Well, I think we’ve all beaten Roger Clemens and did he/didn’t he do drugs to death, so unless more information comes to light before he testifies before Congress next month – they postponed the hearing, I’m just going to find other topics to talk about.
Unless a miracle occurs, and youneverknow, it looks as if the 25 man is pretty much set right now. I seriously doubt that Smith/Wade are going to sign Kris Benson or Freddy Garcia, both of whom are coming off serious surgery and won’t be ready on Opening Day or maybe for a few months. I doubt either one would be able to demand multi-year contracts, but youneverknow.
At this point, best I know, Jason Jennings isn’t coming back either and I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets a multi-year deal with somebody. Jon Lieber is also looking for a multi-year deal, and from what we all saw from him in Philly, he doesn’t look as if he really has real too much left.
This is the time that borderline guys are asked to come to Spring Training, usually signed to minor league contracts (hey, they have to find SOME bodies to play AAA ball.)
Here are the 5 guys who aren’t already with the Astros Organization who received invitations: Lance Niekro, Mike DeJean, Victor Diaz, Carlos Hines and J.R. House.
House, age 27, is familiar to all yall because he was with the Astros Organization in 06. He was recovering from extensive shoulder surgery when he was signed, hit .325 at AA, was promoted to AAA, hit .412/.445/.675 over 114 AB, was in the majors for a few pinch hit ABs and went ofer 9 and was sent immediately back down. Good thing that they were a little more patient with Willie Mays, hunh. Anyway, I guess they thought he would never be able to throw very well again, so they didn’t re-sign him and he was picked up by Baltimore and spent most of last year at AAA, and hit .298/.365/.493†playing 54 games at catcher and 24 games at first. He had a cup of coffee in September and hit .211/.268/.500 in 38 AB. I would guess that he’s gonna catch at AAA again and split time with Quintero – that is, if we keep him on the roster.
Lance Niekro, age 29, we’ve seen with the Giants. He was picked in the second round in 2000 and called up in 03 for a couple AB, then again in 05. He’s split time between the majors and AAA the last 3 seasons. He’s a 1B who doesn’t hit very well – .246/.288/.421/.706 over 499 AB – 26 2B, 17 HR, 29 BB, 91 K. In other words, not much better than Adam Everett, who was a shortstop. I’m sure he’s going to be the AAA first baseman this year – it’s not exactly like we have any up and coming 1B in the minors.
Victor Diaz, age 26. He plays right or left field, and it seems as if it was just yesterday that he looked to be an up and coming star with the Mets. He was actually drafted by the Dodgers in the 37th round in 2000, then traded to the Mets for Jeromy Burnitz in 03. He was a AA All-Star that year, with a .902 OPS and he was called up in 04, where he hit .294/.321/529 in 51 AB. He split 05 between AAA and the majors, and he hit .257.329/.458 in limited duty over 280 AB. In 06, he spent pretty much the entire year at AAA, receiving only 11 AB as a Met before he was traded to the Rangers at the end of August, where he spent the remainder of the year at AAA. He’s a guy who was playing for a team with too many OF, veteran free agent OF, and, well, he didn’t really get much of a chance. All in all, he has 25 2B, 25 HR, 32 BB, 135 K (!!!!!!) over 446 AB in the majors with a line of .256/.309/.457. He’s supposed to be at least a decent fielder, if I remember rightly, and at least he has some power, unlike Mr. Gritty.
Mike DeJean, age 37, RH RP. Remember him being the Brewers closer in 02 and 03? He missed all of 06 with a shoulder injury, and only threw 30.2 innings in the minors last year with a 7 something ERA. I guess he’s this year’s Rick White/John Franco. Who knows if his arm is any better this year? But at least it’s just a minor league contract.
Carlos Hines, 27 year old righty reliever, who looks like AAA filler at best. He spent 06 and 07 at AAA, throwing 54 and 40 innings with a 4.81 ERA and a 1.67 WHIP and a 5.90 K/9.
