From what I recall, AJ Pierzinski personality that grated with Biggio and Bagwell. As for Bell, lack of effort if he didn't get a spot in a certain place in the batting order.
I think Mitch meluskey punched a player in the locker room or something. That **** doesn't fly in a biggio bagwell locker room environment.
"A season already gone bad took an even darker turn for Houston on Sunday when rookie catcher Mitch Meluskey punched teammate Matt Mieske in the eye during batting practice prior to a 4-1 loss to San Diego. Mieske was cut over his left eye. According to witnesses, Meluskey was late for his turn in the batting cage and jumped in ahead of Mieske. The two exchanged words, and Meluskey hit Mieske when the two were outside the cage. Several veterans were upset with the fight and were not afraid to voice their opinions. "To me, it has everything to do with respect," Craig Biggio said. "You know, some people have it and some people don't. I'm going to leave it at that. There's no way in the world something like that should happen." "This is the time when we have to stick together as a family," said starter Jose Lima, "I don't appreciate something like this happening." There was no immediate word on whether or not the Astros planned to take any disciplinary action against Meluskey
Ken Giles has punched himself in the face while entering the chat about current players who were disliked.
Dusty needs to stop playing Maldy from now on. Period! I don't care if he is Valdez & Verlander's favorites. They don't run this team. We need the best hitters in the lineup moving forward every night.
From ESPN: What has surprised us: Call this a non-surprise surprise, but boy does Baker love catcher Martin Maldonado. Statistically, Maldonado is the worst postseason hitter in history among those with at least 150 plate appearances. His framing metrics were among the worst in the game. He had a terrible season throwing out base stealers. Yainer Diaz is a much superior offensive player, had a much better rate throwing out runners and the Astros had a better record when he started at catcher than Maldonado -- .619 winning percentage versus .534. But Baker trusts Maldonado, and the veteran got all four starts against the Twins (Diaz got one start at DH). At some point the Astros may need more offense. Will Baker be willing to sit his guy?
Probably not even willing to pinch hit for him down big before the 8th inning. Impressive that Maldonado is the worst that's ever done it in major league history in the post season. I think if you would have made me guess I'd guess bottom five but not absolute worst.
Watch the last strike from Presley in the twins game. The hitter was expecting curve ball, maldanado setup for a breaking pitch with his leg out, he pointed to the ground with his glove, and the pitch was a fastball that froze the hitter. This is part of the reason why the pitching staff loves him. His ability to call the game, adjust it, and fool hitters.
Cool. Presleys era is like 4 with maldonado and like 0.7 with Diaz. I can’t imagine that he would have been able to locate a fastball if Diaz would have been back there. hell, Framber probably would throw the ball from the mound to left field of maldy wasn’t telling him where to pitch to. read it again- he’s almost the worst framer in all of baseball. He’s historically the worst hitter ever in the post season. The team wins at an 85 win pace with him catching and a 100 win pace with Diaz (and diaz isn’t allowed to catch the good pitchers). Literally, everything anyone says about him is anecdotal narrative framing to explain a result. I’m glad you will be thanking Dusty for burying him on the bench though when he’s playing in multiple all star games and catching 110 sun teams. Dusty told us the city, organization and diaz would all thank him for burying him. You are at the head of the line. Congrats!
This narrative that the pitchers just prefer and trust Maldy is such bs simply because we have no evidence what it would be like if they had to throw to Diaz. Because Dusty absolutely refused to let Diaz catch Framber or Verlander we have no clue what those pairings would look like. I can't remember if Diaz caught Javier or not. Dusty has backed us into a corner simply because he wouldn't give Diaz any chance. Here you go: Thank you Dusty!
