2015 Astros Regular Season Thread [Archive]

Big T

04-01-2015, 11:06 AM

eagle eye

04-01-2015, 01:53 PM

Opening night Line up predictions.

Altuve 2B .333 7 HR 68 RBI
Lowrie SS .260 4 HR 50 RBI
Springer RF .278 38 HR 117 RBI
Gattis DH .260 30 HR 100 RBI
Carter 1B .220 27 HR 80 RBI
Rasmus LF .242 22 HR 70 RBI
Valbuena 3B .254 18 HR 67 RBI
Marisnick CF .270 8 HR 57 RBI
Castro C .240 15 HR 60 RBI

Rotation

Dallas Keuchel 3.89 ERA 15-9
Scott Feldman 4.28 ERA 10-10
Brett Oberholtzer 4.55 ERA 9-13
Asher Wojo 3.88 ERA 2-3
Collin McHugh 3.88 13-10
Hernandez 5.23 ERA 7-13

Final Record 82-80 Runs Scored: 815 Runs Against: 825

I think the Astros are going to lose a lot of 12-2 games but they will win their fair share of 9-8 or 10-5 games. This team will score runs but not consistently as they have very few OBP guys and a ton of Power guys. In other words they are going to score five runs with four homers and fifteen strikeouts, or one run on no homers and fifteen strikeouts. They also don't have the starting pitching yet to stay in low scoring pitching duels but they do have the bullpen to keep games close late. Expect the bullpen to get worse as the season goes on as I feel they are going to get a lot of work early and tire out towards the end of the season. I fully expect this team to be the surprise of the AL at the All-Star break, maybe even being ten games above .500 but like I stated before they will fade at the end of the year with bullpen issues. If Dallas, Scott, or Collin go down in the beginning of the year it will be a disaster for the starting five. If either Geregerson or Neshek go down in the pen, once again it will be a disaster. This will be a fun team to watch because of their power potential.

I think the Astros have a lot more power but with guys like Altuve, Lowrie and Springer at the top of the lineup and Rasmus and Marisnick at the bottom they are fully able to play small ball. The Stros were basically in the same boat last year and there were too many games where it seemed Houston was waiting for a long ball to bail them out of a deficit. What you're not taking into account is a pretty strong pitching staff. The starters performed well for the most part all season and I haven't seem evidence that they will be any less effective this spring. With more consistent hitting and hopefully fewer strike outs the starters should enjoy more run support. The ace in the hole is the bullpen. Houston let go of some cash to upgrade the pen and instead of a distinct liability the Astros have turned it into a team strength. Will Houston improve 19 games the way they did last season? Who knows but one thing for sure is they will take the field every single day against any opponent with a reasonable expectation of a win.

Big T

04-01-2015, 02:29 PM

eagle eye

04-01-2015, 08:52 PM

I've said it before and I will say it again, if you call that pitching staff "pretty strong" then I would hate to see what you call weak! That is not a "pretty strong" staff in the least. Dallas is a good number three and a some what passable number two, and if Collin can can repeat he is a number three as well. To be a number one or two you have to be dominate and neither pitcher, no matter their numbers, is dominate. Feldman is a very good number four and a passable number three. Hernandez is a five as well as Brett. Asher I think can be a good number four. We have seen such bad pitching that we think if a guy has a ERA in the high three's he is a freaking ace. Is the rotation bad? No. Is it strong" Hell no. It is the rotation of a .500 club.

As for playing small ball, Altuve is a .320+ hitter that has a OBP around .340, Lowrie's highest OBP was .344 in 2013, Springers was .336 last season, Rasmus has a career high .313 OBP, and Marisnik had a career .264 OBP. Where do you see guys that can get on base at a good clip? And then you need to take into account that if the top three guys can get on base at a decent clip, .350+ OBP, Gattis, Carter, and Rasmus would actually have to make contact to drive them in. All three K at a very high rate. This club is literally in the same position as last year. The big exception is that they added a lot more power so they will score more runs, but it is going to take that power to drive the runs in. There will be very little walk, bunt over, and RBI single for this team. It will be Base hit, K, K, Bomb. This team is also going to ground into a ton of double plays. One thing I know for absolute sure, the Astros are going to set the MLB record for K's in a season yet again. Count on it. This team will be all or nothing and it will be fun and frustrating to watch.

Wow, Big T, oh ye of little faith. As for Altuve's OBP, your right about him. After all, how can you dispute the fact he was the AL batting champ as well as the AL leader in stolen bases. Lowrie's 2013 was in the cavernous Oakland A's stadium and as you pointed out in another thread when I bitched about resigning him that 2014 was a down year partly due to that same cavernous outfield. The power alleys are made for a line drive hitter like Lowrie and he's a good base runner and a good situational hitter. Hitting between Altuve and Springer should mean he will see a lot of good pitches. Springer was a rookie in 2014 who didn't even begin the season on the big club. He showed lots of promise and with a full healthy season we may see the power and the speed he brings to the base paths. Gattis has battled injuries and he has shown the ability to hit for average and power. Gattis made his MLB debut in 2013 for god's sake. Make no mistake, he's in Houston for his power but there's no reason the Astros can't work with a guy to cut down on K's. Chris Carter was coached up and he had a real nice 2nd half of 2014. I can't argue with Rasmus but he's another power guy who is working off a one year deal meaning Houston loses nothing if he doesn't hit. You notice Robbie Grossman has been pretty hot. Grossman is a base hitter with some power and Marisnick is another young guy who actually is a base hitter. A .281 OBP can be improved upon and he's done well in spring training. He's another guy who just made his big league debut in 2013.
Now don't get me started on the pitching staff. Are you basing you opinion on ERA or W/L record or some combination of the two. I showed in a thread before spring training that these pitchers are better than their W/L records would indicate. Your opinion of what a No 1 or 2 guy is doesn't account for the fact there have been plenty of No 1's and 2's who didn't dominate. What about Greg Maddux? Ave fastball and good curve. What made Maddux great was control. Maddux didn't dominate he just went out every 4th day and got batters out. Keuchel had the most complete games in the bigs, 5. He also lost one of those because the bullpen blew it after the game went extra innings. Keuchel was 7th in ERA in the AL and he pitched 200 innings. That's No 1 type numbers in my book. Now before you go and say I'm crazy to compare Keuchel with Maddux I'm not saying Keuchel is as good as Maddux was they are just similar type of pitchers. To be in Maddux' league Keuchel will have to do what he did in 2014 for about 10 years. Feldman was a little inconsistent but he was respectable to be considered a No 2. He pitched 180 innings and his 3.74 ERA is certainly respectable. Actually, I think Feldman was the No 3 man in the rotation. The real No 2 was McHugh. He came to Houston in May and still made 25 starts. What he did was end up with the 2nd most wins as starter and the lowest ERA on the team with a 2.73 and a miniscule WHIP of 1.02 both Keuchel and McHugh could have been 18 game winners in 2014 except they rarely got any run support and when they did have a lead the bullpen gave it away. Wojo could certainly be much more than a No 3 or 4 but he's got to prove it when it counts. I'm good with Hernandez as a 5. But if he falters and Wojo doesn't then when Obie is healthy Hernandez is the odd man out. The Astros didn't give him squat they couldn't afford to lose. Obie needs to develop consistency and he's a 4 anyway but all your rotation can't be 1's. I really think you undersell this staff. A lot depends on if 2014 was a fluke but from what I saw and heard in the spring the staff could be in worse hands.

I really think this team can win 85 games if breakout seasons by Altuve, Springer, Keuchel, Carter, McHugh are the same or hopefully better and new comers Lowrie, Gattis and Rasmus perform better than M Gonzalez, Dominguez and Singleton and Jason Castros gets back to his 2013 self. That's a lot of if's but 5 days from opening day everyone is going to the World Series but I am genuinely excited to see the Astros play this year. We all will be able to watch them after 2 years of not watching them. Thank you Root Sports Network.

Big T

04-01-2015, 11:18 PM

First, how can you call me "ye of little faith," when I have the Astros finishing above .500 and ten games above at the All-Star Break?!?! Lol

Jose Atuve, .341 Average .377 OBP 36 BB on 707 plate appearances. Most guys with a average of .341 would have an OBP around .400. The issue with Jed Lowrie, and yes I liked this pick up as it does give the Astros a good two hole hitter, is that his best year was 2013 BA .290, OBP .344, 45 2B and he did that in Oakland. So as much as I defended him and as much as you are defending him now we can't say he had bad numbers because he played in Oakland. He put up All-Star numbers in that monstrosity that they call a ballpark. Springer put up great numbers last year. But, Springer has always been a high K guy. He doesn't know how to cut back his swing when he has two strikes as shown by his .184 average with runners in scoring position. But, that is also what makes him great the fact that he never shortens it up and just lets it fly no matter the situation. But we heap all of this praise on him, and yes he did a great job last year as a rookie, but if I just put .231 BA .336 OBP, 20HR, 8 2B, 1 3B, 3/1 K/BB Ratio and asked you to name the Astros player it belonged to you would not say George Springer. Why? Because that really isn't that impressive of a stats line. I think the guy is going to be great this season and for several seasons after but lets remember that he is young and he will be asked to carry the majority of the offensive load with less than a full season under his belt. Kriss Karter, yes I spelled it with a K, had a lower OBP last season than the season before and only increased his BA by .004, and increased his RBI's by only 6. Think about that.....Breakout season right? Grossman won't sniff the field unless Marisnick just stinks it up at the beginning of the season. All I am saying with this is that the Astros won't be playing small ball. Not bashing the Astros players in any way, I am just pointing out their limitations and their strengths. Limitations, hitting for high average and reaching base. Strengths, hitting lots and lots of home runs. This team has come a loooonnnnggggg way from last season on this side of the ball.

As for the rotation there are guys that have "it" and guys that have "IT". Keuchel has "it". He isn't special, he isn't going to blow you away, hitters are not going to come away saying WOW that guy is great. In fact, if I remember right, and I do, at least three teams talked about how mad they were that they weren't able to hit him when his stuff isn't that great. This caused quite the stir among us Astros fans and there was discussion on this board about it as well as the official Astros boards. No one ever said that about Maddux. Here is a better comparison, Woody Williams. Good pitcher, good stuff, lots of wins, work horse, never dominate when it came to K's, and eliminating 2007 when he pitched for the Stros in that terrible season, he had a career 1.223 WHIP. Woody was never better than a number two on an average team never more than a number three on a good team. As for McHugh, he has to do it again over a full season. If he does that then I will consider him to be a number two. Sorry, I don't think he can. Call me cynical if you wish and I hope to hell he proves me wrong. Feldman is a solid, proven MLB veteran who can get major league hitters out. Once again, not going to dominate but he will get outs and give quality innings. Obie is still pretty young and I am willing to give him this year to find consistency. I am low on this rotation for the simple fact the Feldman is the only one that can show that he can consistently get MLB hitters out. The rest of the rotation still has to prove that. I hope they make me eat my words.