Oh yeah – and I hear tell that Jason Lane is going to the Yankees, who I guess want him to play first base???!!! OK. Well, he’s a good human being so I wish him the best and I certainly hope he doesn’t get booed when the MFY come to the Box in June…
Tags: Houston Astros, MLB
Looking at Diaz’s numbers, I recall Rob Deer, the poster child for “strike out or homer” every time. In 1990, Rob had almost the same number of at bats, and the similarity of numbers is scary!
Diaz 25 2B, 25 HR, 32 BB, 135 K (!!!!!!) over 446 AB
Deer 15 2B 27 HR 64 BB 147K over 440 ABs (1990 season)
Deer hit .209 that year, so at least Diaz gets a few more singles and doubles. But fewer walks. Oh well, whatever.
Actually midway through last season the Giants converted Niekro to pitcher b/c he could throw that famous Niekro Knuckleball
I live out here in the Bay Area, I’ve seen Lance for years, and he’ll never make it as a major leaguer. Just won’t happen.
I guess they need some bodies to fill starting spots in the minors after making all those 4 for 1 deals this offseason!
I can’t believe that they are going to go into the year with a rotation of Roy, Woody, Backe, Wandy and Sampson. That’s one of the worst starting rotations in the league, and 2 of those guys are serious injury risks. Can’t wait to see what happens when Backe goes down in May, and Woody breaks down in June.
The offense looks better on paper, and should score a lot of runs, but now their pitching appears to be a serious weakness. And it’s not like they have any stud arms in the minors they can call up to save the day…
I know a lot of you guys don’t like the doom and gloom, but this team looks severely flawed to me. I predict a .500 season, at best. Even if they do happen to pull off a miracle and win that crappy division, there’s no way they can compete with any number of teams from the West who have much deeper pitching staffs. And once again, if the idea is that they will pull off a deadline deal for a starter or two, who do they have in the minors that anyone would want? Depth appears paper thin.
I’d love to hear management’s answer to these questions.
steve,
i know who rob deer IS, but i don’t remember watching him play. i know his fans liked him. but here in houston, the fans hate guys who strike out instead of grounding out/popping up.
- agree that lance niekro has not given any evidence that he deserves a ML job. unless, of course, he learns to pitch.
- and speaking of pitchers, i agree with jdollas. you’d think that fans would have figured it out by now that you can’t win much with a high offense (which, by the way, we don’t have) team if there is not good pitching.
bourn/matsui are NOT gonna go .300/.375 and steal 60 bases apiece. tejada is NOT gonna turn into a-rod. wiggy is NOT gonna be ensberg 2005. towles will hit like any other regular ML catcher and i wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t outhit ausmus. i mean, he is NOT joe mauer/mike piazza/brian mccann.
ah well
Yes, it’s interesting to me that people think the offense is going to be better. Sure, overall, I suppose it will score more runs, but it’s not like we’re going from three runs a game to six. We’ll be lucky to score an extra run per game. And if the pitching gives up more than that (and I think they will), it’s going to get ugly quickly.
It’s true that on those rare occasions when Miggy, Lance, Carlos and the Kid all get hot at the same time, the runs will fall from the sky in buckets. The thing is, that won’t be happening most of the time — one or more of them will be in a slump. That’s baseball: someone’s hot, someone isn’t. When they all get hot, it will be fun, but when they’re not, uggh. And the pitching is highly suspect, so I wouldn’t expect a long string of games where the opponents are held to less than four runs.
Overall, it looks pretty grim, but that’s on paper, and that’s why they actually play the games instead of running simulations on a computer.
And as for Rob Deer, he was a Major League joke — kinda like Mendoza. Hits .200, with most of the hits homers. Hard to believe he lasted as long as he did in the Show.
I understand the impluse to bemoan the lack of starting pitching and predict it will be the downfall of the Astros this year. Perhaps it will, but there’s history that it might not.
In 1997 the Astros won the Central with only 84 victories. Kile was one of the best pitchers in the league that year but bolted for Colorado as a FA. Houston added Moises Alou and Carl Everett that off-season and people were, rightly, predicting the offense would be great but pitching would doom us.
The first 5 starters that season:
Shane Reynolds and Mike Hampton could be counted on for reasonably good performances. They were followed by Jose Lima (who was a crappy relief pitcher prior to ’98), Sean Bergman (ditto Lima) and John Halama.
