At what point do we consider possibly giving this guy a second chance. After he was demoralized up here with our slow start, he was sent down and played even worse.... but he's steadily improved over the last couple of months, and his average is now up to .262. Meanwhile, he's hit 23 HR's and drove in 64 RBIs. If we're still strugglin for offense, I wouldn't be opposed to sending Gallo down (who doesn't get leftys out... I'd rather use Qualls as our "lefty" specialist), and letting him get a few starts for Burke or Lane against good right-handed pitching. In the end... he couldn't be worse than what we have now.
Let me get this straight. We should send down a lefty with a 2.35 ERA so that we can call up an old minor leaguer who hit .154 with no power in his brief stay here? Jason Lane had an excellent July and doesn't need to lose ABs to Scott. Burke isn't hitting much, but he's still better than Scott imo and plays good D. And Palmeiro is having an excellent season so far in spot duty. The one point I agree with is that Qualls has done excellent this year against lefties. Wish he could do the same thing with right handed hitters.
I agree with using Qualls as the guy to get left handers out? Why do baseball managers think they have to have a left handed specialist to get left handers out? Gallo has always been better at getting righties out, but we use him to get lefties out since he is left handed. If a right hander is great at getting lefties out, then use him! It's not that complicated!
Scott's sample size of 39 ABs is far, far too small to draw any conclusions from. If we handpicked 39 ABs from Burke's season we could make him look that bad or worse... the difference is he's been given a more extended look. Sadly, because of "chemistry", we won't make such a move unless we start losing or it's September. Hopefully it's the latter. But I'm with you, Nick... I'd give him the chance today if I could. At the least, he gives you the potential to have a power bat in left, which you don't have at all with Burke.
I'd prefer Luke Scott over Chris Burke. Scott has more power and could have more RBI's and thats what the Stros need.
"Luke has really turned it around offensively. He struggled when he was sent out earlier this season. His return will be dependent upon first of all, how he is playing, but also whether we have a need or not that develops due to injury or lack of performance by one our current players. In any event, he would certainly be a candidate for a September callup." http://houston.astros.mlb.com/NASAp...t_id=1153990&vkey=news_hou&fext=.jsp&c_id=hou
Yea... I know we don't want to mess up the chemistry right now. At the least, I'd think he'd be a good lefty stick to have on the bench (especially for the games we start Palmeiro and Lamb... meaning we have 0 lefty sticks available to pinch hit). Also, to whoever quoted Gallo's ERA... you're looking at a guy with a small sample size (but horrible career #'s) and promoting him, whereas you're downgrading Luke Scott despite his small sample size. I just wanted to point out the inherent contradiction. Also, Gallo does not get lefties out... he never has. He doesn't posess the sinking fastball that most lefty-specialists use to get left-handed batters out. He's done pretty good at minimizing damage in his breif stint since coming back... but unless he magically develops another pitch, his numbers will soon approach that of his career averages. I was hoping to see more pop from Burke's bat with the extended playing time he's had... but I haven't seen any of it. He's looked pretty good when he's gotten on base, and I like having that sort of scrappiness at the bottom of the lineup... but you'd also like to see the occasional 2B or 3B that he should be able to get w/ his speed. If Burke were hitting at the level of Adam Everett, I think I'd be okay with that... but so far, he isn't (but that doesn't rule-out him ever becoming a good hitter).
That would be me. Gallo's career #s are similar to Quall's career #s (3.9 ERA vs. 3.7 ERA). And no, there's no contradiction in me looking at a small sample size for both - it would be a contradiction if I looked at a small sample for one and a large sample for the other. Your comparison is the one that is misleading - Burke's stats in the Majors versus Scott's AAA stats. Luke Scott only got a shot with the Astros because he tore it up in spring training - a small sample size of meaningless exhibition games. He wasn't a top prospect in the minors. Nobody outside of this board would rate him with more major-league potential than Chris Burke. Sure, Burke is having a poor season, and maybe deserves to be sent back down, but he was very good in college, was a top prospect based on his college production and potential, and then proceeded to do well at every stage of the minors. And he's younger than Scott. It's too early to give up on the kid.
Burke was a top prospect as 2nd baseman not corner outfielder. He has little value as a corner outfielder because he has no power and his BA sucks. Luke Scott has power and he is left-handed.
Personally I'd rather have Luke Scott up then Burke, but I can see how the Stros would want Burke. He has speed, and can be a last minute utility man if needed... but if I had to choose which one I had on the roster with Biggio still on the team I'd go with Scott... because Jesus can hit a curve ball, and Scott eventually will be able to too
I didn't think Gallo had any real fans... I guess I was wrong (but I guess its not as bizzare as people defending Russ Springer on this board). Fine... we can send down Mike Burns, who isn't seeing any action, period, since the team has been winning. And, I'm not saying we should give up on Burke. He's our future 2B when Biggio finally decides to hang it up. Sure, Burke may be 29-30 by then, but at least we'll have somebody. I'm just saying to maybe give Luke a real shot at hitting at this level (not 39 AB's). Remember, he came straight to the majors after AA... he had never even seen AAA pitching before, let alone MLB pitching. Also, he struggled significantly when he first went to AAA... maybe he's just the type of guy who starts off slow and takes awhile to hit his groove... like Lance and Baggy are (of course, he wouldn't get much time up here to adjust this season... but I don't think we should write him off as a future productive player at this level). Scott has also now hit for power at every level, and he's a lefty. I do believe he will be able to hit in this league when given a full shot... I just don't know when (or if) we'll be able to do that. (now, for me to defend Burke as well... cause I do like the guy) Burke is a solid player, and he put up great #'s last year at AAA... but he also struggled significantly early on, and he did not progress as fast as the organization was hoping (of course, they didn't think Biggio would still be playing at this level when we drafted Burke in 2001, so it hasn't hurt us that much). His second year at AA is when he finally "got it", and he never looked back. He also had big power #'s last year in a big-time pitcher's park in New Orleans. He's gonna be our future leadoff hitter, and I expect him to fianlly "get it" some time next year (just like Ensberg did in 2003), but till then, we'll have to tough it out and hope he doesn't give in (confidence-wise) to his own failures.
I agree on Scott/Burke as complete packages. But Burke's value as a good prospect comes from his ability to hit at a decent clip at a position (2B) that doesn't have many decent hitters. But if you can only play the two at corner OF (which is the case this season), I don't know if it's a clearcut choice that everyone outside of this board agrees with. Scott's a lefty with power, and though he doesn't draw a ton of walks, it wouldn't take much power to approach the .600 OPS type season that Burke is having. As I said, I agree that Burke's definitely more valuable to this team for the future... but for this season where the two can only play left, I think Scott has the chance to do a bit better. But if Palmeiro keeps up his play this discussion is irrelevant... he's the lefty bat we need. I just hope his magical season can continue for a couple more months... if it doesn't, that's where Scott may need to come in.
