To answer a question on the front page, yes I am sick of hearing Pupura talk about how much talent is on this team. And I agree with Jeff that if the team was banking on Ensberg having a comeback year and return to 4th-place-MVP-form, then Purpura should be fired on that notion alone. The fact of the matter is that the Jennings trade was a bad one, Drayton tightened his purse strings too quickly and didn't allow Purpura to try and acquire more talent to cover our deficiencies and this team needs to be rebuilt. As far as Pettitte was never coming back, its true, completely and totally true. One of my co-workers is a long time family friend of the Pettittes and he was calling this in the middle of the season last year. Andy wanted to go back to NY. The retirement talk was posturing at best, his eyes and those of the Hendricks brothers were always on the Big Apple. It also didn't hurt that Purpura has a genuine dislike for the Hendricks Bros., but he is a professional and wouldn't let that interfere in negotiating to bring a player of Pettitte's caliber back. Purpura targeted Jon Garland, who is in his own right a decent to good pitcher who would look great in our rotation. At the eleventh hour there were concerns about Taylor Buchholz's arm and Ken Williams being the good GM he is (and he hates giving up pitching) decided to rescind the deal. Purpura panicked and made a bad deal to acquire Jason Jennings (whose numbers have looked good the past couple of years). Unfortunately he didn't do his homework and Jennings started having arm trouble in the middle of last season. We lost out on that trade, time to move on. For the record Garland isn't having all that great a year anyway. I'll probably get flamed for this but Drayton McLane cheaped out on the Astros' payroll. Some of you will ask,"J how did this man who gave Carlos Lee and $100 million dollar contract cheap out?" Well he cheaped out by not letting Purpura go out and get another starter. It was no secret that with the loss of the BronxBack Mountain Boys that we had two holes on our rotation. IMHO the Astros badly needed to acquire a second starter along with Williams. Up to this point we are really lucky that Rodriguez has performed as well as he has. I wanted to see the Astros make a run for Jason Marquis or Jeff Suppan, both of those pitchers got boo-coo bucks and the rest of the free agent pitchers out there were overpriced, but unfortunately thats what the market bears. All this talk about the Clemens fund has always been crap to me. If you're willing to spend money to get Clemens who you think will put you over the top, then why not spend that money on another player to help you stay in contention in the first place? Another thought that comes to mind is that we were all up in arms that we didn't have a first or second round pick, but the spin on that was there was more money in the piggy bank to sign draft picks. Neither of the top two picks (rounds 3 & 4) are signed as of yet, Bettis decided to go to Texas Tech instead of joining the Astros and word is that Chad Jones will most likely not be signed due to signability issues. What happened to that extra cash? The plan was to take chances drafting good talent that may have posed challenges to signing and yet this may be the exact reason we lose out on Jones. I continue to hear that Pence, Lee, Oswalt and Berkman are out core players that shouldn't be traded. I disagree, because if I could trade any player from that group it would be Carlos Lee. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for what he has done to help the team this year (I can't imagine how much worse we would be without him). But Lee is a "put you over the top player" he was the slugger we sorely lacked last season, but he really serves no purpose this year other than keeping the team afloat. I know that sounds harsh, but if we go into a rebuilding mode, then a slugger like Carlos Lee and a closer like Lidge can net you the most in return. Now I'm not suggesting going Florida Marlins and trade every player for prospects, but identify what you need and try to target those players in other organizations. There is always a demand for sluggers and Lee could get you a nice return. Ditto for Lidge, we've all heard that Boston, Detroit, NY Mets, etc. all covet Lidge, but what can we get in return? At this point we have to ask ourselves, are we going to rebuild? And if so what is our plan? What is our projected timeline? If you traded Lee and Lidge, you'd get at least three prospects apiece (one blue chipper, one decent, one marginal). Nonetheless, the Astros have along way to go toward rebuilding and the sooner that McLane, Purpura and Co. realize that the faster we can start rebuilding and getting some younger guys in the minors some much needed playing time.
