Click here to check it out.
Naturally, I know all yall incredibly eager to read the Astros forecast written by yours truly, so I will post part of it. Now mind, I had to submit this before the brilliant moves by Drayton McLane to form the Blum-Boone-no platoon at 3B and the swift move to sign Matt Kata to replace Mark Loretta as all-purpose backup infielder (1/4 the price, 1/4 the production) and the stealing of ace Russ Ortiz for pennies on the dollar, so this is why they weren’t included.
Check it out:
“What Happened:
- The Astros had a better year than I expected, thanks to Lance Berkman carrying the team through the first half, and then Carlos Lee and Ty Wigginton picking up after the All-Star break. As usual, the Astros picked it up after the ASB, going 42-24, unfortunately encouraging the owner to believe that the team was better than it was.
As usual, the Astros ended April on a losing note, partly because Roy Oswalt was struggling, partly because Valverde was blowing saves and also because Bourn and Towles were significantly underperforming. The Astros had an outstanding May because Lance Berkman couldn’t be gotten out and Miguel Tejada and Hunter Pence had their only good months of the year. They lost and lost and lost in June and hit (hahaha) a low point when pitcher Shawn Chacon, uh, shall we say, expressed his displeasure with Ed Wade by punching him. The manager had clearly lost the team (dissing players to the media is generally not conducive to building a strong working relationship), the new catcher, J.R. Towles had lost his confidence, his swing and his job and the new CF, Michael Bourn, was catching balls but not getting on base.
After the All-Star break, as usual, the team started winning. Ed Wade stunned Astros fans by
1 – trading for failed, DFA’d Yankee reliever LaTroy Hawkins, who was promptly installed in the setup role after Doug Brocail ran out of gas, and promptly ran off a string of 22 scoreless appearances which lasted until the last game of the season
2 – trading for starting pitcher Randy Wolf, who actually pitched better than expected for the Astros, who won all but 3 of his 12 starts.
The Astros responded by winning, especially because Carlos Lee upped his game, hitting .371 in July. In August, he had already driven in 13 runs when he was knocked out for the year on August 9th when hit by a pitch that broke his pinky. And when Ty Wigginton was installed in left, HE responded by going on the hitting streak of his life, hitting .369, hitting 12 homers and driving in 27 runs until he also was hurt September 5.
In fact, the Astros appeared to be ready to compete for the Wild Card when disaster hit. A gigantic hurricane headed straight for Houston. The owner, even with a minimum of 5 days advance knowledge of the direction and scope of the storm, was unwilling to risk losing the gate from 3 sold out Cubs games, delayed rescheduling/relocating them until it was far too late. Bud Selig moved the games to Milwaukee (instead of more fan-friendly Arlington, which was available) and the shell shocked, exhausted, sleep deprived Astros promptly allowed the Cubs to pitch a no-hitter, then a 2 hitter. They lost the last game of the series before heading to Florida to lose 3 more, which effectively, permanently knocked them out of the Wild Card race.
Not that Drayton McLane was willing to shoulder any blame for his idiotic decision, not that he would allow himself to wonder what had he done to be a champion that year. The players should have just sucked it up, not worried about their families, none of whom were evacuated, and acted as if they were in their own stadium and just won.
I should mention that the Astros’ team defense was the 3rd best in the NL and that they made the fewest errors of any NL team. Both Tejada and Wigginton far outperformed expectations, Lance Berkman looked like J.T. Snow with the glove and Michael Bourn was excellent in center, as were Erstad and Abercrombie. Carlos Lee was, as usual, a cement statue in left, but Cecil Cooper had the sense to pull him for Erstad in the late innings if the Astros were ahead.
But sometimes, the whole actually IS better than the sum of its parts, and the 2008 Astros exemplified that.
Reasons to be Optimistic:
- every time I am POSITIVE the Astros are going nowhere, they make one of their patented second half runs and make it, at the very least, interesting.
