Where do you think the Astros will finish in the AL West standings? How many games do you think they'll win? If you think the Astros finish below first, who do you have taking the division?
I have like 80% confidence that Houston’s win total will fall between 86 and 99 wins. Maybe 45% confidence they win the division but think they are the favorite. 80% confident they make the playoffs. It certainly doesn’t feel like a year of destiny but I like the roster. Astros will need some good luck to win it all. If the Astros don’t make the playoffs, to me it will be a big indictment of Espada. He honestly might be the biggest question mark in the organization at this point.
I'll let the data determine my indictments, but I agree so far as to say I share your trepidation about our current skip.
What specifically do you worry about Espada? The extremely slow start last season or the fact they went out so quietly in the post-season? He seems okay to me tactically and an improvement over Dusty in that regard.
Judging managers is really hard and subjective. I agree I don’t have much issue with his history as an in-game tactician. I mostly worry about his ability to manage the culture and consistently get top performance out of players. To me he is pretty clearly a people pleaser and that can be a really bad trait in a manager.
I picked 1st place because I am a homer. Have not paid attention to what others in our division did this offseason.
I'm thinking with good health luck, this is a 93 win team and #2 seed in AL With average to 2023-24 health luck, it's a 86 win team and a wildcard.
To add to this chain, Espada did not decide to rearrange the deck chairs. I think Brown did a great job in adding value for future years, but I don't think he did much to improve this team this year unless Cam is great this year. He made moves, but he didn't create any surplus value this year. If the Astros win over 84, it will be hard to blame Espada. I don't think he has many choices to make if a player performs poorly and the Astros don't finish in 1st.
I don’t think the onus is on Espada to win the division, but my opinion is this team clearly has the talent to make the playoffs so that should be the bar for Espada, unless there’s a bunch of significant injuries that aren’t from overuse. But yeah, I suppose if they win 85 games and don’t make the playoffs it’ll be hard to judge him too harshly.
The Rangers concern me...they have a good GM and an all time great manager. When Bochy was with the Giants they were great every two years. Their lineup is strong, and if Eovaldi and DeGrom stay healthy, along with their young studs Rocker and Leiter, they will absolutely be a problem.
93 wins. Rogers is a revelation at 2B, Astros reclamation system finally hits on a position player. Altuve battles Father Time to a stalemate. Yordan is healthy with less time in LF, hits 39 bombs. Paredes scores 90 runs in the 2 hole and hits 26 homers. Walker performs to his normal standards. Cam and Dezenzo don’t set the world on fire, but flash upper end talent and hold their own, setting the table for their futures. Peña hits 19 homers and has us wondering if there is even more there. Diaz reprises last year. Framber and Brown reprise last years output. Arrighetti steps forward as SP3, but still has bouts of control issues. Blanco regresses, but wesnewski and help from AAA offset. Mccullers gives us 60 innings before his arm gives out again. Bullpen is just fine - 7th and 6th inning roles get defined, Whitley again succumbs to season ending fingernail injury.