Big T

04-01-2015, 11:25 PM

Here is a fun article on how all MLB teams will be able to capture the WS Pennant this season. It seems pretty legit to me!

http://m.mlb.com/cutfour/2015/04/01/115680786

Big T

04-05-2015, 03:18 PM

Well, tonight is the big night for MLB as the Cardinals face the Cubs to open the season. Tomorrow, everyone else gets under way including our Astros who open the season against the Clevland Indians and facing the reigning Cy Young Award winner Kluber. They are countering Kluber with their own break out star of last year Dallas Keuchel. The Indians are one of the preseason favorites to win the AL Central or grasp one of the Wild Card places. This is going to be a god test and should show Astro fans just where the Astro organization stands when it come to competing with some of the best. Game starts at 6:10. Go Stros!!

KABrother88

04-05-2015, 09:35 PM

I wasn't able to follow ST this year very much and to me opening day snuck up out of no where it seems. Looking forward to a much improved Astros team and one that will get fans back at MMP...already have plans in place to attend a few this year!

KABrother88

04-06-2015, 05:30 PM

Kuechel lookin good through 2 frames

Big T

04-06-2015, 05:38 PM

Kluber looking great as well. Lol 17 pitches through two frames... Ouch. The game was sold out two weeks ago but the crowd looks a bit sparse in portions of the upper deck. Show up people!

Big T

04-06-2015, 06:50 PM

There is your run Kuechel! Make it count! Lol

Big T

04-06-2015, 07:05 PM

Alright EE, Keuchel shut my mouth tonight. He looked like an ace.

Big T

04-06-2015, 07:43 PM

Astros Win 2-0!! That was a game of horrid beauty.

KABrother88

04-06-2015, 07:47 PM

Haha...I'll take the win...Kluber was tough but Kuechel was fantastic tonight...and what a great sight to see the bullpen go 6 up 6 down...very refreshing

eagle eye

04-07-2015, 06:00 AM

Dude, was it a glorious night of baseball or what? The weather was perfect. The atmosphere was amazing and the game did not disappoint. It was priceless! Before I left for the game I was checking out the Bleacher Report and it gave a ranking of the pitching matchups for opening day. The Kluber-Keuchel matchup was ranked the 10th best of the day. For may money, after a quick look around at the box scores and it turned out to be the best of the day.

Kluber went 7.1 innings and threw 102 pitches. Keuchel went 7 innings and threw 103 pitches. Kluber had a no-no working into the 6th inning with 2 outs until Jose Altuve singled to center followed by a seeing eye single that scored Altuve, who had stolen 2nd base on the first pitch after his hit. Everyone in the Juice Box knew Altuve was going to steal 2nd including Kluber and his catcher but they weren't even close to stopping him. Back to the Kluber-Keuchel tale of the tape. Kluber and Keuchel both only gave up 3 hits on their night. Kluber walked 2 and struck out 7 while Keuchel had 3 and 4. Both men benefited from really good defense but none more than by Keuchel himself. He fielded his position as well as he pitched especially on a swinging bunt by DH Ryan Raburn in the 7th. Keuchel had gotten into a jam in the inning by allowing back to back singles to Carlos Santana (who's got the coolest name in the bigs) and Yan Gomes. I thought that would be it for Keuchel on the night but after AJ Hinch went to the mound for a quick chat Keuchel settled down but it was his play on Raburn's bunt that impressed. The ball barely made the grass past the home plate cutout and it looked like the bases would be loaded with just the one out Keuchel recorded after Hinch's visit to the mound by striking out Brandon Moss. But Keuchel was off the mound like a rocket and beating Jason Castro to the ball he wheeled and fired a fastball, his hardest throw of the night, to get Raburn just as he was about to step on the 1st base bag. Keuchel showed why he earned himself a Gold Glove award last season right then and there. The Astros threatened with a couple of long balls, one by George Springer in the 1st and another by Chris Carter in the 5th. Both hits went to right-center field with former Astro Michael Bourn making a nice catch on a long run from his center field spot on Springer's hit while right fielder Brandon Moss. Keuchel avoided giving up a double in the top of the 6th on a sharply hit liner by Michael Brantley to left field that Colby Rasmus caught over his shoulder at the wall. Rasmus, after a quiet spring, had a good game. Besides flashing some leather he did okay at the plate. He went 1 for 2 with a walk and his hit in the 8th moved Jed Lowrie from 1st to third setting up an insurance run which Jake Marisnick provided by flying out to right scoring Lowrie. No long ball histrionics for Houston last night, they won playing small ball. (I told you, Big T. I'll bet you laughed when I did) Great night last night. Great game and I sure hope it's a sign of things to come for the Astros. Good for Dallas Keuchel who had too little run support and too little help from the bullpen last year. Tonight he got both with Altuve and company providing the runs and Tony Sipp and Luke Gregerson closing the door on the Indians night. Sweet.

There's a new eatery in the ballpark called Street Eats and they only have 3 food items on the menu but at least one of them rocks. It sure epitomizes the Texas experience. It called Curley Fried Brisket and it is sooooooo good. First you take a wad of curly fries and cover them up with Nolan Ryan beef brisket shredded to perfection. Cover that with hot melted cheese, sprinkle in some feta cheese and top with a mound of pico de gallo and green onions. It looks awesome and tastes better. My son and I both agreed it was the best ever. Beats the hell out of a plain ol' burger or a dog.

Slowest flyover in history by 3 vintage planes from the Texas Air Force. 3 WWII vintage planes, two fighters and a cargo plane. Still pretty cool.

Craig Biggio threw out the first pitch to his successor Jose Altuve. It was interesting to note Biggio is noticeably taller than the defending batting champ. Great photo op of the two men together and it was sure great to hear the crowd chant Biggio, Biggio, Biggio again. It won't be the last time this season that happens.

There was a lady who sang God Bless America in the seventh inning stretch who sang it like a funeral pall. I have never heard it sang that slowly before. She sang it well but I'm sure Woody Guthrie turned over and thought, I never wrote that song to be sung that slow!

Over 43K in the stadium. Great crowd. The only downside was leaving the place.

lu cards

04-07-2015, 12:31 PM

Astros on tv this year?i got time warner they showing the stros this year?

Big T

04-07-2015, 03:57 PM

They are on Root Sports

lu cards

04-07-2015, 09:36 PM

Time warner doesn't carry root sports so I'm sol again this year.

Big T

04-07-2015, 10:11 PM

http://www.vipleague.se/

http://livetv.sx/en/

http://cricfree.sx/

I don't even have a TV. These are a couple of site that I use for streaming. Just make sure you have AdBlock which you should already have anyways. I have never received any sort of virus or any of that. I don't own a TV because I can get anything you can on my computer and more without having to pay a huge cable bill.

eagle eye

04-08-2015, 11:51 AM

The Astros are back in action tonight from the Juice Box with last year's No 1 starter filling the 2 spot this season Scott Feldman going against Cleveland's Carlos Carrasco. Carrasco probably, no - would have been, the Indians No 1 this season if not for Cory Kluber's amazing Cy Young winning season in 2014. Last year Carrasco was 8-7 in 40 appearances including 14 starts with an ERA of 2.55. Opposing hitters only mustered a .209 BA against Carrasco last season. Feldman had an 8-12 record in 2014 with an ERA of 3.74 with 29 starts and 29 appearances. If Feldman is on this could turn into another pitcher's duel similar to Monday night's gem between Kluber and Dallas Keuchel. If Feldman is a little off, which he was from time to time last season, it could be a long night for the home team. It is important to note the fact that Feldman was a full time starter last year and for his career while Carrasco was mainly a reliever last year. To be fair Carrasco has been a starter all but last year but we'll look for any advantage we can, right?
I would certainly be nice if the sticks got going early tonight after just managing 3 hits on Monday. Given how well Kluber pitched it was encouraging that the Astros as a team only struck out 7 times for the game.
Game time is 7:10 PM on Root Sports Network for those who get it and Big T's web sites for those who don't. Last year I did 1/2 inning by 1/2 inning updates right here on BRI on opening day and I might do the same tonight if I have time. It would be nice to see Houston keep the momentum going and really get off to a hot start this year.

Big T

04-08-2015, 07:58 PM

This is painful to watch. God this offense looks HORRIBLE!!! 1-0 Indians through 6. Nine strikeouts so far for the Stros.

eagle eye

04-08-2015, 08:00 PM

Top of 1st Feldman pitching, 4 up 3 down with 2 Ks an F8. With 2 out Jason Kipnis singled to center.

Bottom of 1st Carrasco pitching, Altuve flies out to center. Springer and Valbuena both K'd.

Top of 2nd, Moss K (1 out), Gomes 6-3 (2 out), Murphy singled to right, Chisenhall K (3 out)

Bottom of 2nd, Gattis K (1 out), Carter 5-3 (2 out), Castro BB, Rasmus F8 (3 out)

Top of 3rd, Aviles 4-3 (1 out), Bourn attempted bunt 2-3 (2 out), Ramirez F8 (3 out)

Bottom 3rd, Marisnick 3 unassisted (1 out),K Altuve F6 (2 out), Springer K (3 out)

Top of 4th, Kipnis F8 (1 out), Santana home run to right field, Moss 6-3 (2 out), Gomes 6-3 (3 out). Score Cleveland 1 Houston 0.

Bottom of 4th, Valbuena K (1 out), Gattis K (2 out), Carter F8 (3 out). Cleveland 1 Houston 0

Top of 5th, Murphy F9 (1 out), Chisenhall 1-3 (2 out), Aviles singled to right, Bourn K (3 out). Cleveland 1 Houston 0

Bottom of 5th, Castro singles to left, Lowrie FC-Castro out at 2B (1 out), Lowrie steals 2nd, Rasmus K (2 out), Marisnick 5-3 (3 out). Cleveland 1 Houston 0

Top of 6th, Ramirez 3U (1 out), Kipnis singles to left, Santana F5 -- Kipnis held on 1st (2 out), Moss 3U (3 out). Cleveland 1 Houston 0

Bottom of 6th, Altuve 6-3 (1 out), Springer doubles to center, Valbuena K (2 out), Gattis K (3 out). Cleveland 1 Houston 0

eagle eye

04-08-2015, 08:27 PM

Seventh Inning
Top of 7th - Murphy 3-1 (1 out), Gomes K (2 out), Feldman out, Joe Thatcher in to pitch, Chisenhall K (3 out). Cleveland 1 Houston 0
Final line for Feldman - 6.2 innings pitched/ 5 hits / 1 run (earned) / 0 walks / 5 K's / 1 HR / 103 pitches

Bottom of 7th - Carter K (1 out), Carlos Carrasco out, Nick Hagadone in to pitch, Castro BB, Lowrie sharp ground ball to 3rd infield single, Pitching change Hagadone out, LHP Marc Rzpczyniski in to pitch, Rasmus 6-4-3 DP (2nd and 3rd out) Cleveland 1 Houston 0
Final Line for Carrasco - 6.1 innings / 0 runs / 3 hits / 1 walk / 10 K's / 88 pitches
Final line for Hagadone - 2 batters faced no outs recorded / 0 runs / 1 hit / 1 walk

eagle eye

04-08-2015, 08:43 PM

Eighth Inning

Top of 8th - Pitching change - Pat Neshak replaced Joe Thatcher, Aviles home run to left field, Bourn singled to right field, Ramirez sac bunt 2-3 - Bourn to 2nd (1 out), Kipnis F5 - Bourn stays at 2B (2 out), Santana K (3 out). Cleveland 2 Houston 0
Final line for Joe Thatcher - .1 inning / 0 runs / 0 hits / 0 walks / 1 K

