Will someone please tell Drayton McLane that the Astros are going no where this season with the severe lack of pitching talent that we have. I for one am glad the mindset of management was to try to win it all this season by trading for Tejada, trying to get some speed in Bourn and the Matsui signing. However, at this point of the season its pretty clear that the Cubs, Cards and Brewers are jockeying for the division and the wildcard. The Astros would need a BIG miracle finish and IMO I don't see that kind of streak in this team. IMO the Astros need to rebuild, we could reload if we had a decent farm system with prospects to trade, but we all know that story. If I were the one making the decisions, here's what I'd do (with the intention to contend in 2011 or 2012): 1) Shop Jose Valverde. Closers are always a hot commodity at the trade deadline. While I like Valverde, he is one of the few pieces we can trade off and at least get a blue chipper or a couple of decent prospects. Right now with the moves that they've made trying to win it all and their suspect bullpen, I'd break my own rule of trading within the division and see what the Brewers are willing to part with for Valverde. Having looked at the Brewers' deep farm system I target 3B Mat Gamel, a left-handed power hitter (ETA: 2010) and SS Brent Brewer, super athletic player with range, still learning the game (ETA: 2011). Why the Brewers make the trade? The Brew Crew aren't just trying to get back to the playoffs after 26 years, they are trying to win it all. The bullpen has been suspect all year and they really don't have anyone to rely upon. Valverde gives them a fearless pitcher who has the stuff to shore up the closing situation. Why I make the move? Gamel is a stud. He is currently blocked by Braun and Fielder (LF and 1B, respectively). Gamel can hit to all fields and is working on his defense @ 3B. Brewer is an athlete learning the game and is already showing great range at the SS position. Brewer looks to develop more pop in his swing and could be a middle of the order hitter. 2) Shop Carlos Lee. Obviously this is easier said than done. IMO Carlos will waive his NTC to go to a contending team. The teams I'd look to trade him to are the Angels (they need more hitting) and the Red Sox (depends what happens with Ortiz). Lee has a huge contract, so the team will probably have to shoulder some of the money to get him moved. Ortiz's wrist wasn't a problem for him today in batting practice, which means he'll probably be back. So it looks like the Angels, who could use Lee at DH, which he is perfectly suited for. I'd ask for pitchers SP (RH) Sean O'Sullivan (ETA: 2010), SP (RH) Nick Green (ETA: 2009) and C Anel De Los Santos (ETA: 2010). O'Sullivan and Green project to be middle of the rotation starters and De Los Santos is an excellent defensive catcher still working on his swing; he has done well recently since jumping to AA. Why the Angels make the trade? The Angels are in need of another stick and Lee could fill that need at either LF or DH. The big problem is that they have a contract they want to unload in Gary Matthews Jr. and probably don't want another one. The Astros will have to bite the bullet and commit to paying a portion of the Lee's contract (1/2 next season, 1/4 the next and 1/4 the following). The Angels have a young catcher in Hank Conger who is ahead of De Los Santos and with such a deep rotation, O'Sullivan and Green can be let go for a power hitter like Lee. Why I make the move? Getting out from under that contract for one thing. IMO I always thought it was a mistake to pay Lee that much money, especially since I always thought of him as a DH. O' Sullivan, Green and De Los Santos give me three young players who have lots of upside and promise at positions of need. 3) Hold on to Roy O; Gauge interest right now before the trade deadline. Roy, IMO is the crown jewel of our otherwise lowly team. With the package that the Tribe got for Sabathia, theres no reason the Astros couldn't get a king's ransom for Roy. At this moment, I don't see another team that I'd trade Roy to for the prospects that I'm looking for. The Angels, Mets, Yankees, Braves, Phillies and Red Sox have all been rumored to have interest in the Wizard. However, of those teams only the Red Sox and Angels have the type of prospects that I'd be willing to acquire for Roy. Unless I got an offer that completely blew my socks off, I hold onto Roy and see how the offseason plays out. Sabathia, Sheets, Garland, etc. will all more than likely get huge contracts, which makes Roy's look like a great deal and will drive his value up (as well as a healthy season, I hope) before next year's trading deadline or teams that missed out on the big fish signings will be willing to deal during the offseason. 