I keep hoping for SOME sort of new news, but no such luck. The only lip flapping has been some of the writers horrified that other writers do not think that Ryan Howard was MVP ONLY because he hit more RBIs than anyone else and he had an .893 OPS on the pennant winning team only in September because the rest of the season doesn’t matter – he absolutely sucked the other 5 months, but hey, like, so? Why not rename the MVP – the guy the writers think makes the best story for “player of the month in September on one of the 4 winning teams.” Good grief. And, by the way, Andre Ethier AND MannyBManny seriously outplayed Howard in September – but hey, not as many RBIs because of teammate suckage, but teammates don’t matter.
But I digress.
Looks as if we are headed down a very very slippery slope into a severe recession/depression and McLane, as usual, is not raising the payroll. Oh yeah, there is some sort of the usual bull about how the payroll is really more like 100 mill instead of 90 mill, but some of us can add. Trouble is that the Astros are already starting with Berkman at 14.5 mill + Oswalt at 14 mill + Clank at 18.5 mill + Tejada at 13 mill + Kaz Matsui at 5.3 mill + Geoff Blum at 1.3 mill + Hawkins at 3.5 mill + Erstad at 1.75 mill = 71.85 mill and that means they have to have 17 more players for 20-30 mill.
If they do not trade Wiggy and Valverde, together earming about 10 mill this year, who will certainly earn raises of a good 3-4 mill each, it will mean needing 16 players for 10-12 mill. And let’s not forget Wandy, who is arb eligible for the first time and will earn at LEAST 3 mill. So that will be 15 guys for 10 mill. Oh yeah – Geoff Geary already has a guaranteed contract for 1.125 mill. So make that 14 guys for less than 10 mill.
And unless Drayton ups the payroll (yeah, surrrrrre) then SOMEone has got to go.
Tejada is the most expensive guy here. I know he hit .283, but unlike a whole lot of other Astros fans, I think that it is important to understand that he made very little of his opportunities to drive in runners – he came to bat with (if I am counting correctly) 704 men on base and he drove in only 57 of them (not counting 9 solo homers) AND he grounded into 32 DPs and and (if I went back and counted) I would bet twice that many FC. I keep reminding everyone that in 666 PA, he got on base with 6 HBP, 20 BB, 4 IBB, 125 singles, 38 doubles, 3 triples, 13 homers and 1 ROE. I might could add that he also got caught stealing 7 times with 7 SB, and complied a magnificient (-)27 RCAA, second last only to Michael Bourn. I will finally add that batting from the 3 hole (mostly) and the 5 hole, he created only 63 runs, 1 more than Adam Everett in 06 batting from the 8 hole behind Brad Ausmus.
It would be cheaper to keep Wiggy and play Tommy Manzella (just placed on the 40 man), an Adam Everett clone in AAA who will instantly earn the enmity of Astros fans by hitting like Michael Bourn. Because BA is all that matters. I should add, by the way, that Everett’s BA with RISP was around .280 his last 2 full years with the Astros, and Tejada’s last year was .237. I can’t think of any reason to keep Tejada instead of Wiggy, who created more runs and has more power and GIDP significantly less.
You might could talk about trade value – well, let’s be real, we certainly wouldn’t get much for Tejada, but even if we got a sack of baseballs, it would still provide 13 mill worth of salary relief, 7 or 8 of which could be spent on Wiggy and another 5 toward something we NEED, like a starter.
Wiggy would be more expensive per year than FA Casey Blake, but then again, it would only be for 1 year.
The most recent “rules” according to economics seem to be that (usually) the team who takes on salary doesn’t give up real too much in the way of top prospects. The other teams are NOT gonna give up cheap young major leaguers OR cheap young top prospects. Then again, the Astros really don’t have any, so any decent prospects would be good.
As for homegrown options for third? Well, there is Mark Saccomanno, but Ricky Bennett has made it plain that they would consider him ONLY in a pinch hitting role IF they even want him on the ML team. Guess his glove is on par with Mike Lamb. Or worse.
There is Chris Johnson, age 24, picked in the 4th round of the 06 draft whose minor league numbers are not exactly Evan Longoria/Ryan Braun – 517 OPS in Rookie Ball, 712 OPS at low A in 225 AB, then a .695 OPS at high A in 224 AB. Amazingly enough, he was promoted to AA (doesn’t say much for whoever’s place he took there in Corpus, does it) where he pounded the ball – .870 OPS in 330 AB, then back down to a .539 OPS in 101 AB at AAA. He doesn’t walk much (approximately 39 BB/500 AB) and he strikes out around 90 times/500 AB. He only hit for power in AA, not in the low minors or AAA. He made 23 errors in 84 games at AA. He sure nuff doesn’t seem ready for the majors to me.
