Does Bagwell even have any administrative power after Dana Brown was hired?? I'd be very surprised to hear that Baggy still has say on roster decisions, and I'd be even more surprised to hear that Dana Brown would have been ok with that when he was hired.
But the Brantley signing didn't hurt us. It didn't prevent us from getting anyone we wanted and it's gone by the end the season. Who knows, Brantley may eventually save us provide we reach the past season. The Montero signing was a little bad, because we won't be be able to able on another reliever this off season. I'm still optimistic about Abreu. I still don't think he is done. He's just a little beat up.
Brantley's deal is a big reduction from last contract + PA incentives, so it's exactly what you called for. He is just at a higher price point than you would pay, but that's what he cost. Montero was a FA and part of the best bullpen in MLB playoff history (arguably) and that's what it cost to prevent him leaving. It was not far off from other deals at the time and I would be shocked if he didn't have very close if not similar offers at the time. In both cases Crane decided he wanted to keep the status quo after a W.S. win and thats what it cost. It hasn't worked out.
Tier1 free agents are an illusion. They cost more in dollars and years and are worth less than any other players nearly every single time. Best to avoid them altogether.
Jim Crane isn’t the problem, he is the best professional sports owner in the history of Houston. He hired someone to be GM that was a real surprise to the baseball establishment (Luhnow), he let him tear down and rebuild the franchise. People can say what they want but the Astros getting caught cheating was bad luck and bad timing. Crane was told by MLB to fire Luhnow. Then baseball put a lot of pressure on him to hire a manager and GM that MLB wanted. As a result Crane was stuck with Click, someone he felt he was pressured to hire (he had little time to pick someone). Click did not fit the Astros culture and didn’t get along with a lot of people in the organization. That is why he is gone. Brown is someone Click wanted, interviewed him multiple times and spent time with him. So we will see what happens. No one is perfect but Crane has been pretty damn good
Yeah, Crane slander is absolutely insane. The Orioles are in what you would call the 2015 version of the Astros run and they are already prepping fans for the money they won't spend.
Agree that Crane WAS great But right now we have the 3rd highest cost to go to an MLB game, we avoid the luxury tax like it was AIDS, and he let's our idiot "manager" play games with the lineup instead of trying to win every game and ensure a playoff spot
Really? To be fair, he didn't resign Correa or Keuchel who were the only ones I think there was any chance of. But Springer and Cole were both absolutely gone with no chance of resigning. They both wanted to be specific places away from Houston which is a right they earned. He resigned: Altuve, Bregman, Yordan, Brantley, Maldy (who THEY feel is/was a star), McCullers, Verlander. Pressly, and Javier. Montero ( separate on purpose) He has brought back way more stars than he has let walk. He has let lots of average- slightly above average starters walk but that's baseball and necessary to be able to pay the stars.
I was referring to keeping our home grown superstars If you want to include Maldy, Montero etc in that, we are just talking about totally different things Also, the Altuve/Bregman/Yordan signings were great, but those were done early on. Bregman will be coming back on the market after next year, so let's see what happens there Obviously Cranes time as Owner has been by far the most successful of any owner in Houston sports history Much of that was what Luhnow built though, Crane did a GREAT job initially of hiring the right people to build the organization And as for the spending part, as I mentioned we have the 3rd highest cost to go to a game in all of MLB, and in the context of cost of living where we live compared to the other 29 franchises, that don't make sense. Especially for a team that refuses the luxury tax level, and with an owner who has made over 1.5 BILLION just in franchise value alone.
You have a valid point, but the Astros have the 4th highest payroll in MLB and 6th highest attendance. That tells me: 1) Crane is spending money and outperforming ticket sales (in # of tickets even if not ticket $) 2) People are still buying at the currentbprices so based on economic theory he isn't charging too much. This team has gone to 6 straight ALCS, 4 W S. in 6 years and won 2 of them. He is spending enough money to win what else do you expect?
The only superstar he let go was Cole and arguably JV who he got back. He made the right decision on Correa and Springer. We will see on Tucker. I do have my doubts about Tucker coming back, but we still have 3 more years of him. Cole was gone no matter what. Life long dream to play for Yankees and a monstrous contract.
I doubt that Bagwell had much say in any of the offseason moves anyway Yes, he was sent to talk to Abreu. But Click or any GM in our situation would have been going after Abreu in the offseason. There were just not any other options that were better. It hasn't worked out, but that is a move pretty much everyone was on board with
Springer is the one who was never going to come back, and that goes back to the manipulation of his playing time. Once Cole got to free agency I agree, he was gone. But he was open to extension talks until Crane refused to go long term with him. We absolutely could have kept Cole if Crane was willing to go more than a few years. And that part isn't a secret, Crane is opposed to long term contracts, that's not a secret. It will take a huge change of philosophy for him to even consider a legit contract extension for Tucker. I hope i'm wrong and he is willing to go 8+ years and sign him, i'll be extremely happy if I am wrong, but it's simply not likely The one player we let go that I fully agree with was Correa. He was an absolute superstar for us, and is a proven performer on the biggest stage. But the injury concerns with him are real.
Which other homegrown superstars do you wish he had kept? Springer, who wanted nothing to do with the Astros? Keuchel or Correa, who have sucked? Think fans would love that? Who else?
And Correa was not willing to consider his injury history and risks as a reason to reduce his demands. I get that from both sides. Correa earned the right to choose. He also WAY outperformed his salary for pre arb and arb seasons making Crane MILLIONS. It would have been nice for Crane to overpay to compensate but that's not how winning teams do things. And we have a championship team to follow because of that.
7th highest according to Spotrac I expect him to not use a "no more than 5 years" policy when it comes to keeping home grown stars And look, I believe in the free market economy probably more than 99% who post on here. I taught Economics for the better part of 3 decades. Yes, from an economic standpoint, Crane is smart to skyrocket prices to go to games as he has done. Problem is the price to go to games isn't like much of the rest of the economy. If we let Tucker go, Framber go, Bregman go and there aren't star level players to replace them, the success of this team will decline greatly but the price to go to a game won't be going down When we lost guys like Springer, Keuchel, Correa, Cole, Morton.....we had guys ready to step in who have turned into stars in their own right. Counting on our current farm system to replace Bregman, Framber and Tucker with similar level performers who be incredibly stupid in my opinion
You could have posted this exact same thing in basically every year since 2018. "We can't let everybody go and stay good" They haven't let everybody go, we keep some, lose some and replenish from the farm and stop gap free agents. You are criticizing Crane for something that has yet to happen. If the farm stops generating talent we will fall off, a couple of mega contracts won't prevent that.