4) Shop Erstad, Loretta and Blum. All of these guys IMO were great pickups by Wade. Erstad has proved to be very valuable covering all three OF positions. Loretta and Blum have been average covering the infield. Contending teams can always use a stick off the bench, the Rays are a young team that could use a veteran presence and a stick off the bench. I'm not expecting to get a teams' top prospect for any of these guys, but a young AA/AAA pitcher or position player would suit me just fine. If none of them garner interest, I offer them arbitration in the offseason and pick up some supplemental picks when they sign for another team. 5) Shop Tejada. With Miguel just getting here in the 6 for 1 deal, its kind of difficult to trade him considering that we won't get back what we gave up for him. Tejada may go in the Roy O plan of waiting until the offseason or next year at the deadline to try and trade him. I'd shop Miguel around to teams in need of a stick, but unless I got an offer that blows me away, I'm putting this move on hold until next season. 6) Have a sitdown with the Puma. First off all let me say I'm a huge Berkman fan. I believe he and Oswalt are the heart and soul of the team. I'd simply ask Lance if he wanted to go somewhere else since we're obviously rebuilding. If he said that he would I definitely try to put him wherever he wanted to go and try to get a king's ransom for him. Ultimately I would think that he would stay since he has said several times that he doesn't want to go anywhere else. 7) Hire more scouts IMO the Boston Red Sox have the best farm system of any MLB team (the Brewers are a close second). One of the reasons why they are the best is because they have more scouts than any other club. The Astros made a great move in making Bobby Heck the head of scouting. Now lets give him the tools and money to make some magic happen. 8) Invest heavily in the draft Now that most of the big money players have been traded away, payroll is lower, so why not take some of that money and invest it in the draft. No more taking a player due to easy signability. Lets take players that will fit this club and have a real potential to make and contribute to the club. Go over slot (not by millions) and tell Bud Selig to mind his P's and Q's and let us run the team and sign who we want rather than abide by rules that hardly anyone plays by. 9) Reach out to the fans Alot of fans were excited that the Yankees and Red Sox were coming to town and were disappointed to find out that in the end, it was all about money. It didn't help that the Astros laid down against the Yankees and opened a big can of quit in the first game against the Red Sox (but they did win the next two, man that felt good). Most fans IMO feel like Drayton is chasing the almighty dollar and letting the on-field product suffer as a result. Minute Maid Park was designed as a retro ballpark, lets bring back some of the old school baseball feelings. Drop some of the prices. When the team is contending and the ballgame is the hottest ticket in town, its one thing to raise ticket prices, but when they are not, lets at least make it affordable. 10) Let the younger guys play Bring up Bud Norris, Brad James, Tommy Manzella, Chad Reineke, Jordan Parraz, etc. What do we have to lose? We're already in last place. Lets get some of the younger guys (albeit Manzella isn't that young), hungry guys play and get some major league time under their belts. Losing sucks. None of us like it. But if fans see that the team is trying to make some changes to better themselves in the long run, IMO fans will still go out to the ballpark and enjoy an evening of baseball. Caps, jerseys, beer hot dogs, etc. will still sell. Winning brings out more people to the ball park. IMO the current Astros aren't going to do much winning in the near future. Rebuilding isn't all that bad, and with the right people and resources the Astros could get back to contending sooner than later. If you made it this far, my hats off to you. If you disagree with me, feel free to flame away, I'm sure many of you will. Go Astros.
Even if this was going to happen (which it won't... Drayton cares too much about selling tickets to give away his best players for "potential" stars)... do you really trust this regime to evaluate the necessary talent that you'd be getting back in the trades? Its a completely inexact science with these projections (trading fo ryoung players)... just as inconcistent as the baseball draft. Additionally, only the Flordia Marlins have really succeeded at doing this over the last 10-15 years... with the Oakland A's being runner-ups (even though the latter primarily built their best teams through the draft). The Cubs and Brewers are a good mix of trades, quality home-grown players, and free agents. The Cardinals hardly have any high priced free agents, and have made a living out of converting veteran retread pitchers in to solid/capable starters.
Actually Drayton should sell the team. I think it's become apparent that he has lost touch with what it really takes to be a champion. BTW, I advocated trading Lee and Berkman last year so I totally agree with trading them now. Valverde, Lee, Berkman, and Tejada should all be on the block. None of them will ever have as much trade value as they do right now. Roy O is a keeper to me though unless he asks for a trade.
