To be fair, the first half of that season did go poorly, though obviously they weren't sellers. But they were below 0.500 in July and had fired their manager halfway through the season.
I am on board. I expect this team to put it all together much better than they have since 2022. In the infield and DH they have 6 potential All-Stars for 5 spots. The rotation is lead by a CY contender and 2 talented unproven guys who have TOR potential. Javier and McCullers have both pitched at All-star level in the past and have been much better than expected this spring. There are several more unproven depth options to cover the bottom of the rotation when needed. The bullpen has about a dozen talented guys for 7-8 spots. They just need to figure out which ones will be flukey good and which flukey bad. Diaz and Meyers each have a big tool that raise their floor even if they have another one so poor it lowers their ceiling. That leaves 2 corner OF spots. Between Smith, Loperfido, Matthews, Cole, Trammell, and Dezenzo they just need 2 of them to rise up enough to be good not great. 92 wins and a good postseason run. Drinking the coolaid.
I'm on board with pretty much all of this, the main difference is i'm fairly worried about the pen. I think Abreu will be fine in the 9th, but there are no sure things after that. King was awesome last year but baseball history is full of guys like him who don't have elite stuff and have that ONE great year. We do have a lot of talented guys there, but pitching out of the pen can be so mental. I kind of expect Blubaugh to end up as either the 7th or 8th inning guy. I'll say if our pen is lock down from the 7th inning on: 94+ wins If Abreu is great and 2-3 others are solid but not great: 88-90 wins If Abreu is great but the rest of the pen is a mess: 82-84 wins If Abreu struggles as the closer and no one else really steps up: Pena and possibly others traded at the deadline
I second this, I am going to enjoy this because I love Baseball, I love knowing that I can go home almost every night in the summer and watch my Astros. I don't live and die by every pitch anymore; we climbed the mountain twice and won it all so now I am somewhat content, but I want them to win, I just don't throw my beer at the TV anymore if they don't. Fingers crossed that Hader is back soon...............IMO, if we falter at the start and are not on track to do anything Hader is gone at the trade deadline, the question is who do we get for him
Hader has a full no trade clause (same with McCullers, Correa, Altuve, and Yordan). If the Astros falter and sell at the deadline, it’ll be Paredes, Pena, Abreu, and Brown traded if they’re healthy, and those 4 would bring back a haul that would make Houston’s farm system one of the 3-4 best in the league. Diaz, Walker, Meyers, Imai, Weiss, Okert, and Javier would be dealt if they have value, although if Houston is in position to sell at the deadline then it likely means those guys aren’t having good years. I don’t expect any of that to happen though. I will say I think there’s a lot riding on the first ~30 games or so. I would bet if they start out 16-14 or worse they end up selling at the deadline.
I think we can still make the playoffs especially with our pitching. Seattle won the division with almost no offense other their home run hitter and their trade deadline guys. We just need Cam to do what he did in the first part of last season for most of this season and Walker, Diaz and Meyers to not be horrible with a bat. Obviously health is always a requirement. Now if Matthews and Cole do something, we are cooking with gas and our window is extended for a while. Matthews has a higher probability than Cole. Both have MVP vote potential if they can make contact consistently.
My obsession with Zach Cole has me looking for players that have similar batting profiles as him and the closest I could find is Cal Raleigh. The big difference is Cal makes contact more often. Cal hits for a very low average, walks a lot, and hits the ball hard when he does make contact. They even have similar bat speed and walk rates. Cal hit 60 home runs when he got his average up near 250.
I was really surprised when I looked up how many hitters have hit 30+ bombs in a season while batting less than .220. It’s a lot. In 2021 Kyle Schwarber hit 47 HR batting .197. Guys with elite elite power who know how to take a walk can find success even with a high rate of swing and miss in the zone. MLB pitchers aren’t willing to throw strikes to a guy they know will get extra bases if he makes contact. Cole’s speed makes him even more dangerous because he can easily turn a walk into a double. Couple that with plus OF defense (including elite arm strength) and he is worth seeing how he does with 200+ pa of consistent play.
