People taking extra bases on weak arms that otherwise wouldn't have been taken doesn't happen nearly as much as fans think it does.
[Puts on old man face] Back in my day, left fielders didn't play defense. Give me your mightiest bat you can find that plays left field and he's the best fielder. Maybe I'm selling Profar or Riley short, but Altuve is the biggest bopper that may play left field a lot this season.
@Nook any whispers we're talking to some of the following FA pitchers? Lance Lynn, Patrick Corbin, Kyle Gibson, Jose Quintana?
We've had 2 terrible arms in the outfield regularly and people aren't tagging up on medium depth fly balls left and right. It is gonna happen occasionally, and fans will scream about it, but it's fringe damage not some gaping hole in team construction that people are gonna run wild on. Teams don't want to run themselves into outs more than they want to be aggressive.
Maybe they won’t “run wild” but at key moments it will be exposed. I think Altuve’s arm is worse than Chas’ arm.
He did mention a couple of days ago that the Astros were in touch with some starters. Pitchers that most likely won't be on the playoff roster(or at least be starters) but would eat up innings which is also important. Think he also said the pitchers are still holding out for a little more money or years. I'll also add Jose Quintana to the list although they were not among the teams on the list that Hector Gomez mentioned recently.
Example of Chas getting exposed at the MLB level when the lights were brightest. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=d140e46c-dcde-44e6-8d83-a471ea989abc
Yes it will occasionally be exposed. Altuve's awful range at 2B will get exposed more. Awful hitting from our other players will get exposed even more than that. Sometimes you have to make compromises and pick the least damaging option.
Yep, Chas is a better CF than Altuve. No doubt about it. Chas is actually a good CF. That catch was made for him.
Yep. Weak arms are typically exposed a lot less than limited range and poor hitting gets exposed. Altuve could be the worst defensive LF in the game, and it likely won't matter much if he hits well.
Altuve won't be playing CF. Altuve will be playing LF. The average LF hits what 16, 17 homers these days (edit: ugh, it was 19 homers last season on average per team)? Considering the Astros play at Daikin Park, I just don't care too much about 5-10 extra runs scoring because Altuve sucks as an OF when he's going to score 30 more runs than the average LF and drive in another 20-30 more over the average LF.