Bottom of 8th - Pitching change Rzepczniski out, RHP Bryan Shaw to pitch, Robbie Grossman PH for Marisnick K (1 out), Altuve F7 (2 out), Springer BB, Valbuena L1 (3 out). Cleveland 2 Houston 0
Final Line for Rzepczniski - .2 innings / 0 runs, hits, walks, K's

Big T

04-08-2015, 08:54 PM

Astros lose 2-0. That was one of the worse games I have ever seen and that is saying something considering how bad they have been the past six years.

eagle eye

04-08-2015, 09:07 PM

Ninth Inning

Top of 9th - Pitching change - Neshak out, RHP Will Harris in to pitch, Grossman remains in the game playing LF, Colby Rasmus to CF, Moss K 2-3 PO (1 out), Gomes F9 (2 out), Murphy 4-3 (3 out). Cleveland 2 Houston 0
Final Line for Neshak - 1 inning pitched / 1 run / 2 hits / 0 walks / 1 K

Bottom of 9th - Shaw out, Cody Allen in to pitch, Gattis K (1 out), Carter F3 (2 out), Castro K (3 out) Game over. Final Cleveland 2 Houston 0
Final Line for Shaw - 1 inning / 0 runs / 0 hits / 1 walk / 1 K
Final Line for Allen - 1 inning / 0 runs / 0 hits / 0 walks / 2 K's

R H E
Cleveland 2 7 0
Houston 0 4 0

For Big T - Cleveland pitching recorded 13 K's and had only 3 walks. Tonight Scott Feldman was the hard luck loser like Kluber was on Monday. Both teams 1-1 on the season. Tomorrow's finale has Trevor Bauer going for Cleveland vs Asher Wojciechowski for Houston.

KABrother88

04-10-2015, 06:56 AM

And the race is on! What race you ask? To see which happens 1st.
A.) Houston gets no-hit.
B.) Opposing pitcher strikes out 21

Now the law of averages says the no-no because frankly it's a semi common thing and that the 21 Ks would set the new record...but this is no average Houston team.

Yesterday Cleveland was 2 outs away from a combined No-No until Jed Lowrie got ahold of an 0-1 pitch and smoked it to LCF for a solo HR.

In 3 games this year Houston has been struck out 7 (all 7 to SP), 13 (10 to SP in 6.1 IP) and 16 (11 to SP in 6 IP) times. Not what you would call a positive trend. I know it will level back out but to put it into a little more context, the 2013 Astros team set a MLB record for strikeouts in a season with 1,535...your 2015 Astros are on pace for 1,944.

Big T

04-10-2015, 09:47 AM

The no hitter will happen first. Lol Hell it almost has thre times in three games already!

KABrother88

04-10-2015, 10:53 AM

Being just a little facetious there...a very disturbing stat though is Houston has 8 hits this season vs 36 Ks...Yikes!

puddin tane

04-10-2015, 01:17 PM

Gattis may break Carter's strikeout record....before the all star break

KABrother88

04-10-2015, 05:12 PM

Round 1 of the Battle For The Silver Boot goes to the good guys by a score of 5-1. CF Jake Marisnick went 3-3 and drove in 2 runs, Jed Lowrie hit a solo home run for the 2nd game in a row and Colby Rasmus added a PH 2 run shot in the top of the 9th.

SP Colin McHugh was solid on the bump going 6 innings giving up 1 run on 5 hits and struck out 4 while walking 2.

As a team Houston collected 10 his on the day after having only 8 combine the first 3 games

eagle eye

04-10-2015, 05:30 PM

Houston got back on track a little bit anyway, beating the Rangers 5-1 today in Arlington. You can add 7 more K's to the Astros total but at least you have 10 hits to balance the total. It's tough when your top 3 hitters are Jake Marisnick (.429), Robbie Grossman (.333) and Jed Lowrie (.308). It certainly isn't how the Astros expected to begin the season. Houston had two players homer today, Lowrie in the first and Colby Rasmus in the ninth with one man on. The other 2 runs came on base hits and good base running and an error by the Rangers.
One thing is encouraging, the starting pitching except for Wojo has looked pretty darn good. Between Keuchel, Feldman and McHugh they have given up a combined 2 runs in their 19.2 innings of work. I think we can forgive Wojo since he made his first ever start in the bigs yesterday. The Tribe roughed up the kid in each of his 4 innings of work. Butterflies and constant pressure by the Indians hitters was Wojo's undoing.
I think it's lucky that Houston gets to face the Rangers this weekend after getting a bitter dose of a good ballclub like the Indians.

Big T

04-10-2015, 07:43 PM

Big T

04-10-2015, 07:45 PM

BTW, i will take seven K's any night for this team. Seven K's is a good night. Any night under ten K's will be a good night. Not being derisive at all, this team is built in a way that it will score runs and hit home runs but it will K at a historic rate.

eagle eye

04-11-2015, 08:55 AM

The only good thing today was the pitching. The Astros accidentally had ten hits and five runs. They didn't get those hits because the were smashing the ball. Hell, the two home runs barley snuck over the fences. This offense just doesn't look ready right now.

We maybe need to slow the truck down just a hair. We are 4 games into a 162 game season. We are 2-2 and 3 of the 5 runs the Astros have scored so far have been small ball runs. I don't think we can make definitive statements about what this team will be after such a short sample size. We need to do the same thing the Astros hitters need to do---be patient and let the ball, or the season, come to us as the case may be. This certainly isn't the way spring training went and I think things will settle down once the team starts hitting better. The Astros can't panic or press to force the issue. Sit back and relax and swing at good pitches. Carter looks like he's coming around and Gattis only had one K yesterday and while he didn't get a hit he did put the ball in play. Sometimes just doing that brings good results which it did yesterday because Gattis reached base on a Rangers error. Springer is going to get better and Rasmus is actually better now that I he looked in spring training. All I'm saying is don't assume what Houston is now is what they will actually end up being. Look at the standings. We are 2-2, in 2nd place 1/2 game behind the 3-2 A's. The world as we know it is NOT ending. That's all I'm saying............

eagle eye

04-12-2015, 03:37 PM

I have to tell you boys, I'm pissed. Dallas Keuchel pitches another gem even though the ump squeezed the crap of him in the 7th he left with a 4-2 lead. 3 pitchers combined in the bottom of the 8th to blow the win for Keuchel. It remains to be seen if the 4th pitcher of the inning can at least preserve the tie. Neshak was supposed to be a top notch set up man and he has sucked so far in every appearance he's . Joe Thatcher, he was responsible for the Chris Carter error that allowed the Rangers go from hanging on to a 2-1 lead to a comfortable 5-1 lead in last night's game and now Chad Qualls walked two, hit a batter and gave up a sac fly to tie the game. Both runs are charged to Neshak and Thatcher but Qualls SUCKED! Most of his pitches weren't even close to the strike zone. I was wrong, Hinch left Qualls in the game and he got the final out but not before he hit pinch hitter Shin-soo Choo on a 1-2 count to reload the bases. He got Leonys Martin to ground out to end the inning but I have no doubt if Martin had been patient Qualls would have hit him too. Excuse me, I have to go swear a lot right now and possibly punch a wall. I can't imagine how pissed Keuchel must be. Shades of 2014 is rearing it's ugly head.

puddin tane

04-12-2015, 06:21 PM

Gattis sucks

Big T

04-12-2015, 06:41 PM

I think Gattis will come around.... First time in the AL and hasn't seen most of these pitchers but he needs to get it figured out very quickly. EE, if this was last years bullpen then this game wouldn't have gone extras. It would have ended 10-4 in the 9th. Yes, I am being sarcastic, but this bullpen is definitely improved. Just get rid of Thatcher. The offense still look Terrible! Thank god for Marisnick and Conger. Who the hell would have thought that I would be saying that this past off season?! Fire Dave Hudgens and Allen Zinter!

puddin tane

04-14-2015, 09:14 PM

Theses guys suck

eagle eye

04-15-2015, 07:42 AM

At the end of the first week Houston was 3-3 despite a terrible offense. Then the come home and look like crap. The defense is making errors, the offense is a limp bisquit and the only saving grace up until the A's came to town was the pitching. Monday Feldman got slapped around like a red-headed step child an Houston lost 8-1 and they only managed 5 hits in the game. Shoot, Altuve had 3 of the 5. The Astros were getting on base though because they were 0-8 with runners in scoring position. Last night Brad Peacock made a surprise start and he pitched pretty well going 5 innings allowing 3 runs. Not bad for a guy coming off hip surgery last fall and making his first big league appearance since the surgery. Unfortunately, Houston got shut out --- again. The Astros got 8 hits last night but they can't seem to get one when it counts. They stranded 7 runners in scoring position and 11 base runners over all. One encouraging sign is the team is starting to make contact with the ball. Sooner or later those hits are going to start finding some holes or, at least, you'd think so. Typical of the day was Jason Castro batting in the bottom of the 8th and he hits a line shot into deep right field. The ball was hit hard enough to get out of the park and with 2 men on base it would have tied the game at 3. Castro didn't get any elevation on the ball and it was just a line drive out the right fielder caught on the run toward the foul line on the warning track. The A's tacked on a run in the ninth and Houston lost 4-0. The Astros have only been shut out twice in their first 8 games but their offense has been so bad it seems like more. This slow start, if it continues, will cloud the team for the rest of the season.

eagle eye

04-16-2015, 09:07 AM

I've said it before and I'll say it again, Houston's starting pitching has been excellent deep into the second week of the season. Last night was not any different. Collin McHugh was on the hill against the A's in the series finale and he was just plain good. He only pitched 5.2 innings but he went deep into counts which included giving up only 6 hits and striking out 11 batters. He tossed 102 pitches and shut down the A's offense on the night. McHugh almost escaped a 2-out bases loaded jam in the 2nd only to have A's SS Marcus Semien leg out an infield single hit to SS Jed Lowrie to plate Billy Butler who was on third. It was an extremely close play but Semien's hustle down the line just did beat Lowrie's throw to first. At the time the A's trailed Houston 2-1 on the strength of a two run blast by Lowrie that scored Jose Altuve who doubled to lead off the game. Altuve, BTW, is looking like Altuve again. He has had multi hit games the last two days and he successfully stole 3rd base, which you hardly ever see done in the bigs, just before Lowrie's home run.
It is worry-some that both George Springer and Chris Carter have seemed to have lost their mojo at the plate. Before he broke his ankle last summer Springer was an All-Star caliber player but so far this season he looks like a minor leaguer again at the plate. His defense is still top notch but he needs to find a way to get his hitting groove back. Same with Carter. The second half of 2014 he was statistically the best hitter in baseball but this season he's reverted back to the 2013 Chris who set an MLB record for K's in a season. Right now he's hitting a meager .067 with 13 K's in 30 ABs. Still he's not as bad as Evan Gattis (14 K's in 32 AB's) and Springer (16 K's in 34 AB's). As for Gattis he finally got a hit on Monday breaking a 0-22 start to the season and he's gotten hits in all 3 games against the A's. He did go 1-4 last night and he only struck out once. So, I hope this all means Gattis has it worked out and he will be okay going forward.

