I'm not saying they say anything like that they will accomodate the player. But players request trades all the time - the front offices just tend to brush it off with "no comments" or "we understand his concern" or whatnot. Wade's response sounded like he was really pissed off (maybe that it became public). Just interesting in that you normally don't get interesting sound bites from him. It doesn't change what they'll do - there's no doubt they will be actively looking to accommodate him. That said, you know this and I know this. And GMs know this - they aren't stupid. Once Roy asked for the trade, the team's leverage goes down, no matter how much Wade/Drayton pretend otherwise. The real way at this point to generate leverage is get multiple teams involved in the bidding.
The firesale should have happened years ago, but Drayton would never go for it so long as he could keep revenue numbers stable with shortsighted bandaid moves with his puppet GMs. He's been taking a piss on fans, and now he's going to get 60 cents on the dollar for his former cash cows. I refuse to give this team a dime of my money until they demonstrate they give half a crap.
And I think it just got so painfully obvious that he sucked that it was impossible to deny it any more. The fact it took so long to dump someone that was hurting your team so much is depressing.
From a business perspective, this post is utterly stupid on a number of levels. When exactly would have have done that firesale? 2005 when we were on our way to the World freaking Series? 2006? A firesale right after a series run is stupid for building a fanbase. In 2007 there was still hope. It was not until last season that it really appeared that we were on a bobsled to hell. Explain to me how you could possibly think that the firesale should have happened years ago when we were fighting for a playoff spot in August 2008.
From a business perspective but not a baseball perspecitve? In any case, it's the conventional wisdom that the Astros should have rebuild a few years ago. Either 2007 or 2008 would have been great years to rebuild. Sure there was hope, and that late season run in 2008 was nice, but the future of the franchise would have been better served by rebuilding rather than banking on a highly unlikely run.
Oswalt Interview: http://www.twitvid.com/V2VLD seems to have approached this in the most upstanding way possible, in my opinion. also says that after his contract is up, he'd be willing to pitch one more year in houston just because he wants to finish his career here. i'd take all that bad attitude speculation with a grain of salt, and even if it's true, so what? it's not like he's distracting the team and ruining the clubhouse. the guy is just sick of losing and he sees a crap product on the field that nobody is allowed to acknowledge. he's given 10 great years to this organization without saying a peep, and he has earned the right to request a trade.
I always thought that Oswalt was an over rated player that padded is stats VS. the scrub teams. Both him and Berkman are living off what the TEAM did in the 04-05 seasons when the Astros was a stacked team.
I'm not expecting him to say that he thought that they would suck, but to even mention the word champion with this team is a joke. Very patronizing to the fans. I would love to hear the owner say, "we've assembled a young exciting group of players that fans can come out to watch develop into a champion some day." Nothing wrong with that. Drayton and Ed just need to get their head's out of their asses and rebuild. Drayton needs to leave the cheap salesman talk at home and figure out what needs to be done to make this team a contender again, or just get on with selling the team if that's what he wants to do.
Name any of the elite pitchers he's defeated this year? Thanks you can slap yourself in the face now.
Wins and losses is a terrible way to judge a pitcher. Every year there are pitchers who have great ERAs and pitch great all year long but end up with 12-15 wins, does that mean they are any better or worse than the pitcher who had an ERA a half run higher than theirs but won 19 games? For pitchers, their job is to go out there, try to shut the other team down, and hope the offense can score more runs than they give up, that's it. Roy has pitched better so far this year than he has in any of the last 3 years. So his ability to defeat elite pitchers is not what is important, his ability to keep his team in the game and give them a chance to win is what is important. Against every "elite" pitcher he has faced this year, Roy has kept the Stros in the game and given his offense a chance to win it. The offense's inability to score runs doesn't diminish how effectively Roy has pitched this year. In 6 of Roy's 9 starts this season, he's given up 2 ERs or less, and he has 2 wins to show for it. No pitcher throws shut outs every time on the mound, and that is what you are implying Roy should be doing in order to win against the elite pitchers. That's an unreasonable thing to ask of any pitcher.
For some weird reason, I always thought wins required your offense to score. I never realized pitchers went head to head with each other.
Oswalt and Clemens both come to mind as pitchers that our offense has let down over the last decade. Clemens had a 1.87ERA over 32 starts in 2005, and only won 13 games. Jeriome Robertson is a great example of the offense giving great run support. He had a 5.10ERA and a 1.52WHIP and went 15-9 for us.
