I think it's more that most teams highly rated prospects are at AA as opposed to AAA, where a lot of teams have a mix of top prospects and veterans who could fill specific needs at the big league level as they occur. I think in 2015 we could get a guy here if we needed him, and if not then Fresno was a terrible choice as a AAA site. And yea on the other post (which i have no idea why it was so controversial), I was responding to a post about Carlos Rodon, not Bryant And no, I don't have access to any mlb organizations "board" so can't tell you where anyone had him on theirs And as i've stated many times before, I hope that Appel ends up being better than Bryant, and I hope that whoever we pick #2 overall ends up being better than Rodon. Those are the guys we have now and i'm as big of an Astros fan as you will find anywhere. It's still funny to me that for a few, if you criticize anything that Luhnow does you get attacked though. I mean I hope the guy ends up being the best GM in the history of baseball and we win 10 or so world series, but the guy isn't perfect
The issue isn't free-passing Luhnow (or the Astros, or any other Houston-area sports team, for that matter) - the issue is a growing disdain for this lazy impatience and lack of critical thinking that permeates too much of the sports talk landscape these days. If, five years from today, Bryant is Mike Schmidt and Appel is Jason Hirsch, I think the decision is fair game and Luhnow *should* be criticized (with at least an ounce of understanding that this isn't easy). But right now?... What is this negative doomsday’ing based on, other than wildly inconclusive (or too small to really matter) evidence and ESPN cheerleading? *That’s* why many of us are quick to shoot this garbage down. It is so needlessly empty and meaningless at this point. Let the players decide this – on the field – with ample sample sizes, and *then* we can have a fair discussion.
Thanks; and one more point, if I may - the other frustrating part of this... if Bryant becomes Cameron Drew and Appel Clayton Kershaw, too few of the "Why didn't we pick Bryant!!!!" screamers will go conspicuously quiet, or forget that they griped about it at all. Declaring a winner one minute into a 26-mile marathon is plain silly.
Interesting, and somewhat depressing/unrelated thought... Kershaw is only 4 years older than Appel, but has already pitched in the big leagues for 7 years.
I may be a bit slow, may be a bit inebriated, several times I've read through the permutations of what you wrote, and I'd really like to know just what in the blue f**k you're talking about.
It took Bryant all of 1 game to adjust to major league pitching. Since that first game, he's played 3 games resulting in: 10 AB 6 Hits 2 Doubles 4 RBI 4 Walks 1 Strike Out The guy is a stud. Im hoping Appel can become a solid #2.
It's not that difficult if you read I responded to a post that said the only reason Appel is at AA is because Corpus is close and there are no direct flights from Fresno to Houston. So Appel, in that guys theory, had to be at AA and not AAA so he could get to Houston quickly if we needed him I just think that we could figure out a way to get him here, or wherever we were playing at the time, if we needed him Maybe I'm totally wrong and it's impossible to do, but in my opinion I don't think we are assigning players to levels based on that
This thread needs to be set aside for at least this season. There's nothing to be gained from overanalyzing small samples.
Yeah, lol, that was my first problem. Not my only problem, but just the first one. Good post, and I agree.
Not talking at you specifically, but this is one of my pet peeves. Other than prospect listerbation, the pigeon-holing of guys and placing their theoretical ceiling as "he's a #X starter" infuriates me. 2 years ago, McHugh was a #what? starter for the Mets, Keuchel was a #9ish for the Stros.
Meh... The Cubs had Appel #1 on their board. You win some and you lose some. The MLB draft is not like the NFL or NBA draft, there is a lot more variables.
So what does that matter? Rarely do you see someone come out of the gates kicking ass. Hoping that a pitcher becomes a top of the rotation guy shouldn't be a pet peeve, lol. Most likely, Appel will take his hits when he gets to the big leagues...but he needs to keep developing to justify the position he was drafted. That's all it is.
I agree with this wholeheartedly. The #1,#2,#3 nonsense is grossly overblown. He has a chance to be a great MLB starter, that's all you can ask for.
Why is that depressing from an Astro/Appel perspective? I'm not even sure it's interesting, frankly, other than offering further proof CK is on a HoF pace right now - not that any of us likely needed additional confirmation of that. CK totaled 230 minor league innings; Appel is currently at 130 and likely doesn't get to 230 if he continues to pitch as well as he has of late.
And just to be clear, the Astros haven't "lost" anything. Appel is projecting to be a TOR pitcher with + stuff. That's nothing to casually dismiss.