*looks at Schilling, Rolen trade* Hmmm....do we really trust this management on getting good returns?
It's no surprise that our pitching probably would suck this season without a true number 2 and even number 3 starter. The bullpen I guess was supposed to be improved, but has been disappointing as well. The offense, right now, is capable of putting up enough runs to win games (though still has holes...Bourne needs to learn to get on base with a higher efficiency and that catching spot is still suspect). I am definitely no fan of firesales because you pretty much guarantee at least a few losing seasons with no certainty of ever becoming a contender again. If the team can figure out a way to bring in some quality pitching, they could be contending for the division again. I'm willing to give them another offseason to figure that out. What could be the harm in that...worst case scenario, the team still sucks but at least we get to watch Roy and Lance in Astros unis for one more season. Best case scenario, we're in the playoffs again.
so what do you propose then? continue going down this dead end road? enough is enough... this is the 3rd straight year we've had disappointing results, all because drayton refuses to go into a bonafide rebuilding mode (and i've never been a drayton basher). we HAVE to get our once fantastic farm system out of the gutter, and it has to start somewhere.
Let Bourn play full time and for the rest of the season he should just go out there and experiment with things and work on his game. Same thing for Pence, and the young pitchers. It would be a glorified practice session. We should make a mockery of the entire MLB, if you are going down, go down big.
I propose a re-dedication to DEVELOPING players we acquire through the draft or signed from latin america, and making better judgements when either a.) signing high priced free agents (this team didn't need to be spending $17 million/year on any one player, let alone Carlos Lee), or b.) signing veteran free agents. Yes, this is the 3rd straight year we've had dissapointing results... but this is also the SEVENTH straight year that this team has failed to develop a starting pitcher who was reliable/above average. Yes, Wade Miller and Roy Oswalt in 2001 were the last home-grown players to make a sizeable impact, and stick, with this team. Wandy Rodriguez is the next best pitcher after them... that speaks for itself. Before Hunter Pence, the last drafted prospect to become an above average regular was Lance Berkman. That's also a huge talent gap. You don't need to sell off all established players to develop this sort of farm system. This team has brought up way too many of the mediocre-type position players/pitchers for this to be just one extended run of bad luck. Its the organizational decision making process that goes into the draft/signing free agents/player development that needs to be changed. Note, out of the Astros major wave of success from 97-05, only a handful of the major components were acquired via trading established players for unknown (the major one being Bagwell for Larry Anderson... and even then, he was simply a releif pitcher). Daryle Kile, Shane Reynolds, Oswalt, Wade Miller, Billy Wagner, Brad Lidge were all talents that this team couldn't dream to produce given the current farm now... and Berkman/Hidalgo weren't bad either. We even traded away some REAL projectable prospects in Freddy Garcia and Guillen. The bottom line is that you are not going to get a blue chip stud for every Berkman, Tejada, or Oswalt you trade... or you may get one that seems like one, but that's still no guarantee he pans out once he reaches the majors. Sure, there's definitely room to trade luxuries/minor fan-favorites that this team simply doesn't need right now (Valverde, Lee)... assuming you can trade them given their salaries. I guess I also have little faith in being able to get much for any of our best players right now... and little faith in the people making that decision. Its definitely a buyers market.
