Right, but if anything, I suspect Luhnow wishes he had coughed up a few prospects to get another team to take Reddick, so he would have the money to sign Morton..... and then have Tucker in the outfield.
I am pretty sure Crane has given Luhnow a salary cap. Astros are going to win a lot of games with or without Morton. Winning in postseason is still not guaranteed with or without Morton.
This hits the nail on the head. Makes me think that it would be in the best interest of the team to pick up a 4th/5th starter ASAP, to ease the load on the bullpen. Cashner was picked up for scraps by Boston, and he would have been perfect for this team's immediate needs.
Oh no, Astros staff wasted some time filling out paperwork to offer Keuchel a QO. The horror. The horror.
The Astros already had two bullpen guys who have proven to fade as the season goes on (Harris, Devo). James has been a disappointing enigma, but still will end up accumulating a lot of appearances. Joe Smith may be the defacto steadier of the bullpen
We have to consider that it is Hinch who wears out his bullpen. He did that when he had 5 good starters.
Look, there is no evidence in the history of baseball that a team can lose 3/5th of the starters on a 100 win team without taking a severe hit. We are seeing that now. Who is actually pitching well right now? Cole? Pressley? Miley? Sort of. Verlander will right the ship, but nobody else can be counted on and that's because management had an inordinate faith that the young pitchers would step. They have not. They will have to give up a lot to get difference makers on the pitching staff. More than paying Morton $17 million.
Astros bullpen pitchers, on average, don't pitch more innings or make more appearances than other team's bullpen pitchers. He intentionally tried to limit Harris' work load last season... and Harris still regressed. Sometimes, arms are just not cut out for the entire season. Its also not as if Hinch is purposely not pitching some great bullpen guys just to stick with his favorites. If it were up to the BBS, Rondon, Devo, bad Josh James, and bad Harris would never pitch in any high leverage situations.
I counted Rondon/Devenski/Armenteros as a single starting pitching performance last night, so adding that into the 23 starts outside of our core four, that's now a collective 7.12 ERA. No words. Scratching for any kind of good news, I'm sure Sneed gets the call next after his 7IP, 5H, 0ER, 1BB, 7K outing last night, probably the best one in AAA all year. Can't ask for better timing on that one, maybe he has the clutch gene, doesn't hurt that he's a man's man who hunts in Alaska in his free time. He did hit 95 in his last Astros outing, averaging 92.7 with above average spin rate, whereas he had an 89-92 mph fastball range and a 'mediocre curve' when we first traded Villar for him in 2015.
It fascinates how deep narrative roots can go... Everyone should forever remember and appreciate Morton's World Series performance... but it has obscured the fact he was he got absolutely blasted in his first '17 ALCS start (7 ER in 3.2 IP) and was outright terrible last postseason (could not make it out of the third inning in his one and only start). I'm not by any means slagging Morton nor arguing for his departure - I'd be thrilled if he was still here. But! There's absolutely a faction of Astros fans who *only* sees, well, frankly, his game 7 performance as the norm and then work their way from there. He is, like most not-ace pitchers, capable of being very good/bad in any random playoff start. He think he'd help us win the division easier; but he doesn't guarantee any additional playoff success.
No he didn't. Didn't our bullpen pitch the fewest innings in baseball last year? We've gone through this freakout the last 2 years. The end result will be the same as the previous times. No one guarantees playoff success - see Randy Johnson, 1998. But Morton is certainly an ace pitcher - he was something like 7th or 8th in ERA last year and #1 this year.
They do pitch in more leverage situations. That said, I'm not too worried about pen being overworked except Pressly and Osuna. Those are the guys that are going to be backbone of pen in playoffs.
Yep. I think Peacock, James, Pressly, and Osuna will be the 4 main relievers in the playoffs. Smith, Harris, Rondon, and McHugh will only appear in low leverage situations or extra innings (at this point I don’t think Devenski makes the playoff roster).
I'm guessing at least 1 of Smith, Rondon, and McHugh don't make roster as well as I expect Astros to add a reliever at deadline. Maybe 2 relievers at deadline.
I’d be really surprised if they added 2 since that would mean either optioning both James and Devenski or cutting a veteran loose. But agree it would make sense for them to add 1, which would bump one of those 3 guys you mentioned off the playoff roster.