The Astros continue their current home stand tomorrow night when the Los Angeles Angels come to town. I will be Hernandez vs Weaver with a 7:10 PM start time. If you like baseball collectables Saturday night is your night. The first 10K fans will get a replica of the 1965 AstroDome. This is to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the opening of the 8th Wonder of the World. Wish I could go, darn it.

Big T

04-16-2015, 12:17 PM

Last night was a better game. That is exactly what I expected from the Astros offense and it was good to see that they were able to string together some hits and cap it off with a little power. Collin McHugh needs to learn how to get batters out quickly. Last night he got away with 11 K's in 5.2 innings, but this Astros bullpen is not yet deep enough to hand the ball to them in the 6th inning. Qualls, Neshek, and Gregerson are great for the 7th, 8th and 9th but hand the ball off too early to the pen and they are likely to blow it. The pitching has had flashes of brilliance this season and that is great to see.

eagle eye

04-19-2015, 10:04 AM

Okay, somebody's got to give some love to Dallas Keuchel. His is now 2-0 (it should be 3-0), His ERA is 0.90 and he's only given up 2 runs in his three starts that encompasses 20 innings of work. Last night he tied up a LA Angel lineup that has begun the season among the best in the bigs. In six innings and 105 pitches Keuchel gave up zero runs on just 2 hits, 3 walks and 7 K's. The bullpen did it's job this time around especially Chad Qualls who blew the hold in Keuchel's last start. Qualls pitched 1 inning giving up nothing in runs, hits or walks and he recorded all three outs in the inning via the K. Qualls has really struggled so far in the regular season including giving up a 3 run bomb to Mike Trout the 8th inning after Houston scratched and clawed it's way back to a 3-3 tie in the bottom of the 7th. Friday night game over at that point with Qualls eating the loss as well he should. The 7th inning last night was a different story. 3 batters-3 K's on 12 pitches, easy-peasy. Pat Neshak came on in the 8th and gave up a hit, got a K and retired the Angels without a run. Luke Gregerson pitched a perfect 9th with 2 K's to shut the door on the Angels. On offense George Springer got his first home run of 2015 in the sixth inning. It was a solo shot that gave the Astros a 1-0 lead and qualified Keuchel for the win. One inning later Robbie Grossman hit a 3 run shot that was the final margin of victory for Houston at 4-0. Houston goes into the rubber game of the series with Scott Feldman on the hill trying to redeem himself from the bad outing he had his last time out in a 8-1 bashing by the Oakland A's in which they scored all 8 runs off Feldman, 7, earned off ten hits including 3 home runs, a walk and 0 K's. He'll be facing Angels ace Garrett Richards who is making his first start since injuring his left patellar tendon covering 1st base against the Red Sox last August. It's a couple of pitchers with something to prove and it should be a good game. With the sun shining today you may want to listen to it while you're doing something outside.

Big T

04-19-2015, 07:15 PM

Astros take the series with a 4-3 victory today. This offense is still looking god awful but the Astros are some how .500 at 5-5. If the offense can get going and the pitching stays good, things could get a bit interesting in H-Town this season.

eagle eye

04-20-2015, 04:31 PM

Actually Houston is 6-6 and they are 2-2 in the 4 series they've played so far. Also, they have played 3 series against division opponents, the Rangers, the A's and Angels and they are 4-2 in those series. The starting pitching has been really good with a combined record of 5-5 with 2 no-decisions all this with Houston having the last place hitting numbers in the American League. Heck, the are worst hitting team in baseball. Yes, even lower than 2nd to last Texas Rangers.
The good news is the team wide hitting funk seems to be turning around. Altuve is back to his multi-hit games and has raised his average above .300 for the first time this season. After a frigid start to the season most of the other guys are coming around. Evan Gattis is making consistant contact and the rest of the lineup has cut down on K's which were coming by the bushel basket to start the season. Even Chris Carter has cut down on the K's but he is having trouble finding holes in the field to get any hits. But, as long as he's making contact that will come.
The Astros 6-6 start is actually their best start since the 2006 season. That's encouraging. Houston will be severely tested this week as they hit the road for a 9 game trip that begins in Seattle tonight and finishes the week in Oakland. They begin next week in San Diego facing the Padres in inter-league play. The end April and begin May at home against the Mariners again. It will be a big road trip and hopefully Houston will still be within spitting distance of .500 when they get back.

eagle eye

04-22-2015, 05:56 AM

Okay, Jim, a coworker of mine just stepped into my office and said, "You know, I'm starting to be a believer in this Astros team." Not being one to want to burst anyone's bubble this early in the morning and being somewhat of a believer myself all I could do was smile and nod in agreement. I continued by saying, "I read a tweet during the early part of the game that said Houston was one of 3 teams in the bigs without a bases loaded hit." Oh, the Astros haven't lacked for chances they just hadn't come through until the top of the eighth last night when Jose Altuve hit a bases loaded double down the left field line to break a 3-3 tie and give the Astros the 6-3 lead. Shoot even Altuve had two other chances earlier in the game. Both times there were 2 outs in the inning and Jose got wood on the ball but no money shot. Two routine outs to end the inning. Jake Marisnick had a nice night, in fact hustle and good base running and damn good slide into home gave Houston their first run of the game in the 3rd and that was all Marisnick who has been the best damn #9 hitter in baseball so far this season. The Astros exploded for 5 runs in the top of the 8th highlighted by Altuve's 3 run double but no hit was bigger than the single up the middle for Chris Carter which plated the Astros first run of the inning ignited the rally IMO. Carter has looked lost at the plate so far this season but a hit like that, especially late in the game, can really do wonders for a player's confidence and may be the spark that gets him going. It would be nice to see Carter stroking the ball in April instead of having to wait until July like last year. Kudos to Collin McHugh who went 7 innings and earned the win to go to 3-0 on the season. A cool stat that came out is that McHugh is 10-0 in his last eleven starts dating back to last August. Yeah, Keuchel and McHugh, not a bad one-two punch Houston has there. Pat Neshak pitch a perfect eighth with 3 K's and Chad Qualls pitched a perfect 9th with 2 K's to close out what looked like an impossible win considering Houston's struggles at the plate and how hard McHugh had to battle the Mariners hitters without his best stuff. Let's talk a look at where we are. 1st Place in the division 1-1/2 games up on Oakland. Guaranteed a series win regardless of what happens today in Seattle, 4 game winning streak, our top two pitchers are 5-0 and Luis Valbuena is hitting the cover off the ball. Who's got it better than us! (I know we're only 14 games into the season which is just under 9% of the season but all in all it's pretty cool to talk about our FIRST PLACE ASTROS!

Big T

04-22-2015, 08:40 PM

IDK if any of y'all are watching this game, but Rasmus just got called out on strikes on a ball that was literally six inches off the ground. Worst strike three I have EVER seen.

eagle eye

04-23-2015, 05:47 AM

IDK if any of y'all are watching this game, but Rasmus just got called out on strikes on a ball that was literally six inches off the ground. Worst strike three I have EVER seen.

LOL! I lasted until the 7th before I had to go to bed and that home plate umpire was horrible. Not only did Rasmus get rung up on a low pitch Luis Valbuena got rung up on a high and tight breaking ball. That call got Houston's batting coach kicked out of the game. I've heard of a big strike zone but from the ankles to the shoulders and 6" off the black on both sides of the plate? C'mon. You could live with it if Houston was getting the same leeway but Roberto Hernandez seemed to pitching to a tighter strike zone than Seattle starter and former Astro J A Happ. The real killer was Chris Carter's K with the bases loaded in the 8th. I never saw it but it's stuff like that which makes me lose sleep out of frustration. It's a shame because Carter had his first multi-hit game of the season and his first home run of the season earlier in the game. In fact the homer came in the 7th which, unfortunately, was a solo shot. How many times have you heard the phrase, timing is everything? In this case it was, sadly, a perfect example of that old cliché. The Mariners first run of the game was the reverse of this in that the M's took advantage of a lead off walk, a wild pitch, a sac fly and an RBI ground out that allowed Seattle to take an early lead in the game without a single hit. It's on to Oakland tonight and we did win the series at Seattle so we can't be too sad.

BTW Carters homer last night was on the one year anniversary of his first home run in 2014. Same date, same stadium, same opponent. I mentioned in a post yesterday that the hit he got on Tuesday night might be one that gets him going, so far so good! The team as a whole needs to start hitting with men on base. I'm really tired of seeing a box score with Houston going 1-8 or 0-10 with RISP. That stat has got to improve for Houston to have any real success this season. Again last night Team RISP: 1-8 and Team LOB: 10. Not good.

KABrother88

04-24-2015, 07:44 AM

eagle eye

04-24-2015, 11:41 AM

It's not secret that I have an addiction to keeping up with prospects...I'm gonna try to compile a small breakdown of how some of our top guys are doing in a couple weeks when the sample size grows some...but I gotta throw this out there...Carlos Correa is tearing the cover off the ball as a 20 year old in AA. In 12 games he's currently hitting .360 (18-50). 9 of his 18 hits (50%) have been doubles and he's cracked 2 HRs while driving in 14 runs and scoring 11. I would love to get down to CC for a weekend...that team is loaded

I wouldn't be surprised to see Correa in AAA by July, a couple of others as well. As much as I'd like to see these kids come up to the big club I'm scared to rush them. I want to see sustained success at the level they are at before moving them up. That said, I think it's quite possible Correa could be in Houston in 2016.

KA, I look forward to seeing your list!

Big T

04-25-2015, 08:44 AM

eagle eye

04-25-2015, 03:26 PM

That was an interesestin 5-4 win last night for the Stros. 0-0 through nine innings Astros score 2 in the top of the tenth and Gregerson gives it up in the bottom. Stros score three in the top of the 11th and Nechek tried to give it up in the bottom by they held on for the win. You figured that the bullpen was due for a bad night after being so good to start out the year. Lets hope that they have it out of their system now. BTW, Dallas was lights out again and had a 0.63 ERA. Holy Shit. He sure is shutting my mouth.

