Austin Hedges seems more available and more the Astros' type with his defense. I don't really have any sense for what it would take to acquire him, though.
@Nook where do you think guys like Bumgarner and Ryu are going to end up? Have you heard anything about them? Seems like no one is really in a hurry to sign them at this point.
you're worrying over nothing. What's going to be wrong is Manfred is going to come down harder on the Stros than he did on the Yankees/Red Sox for doing the exact same thing. MLB doesn't like the fact that Luhnow showed other teams that if you want to compete with the big market teams the only way to do it is to tank.
If Crane gets fined and they lose a couple of draft picks in exchange for a WS victory I can live with this. I would expect them to get what the Yankees/Red Sox got.
The Yankees / Red Sox were punished early. And then the league announced a new ban on all that stuff with bigger consequences. If the Astros did their stuff only in early 2017, I don't think they'll get any real punishment at all. The problem is that it seems likely the Astros stuff was *after* the new ban, which forces the league to come down harder.
This offseason is devolving into one of the worst in recent memory. Kluber to TX doesn’t make them true contenders for the division by any means but losing Cole to the Yanks, Rendon to LAA, Kluber and oh ya the culmination of the sign stealing fiasco is literally a convergence of **** I’d never imagine. hoping we make something happen, even if it’s to help sway the amount of negativity surrounding the franchise right now. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if the idiotic situation we’ve put ourselves in has had a significant impact on players wanting to play here.
Delino deshields jr. and minor league Rhp Emmanuel Clase in exchange for kluber.... not sure how high clase is in Texas’ prospect rankings
Looking at other people's reactions, looks like it's an awful deal for the Indians. I'm not familiar with their prospects as well but if it's so bad, surprised other teams(even the Astros although never rumored to be interested) didn't beat the offer.
