The Astros have said they are leery of contracts greater than 3 years on pitching. Considering that aces sign for more than 3 years, Astros will likely have to give on the three year thing, grow their own, trade for a guy under club control, trade for one on free agent contract with other team kicking in cash to cover bad year, or do without. Appel is currently projected as being a No. 2 or No. 3 starter. No. 2 would be what Keuchel was last year except for more than one year. Basically, that is one or two notches below ace. He could fall on his face and be a bust. He could also overachieve and be an ace (top 10ish pitcher in baseball).
I feel they're still going to need to develop one... even if Appel ends up doing well (and Luhnow probably feels the same way too, hence his draft decisions last year). They thought they had that "ace" candidate last year in either Aiken or Nix (speaking of which, I wonder if Aiken goes #1 again in this draft as is rumored).
What is the expectation going forward for McHugh? Didn't have enough innings last year for the leaderboards, but for players with 140+ innings, he was #7 in ERA, #3 in WHIP, #8 in K/inning. That seems like the definition of a potential ace right there, unless we're assuming it was a fluke.
That's a fair point. I guess it depends on what makes an "ace". My arbitrary qualifications: 2 consecutive years of the following: - Top 10 in WAR - Top 10 in ERA - Top 10 in WHIP - 200+ IP I think that you can be a top of the rotation guy and just keep these stats within the top 20 for a couple of years too. I think that longevity is key for being an "ace" or TotR guy. McHugh has TotR potential and looks to project better than Keuchel, but I would like to see it for a couple of years first.
Sorry to not address your specific points, but what I can't get past when forecasting wins is this: Even with all of our shortcomings last season, including complete black holes at three of the most offensively dependent positions, we unquestionably win 5-10 more games last season with even a mediocre bullpen. I don't see how we are only supposed to be 3 or so games better when that has been substantially upgraded, as has our lineup.
It's an inexact science. I also feel thebullpen got better as the year went on, and Porter stopped being an idiot (and then stopped working alltogether). Fields-Sipp settled into their roles, and Qualls (other than when facing Oakland) was serviceable enough at closer. A lot of the overall poor numbers were skewed by the early year failures of the "committee" and the Oakland games. Also, no bullpen will be perfect so you can't presume that just because they lost 8-10 games last year because of a bad one, they won't win all of those games this year with a good one.
MLB talent doesn't affect draft decisions except in very rare circumstances. I highly doubt Appel, a minor leaguer, had anything to do with the Aiken decision.
No (and I never said he drafted Aiken because he didn't like Appel)... but lets just say Aiken didn't have the MRI issue... he's projected to be a true ace lefty with 3 very high quality pitches. If healthy (and again, nobody really knows what the real story is on that), he's a better prospect than Appel. My point was that Luhnow drafted Aiken #1 with "future ace" in mind... regardless of what Appel's projection was/is... and would probably not hesitate to use a top pick on another high ceiling pitcher if given the opportunity, as it's still the most important commodity to building a successful team.
On being a better prospect..nobody really knows. The Astros decision indicated that they believe the No. 2 prospect this year will be better than Aiken and Nix on real life conditions (i.e. Aiken is a worse prospect to Astros based on real world conditions). The Astros drafting Aiken only symbolizes one thing....he was the best available player willing to sign at the agreed on price pending physical.
Wasn't the 3 year limitation something imposed by the previous regime? I always thought that was something Drayton McLane demanded after some of the long term pitching contracts failed (was it Doug Drabek? Pete Harnisch? Can't remember). I doubt the current management cares about any of that unless they just adopted it as part of their own personal philosophy.
I'm ranking him higher based on their respected projected real life condition "stuff" when they were each drafted, that is all. Well, based on what you just said above, nobody ever knows. Just like we don't know if the Astros would be right being fine with gimpy Aiken-Nix-Marshall over the no. 2 prospect this year (as they were). Agreed... and the exact same thing could happen again, regardless of Appel. We're basically saying the same thing... the Astros need to eventually develop/acquire an ace, and while Appel "could" be that person, they're not just going to presume he will be based on his last two years of college. Appel's development will not affect their future decisions in regards to drafting pitchers or acquiring aces one way or another (and who knows if he could end up being a piece used to acquire an established ace).
Nolan Ryan feels very strongly about it... and shared that vision with the front office (which I guess he's a member of).
I think the term "ace" is overused and arbitrary. It's much like the term "elite quarterback" in football. You can compete for, and win championships without having one true elite pitcher on your staff. If you have four great pitchers, but no dominant pitcher, I think you will be fine. I agree that it's a bad idea to hand out huge FA contracts to pitchers.
Agree that you don't have to have a true "ace" to win... however disagree that both "ace" and "elite quarterbacks" are arbitrary terms (but both certainly overused). There aren't that many elite quarterbacks in football, and you don't need one to have repeated success (but you do need a "good" one). Same thing in baseball... there are a few dominant aces that are expected to win every single time out (and rarely if ever have a bad game), but I do think there's a difference between that type of front-line starter and simply a "good to great" starter.
I tend to value ace as a top 8-12 pitcher. A WAR greater than 4.5~5 is usually a good indicator of the pitchers I consider aces. I don't see an ace as an absolute necessary...though it does help a lot. On seeing the length of contracts this offseason for starting pitching, it seems that ToR pitchers contracts are not getting shorter with higher per year numbers as I was expecting. Looking more likely that the Astros are just going to try to continue to grow their own starting pitching.
I'm really looking forward to this season. We have the Astros back on TV again!! I'm always at Opening Day every season so April 6th can't be here already!! I can't wait to see if Altuve continues where he left off in 2014. Hoping Carter continues to blasts HR's but also pick up that blasted BA %. Keuchel and McHugh get better as great starting pitchers. Springer, Gattis, the bullpen, etc. I like what I'm seeing this year.