Interesting is not what I'd call what happened last night. What would you guess if I told you the starting pitcher for team when 9 innings, gave up 0 runs on 2 hits, 2 walks and 4 K's? I'll bet you a paycheck you'd say that the guy was the winning pitcher and that the team notched a win as well. AAAAAAA. The buzzer sound means you are wrong. If you saw the TV shot of Dallas Keuchel walking away after Luke Gregerson blew the save in the bottom of the 10th last night you would have to know he was pissed to the max. After dominating the A's for nearly 3 hours the offense got him the lead in the top of the 10th and it took Gregerson about 8 minutes to flush it all down the toilet. Keuchel should be 4-0 but the bullpen has blown 2 of those games including last night. A two out 1-1 pitch that was a mistake by Gregerson that Josh Reddick crushed into left-center field. It was just a heads up play that, after the relay throw got away from Hank Conger that enticed Reddick to try to score, Houston was able to nail Reddick at home plate or the game would have been over right then and there. Big T is right, the bullpen tried like hell to give the game back to the A's but they were just not quite able to do it. You gotta feel for Keuchel. It's the second time he pitched a complete game, or rather 9 innings, and came away with no decision. Last season he left a tie game and the bullpen gave it away in the 12th if memory serves. If I could remember the team, my day would be complete. Keuchel had an MLB leading 5 - 9 inning (complete) games and was 4-0. This season Houston relievers have had 8 save opportunities and they have converted 6. Guess who was the victim of the two blown saves was---you guessed it---Dallas Keuchel. Chad Qualls has one and now Gregerson. He should be tied for the MLB lead in wins with the Mets Bartolo Colon and Detroit's Alfredo Simon with the 4. His 0.62 ERA is second only to the Rangers Nick Martinez who has one less start than Keuchel. Keuchel's 29.0 innings pitched is tied with Cincinnati's Johnny Cueto and Cueto is 1-2 in 4 starts. He's also top 10 in WHIP and BAA. If I was Qualls and Gregerson I couldn't look Keuchel in the eye without feeling like crap about it.

Scott Feldman is cruising through today's afternoon game with Oakland. Right now it's the top of the 5th with runners on the corners, two outs and a suddenly effective Chris Carter at the plate. Ooops. Wild pitch scores Jed Lowrie from 3rd and advances Rasmus to 2nd. Right now it's 6-0. Wow, Carter HBP on a terrible curve ball. Men on 1st and 2nd with Jason Castro at the plate. First pitch, high lazy fly ball to right-center. Inning over.

eagle eye

04-26-2015, 08:28 PM

Three weeks are in the books and could you have hoped for a better start to a season? How about an 11-7 record, first place in the West and up 2-1/2 games on the Angels who lost today to Texas. How about the fact they have played 6 series so far and they are 4-2. They just completed their first series sweep today with an improbable comeback win over the A's. The only smudge so far has been the poor showing by Asher Wojciekowski. In 3 starts and 4 appearances this season he has demonstrated that he's clearly not ready for the bigs. During the broadcast of today's game it was noted that Houston has the 2nd best staff ERA in the bigs. If not for Wojo's struggles we probably would be #1.

Could it be that Evan Gattis is finally breaking out of his early season hitting funk? Gattis came up to bat twice in today's game with the bases loaded and he singled in two runs on both occasions. The last time was in the top of the 9th with Houston down 6-5. Gattis' hit gave the Astros the lead and eventually the win. The second time was the ugliest AB I've seen in a while. A's closer Tyler Clippard had him swinging at balls up around his eyes. On a 1-2 count Gattis hit a pitch so high I could read "Astros" on Gattis' uniform clear as day when he swung at the pitch. He made solid contact and drove the ball over the center fielder's head to the wall plating Jake Marisnick and Jose Altuve. He's been long overdue and a day like Gattis had today can do wonders for a player's confidence. Lord knows Houston will need him and the rest of the offense to show up against the surprisingly powerful San Diego Padres as they close out the current road trip beginning tomorrow.

Despite struggling on offense George Springer shows how a player can contribute to his team by playing good, solid defense. At times Springer has elevated that to spectacular. Springer made one of his patented running catches, and I mean on the dead run today to save extra bases in the bottom of the eighth. That was to go along with the rock solid play the rest of the game but, there was a particular play he made that showed his baseball smarts. In the bottom of the 4th Ike Davis doubled to right-center advancing Steven Vogt to third base. Vogt had led off the inning with a walk. What was impressive about the play was that the ball was headed straight for the wall and would surely have scored Vogt and probably ended up a triple for Davis. Instead Springer chased down the ball and deflected it strait to Jake Marisnick who was able to get the ball in preventing a run from scoring. Totally impressive play for Springer and even though it's not in the highlights, it should be.

This week was a week of firsts. George Springer hit his first HR of the season. Chris Carter got his first hit of the season, first HR of the season and first multi-hit game of the season. Evan Gattis got his first mult-hit game of the season and he drove in 4 of his 5 RBI's this week. Today, as a matter of fact. Some firsts not so good like Luke Gregerson blowing his first save in the 10th inning of the Dallas Keuchel gem against the A's Friday night. Stuff like that I don't like to dwell on.

Of all the moves A J Hinch has made so far none has panned out like putting Jake Marisnick in the 9th spot in the batting order. He has been terrific. I called him the best 9 hitter in the bigs earlier this week and I haven't seen anything to make me crawfish on that opinion yet. His team high .364 BA is just the tip of the ice berg. The way the lineup shakes out a good bit of the time Marisnick is leading off innings which means you've got another leadoff man in the lineup and it allows Altuve to shine as a 2 hole hitter. To illustrate the point, in today's game Marisnick led off the 9th inning with a single up the middle. With the hit-and-run on Jose Altuve smashes a shot to 3B Brett Lawrie who tried to cut Marisnick down at second. The replay clearly showed that even if the throw hadn't gotten away from SS Marcus Semien Marisnick clearly beat Lawrie's throw. Speed kills and it became evident while George Springer was up after Altuve. Hinch called a double steal executed perfectly by Marisnick and Altuve with Marisnick sliding under the tag at 3B. Springer struck out bringing up the newest weapon in the 3 hole, Jed Lowrie, who has garnered enough respect at the plate lately that the A's intentionally walked him to load the bases and get the double play back on the table. Then came the Gattis AB I decribed earlier that resulted in the RBI's that won the game. The point was two guys who are fast, have terrific bat control and are proving to be clutch as hell put the A's behind the 8 ball before an out was recorded. Marisnick was kind of an oh-by-the-way addition to the Jarred Cosart trade with Miami last season and he's turning out to be a steal. The real prize Houston was targeting was 3B Colin Moran who was a top notch prospect in the Marlins system. I'm sure KABrother88 is going to update us on Moran and the Astros other top minor league prospects but it's Marisnick who is looking like the steal in that trade. Despite a crowded outfield in spring training Marisnick elevated himself to become the starter in center field against the odds against it and he's done nothing to cause Hinch and GM Jeff Luhnow to regret the decision.

I like this team and they seem to have a chemistry about them. Even when they struggle in one phase the pick it up in another. There are already games where Houston has pulled out wins that would have been losses in the last few years. They are a team that brings their lunch pails to work and they don't quit until the last out. That, to me, it going to be the identity of this team. GO 'Stros!

eagle eye

04-28-2015, 05:25 AM

Asher Wojociewski is not ready for the bigs. That's not me saying that. The Astros made it clear when they sent Wojo to AAA Fresno Monday. Wojo was 0-1 in 4 starts with an ERA over 7. He pitched just 4 innings in all of his outings and as A J Hinch said, "It was clear that Asher didn't have the same stuff he showed in spring training. The stuff that earned him a spot in the starting rotation." It's good it's being done now before his confidence is totally shot. To fill Wojo's spot in the roster Houston called up L J Hoes who's been on a torrid pace in AAA. He was hitting .418 with a .458 on-base percentage and 12 RBIs in 15 games, including a five-hit game last week. He'll be used primarily off the bench as an extra outfielder.

In last night's 9-4 win over San Diego SS Jed Lowrie injured his thumb sliding into home scoring a run in the 8th inning. He will fly to Houston today to have an MRI to help determine the extent of the injury. He said that his thumb is sore and swollen but he isn't jumping to any conclusions about how bad his thumb could be. Lowrie, who has been hitting 3rd or 4th in the lineup the past week went 2-3 last night with with 2 runs scored, an RBI, a walk and a K, has been hot as any of the Astros have been in their recent offensive outburst. When was the last time you heard of a shortstop batting cleanup? Hopefully, this will neither keep Lowrie out of the lineup for long or cool him off at the plate.

Had Collin McHugh not stumbled in the 5th inning allowing 3 runs to San Diego that allowed them to tie the game it's quite likely McHugh would have won his ninth straight game which would have tied him with Roy Oswalt's 2002 9-0 run of consecutive wins which is most in team history. He ended up with a no-decision which isn't a bad thing all things considered. McHugh was in line for the win after going 6 innings giving up just the 3 runs to a powerful San Diego offense when Houston scored a run to break a 3-3 tie in the top of the 7th but Josh Fields took care of that by giving up the tying run to the Padres in the bottom of the inning when Yangervis Solarte doubled in Alexi Amarista who led off the inning with a single. Houston did score 3 runs in the 8th and 2 more in the ninth but by then McHugh was long gone.

This from Astros.com:
By Brian McTaggart / MLB.com | @brianmctaggart (http://www.twitter.com/brianmctaggart) | 12:54 AM ET When the Astros face Tyson Ross and the Padres on Tuesday night at Petco Park, they'll try to do something they haven't done this year: win a game started by Roberto Hernandez.
Hernandez (0-2, 3.57 ERA) hasn't pitched poorly with two consecutive quality starts to his name. In fact, his ERA is his best through three starts since 2008. Meanwhile, Ross makes his fifth start of the season and first in his career against Houston. He's been very good at times but has scuffled with his command.

Big T

04-28-2015, 11:29 PM

eagle eye

04-29-2015, 06:18 AM

May we play the Padres bullpen every night? Please?! BTW the Astros are winning 14-3 bottom of the 9th! Looks like the Stros are going to go 13-7 and four game up in the AL West! Springer has had a 2 hit, 5 rbi night and Altuve has gone 4-6 with 2 doubles and a RBI. Carter, Gattis, and Springer all have homered. Valbuana and Marisnick both have multi hit games tonight.

The past two weeks have been amazing for the turnaround the Astros have shown on the offensive side of the team. At the end of week 1 Houston was dead last is every conceivable category and now, at least before last night's game, they have climbed to 8th. Houston did win last night by a score of 14-3 that featured 3 home runs by the Astros. One each by Chris Carter, Evan Gattis and George Springer. The funniest thing last night was in the in the top of the 5th. Starting pitcher Roberto Hernandez led off the inning by drawing a 4 pitch walk by Padres starter Tyson Ross. Jose Altuve came up and just drilled a ball to straight away center field for a double. Not only didn't Hernandez score on the hit he barely made it to third base! There was no play at the 3B bag but it was funny seeing Hernandez chuck around the bases at long last reaching base safely. Honestly, if it hadn't been for Hernandez holding him up Altuve would have had a triple. The funny part was how much the Astros broadcasters Alan Ashby and Geoff Blum were teasing Hernandez for his lack of speed. They both agreed that if the next hitter, which was Luis Valbuena, hit a similar shot as Altuve's Hernandez MIGHT be able to score from 3rd. Houston had 2nd and 3rd with no outs and Hernandez did score on a fielder's choice by George Springer but that was it. Evan Gattis and Colby suffered back to back K's to end the inning. That was about the only time Houston sticks failed to do damage to Padres pitching. A season high 17 hit attack left the Padre pitchers beaten and bloody (figuratively speaking) on the night. Hernandez was in the game for more than comic relieve, he pitched another solid game to earn his first win of the season. He went 6 innings giving up 3 runs on 6 hits with a walk and 6 K's. The difference tonight was the run support he got on the night. Tony Sipp (1 inning) and Will Harris (2 innings) effectively shut the door on the Padres offense and preserved the easy Astros win.

