That has been said a lot about Diaz. Something has to give soon. He has been back sliding at game preparation. He swings at everything and half the time seems distracted.
Sounds like Altuve and Walker too....but sometimes they all hit big flies to make us forget. Really missing Corea's stick and play. DD
We're talking about this year or just in general? Because rarely does hader get put in with runners on. It's usually Okert, king or other relievers get put in with runners. I can't recall hader was asked for more than 3 outs save this season.
Exactly. So I'm sure the Astros would prefer Hader to come into a clean inning in the 9th instead of being held back for extras with a dude on base.
He seems like the type of guy who could benefit from Adderall. I imagine him in the batters box getting distracted by a bird flying across the centerfield bleachers
Hell of a weekend, I thought we would lose yesterday and they came back strong........maybe I was wrong and this team does have some fight in it, hell yea I will eat some crow, 1.5 games back, let's go baby...........................PROVE ME WRONG
Ever since the minimum batter rule went into effect, you don't see as many relievers pigeoned solely to get out of on-base jams... or the previous lefty-only specialist or the previous ground-ball inducing double play specialist (if there ever was one). Granted, yes some are more used to mop up duties than others... and presuming you haven't used them already, I suppose having one of those guys stashed for extra inning work would have its merits. I just think the extra inning ghost-runner innings are crapshoots as is... if the road team doesn't score more than 1 run in their first crack, they're probably going to lose. In the end, all the players (including the closers and the other high leverage pitchers) prefer the extra inning ghost runners... so even they know at that point its just "get it done with already", regardless of it still being very gimmicky.
25-16 is nice but Astros started 3-3 (ARL-MIN series) during that stretch. 22-13 has a better ring to it and percentage. Astros could possibly use another starter and OF stick but I'd rather Espada stop batting Meyers 8th first then see what we have offensively. If Blanco can enter and post a 4.00 ERA, guys like Arrighetti and Teng can be rested more with skipped starts or reduced pitches.
9th..... 150 OPS increase. Jake has 2 seasons of stats telling the world he should not bat 8th. Whether pitchers relax more with the 9 hole or Jake likes Pena protection, the numbers are there.
He thinks if Meyers hits 9th full time he will magically become a better hitter because he's using the randomness and small sample sizes of his stats based on where he hits in the order the last season and a half.
I'm proud of our guys for hanging in the race. They could have folded a while back due to all the injuries but didn't. They are showing heart in my book. This will go down as a great season if we win this race. It's exciting again. The work ethic built from the dynasty remains imo. Anything can happen.
Wait, you really believe this? And based on sample sizes of like 50-80 at bats? Do you do the same with monthly samples? When Yordan is 300+ OPS points better in April than May, should we just stop playing him in May next year, since that's obviously the reason? And why wouldn't you bat him 7th, where he's been waaaay better than 9th this year in a larger sample size? And what happens when Brice Matthews ALSO has been better in 9th spot than 8 (by 200+ OPS pts) in the same small sample sizes? Should they both bat 9th?
I told him we should bat him 2nd because last year he had over a .900 OPS in that spot. Don’t even need to add another OF bat, we’ve got another Yordan if we just bat him 2nd.
P-hacking has proven he’s elite… when batting second, on the road, against lefties, after a team off-day, in stadiums with retractable roofs, during games started between 6:40 and 7:10 p.m.