Reasons to be Pessimistic:
The team will remain essentially the same and its weaknesses have not been addressed:
1 – The rotation consists of Oswalt, Hampton, Wandy Rodriguez, Brian Moehler and Ida Know-Hu. A rotation consisting of one ace, an acceptable 3rd starter when healthy, one 38 year old who had performed so poorly that he had been relegated to mopup duty before having a decent year last year, and a guy who had been on the DL with one surgery after another for 3 years doesn’t scream “CHAMPIONS” to me.
2 – Ty Wigginton, the third best hitter on the team, is gone and has been replaced by Geoff Blum, who is not good enough with either bat or glove to be a full time third baseman.
3 – Miguel Tejada, whose bat was already in severe decline, is even older, and will most likely decline more.
4 – Kaz Matsui will spent 1/3 of the year on the DL, as usual, and instead of Loretta/Newhan filling in, we will have some cheap replacement-level filler like Tomas Perez or Jose Castillo
5 – Humberto Quintero, a worse hitter than Brad Ausmus, can’t frame a pitch to save his life and will be the main catcher, and neither Roy Oswalt nor Wandy Rodriguez appear to like throwing to him.
6 – The players do not appear to like playing for the manager, who rips them to the media. And once again, the manager was not permitted to select his own bench coach. The pitchers do NOT like the pitching coach and he has not been replaced.
7 – The 4 most highly paid players can not be traded for prospects – 3 because they have no-trade clauses and one because his contract significantly exceeds his value.
8 – Every time I am pessimistic about the future of the team, they perform better than I expect.
Now I know you are anxious to buy the book, not just to finish MY chapter, but to read all the chapters on each team, the projections, the player comments, and the latest of stattiest stats. So click
here to buy the book straight from the publisher.
Full Disclaimer: I get paid a few bucks for writing my chapter. Period. The rest of the money earned on this book goes to pay for the stats we buy from BIS and the cost of running the website. I sure do WISH i could say that this book will make me rich as Oprah, but no such luck…
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Lisa – To follow up your endless (and very accurate) rants about the trava-sham-mockery that is our minor league system, I ran across this post on a Nationals blog that gloats (tongue in cheek) about the Nats being 29th in farm system rankings, ahead of only one team….
http://www.halfstreetblues.com/2009/01/whos-worst-franchise-in-baseball-not-us.html
There’s a link in there to the ESPN rankings of the farm systems. For those without the Insider subscription who can’t read the Astros summary, I’ll post the gist:
“Houston’s farm system looks like General Sherman marched through it, then turned around and marched through it again just to be sure the job was done. The Astros’ 2007 draft class might turn out to be one of the worst in history: They had no picks in the first round (for Carlos Lee) or second round (for the now-retired Woody Williams), and they failed to sign either their third- or fourth-round pick (one of whom, Georgia Tech shortstop Derek Dietrich, looks like a sure top-50 pick for 2010). Two of the top six players they did sign were released in October, and their top signed pick, Colin Dellome, just posted a .305 OBP in high-A at age 22.
Their 2008 draft was better — not that it could have been worse — with two promising high school arms in Ross Seaton and Jordan Lyles and one solid catching prospect in Jason Castro. The organization’s decision to turn its back on Venezuela might reflect the nation’s political instability, but it also leaves the Astros among the least-advanced teams in international scouting. There are lean times ahead in Houston, and even a massive shift toward rebuilding won’t stop the oncoming drought.”
Who else is feelin’ optimistic about our ‘Stros!!!
and everyone complains about what a pessimist i am
it wasn’t just one bad draft
take a look at 02-06. take a look at the top 5 picks. i actually wrote a series of posts after the end of the season back in 04 when i went through the astros previous 5 drafts and i was horrified THEN. i wrote a couple of posts since then looking at the astros top 10 picks every year. it is not pretty.
i don’t know whether or not it is poor selection or poor training/teaching, but the last really good crop of guys to come up were all drafted in the late 90s
burkie-poo wasn’t a bad draft pick, as i keep hearing. he was a FINE ballplayer until he injured his shoulder and had it repaired – he wasn’t the same guy.
any prospect/good young player we had over the past 4 years has been traded away and we have basically nothing left.