So, in their last ten games Houston is 9-1 and they are on a 5 game winning steak AND they have won the series with San Diego with the sweep possible today with Dallas Keuchel on the hill this afternoon at 3 PM. I hope there is still some runs left in the Astros bats because a little run support for Keuchel would be greatly appreciated I'm sure.

I know why I'm sick. No, it's not the sinus infection I have that caused me to get a shot and some prescriptions from my doctor yesterday, it because the results of the MRI on Jed Lowrie's thumb revealed a torn ligament in the thumb that will require surgery resulting in Lowrie being out until the All Star break. It's a real shame considering how well Lowrie was playing both in the field and at the plate. Jonathan Villar has been brought up to replace Lowrie.

Another mystery to me was that Evan Gattis was pulled out of the game last night after the Astros half of the 5th inning in favor of Jake Marisnick. I can't find anything saying he was hurt. Maybe I'm just an old worry-wart.

Chris Carter on current 7 game hitting streak is hitting .346.
George Springer and Jose Altuve each have 8 stolen bases and are tied for the AL lead. the Reds Billy Hamilton leads the majors with 13 steals. (small ball Big T)
After a 1-11 start to his season Jose Altuve is hitting .385 in his last 17 games.
It's looking like the break throughs last week that Chris Carter, George Springer and Evan Gattis had have really gotten them on track.
Jonathan Villar came in as a pinch hitter in the 8th and he went 1-2 with a run scored.

Big T

04-29-2015, 08:37 AM

Gattis was not injured. At the time the Astros had a sizable lead and in the hopes of keeping it they wanted to play the best defensive players. Marisnick is obviously the better fielder therefore he went into left field. Then he racked up two hits including a triple, batted in a run and scored a run. Not a bad move by Hinch lol

eagle eye

04-29-2015, 12:03 PM

Big T

04-29-2015, 07:19 PM

Astros do it again! They scored 4 runs in the ninth stretching a 3-1 lead to 7-1 and holding on for the 7-2 victory. Colby Rasmus added another homer today and Jose Altuve upped his BA to .355 with yet another multi-hit performance going 2-4 with a single, double, and a RBI. Jake Marisnick added two more hits and a RBI to up his BA to .388. Unfortunately, the lone run given up by Dallas caused his ERA to rise to 0.73. I really hope this guy gets back on track in his next start. We cannot have him giving up a run like that! Lol Oh, if you didn't know by now the Astros are 14-7 and 4.5 games in first place! Yeah yeah, 21 games into a 162 game season blah blah blah. Oh, and one more thing the Astros have averaged almost 7 runs per game in the last 11 games and 8.5 runs in the past 6 games. Looks like the offense is starting to come around!

Big T

04-30-2015, 09:19 PM

Astros face the Mariners in a 4 game set this weekend and lets just say that they started it off in style! Astros won game one 3-2 in ten inning. Jose Altuve went 3-5 with a double two singles the second of which was off of the Crawford Box's wall for the walk-off victory. Feldman struggled quite a bit onight but gutted it out going 7 inning giving up two runs. Astros are 15-7!!!

eagle eye

05-01-2015, 06:57 AM

The month of April is over and in some ways that's too bad because of how well Houston began the season. It's been so good in fact that you have to go back to 1986 to find a better April for the Astros. You remember 1986 right? Sure you do. That was the year that Houston won the NL West and won it on the last game of the regular season with Mike Scott tossing a no-freaking-hitter against the San Francisco Giants. That was also the year that Houston lost that heartbreaking NLCS series with the Mets who went on to beat Boston in the World Series. You remember THAT one--Bill Buckner--ball between his legs to allow the Mets to win Game 6 that led to a Game 7 win for those lucky-assed Mets? Yeah, you remember.
Houston went 15-7 in April winning 8 of 9 on the longest road trip so far this season, and they ended the month with a gritty, hard fought win last night over the Mariners. The Astros won 10 of their final 11 games of the month and in the process took 1st place in the AL West by 4 games over the Angels who are at standing at 11-11 on the season. The Astros have won 4 series in a row, two by sweeping the M's and the Padres. This is after weathering a truly horrendous beginning week and a half of poor offense. The Astros were able to survive that 10 day stretch by going .500 in their first 12 games because of some really good starting pitching particularly by Dallas Keuchel and Colin McHugh who were, until the 15th game of the season the only starters with a win on the season.
The fact is the only starting pitcher who really struggled this season so far is Asher Wojciekowski who was 0-3 in 4 starts lasting no more that 4 innings in any outing. This past Monday he was sent down to AAA Fresno after another poor start last Sunday.
That's the only real bad thing that happened to Houston in April except for the loss of SS Jed Lowrie who injured his thumb sliding into a base suffering a torn ligament that required surgery to repair. Lowrie will be out of the lineup until the All Star break. It's a shame because he was playing his usual good defense and he was on fire at the plate. It's not often you see a SS hitting 3rd or clean up in an MLB batting order. Until his injury Lowrie was. Another pleasant surprise was the play of Jake Marisnick who earned a starting center field job in spring training and has been tearing the cover off the ball hitting primarily in the 9 spot. He has the best BA on the team at .373 and despite AJ Hinch moving him up to 7th in the batting order last night he still went 1-4. Three players really struggled in April at the plate, Chris Carter, Evan Gattis and Colby Rasmus but all 3 are showing signs of breaking out. In fact Gattis was responsible for driving in 2 or the 3 runs Houston scored last night without recording a single hit. His ability with his bat control allowed him to hit a Sac fly and FC ground out that plated the two runs that allowed Houston to even get to extra innings last night. George Springer has struggled some too but he shows flashes every single day of why he is going to be, heck already is, a special player for the Astros. What can you say about Jose Altuve. The guy is just amazing. 2nd on the team in BA, leads the team and is 1st in the AL in stolen bases with 9 and he already has stacked multi-hit games like cord wood. Last night he had his 8th multi-hit game IN A ROW going 3-5 and driving in the winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning with a rocket line drive off the left field wall. I vote we start calling Altuve The Atom because he's truly a super hero.
Onward and upward we hope. In years when Houston starts off the season well they usually make the playoffs. I'm serious here. Heck, even in spring training Astros owner Jim Crane said he was really happy with the make up of this team and he felt there was a real chance they could make a run at the playoffs. I'll bet people laughed at that given the Astros recent history but I'll also bet there aren't so many people laughing now.

KABrother88

05-01-2015, 07:40 AM

End of April AAA Prospect Report:

Note: The #.) before the name represents where player is ranked in MLB.com's Astros top 30 list.

3.) Domingo Santana - OF: 18 G, .279/.362/.623, 17 H, 2 2B, 2 3B, 5 HR, 10 RBI, 13 R, 26K/8BB

15.) Preston Tucker - OF: 20 G, .329/.371/.683, 27 H, 2 2B, 9 HR, 29 RBI, 18 R,

17.) Nolan Fontana - SS: 18 G, .250/.394/.411, 14 H, 4 2B, 1 3B 1 HR, 3 RBI, 14 R, 16K/14BB

18.) Max Stassi - C: 16 G, .216/.293/.314, 11 H, 1 3B, 1 HR, 4 RBI, 6 R, 19K/4BB

24.) James Hoyt - RHP: 9 G, 0-1, 3 SV, 9.72 ERA, 8.1 IP, 9 ER, 12 H, 9K/3BB, 1.80 WHIP

26.) Brady Rodgers - RHP: 3 G, 1-1, 8.22 ERA, 15.1 IP, 14 ER, 26 H, 11K/3BB, 1.89 WHIP

27.) Andrew Aplin - OF: 12 G, .282/.417/.410, 11 H, 2 2B, 1 HR, 4 RBI, 9 R, 10K/9BB, 4SB/2CS

28.) Ronald Torreyes - 2B: 16 G, .190/.203/.206, 12 H, 1 2B, 5 RBI, 5 R, 8K/1BB

NR.) Tommy Shirley - RHP: 4 G, 3-0, 2.70 ERA, 16.2 IP, 5 ER, 14 H, 14K/3BB, 1.02 WHIP

NR.) Jordan Jankowski - RHP: 10 G, 1-0, 1.54 ERA, 11.2 IP, 2 ER, 12 H, 12K/6BB, 1.54 WHIP

eagle eye

05-01-2015, 08:07 AM

KABrother88

05-01-2015, 12:47 PM

He is a little more of a utility infielder if it makes any difference...he also had a very good year last year at the same level hitting .298. His best attribute is he (prior to this season) just doesn't strike out. Coming into this year he had struck out just 122 times in 1883 ABs and just 26 times is 460 ABs last year in AAA.

KABrother88

05-01-2015, 01:35 PM

End Of April AA Prospect Report

1.) Carlos Correa - SS: 19 G, .385/.455/.744, 30 H, 11 2B, 1 3B, 5 HR, 22 RBI, 19 R, 5SB/0CS

2.) Mark Appel - RHP: 4 G, 2-0, 4.00 ERA, 18 IP, 8 ER, 17 H, 11K/4BB, 1.17 WHIP

4.) Vincent Velasquez - RHP: Has Not Played Due To Lat Injury

6.) Colin Moran - 3B: 20 G, .268/.318/.378, 22 H, 9 2B, 17 RBI, 9 R

8.) Teoscar Hernandez - OF: 17 G, .133/.212/.217, 8 H, 2 2B, 1 HR, 4 RBI, 12 R, 2SB/1CS

9.) Josh Hader - LHP: 4 G, 1-1, 4.20 ERA, 15 IP, 7 ER, 14 H, 15K/6BB, 1.33 WHIP

10.) Lance McCullers - RHP: 3 G, 1-0, 1 SV, 0.00 ERA, 14 IP, 10 H, 21K/6BB, 1.14 WHIP

14.) Tony Kemp - 2B: 20 G, .347/.462/.387, 26 H, 3 2B, 10 RBI, 12K/16BB, 2/3 SB/CS

19.) Kyle Smith - RHP: Has Not Played Due To Tommy John Surgery.

