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2022 Houston Astros Thread


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1 minute ago, Muny_Tex said:

If you’re spotted an 8 game lead in mid-June within a terribly inferior division, when is there ever going to be a better time/opportunity to see what Yordan is capable of doing at 1B?

The contract ink is dry…it’s time to capitalize while there’s still time ample time to prepare for a playoff run.

Yuli is still a helluva asset for late inning defense and pinch hitting in RBI situations where a fly ball is needed…but something has to give before he (and Bregman) torpedo yet another postseason.

Or Brantley- wonder if he could play 1B? 

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1 hour ago, Muny_Tex said:

If you’re spotted an 8 game lead in mid-June within a terribly inferior division, when is there ever going to be a better time/opportunity to see what Yordan is capable of doing at 1B?

The contract ink is dry…it’s time to capitalize while there’s still time ample time to prepare for a playoff run.

Yuli is still a helluva asset for late inning defense and pinch hitting in RBI situations where a fly ball is needed…but something has to give before he (and Bregman) torpedo yet another postseason.

This makes sense to me at least. Why not try it for a few games to see how it is. It's June, not October and the division is weak. It's time to experiment

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2 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Not a chance. We win the division easily. 
LMJ is coming back (not that the pitching has been a problem) 

Meyers is coming back. 
They have to add a bat at 1B and would be smart to add one in LF/DH (or just make it Chaz) as a platoon partner for Bradley. Do that and you’ve got 2 bad spot in the lineup for the playoffs, it’s Maldy, and you have a good PH in either Chaz against a lefty or Brantley against a RHP. 
we are fine. It’s just baseball (he says- hoping fervently). 

when was the last time we added a significant upgrade bat at the deadline? beltran?

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5 hours ago, henrygandorf said:

when was the last time we added a significant upgrade bat at the deadline? beltran?

To be fair, our offense has been awesome and virtually without holes, accept at catcher and we won’t belabor that, this entire run of amazingness. This is really the first time we’ve had glaring holes pretty much anywhere. 

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10 hours ago, Muny_Tex said:

If you’re spotted an 8 game lead in mid-June within a terribly inferior division, when is there ever going to be a better time/opportunity to see what Yordan is capable of doing at 1B?

 

10 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Or Brantley- wonder if he could play 1B? 

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10 hours ago, Wulaw Horn said:

LMJ is coming back (not that the pitching has been a problem) 

Maybe.

it would be terrific if Alvarez could play 1B, but didn't we try that a couple years ago and he was a disaster? I could be misremembering.

And while the offense has been frustrating, the Astros as a team are 6th in MLB in wRC+ (111). It’s hard to see, but you have to keep in mind how shitty overall offense has been in MLB this year. The Astros are hitting .238/.316/.409. Last year, TOR hit .266/.330/.466 as a team and that was good for a 112 wRC+. Pretty much every team is hitting like shit in 2022.

All that said, I agree that this is no longer an elite team. It’s a good team. It wasn’t going to last forever I guess.

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49 minutes ago, Hank Chinaski said:

Maybe.

it would be terrific if Alvarez could play 1B, but didn't we try that a couple years ago and he was a disaster? I could be misremembering.

And while the offense has been frustrating, the Astros as a team are 6th in MLB in wRC+ (111). It’s hard to see, but you have to keep in mind how shitty overall offense has been in MLB this year. The Astros are hitting .238/.316/.409. Last year, TOR hit .266/.330/.466 as a team and that was good for a 112 wRC+. Pretty much every team is hitting like shit in 2022.

All that said, I agree that this is no longer an elite team. It’s a good team. It wasn’t going to last forever I guess.

I was so pissed about us not signing Correa bc I thought that was management throwing in the towel on being elite and settling for merely good. Interestingly enough, Peña has been good enough he’s been a reasonable facsimile for Correa so far (correas OPS as of yesterday morning was above Penas but not by a lot, and Correa absolutely plays better defense than Peña) but that difference isn’t amounting to anything super important- rather it’s Catcher going from putrid to historically god awful, Bregman continuing to be merely good and not elite, Brantley not thumping the ball at all, 1B being well below average, CF being meh, and our be honest brigade sucking shit through as straw. 
Also, some bad luck. 
I still contend that it will be pretty easy to fix, and Meyers coming back and being good, someone making Dusty platoon Simone with Brantley, and a bat at 1B and we are back to really really good offensively. That’s 1 bat addition at the easiest and cheapest place to add, one successful return from injury and one monumentally simple managerial decision away from being elite. It’s not hard. 
And I agree completely on Brantley. 
 

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34 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

I was so pissed about us not signing Correa bc I thought that was management throwing in the towel on being elite and settling for merely good. 
 

I don’t think they were throwing in any towels - I think they were sticking to the plan that was laid out years ago. They’re just not going to give out huge contracts for guys into their 30s, as we’ve discussed extensively. The only reason we had elite teams was because that core was all young and inexpensive at the same time.

And yeah - Pena is at 2.5 fWAR 1/3 of the way through his rookie year, at $700k. Correa is at 1.2 fWAR at $35 million, and has missed 1/3 of his team’s games. That’s why this is the plan. I don’t hate the plan. 

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26 minutes ago, Hank Chinaski said:

I don’t think they were throwing in any towels - I think they were sticking to the plan that was laid out years ago. They’re just not going to give out huge contracts for guys into their 30s, as we’ve discussed extensively. The only reason we had elite teams was because that core was all young and inexpensive at the same time.

And yeah - Pena is at 2.5 fWAR 1/3 of the way through his rookie year, at $700k. Correa is at 1.2 fWAR at $35 million, and has missed 1/3 of his team’s games. That’s why this is the plan. I don’t hate the plan. 

Correa is a better player right now than Peña, and I sure as shit would trust him more in the post season but at the price differential it’s an obvious no brainer for Peña. I like being elite and stacking the deck in our favor. All that said didn’t matter in 19 or 21 for us and hasn’t mattered for the Dodgers ever, so maybe elite is overrated. 

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10 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Correa is a better player right now than Peña, and I sure as shit would trust him more in the post season but at the price differential it’s an obvious no brainer for Peña. I like being elite and stacking the deck in our favor. All that said didn’t matter in 19 or 21 for us and hasn’t mattered for the Dodgers ever, so maybe elite is overrated. 

Yup, Correa is better. But when you factor in age, cost, control, etc, like you said - it’s a no-brainer.

Yup, in a short series, elite is absolutely overrated. Elite matters a lot more over 162 games than it does over 7 games (which is why I like fewer playoff teams, not more, but oh well). 

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It feels like anyone who gives up more than 1 run is fucjkng this team really hard nowadays. 
this offense is good not great. It doesn’t have greatness in it due to age and FA, and Bregman having head up his ass disease, but bats in walk years are practically free, and I suspect we will do something to alleviate this awfulness on offense, while also winning the division by 13 games and clinching the bye. That sets us up to buttfuck the winner of Minnesota vs whoever and then go play the Yankees in our 6th straight ALCS. Without serious work to the team this is the first year I think they are actually better than us. Not enough to matter in a best of 7 series b/c baseball. 

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Astros entered the game with a .607 win%. That’s a 98-win pace. This is not a 98-win team. We are in the midst of a record correction. I think this is an 85-90 win team (.525-.555). So I’d expect the curve to continue to inch downward a little and then stabilize over time (winning % by game, 2022):

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