Oh yeah. And please, Blum can NOT play full time.
As for trading Valverde, well, BEFORE we do, might could I ask
- to who? And seriously, what could we get for him? Please don’t waste your time explaining how the Mariners are gonna WANT to trade Beltre (not cheap) and King Felix for him – or something equally stupid.
- and speaking of who, WHO is then gonna close? There is NOBODY on the major league club or at AAA or at AA who is closer material. NOBODY.
This means that we would have to get someone in trade for Tejada or Wiggy who would be good enough to close. Unless we got lucky, no club is going to trade a good, top notch cheap young reliever for salary dumps. So as for me, I say NO to trading an essential top player who we can’t replace.
I know lots of Astros fans want Wandy off the team – and think he wouldn’t bring much because he’s terrible and sucks and has emotion or something. You would replace him with WHO?
Remembering, of course, that Drayton is NOT gonna sign Garland, Lowe, Burnett, Sabathia, Sheets (unless he signs a very low incentive type deal) because he doesn’t want to raise payroll – except for top ace Randy Wolf. And he isn’t gonna sign any other expensive FA or any Boras client.
Oh yeah – and please, Michael Bourn has like NO trade value, so let’s not talk about trading him for anything of value, let alone playing Pence in center and Bogusevic in right. And apparently, the Organization is in love with Pence and he isn’t up for trade.
Tags: Houston Astros
I would trade all three. It would be sad to see Wiggy go, but he would prbably leave in a year anyway. I thought he really outperformed my expectations.
Who would take Tejada. Tejada couldn’t even put up decent numbers in the juicebox. Only Drayton has a man-crush for him. I would love to see him go, but I’m pretty sure very few people would want him, and the only teams that would be fine with taking on a huge contract like that have pretty good lineups without him.
I am still, and always been, for trading Valverde. To me, closers are the closest thing to NFL rb’s. They really do grow on trees. Great ones don’t, but serviceable ones do. Sure, when Wag left, the Stros had Dotel and Lidge in waiting, and there is no one current that approaches either of them, but someone could just bubble up (Sammy Gervacio??? – I may be stretching). There are always scrap-heap FA too. Look at the A’s. At the hieght of moneyball, they had Isringhausen, got rid of him, Billy Koch, got rid of him, and then Foulke, then got rid of him, and finally Huston Street. Closers are easier to replace than most positions. Also, Valverde would get something in return from a closer-mad team. The Mets are logical for wanting Jose, however they have little in return.
From what I’m hearing from Justice and them Chronicle guys is that McLane and Wade are actively shopping Valverde and Wiggy. They should at least attempt to shop Miggy, but I guess Wade doesn’t like the sound of other GM’s laughing at him.
Anyway, should be interesting.
daniel,
who would you replace wiggy with?
we might could get the A’s to take tejada IF they don’t get furcal, but knowing them, the astros would have to eat a chink of salary. crosby is close to useless, so who would we get back?
as for a closer, well yes, you talk about lidge, dotel when trading billy, BUT we already had them on the team, had seen them in ML action for a year AND knew how good they were. there is nobody like that on the ML team.
who looks ready in the minors? i mean, they are gonna be throwing to major league hitters in a do or die situation. gervacio sure doesn’t look anything like lidge did inthe minors
as for billy beane, he traded for izzy/koch who were ALREADY major league closers. you haven’t seen him do something like that in over 5 years.
i have got NO problem with shopping any player BUT you have to have replacements for anyone you get rid of. if a team WANTS a closer, why on earth would they give us back a young cheap closer?
I agree with most of what you say. I really don’t know who we would replace these guys with, but I would rather get something, than lose them one year for now. I wouldn’t trade Wiggy. He was quite dependable when healthy. As I said, he has far outperformed my expectations.
However, he, as would Valverde, would become too expensive for McLane in another year. I’m aware there is no one in the minors that looks like a closer, however, I just feel like closer is a position that you can get a dependable one from alot of places. Great ones come along rarely, however stable ones are not that hard to find. You can even find scrapheap options, like a David Weathers type.
