It was one f'ing game. Extrapolating anything from it is the height of silliness. btw...every team in MLB "almost always [has] offensive problems against other teams' #1 starters". Because they're good & ****. On another note, one would be hard pressed to find a worse big league debut for a position player than Hanley Ramirez had last night - single, caught stealing, K, K, K; 2 errors + a botched DP & a poor throw in the field. Marlins have some very, very good young guys on that team, though. Jimmy D said that something like 35 of the players on the Marlins 40-man roster spent at least part of last season in the minors. Crazy.
This only works half the time though. With Taveras first, Biggio second, NO outs, a man on base, and the pitcher sac bunting, Biggio will still get a chance to drive in the run, regardless of what Taveras does. With ONE out, Biggio's chance to have a chance to drive in the run will be whatever Willy's OBP is minus whatever percentage of runners in scoring position Willy drives in. So, it would be better to have Biggio in this position. So I suppose it's a wash in the scenario I brought up. But, since Willy's OBP was identical to Biggio's was last year, I think it makes sense to have the player with the much higher slugging percentage (Biggio, by nearly .130) follow the weaker hitter. Also, since whoever comes before Berkman will see more pitches to hit, you'd want the more productive hitter in that spot.
They are quite the strange team. A Cy-Young candidate (Willis), an MVP candidate (Cabrera), and a whole bunch of minor league players.
Yeah that guy was really bad last night. I was at the game and a lot of us got to the point where we started yelling for the Stros to hit it to him, because chances are he'd botch the play.
Putting Biggio in the leadoff spot works really well when it is less than 2 outs. Biggio tends to get a lot of doubles and so Taveras can come in and advance him to third at least. Then again if Taveras were to get on base ahead of Biggio, with his speed he might score on a double from first. I am arguing both sides here I guess.
yeah, the owner sucks. he gets zero credit for anything this franchise has accomplished. i wish the astros were more like they were before he got here. you know...never making the playoffs, and all.
MadMax- what everyone wants is for the Chronicle to put a tombstone over the season because we won the opener 1-0. Go figure?
Soooo many problems with this tied old argument. 1, 2, 3, etc...) Jeff Kent, Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Jeff Bagwell's fat contract, Lance Berkman's fat contract, Richard Hidalgo's fat contract, the Carlos Beltran trade, and Preston Wilson all say hi. Hell, Shane Reynolds even made $8 million one year. Then there's Billy Wagner's fat contract. Too bad the Astros don't pay anybody. 99ish) The stinginess or generosity of an owner have nothing to do with the payroll of his franchise, as NO BUSINESS OWNER FUNDS HIS BUSINESS FROM PRIVATE WEALTH. Good grief, it blows my mind how people can't grasp this very simple concept. Every business must stand alone and not be subsidized from other businesses or personal wealth, or the business will die. Does anyone here want the Astros to go bankrupt? (...crickets chirping...) ...Thought so.
i think our offense is going to hinge on what kind of production we can get out of lane and p. wilson. I think lane can improve on last year's numbers, but I'm not holding my breath for Wilson. I don't see ensberg having as good of a season but i havent really forgave him for the turd he laid in the world series. there will always be questions about our offense until they prove otherwise.
Yeah, that's kind of what I was getting at. -Man on, no outs, pitcher bunting: better to have Taveras in the one spot -Man on, one out, pitcher bunting: better to have Biggio in the one spot -Two outs, pitcher swinging: better to have Taveras in the one spot I think it's better to have Taveras in the one spot on that last one because the pitcher will make an out the vast majority of the time, giving the Astros Taveras and his OBP equal to Biggio the chance to get on with Biggio's superior slugging percentage behind him.
I don't think it's silly to look at a team that basically has the same faces from last season and conclude that we could run into similar offensive problems again this season where pitching and scrappy play will have to get us over the hump. The only thing we can hope that changes is the players improve over what they did last season. I'm not making a statement about wins or losses. I'm making a statement that we're not going to suddenly become a league leader in offense given the little changes we did make. As we have seen, if our pitching is doing well...then it may not matter as much. We can always hope we will be among the top teams in offense but it's a pipe dream. Chances are we will be in the bottom half somewhere and I would be pleasantly surprised if it were proven otherwise.
Except that the argument ignores the documented improvement of the Astros' offense after the All-Star break last year.
