I just hope next year we start building from the farm system. It's obviously time to cut our losses and re-build temporarily. Look at the Rangers!
He only led off one inning but we really should have scored in the 1st. He was on 2nd with no outs and 3rd with 1 out.
Berkman has had a forgettable night at the plate. He's had his opportunities, too. Make that Berkman and Lee. 0-for-8, combined, with zero walks.
Lance Berkman Avg HR RBI Runs .276 18 65 59 I know he missed a few games but those are pretty bad numbers for Puma. OPS is not bad but very much his worst year in a while just looking at the numbers.
All you need to know about how irrelevant batting average is is to consider the Astros are one of the top teams in the league at it. All in all, it's pretty standard for Lance -- since 2002, he's basically alternated between very good one year and great the next. His OPS: .983, .927, 1.016, .935, 1.041, .896, .987, .912 (this year). Hopefully that trend continues -- if it does, he's due to be great (1.000 OPS ish) next year! Needless to say, we'll need it...
Avg wise I think he is ok but the power numbers are down big time...18hrs and 65 RBIs??? Only 27 doubles down from 46 last year??? Almost all his numbers are way down except for OPS which is still good but just come to expect more from Puma.
It's not meaningless but insufficient to judge an offense. We're a good singles hitting team. We just don't hit for nearly enough power or walk nearly enough relative to the rest of the league. Another surprising stat I noticed a few weeks ago was that while a lot of people claimed that we were an unclutch hitting team, we were actually in the top half of the league in terms of AVG w/ RISP. We were even ahead of the Phillies, who were/are leading the league in runs scored. The difference of course was that the Phillies slug the crap out of the ball and walk a lot. Another contributor to our low run production is our poor baserunning but I don't think it's as big a factor as the lack of power and walks.
Still in search of that elusive road series win.... that hasn't happened since the Padres series to close out June. 3 months ago.
Eh, the power numbers are largely a reflection of how few at-bats he's had because of injuries and whatnot. He's had 362 at-bats, relative to 554 last year -- 65%. His doubles are at 59% (27-46) of last year, homers at 62% (18-29). He's down a little, absolutely, but "way down" is overstating it -- it looks worse than it is because of all the time he's been out. Plus, it seems like he's due for a hot streak to end the season -- he's only finished below .288 once in his career. As for Tejada, all depends on the price. Honestly, unless it's $4m or less, I don't like it, assuming they would be moving him to third. He just doesn't have the power/OBP to be an above average 3B, and averages are notoriously fickle, especially with free swingers. With that said, the Astros don't have a lot of in-house options (unless they experimented with Towles at 3B, which someone had rumored). So if he'd come back for a league average salary, I'd take him, especially given that he's a clutch hitter and evidently a good leader. But I have a feeling he'll get more based on his "name" and I'd prefer that sucker team not to be us.
That is arguably the worst idea I have heard in a long time. While we are at it, let's sit Bourn and have Quintero play CF. Yikes.
Yea I guess I should wait for his end of year numbers as there is still sometime to push those numbers up and like I said just come to expect bigger numbers from Puma so kinda spoiled.
Towles' bat is just so good, you can't keep it out of the lineup. You have to find a way to get that guy to the plate as often as possible. I'd suggest we bat him leadoff, especially since Bourn will be sitting for Q.
Why? He's fairly athletic and has a good arm. That said, it was me that posted that here a while back and it turns out I was wrong. The real rumor was that they were thinking of experimenting with him at 2B, not 3B. FYI...Chris Johnson has had a nice 2nd half. They changed his stance a bit which has allowed him to see the ball a bit better. All of his numbers have gone up. Hopefully, he'll build on it this fall and be ready to go in the spring.
I don't really know how the Brewers are viewing JJ Hardy after this season but I wouldn't mind looking into trying to pick him up. They have there future shortstop already up with them now so Hardy should be expendable. I know he had a rough year but that should limit his worth and, being fairly young, still inexpensive. He could bridge the gap to Mier and again don't think we would have to give up to much to get him. Just a thought.