29.) Jandel Gustave - RHP: 6 G, 0-0, 1.13 IP, 8 IP, 1 ER, 5 H, 2K/2BB, 0.88 WHIP

NR.) Chris Devenski - RHP: 4 G, 2-0 1 SV, 0.00 ERA, 19.1 IP, 8 H, 16K/4BB, 0.62 WHIP

NR.) Kyle Westwood - RHP: 4 G, 1-1, 2 SV, 3.12 ERA, 17.1 IP, 6 ER, 25 H, 6K/4BB, 1.67 WHIP

KABrother88

05-01-2015, 01:36 PM

End Of April A+ Prospect Report

5.) Michael Feliz - RHP: 4 G, 1-1, 5.14 ERA, 14 IP, 8 ER, 13 H, 17K/7BB, 1.43 WHIP

7.) Brett Phillips - OF: 20 G, .341/.379/.634, 28 H, 6 2B, 3 3B, 4 HR, 13 RBI, 17 R, 13K/3BB

12.) A.J. Reed - 1B: 20 G, .208/.356/.417, 15 H, 2 2B, 2 3B, 3 HR, 11 RBI, 14 R, 24K/17BB

13.) J.D. Davis - 3B: 18 G, .324/.378/.507, 23 H, 5 2B, 1 3B, 2 HR, 14 RBI, 10 R, 19K/7BB

20.) Danry Vasquez - OF: 17 G, .257/.316/.371, 18 H, 6 2B, 6 RBI, 10 R, 9K/6BB

25.) Adrian Houser - RHP: 4 G, 0-1, 5.40 ERA, 13.1 IP, 8 ER, 12 H, 18K/8BB, 1.50 WHIP

KABrother88

05-01-2015, 01:37 PM

End Of April A Prospect Report

11.) Derek Fisher - OF: 14 G, .314/.397/.647, 16 H, 2 2B, 5 HR, 11 RBI, 12 R, 13K/7BB, 3SB/1CS

16.) Joe Musgrove - RHP: 4 G, 3-1, 0.87 ERA, 20.2 IP, 2 ER, 17 H, 20K/1BB, 0.87 WHIP

22.) Daniel Mengden - RHP: 4 G, 1-1, 2.04 ERA, 17.2 IP, 4 ER, 17 H, 22K/3BB, 1.13 WHIP

eagle eye

05-01-2015, 07:36 PM

Big T

05-01-2015, 09:12 PM

Astros keep on trucking! They just took game two from the Mariners tonight by a score of 4-3. Astros scored all of their runs on long balls tonight which is not surprising as they are leading the entire Majors in Home runs. Gattis opened up the scoring with a two run shot followed by Jake MArisnick. Springer capped it off in the bottom of the eighth by hitting a solo shot for some much needed insurance. Geregerson come on for the save and gave up two solo shots to Cruz and LoMo but was able to get the last two batters out for the eighth straight Astros win! How about those 16-7 Astros?!

puddin tane

05-01-2015, 09:15 PM

Marisnick is playing good ball. Would like to see Tucker brought up, but that would probably mean sending Springer down...and I don't see that happening

puddin tane

05-01-2015, 09:17 PM

We may never lose again!? 155-7

eagle eye

05-02-2015, 11:29 AM

Not trying to throw a monkey wrench into the machine but there is a bit of an item of concern. The last 3 times Luke Gregerson has gone out to pitch he's given up at least one run per outing and the 2 home runs he allowed the Mariners last night in the ninth made a fairly easy save situation a nail biter. In those same 3 outings I mentioned, if they had been one run games Gregerson would have had 3 blown saves and last night's game would have been a loss. Before that it was a one run situation after Dallas Keuchel pitched nine innings of shut out ball and after taking a two run lead in the 10th Gregerson blew it. Your closer isn't supposed to be giving up runs like that. I hope that his issues can get resolved and soon.

Another item of concern is that despite getting a couple of hits and a home run this past week his struggles at the plate continue with him looking more like the Carter of 2013 that set an MLB strikeout record. So far against the M's in this home series he's 0-8 with 5 K's. At some point you wonder if his confidence is in the toilet. Credit A J Hinch for sticking with Carter despite his struggles trying to allow him to hit his way out of his slump. If I was Carter I go to the guy who helped Jose Altuve become one of the best hitters in baseball. Or I'd get a voodoo doll name Jo-bu, or I'd do something different to break this bad luck cycle. I know power hitters have a certain mindset but it's been my belief you can't left your ego step in the batter's box with you. Be willing to get a hit, use the whole field and because his is a power hitter the home runs will come without forcing the issue. That said, when you are in a slump you press and when you press usually things don't get better, they get worse. Maybe Carter needs to ride pine for a couple of games just to give him a different perspective.

BTW, the Angels lost last night to San Francisco meaning Houston's division lead is now 5 games.

Big T

05-02-2015, 03:33 PM

Big T

05-02-2015, 07:51 PM

Nine in a row?! I think so! Astros win again 11-4 on the strength of FIVE home runs. Collin McHugh battled through some early struggles as the Astros were down 3-0 after an inning and a half. BTW, did y'all know Jose Altuve was a beast? Ok, just making sure. How about them 17-7 Astros?!

eagle eye

05-03-2015, 08:32 AM

The Astros haven't said anything, but I think he is going through a bit of a dead arm phase. His pitches just don't seem as crisp and he is leaving balls up. Now the HR to LoMo was down and he just hit a good pitch out.

Dead arm? In May? I'm assuming you're talking about Gregerson. I would be worried if his arm is "dead" a month and only 5 appearances into the season. You never know, it could be but isn't that a reason for some concern?

As for the streaking Astros, the only bad thing was the end of the 9 game multi-hit game streak Altuve was on. He went "only" 1-4 yesterday but what a one it was! A three run bomb to left center that took the life out of the M's who were still in the game at 5-3 when the blast occurred. McHugh wasn't exactly sharp as a tack and allowing 4 solo home runs, two to Nelson Cruz, didn't do his ERA any good (3.41) but his 4-0 record is the most important stat and his slate is still perfect.

Did you guys notice that when standings pages list the W/L record they also include the team record over the last 10 games as well as the current streak whether it's in wins or losses. For the last 5 games the Astros streak has been 9-1. Why because at the end of the last 4 game streak was a loss then the current streak began. If we win again today that streak number will be 10-0. Absolutely impressive but only slightly more impressive than the 9-1. Ironically enough if we lose today that streak in the standings will still be 9-1. W/L streak will change to L1. Hopefully, Roberto Hernandez can lead the way to a tenth win in a row!

Big T

05-03-2015, 09:40 AM

Most pitchers go through a dead arm phase in Spring Training or the early part of the year. I am not saying for sure that is why he is being hit right now, but the way he is leaving the balls up in the zone makes me think that is what it is. Hopefully not throwing llast night gave him some needed rest.

KABrother88

05-03-2015, 04:19 PM

Another day another win. 10 in a row for the first time since the 2004 team that was 1 game away from the WS. Not only is the 18-7 record good for #1 in the AL, #2 in all of MLB and a 7 game cushion in the AL West...but it is also a franchise record for the best 25 game start to a season. I know it's still May and this team is on fire but there just seems to be something special long term with this club to me. Hopefully all summer is as enjoyable as the first month has been.

Big T

05-04-2015, 06:06 PM

eagle eye

05-04-2015, 06:44 PM

Bring on the Rangers! Astros already hold a 2-1 lead in the chase for the Silver Boot after one series that was played in Arlington. Lets see if the Astros can extend that lead and extend the winning streak.

Bottom of 2nd with Houston already leading 1-0 on a sac fly by Gattis that scored Altuve, who led off with a walk. Springer walked too and then they pulled off another double steal to set up Gattis. Small ball at it's best.

eagle eye

05-05-2015, 05:59 AM

Why, or why, does the offense always seem to go to sleep on Dallas Keuchel? I'm not sweating the Astros losing last night. I'm not. But why is it that either the offense takes the night off or the bullpen decided to suck every stinking time Keuchel pitches? (You hear that Chad Qualls?) Listen, you pitch 8 innings and give up one lousy run you should have the reasonable expectation your team is going to win. At least Keuchel didn't have the indignity of having to pitch that well AND eat a loss. Chad Qualls is entering the "Lights Out Lidge" territory the way he's surrendering runs in close games. Sheesh, he had 1st and 3rd with no outs before he teased us with a K. Now, Houston has hope that a ground ball can be turned into an inning ending double play but no. He gives up a fly ball for God's sake but it's not all Qualls fault. Jake Marisnick had a real chance to gun down Delino DeShields at the plate but his throw to home plate was horrible. On the other side of the coin the offense just plain took the night off. Rangers starter Ross Detwiler came into the game with an 0-3 record and a 6.57 ERA vs Keuchel's 3-0, 0.73 ERA and you say, "this game is a slam dunk for Houston." (Bad analogy considering how bad the Rockets were down the street at the Toyota Center.) But, noooooo! Houston hitters make Detwiler look like the second coming of Cy Young. The Astros just could figure out Det's change up and considering some of the awkward swings the Astros took I suppose we should feel lucky nobody was injured. The winning streak was fun while it lasted but why is it you always seem to lose to break a streak to the team you'd least want to lose to? That's baseball.

eagle eye

05-06-2015, 09:37 AM

The Astros lost to the Rangers again. Fans of Wandy Rodriguez should be happy Houston had no answer for Wandy last night. Everybody else the Rangers have faced seems to have had an answer but not the Stros. Lost 2 in row. Hopefully, we can salvage one game in the series tonight. Scott Feldman looked as bad as Collin McHugh did Sunday against the Mariners but he got some run support. Feldman wasn't that lucky. What did Feldman in was a horrible 1st inning when the Rangers hung four runs on Houston. Just about the time you thought the Astros might get out of the inning allowing only two runs after Prince Fielder was thrown out at home trying to score on a single by Kyle Banks Carlos Peguero hits a two run HR making the score 4-0. Luis Valbuena jacked a HR for Houston in the bottom of the 1st but that was it for Houston's offense. I knew it was going to be a long night when Jose Altuve went to the plate in the bottom of the 2nd with two out and the bases loaded and all he could manage was a weak ground ball to Wandy to end the threat.

In the top of the seventh George Springer made, what is becoming almost a daily thing, a highlight catch of a fly ball to right field in which he crashed into the wall about the same time he made the catch. Springer came off the field under his own power but A J Hinch pulled him from the game as a precaution. Initially, I believe Hinch thought he might have injured himself because the vision in one of his eyes was not right but it turned out to be his contact lens shifted when he hit the wall. Springer will likely be out of tonight's lineup while he undergoes testing for concussion. Hinch said that is normal precautionary action when a play has a collision involving his head. It was a catch worth seeing again though.....

http://m.astros.mlb.com/hou/video/topic/11493214/v103159383/must-c-catch-springer-crashes-into-wall-secures-out

KABrother88

05-07-2015, 09:17 AM

Another loss to the Rangers as they get the sweep. Tough to watch.

George Springer is headed to the 7 Day Concussion DL after crashing in to the wall Tuesday night. Preston Tucker is being called up from AAA Fresno to fill the roster spot. I am very excited to see what he can do. Was hitting .320 (32-100) with 10 HRs and 32 RBI in 25 games with "only" 18 Ks.

eagle eye

05-07-2015, 07:31 PM

Since nobody has mentioned it Dallas Keuchel has won AL Pitcher of the Month of April and Jose Altuve has won Co-Player of the Week of April 27th. Altuve shares the honor with the A's Josh Reddick.