I stopped reading right here. In many ways, having Jennings struggle may be a slight blessing in disguise (in terms of rebuilding/reloading)... there's no way the Astros can afford to make a mistake on signing any pitcher to a long-term deal who's not going to live up to it. Hell, they may have to worry about Oswalt and Berkman (who were as sure of a thing as there was in baseball just one year ago) living up to their long deals. You are right, however, it is still all about pitching. 2004 showed that you can get by with 2 stellar starters, a great bullpen, and a streaky offense. 2005 showed that you can get by with 3 stellar starters, a great bullpen, and zero offense. Unfortunately, neither Suppan nor Jason Marquis make this team all that much better to mask the other guys' struggles... Suppan is solid but older, and Marquis is simply a headcase whom the Cubs overpaid despite the market... and if you sign them, you definitely are handcuffed, payroll wise, for the next 5 years.
cat, i've repeatedly heard taveras WAS the principle, that he afforded the rockies a wealth of viable options, both intenrally as well as externally, that really appealed to them: they could keep him and move other players or trade him because (reportedly) several teams were interested in him (florida and the white sox being the ones mentioned most often). plus, it's a bit naive to think the astros were the only ones who recognized hirsh was overachieving. if their concerns had been rooted in things he was doing in the clubhouse or behind the scenes, i can see where they might have been able to sell him high. but you specifically mentioned his "talent" - if he was dealt because he was overrated, that's something most teams are smart enough to sniff out, especially organizations that seem pretty adept at developing young talent. like, for instance, colorado. points 2 and 3, imo, sling more mud at the deal - bringing biggio back forced their hand with burke and, by extension, taveras - they allowed circumstances, and not play on the field, to dictate a direction. meanwhile, trading away 3 25-year olds so your .500 team can add a middle of the road pitcher in the final year of his contract is one of the reasons why the farm system is limited. not the ONLY reason, but certainly one of 'em. as for the underachivers tag - i just don't see it. on march 31, our top five hitters projected to be berkman (career OPS of .970); ensberg/lamb (.842/.767); lee (.838); scott (.786); burke (.706), plus ausmus, biggio and everett. as august approaches, our top five hitters are pence (.929); lee (.873); lamb (.858); berkman (.827); loretta (.785), plus ausmus, biggio and everett. pence is ranked 6th in BA, lee 2nd in RsBI. if anything, the offense has overachieved. the pitchers, especially, the bullpen, have certainly been worse than expected. but the bullpen was an issue last year, too. but some of the downturn in the pitching performance has to be tied to the team's below average defense, which got worse with everett's injury, sure - but everett was likely to see his playing time reduced, anyway, so loretta's bat could be in the everyday line-up. they have one of the worst defensive OF in baseball (which pence is actually making better as he seems to be an upgrade, of sorts, to burke) and when biggio's in the line-up along with loretta, one of the worst defensive infields in baseball. what really irks me is all the praise we heaped on purpura for having the courage to stick with his guys in '05. i frankly found most of it a bit over the top (did he REALLY stick with 'em, or have no alternatives?), but, fine: they were his guys, he believed in them, and it worked out - well done. so where did that approach go? why did he bail on hirsh and buchholz for jennings? and give up on taveras? to me, it reeks of an organization without a clear-cut plan.
It only seats 18,000... 2,000 more. Several games since the opening of the Toyota Center have featured around the 11-12,000 mark (which would have been bad in the Summit). As I already said, Colorado and Toronto are unique situations that don't compare well with the Astros. The Cleveland and Baltimore siutations do compare well. The main point is that the team would have to be summarily gutted, and Drayton would have to sink to Kansas City Royals-type payroll if they were to ever sink to the irrevelance they had in the early 90's Astrodome days. The strike also played a big role in fostering that irrevelance from 94-97. 1998 was good for baseball (McGwire-Sosa), good for the Astros (Randy Johnson, new stadium broke ground), and started the momentum of actual excitement in April/October that this city hadn't experienced much of since 86. Having that momentum peak in the new ballpark (as it did in Cleveland) went miles towards fostering some life-long Astro fans, and turning a day at a Houston ballpark into much more than simply going to some random sports game (like a Texans and Rockets game currently feels like). The Rockets do have a chance to take over the city again... and they've had that chance every year of the Yao Ming/T-Mac era... I'm just saying that the Astros weren't irrelevant simply because of their success. It had a lot to do with the ballpark, the way Drayton refused to spend after the Drabek/Swindell fiascos, and the state of baseball overall.