Anyone terrified by that starting staff?
Of course Lima emerged from nowhere to win 16 games, Bergman actually did a pretty nice job as the #5 starter and then there was the trade for Randy Johnson at the end of July.
That team won a club-record 102 games. Will the 2008 version of the Astros? Not likely. But the ’98 team went into the season with a whole s***-load of “ifs” in the staff, too, and ended up with the second-best ERA in the NL.
The big “ifs” this year, to me, are more about injury risks combined with a startling lack of depth in the minors. Yeah, if all 5 guys go all year long, then ok. But can you count on Backe for 180 IP? What about Williams, who is like 50 years old? If one or both of those guys gets hurt, who do you bring up to cover those spots? While you’re working on that one, it might help to think about all the Astros pitchers that they’ve dealt away in the last 2 years. It’s unfathomable.
Yes, J$, that’s it. These guys could do okay. And further, there could be a mid-season deal that works well. But the issue is that we’ve got a very, very weak 40-man roster. We need a lot of things to go right and for basically nothing to go wrong. It could happen, but the probability isn’t high. We’ll see.
michael,
yeh, the nl cental wasn’t good in 97 – these things go in cycles, don’t they – and winning with 84 games was like st louis winning in 06.
but cmon boy, you can’t seriously be comparing the 98 and 08 lineup and telling me that the 08 version is as good as the 98 one – or that there is any pitching combo that is as good as hampton/reynolds – and yes i DO know that oswalt is bettern either one of em but, but, BUT look what is left in the rotation we have now. i agree that no one could have reasonably expected lima to win 16 games, but i don’t think it is reasonable to expect any pitcher besides roy to win 16 games neither
and i don’t WANNA think about all the young cheap pitchers we’ve thrown away in the past 3 years.
we have absolutely nobody in the high minors who can hit. and that includes the NRIs and these new guys with minor league contracts. and darin erstad is all grit and no hit. and i see zero reason to expect kaz matsui to hit any better than he did over the past 4 years outside of coors.
it is not this devastatingly excellent lineup. it isn’t.
sure every guy can have a career year, just like the angels in 02. but it isn;t a reasonable gamble.
it was the right thing to do in terms of pleasing the fans THIS year. but 09? and 10? and 11? i can’t see it. i just can’t…
Hey, our SP’s could be worse, they could be the St. Louis guys. If Backe finally shows the promise he does in the postseason, and Wandy pitches half as good on the road as he did at home, and Sampson (if he’s the number #5) pitches like he did early last year, the rotation is only mediocre to below-average, not absolutely terrible.
Well, because the depth is so lacking, as soon as guys start getting hurt, you can bet the Astros will go dumpster diving, just like the Rangers have been doing as they’ve attempted to rebuild their devastated minor leagues. At least they’ve (Tex) finally gotten a clue and started stockpiling young talent – wish I could say the same for the ‘Stros. Lisa is dead right – what about ’09, ’10, and ’11?
well,
even IF backe is somewhat as good as he is in the postseason (cmon, his ERA is not gonna be 2 entire points lower) and sampson manages to somehow succeed in spite of the lousy fielding on the left and wandy cuts his away ERA down to 4.5, lets be real – we STILL are not gonna beat milwaukee, let alone the rest of the league in the playoffs.
mediocre SP 2-5 are just NOT gonna cut it when push comes to shove.
sounds like joe has been reading my blog/THT essays
“execrable draft” is what i called it and i only used that word because i couldn’t find anything stronger that wasn’t a swear word.
agree that this team looks as if it will be absolutely dreadful in 09/10/11 and i doubt it will be even competitive this year.
i’ll need CPR if matsui matches his coors numbers and doesn’t spend the usual time on the DL and if bourn hits 300 and steals 60 bases like everyone thinks he’s gonna…
The guys at baseball prospectus always have something bad to say about us. Here’s their latest comment:
——-
Fred (Houston): What do you think of the Astros “win now” moves this offseason? McLane says his team will never “rebuild”, but rather must strive to be “champions” every year. Are they even close to the Cubs/Brewers in terms of 2008 talent?
