You make some unarguable points. My frustration at the moment is that in an off season when there were 'bargains' out there the 'stros saw fit to add Kent -- good, but nothing else -- bad. They are ok at many positions but hardly contender status except for a few. The minors seem to have dried up and position players from the minors have been rare adds -- Gintner and Ensberg, for example, fell very flat. Oswalt and Miller have excelled. Maybe Doggie will become worth his weight in millions. That would help. Maybe Bigg will be reinvigorated in CF. That would be great. Spring is when hope is rampant, and I am not sprung. I hope you can rag me through a long October run.
I heard Drayton make an interesting point on the radio this morning: over the last 10 years (which coincided with his ownership of the team), the Astros have the 2nd highest winning percentage in the NL and the 4th highest in MLB.
i heard that same thing...i proceeded to butcher that stat in a previous post on this thread. thanks for clearing it up!
i understand that...the question posed was what effort was put out into winning, though. the regular season means a ton more in baseball than it does in basketball and hockey, as playoff spots are at a premium. the emphasis in baseball is on the regular season. the astros are clearly working toward being a better organization...and they've demonstrated that with success in the regular season. who would have guessed that regular season monsters would be such duds in the playoffs? i can't lay that blame on drayton's doorstep.
I don't disagree with that, I think the Astros actually have an exemplary front office when it comes to getting bang for the buck. The only move I really had a problem with since Drayton has been here was letting Carl Everett go for money reasons, and then a couple of days later letting Hampton go. I think if the Astros would have waited, they would have ended up keeping Everett, I know this guy has had his problems since he left, but losing him has left a big void in the outfield that still is an ongoing problem. All other moves even the mistakes I don't have a problem with. There lack of playoff success definitly falls on the players, especially when they picked up Randy Johnson.
Whaaa? You can argue that the 'Stros should have gotten more for Everett, but to how can you argue that they should have kept him, or that his loss created some sort of "void", given 1) his current salary; 2) his performance since leaving (1 great year, 2 terrible years); 3) the player(s) that comprised the OF after he left? 1) Dude makes $8M per 2) He has absolutely sucked on the field the last 2 years 3) The Astros OF in 2000, the year after he left, consisted of Moises Alou, Richard Hidalgo, Lance Berkman/Roger Cedeno. Someone had to go, and Everett made the most sense to trade. I'm not even mentioning his injury/emotional problems. The guy is a nutcase, plain & simple. Trading Hampton sucked, but given what we got in return & the deal he accepted from Colorado, it was the right move.
hindsight shows they were right on that one, pgabriel. plus, as pointed out, he was going to be the most expensive of the players in their outfield with Alou, Berkman and Hidalgo ready to play.
He had a problem in NY with the Media, traded here and under less scrunity of a more laid back press, he flourished, traded back to Boston, again has a problem with media, career starts to tank again. My point, he was in a much better environment for him, in Houston. Its not as simple as he just started to diminish out of the blue.
I doubt seriously that Houston was somehow, magically, the one place where he could exist without problems. We just got lucky that he stayed relatively sane while he was here. But in all likelihood, he would have gone crazy eventually, just like he has everywhere else.
It magically is. What is the reason the? Like I said, its not like he was rising before he got to Houston.
That can be argued. He had a higher BA his last year in Houston, same number of RBI, slightly higher OPS. He had more HR in Boston but played more games.
You're right, but that's not even germane to our original discussion. You said it was a mistake to trade him, I gave you 3 reasons why it wasn't. Care to respond to those?
Like I said, I can only argue that IMO, he would have continued to succeed in Houston, our biggest defensive problem is defense up the middle, which a healthy Everett would help solve, and if he continued to put up numbers like he did before he left, $8MM would not be that much. But like I said, that's on the assumption he would have continued to succeed here.