Just imagine if Berkman actually hit his career OPS number, instead of being mired in his current career WORST OPS (which most batters, Carlos Lee especially, would take in a second). Not just worse... MUCH worse than expected. Oswalt has never ever ever had an ERA this bad at any point in his MLB career this far along into the season. The bullpen last year had issues with mainly ONE guy... who still managed to convert 31 of 36 saves. They got reliable contributions from Qualls, Wheeler, and Trever Miller. This year, all three of them have SUCKED, while Lidge has been hurt (hell, even with the 5+ ERA, he was at least closing out games... eating innings/appearences). As for the defense, yes infield defense has been awful... especially when you have 3-4 groundball pitchers in your rotation/bullpen (Oswalt, Jennings, Sampson, Qualls especially). Ideally, Loretta could play 3rd, Everett SS, Burke 2B, and Lance/Lamb 1st... that would be the best defense/hitting combo they could put together. As for the outfield defense... it falls well behind the other issues mentioned above... but did need improving once it was shown Burke couldn't handle the job out there (see, speed doesn't make up for everything).
Yeah, it was clearly a decision between the two... it had nothing to do with one requiring $15 million per year for those two years and the other requiring only $6 million... oh wait.
last year, berkman's WARP was 8.5 - it's a projection of how many wins he alone is worth to a team above replacing him in the line-up with a league average player. so the astros would be 49-46 - roughly; that's not really all together accurate since, even struggling, berkman is performing above league average. but i'll give you the full 9 wins... and we're still skating around .500. and i'm not sure pence is here if berkman had been "berkman" all year.
That's actually a bigger impact than I expected for Berkman alone. What is Oswalt's WARP? He's certainly doing a similiar thing (peforming above league average, but well below his average). But, these guys aren't getting paid 14 million dollars a year to merely be above league average... going into this season, each was a top 3 batter and top 3 pitcher in the NL respectively. Now, one was barely an undeserved all-star (merely on reputation). And hell, Pence may get called up if Willy performs as bad as he did for Colorado to start the season here... I don't understand why that speculation even needs to be addressed. I've never defended them for not having him up here to start the season (hell, I had 3 separate conversations with him at spring training this year... I'm a big fan). The topic is how good would they be currently if Berkman/Oswalt were hitting their career averages.
Clearly I'd prefer Pettitte, but it's irrelevant to evaluating Purpura. He wasn't the one who created the budget; all he can do is work with the money he's given. Besides, I'm not sure how many times it needs to be said... Andy didn't want to be here. Sadly, it was that simple.
Actually, bandwagon fans only root for the team when they are winning. Hence the name bandwagon. How? How is it Garner's fault that players are performing well below their normal expectations? How is it Garner's fault that Wheeler has underperformed? Jennings? Berkman? So you can get somebody else who will have to get Drayton's approval, thus can only make marginal or stupid deals? Odd...
If the 'stros fail to 'strike back', ie if Drayton et al fail to infuse talent thus excitement and hope, then Colorado and Toronto histories are plenty valid. This 'administration' needs to make use of it'[s 'baseball capital', or their approval ratings will sink, and stay sunk for the indefinite future.
how can this team be so inconsistent? how can they suck so bad in the first half then do well in the second half since he's been here?
Nobody knows. I don't. You don't. Drayton doesn't. Garner doesn't. I would think that only the almighty knows that answer to that one.
