2022 absolutely agrees with me. Between opening day and September 1st 2022 The Astros started 60 games with a 5 man rotation. The starters averaged 5.74 innings per start. They started 71 games with a 6 man rotation and averaged 5.71 innings per start. So with a 6 man rotation, 7 relief pitchers had to cover the same number of innings per game as 8 relief pitchers during a 5 man rotation.
And the Athletic charges a subscription. I think it says Buck T is closely monitoring to see what happens this trade deadline 2023 and wants the new GM to make the good trades for good players to get us over the top! 1 game back of Rangers and Yordan n Altuve might be back tomorrow. Maybe it will all work out soon! Goooooo!
This is the Braves year to win it all. The Astros have a lot of work to do. It will be beyond stellar if Dana can pull something off to get close to Atlanta.
Which means they probably won't just like 2019 for us and all those seasons the Dodgers looked unbeatable.
Let’s not forget we did sweep the Braves at Atl (albeit with a healthy Yordan). their bullpen had been hit hard with injuries
Long ways to October. Some players fall off others catch fire. Some teams explode some implode. If the Astros can get to October baseball, experience on how to do it and how not to do it will be huge for this team. They have the confidence that they can win any series no matter what the situation is. Dana needs to find another pitcher that can eat up Innings until October and a couple high leverage arms for the playoffs. JP France has done an amazing job but the most Innings he's ever pitched in a season is 114 in 202, he's already at 104 this season. Hopefully Urquidy can get geared up and have a decent second half. We need arms.
They said the same thing about us in 2019... but... game still gotta be played on the field and not on paper.
Ten smaller trade deadline deals that could make a big impact for contenders Astros get Michael Lorenzen The co-creator of Stuff+, Max Bay, now works for the Astros. In a possibly related matter, the Astros have the best Stuff+ in baseball. Lorenzen does not have the best Stuff+ on the market. That belongs (of course) to Shohei Ohtani. He also doesn’t have the second-best. That’s Dylan Cease. In fact, he’s not in the top five of this handy chart created by throwing most of the starting pitchers on Jim Bowden’s available list onto a custom leaderboard on FanGraphs. What you might notice is that Lorenzen is one of eight starters with above-average stuff that’s available this deadline, and as a rental without a long track record, he has to be one of the cheaper gets on the list. He has sneakily good stuff thanks to a sweeper he added in 2022. Vid But he also throws five or six other pitches that are all close to league-average by Stuff+. That represents an opportunity to tweak a pitch or the mix to coax more strikeouts out of the 31-year-old righty. An added benefit is that he has experience in the pen and the rotation, and could easily be a big glue guy for them in the postseason.
Lorenzen would be an underwhelming but good add. If Houston is going to go safe/cheap this deadline, he’s a great target because he can be a Game 4 SP or flip to the pen, and there’s a chance Houston could help him take another step up in performance.
I wasn't thrilled with the piece that Chandler posted regarding Brown's view of the deadline. I hope it's just fluff because Jose Urquidy isn't a workhorse. Unless Javier can get it together, they need a number 2 to place behind Valdez. Even if Javier can get it together, this rotation needs help including the pen. I understand the thought process of not going after a bat with Yordan and Altuve coming back. If they are still looking at a left-handed bat, that means they know Brantley isn't coming back. I don't think anyone was expecting him to make it.
He could also play the OF and pinch hit! Just playing but I had no idea he has played the outfield a decent amount back in 2018/2019. Seems like he really could be capable of pinch hitting, playing the outfield and pitching but that ship has probably sailed. I would like to see more teams give pitchers a shot at being able to play the field and pitch in the lower levels of minors as well as college until they prove they can't handle it or just aren't good enough one way or another.
And there's no 100% certain Atlanta makes it to the World Series. I expect the Dodgers and Phillies to look different after the trade deadline.