Joe Sheehan: No.
Hmmmm…you probably want more.
The Astros are in a weird spot in that the combination of execrable drafting and holding to slotting recommendations has given them one of the worst farm systems in baseball. Unlike the A’s, they also don’t have the kinds of players/contracts they can deal for big packages to start over. No one’s trading for Carlos Lee.
I can’t say I would have done what Ed Wade’s done, and his work isn’t going to produce a postseason appearance. However, he is executing the owner’s wishes, and it may be the only rational approach to their current mix of talent.
The Astros will probably be the worst team in baseball for a two- or three-year period starting in 2010 or 2011.
I just read that the ‘Stros are about to sign the corpulent and mostly ineffective Runelvys Hernandez to shore up their starting pitching. Good luck with that…
Lisa,
Anyone who would have told you Sean Berry, Carl Everett, Derek Bell and Richard Hidalgo were going to have career or breakout seasons all at once prior to the 1998 season would have been called a crackpot or hopelessly optimistic.
Frankly, it seems a bit more realistic to think Brandon Backe, Wandy Rodriguez or Chris Sampson could win 12-15 games this season than it was to project either Jose Lima or Sean Bergman would do so in 1998, much less both of them.
Heck, if the bullpen can revert to a reasonable amount of blown saves and league average ERA – Houston’s already 5-6 games better than they were last season from that standpoint alone.
Lastly, Joe Sheehan can keep his execreble opinions to himself…
(In all honesty and candor, he knows next to nothing about the Astros minor league system and BP has been reduced to snarkiness moreso than being instructive or informative.)
Oh, one more thing… Shane Reynolds had one season in which he’d won more than 10 games prior to 1998 and he won more than 11 games a whopping total of 4 times in his career. Mike Hampton was full of promise prior to 1998 but he won only 11 games that year.
(Yes, I realize W/L is not the full measure of a pitcher…)
I’d take Roy Oswalt and Brandon Backe or Roy Oswalt and Wandy Rodriguez over Shane Reynolds and Mike Hampton any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
Yes, but can Backe make it through a whole year without serious injury?
As someone once said, we’re ALL day to day.
jdollas,
yeh i heard it was somebody hernandez
more washed up guys…
sigh
All speculation aside, there’s enough uncertainty in the league, and in baseball, and injuries, and career years, so that the Astros have a chance to have a good season and even win the division. You can argue the probability, but I’m content to wait and see how the first couple of months go. Should be interesting.
I agree that it’s prudent to wait and see, but I also think it’s imprudent to take a rose-colored glasses approach to this new team, as many fans seem to be doing. There are too many noticeable cracks in the foundation, IMHO.
Rose-colored glasses are never appropriate and, no, I’m not talking from a Mr. Blackwell perspective.
Seriously, I’m not EXPECTING this team to be great (ie the 1998 reference). But then neither am I going to assume definitive prognostications based on past performance are, well, definitive.
steve, jd and michael,
we all know about teams that were supposed to be great but sucked and teams that were supposed to suck, but somehow turned into the cleveland indians in major league.
and most of the guys on this team are gonna play together for the first time in march, and who knows how it is gonna work out
and guesses about future performances are just that, guesses. people have incredible career years, even without roids. people have sudden terrible years for no particular reason. but usually, guys do what they can with their own skill set.
meaning that i don’t expect adam everett up in minnesota to hit 300 with 30 homers and 120 RBIs.
meaning that i don’t expect woody williams to turn into jake peavy or wandy to turn into randy johnson 2001 or backe to turn into roger clemens or any of our other #4/5 starters to look like aces.
meaning that i don’t except wiggy to turn into rolen – or even ensberg – with the glove. meaning that i don’t expect bourn to hit 300 and steal 60 bases and win the GG. meaning that i don’t expect matsui to not be hurt a third of the season.
the improbable is just that – and the few times it happens, we actually remember the ozzie smith home run offn niedenfurer or the kirk gibson homer offn eck.
- smile
or even coming back to win the pennant after being down 15-30…
i just figure – they play the games, we see what happens. and we ignore 2009/2010….