Longer because of perhaps, well...the players on the Mitchell report might give us hints for why Very true though in baseball. Alex Rodriguez is 32 and was just a monster last year, and all the other key Yankee players are that age and older. He's 31 cuz they tell us that. Good chance he's probably more Dikembe Tejada. But there's plenty older hitters in the leage still swinging the sticks. - Chances are slimmer of sending Pence to run when Berkman or Lee are at the plate. - Top 2 spots will be occupied by speed demons already. Pence's speed won't add much more than what Kaz or Bourn lends. - Like a poster mentioned, Pence's speed helps MORE the 7 and 8 hitters on the team. If he steals a base or gets an extra base hit, makes it easier for the weaker hitters to knock him in. If the lineup is top-loaded with all the speed, Wiggington and Towles have nothing but slugs on the bases to knock in. Lineup depth, starting to like this trade Also, Tejada freakin drove in 151 runs one year , on a crappy team. He's not at that level now but he's a known run producer. Pence figures to be one but you can count on Tejada's stick more (that is if Tejada figured to be the 6th guy instead)
A few thoughts: Keith Law is crazy if he thinks this team in a division won by a team with 85 wins that has shaky pitching in the cubs as well will not contend. My hope is they sign an inning eater to a short deal(see livan or jennings type), bring back ducky(dotel) on a 1 yr deal, and pluck a lefty reliever from the market. If they do those things, this team can win the division and contend for the pennant. Look around, the rockies got to the WS with aaron cook, jeff francis, ubaldo jimenez(electric arm but erratic) and josh fogg. The phillies had hamels and nothing, the mets rotation was blah and after the zambrano the cubs rotation is nothing special. The only one of those to improve so far is philly by moving myers back to the rotation. Pitching is not deep in baseball right now with quality, and it shows. The team with the strongest pitching in the NL, SD, missed the playoffs do to an astros like offense.
What about the Brewers? I was surprised at how good their offense was last year but for some reason their pitching was inconsistent. Their better pitchers had down years but if they have good years this year they should contend for the central as well. I think our pitching can be adequate enough and if our offense is consistent it should be a close division race like you said. The Brewers are the only ones that somewhat scare me though.
The brewers have to prove to me they can stay above average for more than half a yr before they scare me. On paper they have nice pitching depth and overall talent, but unless sheets stays healthy it's nothing special.
Miguel Tejada hit .300 with 18 homers and 80 RBI in a bad year on a bad team. He's a year removed from a .330 / 24 / 100 season, and all of a sudden he's washed up? He goes 5 consecutive seasons without missing a single game and he's injury-prone? If the Mitchell report fingers him that's one thing, but otherwise I don't see the downside to this trade. We gave up questionable minor league prospects (Patton has a low-90s fastball and mediocre strikeout numbers, which translates to potential as a #3 pitcher but very doubtful he's going to be a star) and got a potent bat in return. Salary wise, we're still in the low 80s, so the budget was hardly stretched. The starting rotation is a joke outside of Oswalt, but that would have been true even if we didn't unload Albers and Patton. The club makes enough money that they can afford to pursue Livan Hernandez - that would be my priority. He's definitely not an ace, but he can rack up the innings like nobody's business.
This is the thing no one seems to understand. We couldn't get any quality starting pitching for the package we gave up for Tejada. A 4th outfielder with no spot on the team except in reserve, a reliever that we picked up in September that the Brewers didn't want, Matt "One step forward, 8 steps back " Albers, and the only true prospect in the trade Patton - who isn't even a blue chipper. I will miss Adam and he turned the best double play I have ever seen against the Cards in the playoffs, but Tejada's upgrade on offense > Adam's defense. Also I never have to hear a Seinfeld reference every time someone talks about Costanzo. That's 5 marginal players that really didn't have a future with the Astros (I don't care where they were ranked in our system, our system needs a complete overhaul anyway. It's about time we sign draft picks and get some under 30 prospects again) and a non-blue chip pitching prospect. We were not going to get a front line rotation starter this year, so Tejada's short contract gives us payroll flexibilty for the future. I know people think we gave up all of our trade chips, and we did. All those guys + Pence wouldn't get us a starter. We have to sign draft picks, wait for the minors to revive and sign free agent pitchers when they are available to hold us off until we grow our own front line starter. Good offseason for Wade, imo he did what he could - fans are WAY overvaluing what the Orioles recieved - and we just got a shortstop that doesn't hit 8th but 3rd! (with min. risk cause of short contract) Just getting rid of Lane and Ensberg was a big step forward!
Great point! I won't miss the references at all! (Your other points were spot-on, too. Nothing changed as far as our rotation yesterday other than losing one of the many candidates for the 5th starter role (Patton).)
Tejada is rumored to be on the Mitchell list. If this is truly the case, then I think Astros management should just go ahead and resign now. What an absolute lapse in judgment to trade for a "roider" a day before he is outed.
What is being ignored is that this is a Mitchell Report, not a Mitchell List. What's going to be really interesting is to see in what context each name is mentioned. Is Tejada mentioned as someone who bought 3000 doses of steroids, or as someone that talked to someone about 'roids, etc. This is going to be really interesting to see all the details. If he was truly mentioned as a guy who was definitely on roids, then it's very confusing why you'd trade for him - all his numbers are suspect at that point, and the decline last year may be very real.
I for one don't give a damn either way if he was on the list or not.. I want him to produce and thats all. I don't care about his attitude,hobbies,what religion he has..etc.. All I care is that in 08 he better produce. It's not just Tejada who is a big name on the list. But there is a lot of big names.. Do you think St. Louis is going to try and trade Albert Pujols now that he is on the list? If any of these players took steroids ( which I think they did ) Then obviously they are going to stop taking them and thats what matters.. Move forward now that the cats out of the bag do something about it.
Have you ever considered that, if his numbers were steroids inflated, then they might just continue to decline as they did last year? If all you want is for him to produce, then you should definitely care whether he was named or not.
I guess I can't believe that his numbers are going to drop to 10HR 50RBI seasons.. He was in a sorry lineup in Baltimore and on top of that he was injured. He's coming to Houston with an impressive lineup and a new start. I believe he still has the skills to hit 20-30HR : 90-120 RBI's even after this steroid fiasco.
So, are the Stros going to be greeted by fans with inflatable syringes and "Tejada = cheater" signs when we go on the road? That's going to be fun.
I don't think so. Didn't people know Tejada was tied to steroids before?? This isn't a positive drug test.
Well, Barry didn't test for a positive drug test either. I think being in the Mitchell report is different from previous rumors, but maybe it won't turn out to be. But, now that I think about it, so many teams are going to have a player or two in the report that fans would be going bonkers for every visiting team ...
That's just inexcusable, IMO, especially given the timing. Talk about a PR disaster. "Hey, let's replace our non-roided SS with one who is! Oh, and let's trade 5 non-roided players (assumption) for him, too!" If you don't see the difference between merely having a roided player on your team (and one that you drafted) versus actively pursuing one a day before the s*** hits the fan, then I have nothing to say to you. But, like others said, let's wait for the real list to surface.