I remember those posts on their draft picks. That was one of the most in-depth baseball stories I’ve ever read. Superb. I mean, in a depressing “what on earth is my team doing?” kind of way. lol
Yes, those were great posts back then that really opened my eyes to where the future of this organization was heading in the years to come. Roger and the runs in 04-06 really just masked and delayed the inevitable downfall that was to come due to the dwindling lack of minor league talent in the organization. Hasn’t seemed to get better in recent years either. I too am a pessimist by nature when it comes to my favorite teams, so hearing stuff like this doesn’t help raise my hopes…
With the Titans heartbreaking loss a few weeks ago to abruptly end a promising 13-win season, the Rockets constant high-hopes-leading-to-1st-round-exit-disappointment year after year, and watching my Astros fall apart since the World Series run in 2005, I don’t know how much more I can take. Luckily, being a lifelong fan of Houston teams gives me an uncanny ability to absorb and rebound from endless disappointment
Lisa and I have that in common. I have a friend who is a die-hard fan of the Astros and the Longhorns. He thinks I’m a pessimist, but I’m really a realist. Admittedly, I rained on his parade when the Astros made the World Series a few years ago. But I knew then that the Astros had no youth to maintain the winning and that the second Roger and Andy hit the door that they’d hit the skids. And that’s exactly what happened. Lisa and I have been dead right the whole time. Pupu, Wade and Mr. McGrocer have been looking for bandaids ever since, not realizing this team is NOT just a gritty veteran away from another miracle playoff run. More on that to come…
Not to worry. Towles will get his groove back and slide over to 3B. Bourn will become an elite CF. Castro will rock and roll. And Lisa will find us a minor league starter who is ready for the opportunity of a lifetime.
I wish austin and lisa were running this team.
smile
thank you
the difference between austin + me and unca draytie is that we want this team to WIN, not just compete.
seems to me there’s really 2 parts to running a baseball team
1 – getting fans interested in the ML team and filling the stadium
2 – the entire minor league operation, which is picking minor league guys AND teaching them
unca draytie and pam gardner (yeah, give the grrrl her due – she is sharp as a tack and understands the business of getting fans in the stadium) have done a good job with part 1 but for some reason, drayton has NOT picked good people for part 2.
now i actually DO understand that when it comes to prospects, youneverknow – even ignoring injuries, guys from round 49 can become sound major leaguers and guys from round 1 can crap out (can you say – robert stiehl, mike rosamond – etc)
so there is not only identifying talent BUT there is also doing the best you can with what you have got and not forcing players into roles YOU want because of how they look – or some silliness like that.
as well as not getting rid of young guys because you personally don’t like them for whatever reason – phil barzilla, matt albers, LUKE SCOTT!!!! etc
but my question is – WHY is it that none of these guys can be taught? what happened to mitch einertson and eli iorg? why this expectation that any guy who is called up MUST come up and hit like pujols (sure nuff didn’t happen with, say, st. biggio)
Also, you need to not get obsessed with niche players. Like say, lefty relievers, middle relievers, guys from Texas, “gritty” veterans, utility players, platoon players, former Phillies and former Tigers…
You know, just to name a few. lol
lol…thanks! While part of me thinks of that as my dream job, the other part doesn’t want the stress. There’s a reason I’m targeting journalism, and it’s not just because I like writing (though I LOVE writing). It’s in part because I like my largely unscrutinized position in the sports world.
Hey guys thats exactly why i wish you were running the show.
smile
one of these days, i am going to try to do some investigative reporting, find someone who WAS in baseball, who is now OUT of baseball, won’t be going back, has no sons/grandsons, and try to get him to talk to me about the minor leagues and how things REALLY are.
because i really want to know why so few guys are able to succeed and why guys who seem to do very well in AAA usually aren’t given a chance in the majors