Question is how much? It also seems likely that 2-1 will be another pitcher Manea, Whitson, or Bickford.
Have to imagine they have worked out most of the contract details. Seems to be a fast mover, not July fast lol, but probably sometime next year. Appears to have all the tools to be that top of the rotation guy. Appel, Foltynewicz, Tropeano, McCullers, Cosart, Norris, Lyles and Wojochowski. Maybe even another arm the the second pick, thats a lot of prospective good arms for that 2016 rotation.
The Astros had a terrible OF in 2006, and a terrible offense in general. Who knows if it was the right or wrong decision? Maybe cost us the playoffs in 2006, but long-term it worked out. Maybe we could have had our cake and eaten it to. Martinez perhaps was rushed, but was brought up to show killing AA doesn't mean being big league ready. Unfortunately, that was one less roster spot the team had available that they could have kept. Definitely expect the 40-man roster to have a serious effect on who we call up in September. Flexibility has value. 40 man problems are how you end up with Lucas Harrell. 40 man problems is how you lose Johan Santana (granted, stars are almost never lost that way). After July 31st, things will become more clear. I don't think we would have called Bryant (or now Appel) this season.
At the time he was exposed to the Rule V, Santana had done zilch in the Astro's minor league system to be worthy of protecting him. IIRC, he had good K #s, but had ERAs into the high 4s, low 5s in A ball. Not sidetracking your argument, just showing that the Astros probably didn't give a 2nd thought to exposing him to the Rule V draft.
