Correa's goals: stay at SS, make AA squad

I'm all for quick moving, but you don't go from A ball to the show. While he may make it eventually, you don't wanna waste valuable team controlled years on a project.

End of this year is the absolute fastest he should be in Houston.

 

I'll let you try and come up with a list of players who were actually RUINED by aggressive promotion. My stance is those players likely weren't that good to begin with.

We've been through the list of some all time greats that succeeded despite making their debuts as teenagers. Not saying they should do that with Correa, but the truly great ones usually don't get ruined.

 

There are more players who made their debuts as teenagers in MLB (with many of them going on to be HOFers) than those in the NBA and NFL combined.

 

There have been a lot more MLB players than NBA players thanks to the longevity of the leagues and roster sizes. Due to the draft rules in the NFL, there aren't a lot of teenagers that would have been eligible to make their debut at that age anyway.

 

All true.

Just refuting the point that "MLB is not like the NFL and NBA where young guys can contribute earlier."

If you go simply by age, odds are they can contribute earlier in baseball.

 

You cant even enter the NFL as a teenager as you need to be 3 years removed from High School. And in the NBA, you now need 1 year of college plus there are far fewer players as a whole (so less teenagers will naturally play)

Baseball is the only sport left that drafts straight out of high school and it happens in huge numbers.

 

Of course if you just go by age, but that's not his point.

 

David Clyde

 

This franchise has no time to wait. Griffey, Arod, Mike Trout, Bryce harper they all got up pretty fast. Obviously he isn't anywhere near those guys as a prospect, but the astros need to find out what they have. Can't take any more 100 loss seasons with no guys coming up.

 

Pitchers with young/nonmature arms are entirely excluded.

That being said, Doc Gooden sure dominated off the bat... But had a shortened career.

There's nothing to say that he would have been just as spectacular, or had a longer career, had he not come up as a 19 year old.

Pitchers arms are either ready or they're not.

 

It's a counterfactual that's impossible to prove. Corey Patterson was considered an uber-elite prospect, and made the initial jump to the majors from AA. He struggled. He still managed to have a 12 year career, but was never great. Was it because he was rushed, or just not that good to begin with? It's impossible to know.

You've pointed to Griffey/A-Rod/Trout/Harper. Griffey's a no doubt Hall of Famer, and A-Rod would be in the conversation of GOAT if not for the steroids. Trout and Harper are freaks.

Could Correa join them? Maybe. Trout got an extended look during his age 19 season after he was putting up a .950+ OPS in AA. And he struggled, and went back down the next year before he forced his way back up. Trout also put up a .900 OPS from the word go in the minors, while Correa had an adjustment period.

I'd be all for Correa jumping straight to AA if he shows well in spring training, or having an abbreviated time in Lancaster (like Folty last year). But if your expectations are that he compares side by side with any number of sure-fire HOF guys, it's not really fair to him.

 

I'm not saying that correa is on par with those guys. Just saying that it's ok to rush the truly special ones. Don't consider corey Patterson ruined by rushing, nor do I think he automatically becomes great with maturing. Maybe he didn't have the right type of mindset to learn from failure and improve because of it. And most of these guys struggle when they first get promoted... that's pretty universal regardless of whether or not they're rushed.

 

That kind of proves the point.

Every time an 18-19 year old is called up and fails, the argument will be that it was something other than being called up too soon. It makes it a fruitless argument all the way around. The fact is that we do not really know.

 

Probably why I wasn't really referring to aggressive promotion of pitchers, vs. everyday players.

There have been studies done that basically illustrate that a pitcher's arm likely only has a finite amount of pitches he can throw with high effectiveness prior to either injury or fatigue/wear setting in... regardless of which level the pitchers starts out at. (IOW, it really doesn't matter... when a pitcher is "ready", and able to harness his stuff/mechanics regardless of the competition, you promote him).

 

Are we really arguing if Correa should be called up soon? Did we just skip the whole Springer outrage and move on to Correa already, haha!

For the record, I agree with the guess that we will see him at some point in the 2015 season, at the earliest.

I also understand the financial implications and benefits of keeping Springer down until a month or two into the season.

 

The same argument can be made about position players. Prospects that are called up fail, including some that are called up very early and are very heralded. We cannot always pinpoint WHY they failed.

As far as the "finite # of pitches argument", I am well aware of it. Roger Clemens believed in it when I worked for the Astros. I also have heard Kerry Wood say one day it is just gone..... of course he blames his high pitch counts and not his injuries and that he actually pitched through pain he shouldn't have as a young player.

 

He was suggesting calling him up right now, straight from Low-A, which is a bad idea. Nobody's against fast promotion.

 

Hank Aaron and Robin Yount say hi