That is because they have Tony LaRussa, and one of, if not the best pitching coaches in Dave Duncan. Say for example, Kyle Lohse. 2008 STATS ERA W-L SO WHIP 3.61 10-2 56 1.26 And this guy didnt even have a job until 2 weeks before the start of the regular season I think? Think he could of done that if he came to Houston? Probably not. Point is I guess, we dont have the right coaches, or good enough coaches for our players to succeed. Take a look at even former Astro pitching coach Jim Hickey in TB. Now I dont want to say all the success goes to him for this, but TB went from one of the worst pitching staffs last season to one of the best this season. But then again, it may just be the players. (Pitching) Team Aggregate Stats: 2008 RK TEAM GP W L ERA Sv CG SHO IP H ER R BB SO BAA 1 Oakland 90 49 41 3.39 19 4 5 807.0 701 304 327 285 612 .235 2 Chicago Sox 90 52 37 3.41 21 4 5 805.2 752 305 346 250 637 .247 3 Tampa Bay 89 55 34 3.62 27 5 8 801.1 721 322 354 277 617 .240 4 Toronto 90 43 47 3.63 26 8 8 807.1 754 326 353 267 654 .246 5 LA Dodgers 90 44 46 3.70 17 3 6 797.1 764 328 365 290 660 .252 6 Atlanta 91 43 48 3.75 13 2 4 813.2 748 339 373 321 606 .247 7 LA Angels 90 54 36 3.75 37 5 8 803.1 770 335 360 257 570 .253 8 Boston 93 54 39 3.81 30 4 10 823.2 756 349 382 341 677 .243 9 Chicago Cubs 90 54 36 3.85 27 1 3 810.1 758 347 376 305 670 .246 10 Arizona 90 45 45 3.87 21 3 6 796.2 752 343 390 254 689 .248 RK TEAM GP W L ERA Sv CG SHO IP H ER R BB SO BAA 11 Philadelphia 91 48 43 3.90 22 2 5 812.0 801 352 382 297 592 .258 12 Milwaukee 90 50 40 4.07 31 3 3 803.0 795 363 402 323 591 .259 13 NY Mets 90 46 44 4.12 20 0 3 815.0 785 373 417 325 644 .253 14 St. Louis 91 51 40 4.12 26 2 5 819.1 848 375 399 282 520 .268 15 NY Yankees 90 48 42 4.15 25 1 8 799.0 804 368 394 283 607 .263 16 San Diego 91 36 55 4.17 16 2 4 831.2 818 385 420 291 631 .258 17 Minnesota 90 50 40 4.17 27 3 5 806.2 890 374 413 210 527 .280 18 San Francisco 90 39 51 4.28 24 0 6 805.1 787 383 415 360 700 .258 19 Seattle 90 35 55 4.34 20 3 4 796.2 825 384 419 326 590 .268 20 Cleveland 89 37 52 4.36 14 6 9 786.2 830 381 402 254 552 .272 RK TEAM GP W L ERA Sv CG SHO IP H ER R BB SO BAA 21 Detroit 89 45 44 4.39 20 1 1 790.0 803 385 420 346 473 .265 22 Baltimore 89 44 44 4.40 29 2 1 795.1 793 389 417 364 503 .262 23 Cincinnati 91 43 48 4.47 18 0 5 812.0 854 403 446 312 699 .271 24 Washington 91 34 57 4.48 17 1 5 812.0 855 404 449 330 596 .271 25 Houston 91 41 50 4.48 24 0 3 805.0 854 401 440 303 595 .271 26 Kansas City 91 40 51 4.56 24 2 5 811.0 842 411 441 282 589 .268 27 Florida 90 46 44 4.75 16 0 5 800.1 823 422 471 360 602 .265 28 Colorado 91 38 53 4.89 19 2 4 815.1 876 443 481 321 543 .277 29 Texas 91 47 44 5.00 25 3 4 816.0 905 453 522 367 504 .281 30 Pittsburgh 89 42 47 5.15 21 1 3 807.1 916 462 492 366 518 .287
Somewhere along the way to reaching our first World Series, this team lost track of what made it so successful for so long a period. In fact it probably was the very essence of being within reach of the World Series that did it...the "win now" mentality that has crept into the heart and soul of this organization. Being competitive now is just fine, but not continually at the expense of the future. So what good will firing managers/coaches/GMs or trading away players do if you don't change how you approach the game from every level in the organization.
I want a FIRESALE but I DONT TRUST ED WADE! instead of turning us into the Rays he'll turn us into the Royals for the next 10yrs.
Having a firesale is a dumb idea. Montreal did that after 1994...now look at them. The fanbase in Houston is similar. Once attendance drops below 15,000 a game, we will bot have the revenue to re-sign anybody we do bring up who ends up being good. What we will be is a glorified farm team for the rest of the league. I'll pass.
from a baseball team's view, i agree with pretty much all your points. but yeah, i don't want the fans to stop coming, don't want drayton to be pissed, and don't want the team's status in this city to go in the toilet. So I guess we'll have to mire in mediocrity for a while until we can dig our way our somehow..
