Pitching is just too unpredictable to bank on. You could have said that several years ago with McCullers, Garcia, Javier, and Urquidy, and we can see how that ended up. I agree with the overarching point that Houston has excellent pitching depth that should afford them some leeway to trade for position players or spend money on free agent position players, but the kind of guys Houston looks like they will need are the kind that cost $200M+ in free agency and require a top notch farm to add via trade. Houston will be able to add some good complementary players via trade and free agency (Brendan Donovan, Michael Brantley types), but that may not be enough if guys like Walker, Altuve, Yordan, and Diaz are not producing like stars; regardless of how good the pitching is (as we are currently seeing).
This. If Altuve, Walker, and Yordan continue to be below 120 OPS+/wRC+ guys then this team has no chance. That said, even if they do, this team doesn't have the depth of run production to have Rodgers (88 OPS+) and Dubon (52 OPS+) at 2b, and the ticking time bomb of strikeouts and weak contact that is Jake Meyers in CF. Yordan needs to be 140+ Altuve needsvto be 125+ Diaz needs to be 125+ Christian Walker needs to be 110+ Isaac Paredes needs to be 110+ Pena needs to be 100+ Cam Smith needs to be 100+ In 2019, Josh Reddick had a bad bat. The team was able to win with him because everyone else was great. In 2017, Carlos Beltran was bad. The team won with him because everyone else was good. This team does not have secondary hitters that are good enough to carry one, much less two glove only players. They need a 2b who can hit immediately and a CF who can hit as soon as Jake returns to Earth.
The Astros managed in 2022 with Maldy and Gurriel being awful all season. All it takes is being decent enough to make the playoffs and then people getting hot at the right time. The Astros aren't going to the overwhelming dominant best-team-in-baseball type they have been in recent years but they can still win a WS the same way the Rangers and other teams did.
This is true. But you have to get there first, and right now, the Astros are not devent enough. They are on the outside looking in. And look how last year went. I would add that it is pretty important to get a top 2 seed, which requires being better in the regular season.
Walker and Altuve might be average or worse going forward. I cannot fathom Yordan not being a star when he's playing. Diaz has been a 3 and 3.5 WAR guy as a rookie, and I'm not going to let a bad first 25 games (he's been fine the last 7 or 8 games) change what I think about him. Smith I think is somewhere between good and all star. If those 3 guys are bedrock guys that combine for say, 13 or 15 WAR between them then a Donovan and Brantley type makes for 5 good players. I think we are good. Also- there's no reason why we couldn't sign a 200 or 300M plus FA guy at the end of this season. Money allocated in 26: SP- Brown, LMJ, Wesneski, Blanco, Arrighetti, Garcia, Javier, Blubaugh etc: 55M Bullpen- Hader, Abreu, SP not starting, filler, 30M C- DIaz, Salazar- 2M 1B- Waker- 20M 2B- ??????? SS- Pena- 5M 3b- Paredes- 10M DH- Yordan- 20M LF- Altuve- 27M CF- ???????- RF- Smith- 1M Bench- 5M That's 175M or so- that would leave you 45M to get to 220M- then the Fringe stuff takes you to the Apron. So- you could fill 1 of 2b or CF with a 35 or 40M a year guy and go with farm team beyond that or you could do 2 guys at 20M. If LMJ and Javier end the year healthy you could also trade both of those guys and get another 40M to spend on offense. That could make the starting rotation: Brown, Arrigehtti, Garcia, Wesneski, Blanco, Blubaugh, Ullola, a couple other guys I think would be at a minimum serviceable back of the rotation guys. That rotation would cost you 15M is all and you'd have an absurd amount of money to spend in FA. If you can't even spend that money in FA then you could do stuff like pay all of the contracts of LMJ and Javier and get back real and legit prospects if you don't want to go the FA route. I don't have my heart set on any 5 guys (like you said- injuries happen) but I just think we have the development chops and guys in the pipeline to be able to keep pitching good and cheap and be able to add in star level guys. This is the last year of dead money (hopefully) as I think Altuve and Walker are at least playable.
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/suddenly-the-mariners-are-mashing/ Article about the Mariners offense, relevant to the Astros not just as a division rival but because it looks pretty clear that replacing their manager and hitting coach is at the heart of the dramatic improvement.
The Astros did not "undersell" Tucker. The Astros got a very strong return for Tucker. You post this like every other week.
It’s really insane, honestly, that someone can see how good Paredes has been, how good Can Smith looks, that Wesneski has credible ability to start at the big league level, you have 14 years of combined service time amongst them and still **** on that trade. It’s beyond delusional.
Cal Raleigh is a star - he isn't a household name but he is that good. They also have a lot of younger players getting closer to their theoretical primes. I like the Mariners chances to make the playoffs regardless of what the Astros do - but I believe that the Astros have to be aggressive - a few weeks ago I said they have the pitching to win a World Series title, but their offense is simply not good enough or deep enough.
I mean, it probably isn't their fault that good major league hitters are hitting like crap, but I also believe Espada doesn't bring a single positive thing that he's really good at to the organization so I can't conceive of getting worse by doing that. Guys might benefit from having a different voice in their ear as hitting coach. It's not that big a deal I don't think.
yeah but procrastination is the assassination of masturbation or something like that. I can’t remember the exact words anymore.
I think they will need to get way worse and stay bad for a long time on order for a change to happen. I don't have any opinion on the hitting coaches. I just think replacing them is a waste of money. You are already paying them and the new ones won't really make much impact. Why pay more coaches. This isn't the NFL and hitting coaches don't change plays or philosophies. They are cheerleaders who watch video and tell players what they see. Not to mention every player has his own personal coach anyway. Now changing managers would change lineups, pitching decisions, and even plays like steals, takes/swings, hit n runs, bunts. Possibly even positioning. Huge impact.
I find it highly unlikely that many players are spending money on personal coaches. Maybe a few very highly paid players are. Perhaps a few more hire one for a part of the off season. They are much more likely to listen to advise from their friends who are pro hitters and more knowledgeable than anyone they could hire.
I refuse to believe the hitting coaches are simply cheerleaders and evidently several major league teams disagree with you
They still won 106 games that year. They didn’t just scrap their way and “get hot”. But other teams have done it and this version of the Astros does have pitching that can translate to the post season… I just fear they won’t have enough offense to score the runs to get the wins needed. (Let alone getting 106 wins).
That Astros team was great. I'd say Yuli was hot in the postseason, and Chas was actually played over the 0.208 BA and under club. I think the 106 wins undersells how solid a team that was.
On a side note: It sure is odd how every good team in the AL besides the Astros had their pitching staffs fall apart when MLB started looking for cheaters. Not saying the Astros didn't use sticky stuff, but the Astros pitchers appear to have been a lot less dependent on it.
