Getting owned by pitchers with bad ERAs, a tradition like no other. They should be 2 games up and already won this series but that blown save comes back to bite us. . Dusty giving Tuve a day off like they were up 2-0 is so Dusty that I don't mind anymore. It's expected. But the energy/excitement drops when the goat isn't in the lineup.
The sample sizes are small so I am mostly relying on what I have seen in person from their starts. JP France would set up hitters well about 2/3's the time, but when he failed to, he was hit very hard. His exit velocity has to be close to or over 90 MPH and his fastball doesn’t do much when he increases velocity. I don’t think he keeps it up but I hope I am wrong. No I wasn’t worried about his WHIP at the time being around 1.5 and I still not really worried about him. He is a reliever, and ranks low on my list of concerns. His FIP is lower than 4.50 after a poor start to the season. As far as selling…. I’m not really selling anything one way or another. The depth in the rotation and line up are far bigger concerns.
Its not Click, its that Luhnow pretty much set up The Astros to be a dynasty and The League greatly nerfed The Astros with the "cheating" scandal and took away the mastermind behind it all. Luhnow's work is slowly but surely disappearing, I'd love to see what Luhnow would do with Abreu and Maldonado.... His first move would most likely be to fire Dusty.....
Astros better get this offense in gear soon in the event we start to get the pitching wobbling a bit.
Something to consider - Julks and Jose Abreu have almost an identical on base percentage the last I checked. I appreciate his effort but he isn’t a very good fielder and he doesn’t get on base. We need better than what he has given us.
Offense has improved a lot since Altuve came back. But in terms of Click, it's not like the offense has changed much from last year. 7 players are the same: Altuve, Bregman, Yordan, Pena, Tucker, Maldy, Chaz They replaced a very bad 1B with a very very bad 1B so far. They added Meyers to effectively replace the random mix of OFs from last year (Diaz, Dubon, etc) Players simply aren't performing as well as expected - in particular, Bregman and Tucker, which are 2 of the core 4 big bats from last year. Nothing Click would have done would have changed that. Maldy and Dubon have been better than last year. Meyers is an upgrade. Everyone else is about what's expected (Altuve, Yordan, Pena, Chas) outside of Altuve missing a chunk of the year.
Bregman and Tucker are not the same. Clutch hitting is not there. Maldy can't cut down guys anymore. They're stealing base left and right on him. But in terms of offense, yes, he's the same. But if he's a liability on defense and going 0-fer on offense, what's the point of having him in the lineup?
He makes guys pitch better. Did you see the way Hunter Brown dominated that awesome Oakland offense. He never could have done that if Diaz caught him. I've largely given up on complaining about him starting 80% of the time over the last few weeks. Theres never been a single shred of evidence that pitchers actually perform better with him behind the plate versus his backups, but that doesn't seem to matter. He's the starter, just learn to accept it.
Click inherited one of the best offenses in baseball and last season, it was pretty mediocre. Letting your stars go will do that. Click made all the wrong moves or no moves at all from an offensive standpoint . His best moves were for relief pitchers.
It's an act you imbecile. I'm the furthest from being religious. I don't give a **** what you think about me but need to set the record straight with idiots like you evidently. Get over yourself. You feel the need to be this internet tough guy who tries to always be right especially on this forum I've noticed. Haven't you learned anything in the 16 years you've been on this message board? Let me guess, you believe Trader Jorge is sincere in his posts too? And if I want to swear at a player for doing bad, I'll do so. It's how I do it as a fan of the team. If you are so offended, stop quoting me and go on with your miserable life.