Thinking outside of the box ... Given a 6 game work week, the Astros could rotate Parades something like: Day 1: Parades at 1B, Walker sits Day 2: Parades at 2B, Altuve sits Day 3: Parades at 3B, Correa sits Day 4: Parades at DH, Alvarez sits Day 5: Parades at DH, Matthews sits, Alvarez at LF Day 6: Parades sits Maybe yes, maybe no. It would actually surprise me, if the Astros did the above (or something like it). But they have to do something with Parades and they have threatened all off season to rest Altuve, Correa and Alvarez.
I agree with a lot of your takes, but I would be shocked if Crane allowed a full sale in any circumstance. Pena and Paredes have an additional year after this year and Brown has 2 more. The only way I would see Crane sign off on moving any of those guys would be for other proven MLB players, not trading them for prospects to suck next year and reset Abreu I could see being moved if we are out of it, but if we start out 16-14 there is no reason to think we will be sellers, we would have to be clearly out of the playoff race for Crane to allow us to make a move aimed toward long term that hurts our chances to win now If we are middling along close to the deadline around .500 and Hader is back and both him and Abreu is dominating, I could see Hader moved in a deal to bring in a LH OF bat or something like that....but I just don't see Crane as a guy who is going to blow up the team for prospects, and especially so if we are not clearly out of the playoff race
As Major said, we were .500 on July 31st. When was the last time a good team sold off their closer? Further, if we were to trade Hader, there’s only a few teams out there that are going to take that contract. Those teams aren’t likely to be selling anyone that will help us this season. If Hader is traded at the deadline, we are likely giving up on the season. I realize there is a world where this happens though.
Yea I think we have the best chance to win the division of anyone in the division Seattle is obviously talented, but they beat us by 3 games last year. They got a historic year from their catcher (60 HR) and the chances of that happen again are slim. Even if he has a GREAT year this year and hits 40 HR, that's a lot of production gone. They added Donovan who is great, but they also lost Suarez who hit 13 HR for them in the last 50 games. Donovan is a different type of player obviously, but again that's a lot of production to replace and especially so in that park. For them to just match what they did last year offensively they will need guys like Young and Emerson to be pretty good Pitching wise they are great, but hard to see them being better than last year. Woo was sub 3 era, Gilbert and Castillo were what they are. Kirby wasn't at his best so maybe he improves, but Miller is already out to start the year. Astros on the other hand got 6 HR from Yordan. Pena had our highest OPS and he missed 30 games, Paredes had our second highest OPS and he missed 60 games, and Altuve likely played hurt most of the year so seeing him getting a little better isn't out of the question. Yes we lost Framber, and even if Imai is really good he won't give us the number of innings we got from Framber. But behind that we had 54 games started between Gusto, Gordon, Lance and Alexander that added up to an ERA north of 5. Anything can happen, but it certainly looks like we will be MUCH better in the rotation overall this year than last Yes we have issues, we have a roster that isn't perfectly put together. But we are still the HOUSTON ASTROS and seattle and the rangers can kiss my fat ass LETS GO!
No real surprises here...Matthews with his performance and versatility earned his spot over Cole, who needs to work on some things. Really the way things have gone this spring and the WBC, Whitcomb is probably ahead of Cole and the rest of the field as far as the first OF callup.
Whitcomb looked good last night. Just wish Matthews or he could play SS to move on from Allen. I'd hope CC as an emergency SS would suffice.
My guess is that it would require adding somebody new to the 40-man roster, and the Astros will use the 15 day IL as a way to maintain roster flexibility until the need arises to add to the 40 man.
Whitcomb played SS exclusively in college and played SS much more than any other position in the minors. They must have no faith in his ability there. When his defense was so bad in his first Astros run in 2024, that was 3B, where he's got much less experience and a poorer track record in the minors. I think they should give him a little opportunity at short. Allen's bat is so bad. Matthews gets to fewer balls and makes more errors at SS than Whitcomb does. But I'd be happy to see either get a real shot at some innings there.
