously served as the Astros bullpen coach, and Murphy, who is more data-driven and taught himself how to code, know the ins and outs of the organization and have already played a hand in many of the young arms’ development. So there was no big changing of the guard this spring, no big speech that needed to be delivered in Strom’s absence. (Though gone, it’s not unusual for Strom to check in via text about how Houston is doing.) “He was deeply involved in crafting our organizational pitching philosophy and our curriculum and how we teach from the big leagues all the way down to the Dominican summer league,” Miller said of Strom, who was Houston’s pitching coach from 2014-21. “When we get a pitcher in the organization it’s the same process, whether it’s a trade at the major-league level, or we sign an amateur player. It’s all the same message, the same stuff based in objective data. It all makes sense to us, and it seems to have made sense to a lot of the pitchers.” Valdez credits that cohesion as well as the comfort of coming up with guys like Garcia and Urquidy for such a seamless transition. When Miller and Murphy approached him before the lockout (the organization gives development notes to each of its starters) to add another pitch, preferably one he could easily command in the strike zone to left-handed hitters, he enlisted the help of Garcia and Urquidy, who helped him develop a cutter he’s been working on since this spring. Valdez is at his best when he’s throwing a lot of sinkers down and low in the zone, and adding a fourth pitch gives him another tool to keep opponents off balance. He’s pitched to a 2.93 ERA in his first seven starts. For the rest of the staff, largely a more fly-ball prone group, the new baseball may be another welcome addition. The baseball has been a hot topic in the sport over the years and this year’s group, which seems early on to not have the same carry, has seen many balls at Minute Maid Park die on the warning track instead. Any ball that’s got a chance to be caught by a Houston fielder, “just fuels your confidence” said Odorizzi. And around and around the circle goes. The big question, of course, is can Houston sustain this? But even if there’s some regression on BABIP (batting average on balls in play) and warmer weather starts to lift the home run rate, the Astros can point to two positives: their lineup is also just starting to click and McCullers could return some point next month. “It’s funny, we’re having this conversation without Lance and he’s 1A or 1B on this staff,” Odorizzi said. “(He) is going to be another huge boost. So, the fact that we have depth on top of success is something I think a lot of teams envy.”
Montero and Neris have been great additions. I’ve wanted Javier starting, but maybe he’s best when not stretched out. We already know he’s money out of the pen for up to 3 innings. If Abreau can develop into that guy as well, it gives you a whole lot to work with.
I think Javier just doesn't have the mindset required to be a full time starter yet. It's different thinking you may go 3 to 4 innings(possibly shorter based on matchups) to being asked to go at least 5-6 innings and working yourself out of jams.
He's a Starter that has pitched where the Astros asked. If he doesn't start for the Astros, he will start elsewhere very soon. He's not pitching long relief because that's his best use. It's because he's doing what the team needs. This is the second year with 7 starters that would start somewhere on almost any team. He's just being a team player.
Astros give Justin Verlander extra day of rest, stay with 6-man rotation https://www.houstonchronicle.com/te...utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=sftwitter
Very little incentive from Tucker’s side at the moment. Pena would probably be more receptive but very little incentive from the Astros standpoint at the moment. Curious to see how much higher contract values could go with new apple money and expanded playoffs money.
Im with Bobrek here. We were stoked about Biggio. At catcher or wherever. I remember comparing his early stats at second to Billy Doran’s and how quickly he filled the gap.