It really will be interesting. If they can dump Tejada, and get even a bag of balls back, I’ll take it. I would hate to see Wiggy go, but I would rather have him go now, and get something back. Unless, he becomes a type-A and we can get compensation.
thing is about closers – as we’ve seen in other teams, not every reliever succeeds at closing. unlike a lot of reporters, i got no trouble with a “closer by committee”
BUT
then you gotta have a committee
you have to have at least one plan AND a fallback option in place BEFORE you get rid of a closer. because you can’t have the villanuevas of the world going out there.
besides, i think there really IS a psychological component to the 9th inning. when u send a guy up there who everyone KNOWS is tough to beat, it DOES have an effect on the other team. any hitter would rather face david weathers than lidge/rivera – and i think that there absolutely MUST be a component of “confidence” to BOTH hitting and pitching because the players THEMSELVES believe in it.
i know that for a while wesley wright/geoff geary/any ol dude we get in a trade or pick up offn the scrap heap just might could do fine for a while. BUT if he fails after a while, THEN what?
Can we get Lamb back? The Brewers signed him for the stretch run after he was released by Minnesota – we might have dropped the ball on that one. His third base fielding improved dramatically over the previous couple years – he had more confidence and was going after balls he had just let go by previously (so his actual stats may not look better, but his run prevention does). And he was starting to make some impressive plays.
He had a lousy year in MIN, so he might be available. We all know he can hit.
We should keep Valverde – he gets the job done. If we get Lamb back, Sutton and Soccomanno can be slowly worked in at 3B. Like I guess we should have slowly worked in Towles – I don’t know what the heck happened to him, but down underneath that super-funk, he is a good ballplayer.
Hopefully Towles and Bourn will both take a step forward in 2009.
…and bring back the Big Unit!
sure we COULD get lamb back – the twins have to pay him 3 mill in 09.
but like luke scott, the Organization wanted him gone. they wouldn’t let him play hardly at all the last 2 months of 07. i would be real surprised if they let him come back. after all, they have replacement level player Blum to hit from the left side
i wouldn’t want to give up valverde unless it was a complete rebuilding year with pretty much all rooks. which won’t happen. hoffman does not look real too good any more, and no one cheap is available. sure we MIGHT could get lucky with some middle reliever who is cheap, but youneverknow
sutton is a 2B, so we don’t need labm to work him in
as for towles, he was fine until that day in arizona when his homerun was called a double. i don’t know whether or not coop screwed him up of sean berry did, but he was hopeless after that. i hope dave clark got him back on track in AAA.
because quintero is even worse than brad ausmus
not sure if randy johnson would agree to come back here or how much he would want. but he ain’t who he used to be.
but then again he’d be here for #300 so drayton could sell some tickets
He may not strike out 350 anymore, but Randy has still got it. And he is AVAILABLE for courting.
2008 stats -
184.0 innings, 184 hits, 173 K’s, 11-10 W-L, BAA .260 ERA 3.91, WHIP 1.24
Another attraction is the one year contract. The economic world may look quite different in 2010.
i agree about the 1 year contract thing. i seriously doubt he WANTS to go back to the east coast. not that i blame him.
but i am not thrilled about giving up draft picks AGAIN…
and i would be surprised if the economic world DIDN’T look different next year
The draft pick issue is a very good point. We have gone that route too many times.
Hey all first time poster long time Astros fan. I am on the espn message board alot. I hope whatever this team does will help. I would like them to pickup Peavy some how without losing Pence.
hi jamie!!!
welcome!!!
i would guess all of us astros fans would like to get peavy – trouble is that whatever it is that the padres are demanding, we ain’t got.
peavy is more valuable than pence, that is fer SHER. ace pitchers >>>>> RF with an .800 OPS who are lousy baserunners. pence had a pretty meh year. but then again, the guy is only 25, i’m not exactly giving up on him, but he sure doesn’t look like a star, and i don’t equate enthusiasm with excellence.
but they obviously want a LOT more than pence – and we simply have an almost empty farm.
Sutton and third base, just to keep the comment list going.
http://www.crookedpitch.com/390/drew-sutton-looking-to-crash-astros-party-in-2009/
Saccomanno is WORSE than Lamb at third. And you know what that means coming from me. He’s a solid first baseman, but there’s a reason they moved him. He makes decent stabs and stops over at third, but you hold your breath every single time the ball leaves his hand. It’s hideous.
I still don’t get the fixation with Tejada. He’s a DUD with a capital SUCKS.
worse than lamb???!!!
here and i thought that only ryan braun was worse than lamb.
well then, they are going to have to either keep wiggy, promote chris johnson or find an elcheapo (nor likely) replacement
and i never got the tejada thing neither, as you know. but fans see the “enthusiasm” and the .283 BA and that is all they want/need. i could handle it for about 12 mill a year less. remember all the people who were so SURE he would hit 50 homers in the Box?