Here's a look at Keuchel's month. BTW, when you see 3-0 in 5 starts in April know it should have been 5-0 if not for blown saves by Chad Qualls and Luke Gregerson. It was more of the same crap as Keuchel pitched 8 innings giving up only one lousy run in a loss to the Rangers on Monday night. Houston bats went to sleep on the night and only managed a single run in a 2-1 loss. Keuchel has pitched more than well enough to be 6-0.

http://www.crawfishboxes.com/2015/5/4/8548251/dallas-keuchel-named-a-l-pitcher-of-the-month

http://blog.chron.com/ultimateastros/2015/05/04/jose-altuve-wins-al-player-of-week-award/#27055101=0

As for Reddick he had a good week too as we got to see part of it when Houston played the A's last week.

http://www.athleticsnation.com/2015/5/4/8546787/josh-reddick-athletics-american-league-player-of-the-week-jose-altuve

eagle eye

05-08-2015, 07:12 PM

Astros closer Luke Gregerson has been placed on the Family Medical Emergency List as of today for an undisclosed reason. Presumably, there is a family medical emergency. He can be on the list from three to seven days. Hopefully, whatever is wrong turns out okay. To fill Gregerson's roster spot Asher Wojociewski has been called up and will be in uniform tonight. I am assuming Wojo will come in as needed out of the bullpen.

Maybe Houston blasted their way out of their offensive funk with a 9th inning come from behind win over the Angels. In his first game in the majors Preston Tucker picked a perfect time to get his first big league hit. Top of the 9th with men on base he laced a ground ball into right field driving in a run for not only his first MLB hit but his first MLB RBI. Bam-bam went 1-3 on the night with the RBI, a walk and NO K's! Nice start for the kid.

eagle eye

05-11-2015, 05:59 PM

The Astros split their series with the Los Angeles Angels which, for a normal road trip, isn't bad but we had gotten a little spoiled by the red hot April the Astros had particularly on the road. This past week they came down to earth by getting swept at home by the last place Texas Rangers. In 3 games the Astros scored a whopping 5 runs for the 3 game set with Texas. Even with the great starting pitching the Stros got it wasn't enough to overcome such dismal run production. To top it all off George Springer crashed head first into the right field wall tracking down and catching a fly ball in the seventh inning of the Wednesday game. Springer has been out of the lineup since as Houston goes through their concussion protocol with Springer. To fill his spot in the lineup the Astros brought up Preston Tucker, nicknamed Bam-Bam in the minors because of his hitting prowess coming up through the Astros farm system. He made his first start on Thursday in LA and got his first MLB base hit and his first MLB RBI as the Astros rallied in the 9th inning to beat the Angels and snap the 3 game losing skid they were on. Tucker didn't get another hit over the weekend as he got his initiation to big league pitching and then some. The Angels shut down the Astros offense for the most part all weekend as Houston toughed out a split by scoring 6 runs for Saturday starter Dallas Keuchel. For Keuchel is was his worst outing of the season as he allowed 4 earned runs in the game, 3 coming in the 1st inning as it looked like it could be a long day for the Astros. But, they rallied and had their only real offensive output of the series in support of Keuchel. It was almost for naught as Chad Qualls came on in the 9th to close the game and it looked like he was really sent in to facilitate an Angels rally. Leading 6-4 when the inning began and when it was finally over it was 6-5 with men on 1st and 2nd with Albert Pujols at the plate. A J Hinch decided to stick with Qualls who got Pujols to ground into an inning ending out. Collin McHugh got a no-decision on Thursday and Keuchel won on Saturday to move his record to 4-0 while Roberto Hernandez was a hard luck loser on Friday as Houston was shut out 2-0 and Scott Feldman ate his 4th loss of the season as Houston fell 3-1. Houston had opportunities but score runs and steal the win but they continued to be quite anemic at the plate. Hopefully, it was just a bad week and they will snap out of it as they return to the Juice Box tomorrow to begin a short 2-game series with San Francisco.

The Astros have made one minor league move today as they promoted their #1 prospect SS Carlos Correa from AA Corpus Christi to AAA Fresno. Currently in AA Correa is hitting a blistering .385 and leads the league in many offensive categories. With SS Jed Lowrie out until the All Star break and little production since Lowrie went on the DL if Correa continues his hot hitting in AAA it could very well be we see him in Houston sooner rather than later.

Need KABrother88 to update the best of the minors again with this move by the Astros. (hint-hint)

KABrother88

05-11-2015, 06:59 PM

Haha...work and life has been a little hectic the last few weeks but I've got the day off Friday so I'll try to put a little something together for ya EE. I'm pretty giddy about Correa getting promoted to AAA though...I still don't want them to rush him but it was obvious AA was not challenging him

eagle eye

05-13-2015, 02:35 PM

For the series finale tonight against the SF Giants you will see a couple of roster changes. First, the Astros were happy with George Springer's progress and he has been cleared by the concussion protocols and will be back in the lineup for the first time since crashing into the right field wall head first last Wednesday night against the Rangers. Hopefully, the time off will change his fortunes at the plate as he is only sporting a .192 BA. He has drawn enough walks so that he is among the AL leaders in stolen bases. Now, it's high time his bat caught fire.

To make room for Springer the Astros have sent OF Robbie Grossman to AAA Fresno. Okay, you say, Grossman wasn't doing anything to make me sad he going down to the minors but then you think, "Hey, that means Preston Tucker, who Houston brought up last week to fill Springer's spot, is still on the big league roster!". In all fairness Tucker hasn't been hitting all that well but he faced an Angels pitching staff that made the playoffs last season. He got one hit in 10 official ABs but he did work a couple of walks (3) and HE DIDN'T STRIKE OUT BUT 2 TIMES. For a Houston player to work more walks than he has K's, that is something to crow about. Honestly if you are going to put up with a sub .200 BA it may as well be a new kid who was producing in the minors enough so that his nickname is Bam-Bam than a veteran guy who can't hit his ass with both hands. May as well give the kid a shot, am I wrong? Tucker wasn't in the lineup last night against the Giants and Grossman went oh-fer on the night. To be fair the whole Houston roster only managed 2 hits on the night but it was obviously the impetus for sending Grossman down was, in part, his lack of success last night.

Finally, after dealing with a bad blister on his pitching hand that popped up in spring training, Brett Oberholtzer is making his first start of the season tonight against the defending World Champion Giants. No pressure. In his most recent start at Corpus Christi was successful as he went 5.1 innings giving up no runs was deemed ready early in the week. I like Obie and he was a guy I was counting in spring training assessments of the pitching staff as a strength. With Obie on the DL Asher Wojociewski and Samuel Deduno tried to take up the slack but were ultimately unsuccessful as they combined for an 0-2 record in 5 starts. Houston needs Oberholtzer to lock down that No 4 spot in the rotation. It's a crying shame his first game is against the 2014 World Series Champs. The same team that put an 8-1 beat down on Houston last night. Maybe Obie, Springer and Bam-Bam can spark an upset tonight.

One thing to keep in mind. Despite going 4-6 in their last 10 games Houston is still 4 games up in the division over second place LA who they split 4 games with last week and after tonight's game with San Fran they have a four game series with Toronto who have a .500 record (17-17) and are 8-10 on the road so far this season. The last week and a half hasn't been pretty for the Astros but it's about time the bats caught fire again. Also, against the Toronto the Astros will send Dallas Keuchel, Collin McHugh and Scott Feldman to the mound looking to make up for sub par outings in their last starts.

eagle eye

05-15-2015, 07:37 AM

Bam-Bam does it for Houston! Going 3-4 with an RBI and a run scored. Of course Bam-Bam refers to MLB rookie Preston Tucker who had his first multi-hit game as a big leaguer last night. After speculation that Carlos Correa needs to be promoted to the big club ASAP Jonathan Villar responds with a good night at the plate to go with is good play in the field. Villar went 1-3 with a walk, no K's with 2 RBI's and a run scored. It was Villar's 2 run double that gave the Astros the lead as part of a 7th inning rally from a 4-2 deficit to a 5-4 lead. Villar's head's up base running in that 7th inning rally extended the Astros lead to 6-4 which was the final score of the game. After Villar's double Jake Marisnick flew out to center field advancing Villar to 3rd. After a pitching change Jose Altuve was intentionally walked. With Luis Valbuena at the plate Altuve stole 2nd base and when the ball wasn't fielded cleanly Villar took off and scored without a throw to the plate.
Unlike the previous night when Houston depended on the long balls by Valbuena and Springer to beat the Giants against the Blue Jays Houston depended on timely hitting and good base running to win. It's also getting pretty clear, teams better not let down their guard late in games because Houston will make you pay. There have already been more than a handful of games when the Astros put up crooked numbers in 7th inning or later to either come from behind and win or extend leads to salt away games. This is exciting to see this team performing like this and so far it appears they are actually performing in a way that is 2 or 3 years ahead of the schedule the experts predicted for this team's emergence as a real contender. I know, it's only mid-May but with a 4.5 game lead in the AL West it's hard to see Houston just collapsing. It really looks like they will be a team of interest in this year's playoff picture. Nice!

While Carlos Correa is getting all the pub on the heels of his promotion to Jon Singleton is trying to show the Astros front office he needs to be in the big league lineup. On Wednesday night Singleton went 4-5 with 10 RBI's in a AAA Fresno win in Pacific Coast League play. This included a 2 run home run and 3 run homer. I'll tell you, with Chris Carter hitting a dismal .150 and piling up K's like it was 2013 he has to know a guy like Singleton could easily come up and take his place if he can't find the stroke that made him the best hitter in baseball the second half of last season. In the "what have you done for me lately" world of pro sports the answer by Chris Carter would have to be, "Not much.". And Chris, you know that how you lose your job, right? I don't care how well you've been playing in the field, no hit-no play, dude.

As for call ups, the Astros moved another player up from Corpus Christi to Fresno this week. P Lance McCullers, who as drafted in the same draft as Carlos Correa was promoted from AA to AAA. He has been pitching his behind off so far this season and deserved the move easily out-pacing former 1st round pick Mark Appel. Appel is 3-0 in 6 starts with a 3.71 ERA in 26.2 innings pitched. McCullers is 3-1 in 4 starts and 6 appearances with a save and a microscopic 0.62 ERA in 29 innings pitched. McCullers has half as many hits allowed (15 to 30), 1/4th as many runs allowed (3 to 13) and over twice as many K's (43 to 19). Appel has walked fewer batters (9 to 11) but the difference is negligible compared to the innings pitched and the K's and runs allowed. It's worth noting that the numbers Appel has are not chicken feed. They are not terrible by any means and when you figure the injury and health issues that have held Appel back and given that McCullers has an extra year in the pros it's not time to call Appel a bust. I'm not saying that at all. I think Appel will reach Fresno sometime this summer for sure. Excuse me while I look for my shades because the future is looking pretty bright to me. (Catch that reference to Timbuk 3's, "The Future's So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades?" What? Never heard it? Check it out on youtube.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qrriKcwvlY

Feeling a little funky today. Here's a video of a guilty pleasure of mine. From the mid 80's the song Heart and Soul by a group known as T'Pau. Sorry, but it's Friday and I don't want to be at work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwrYMWoqg5w

KABrother88

05-15-2015, 08:49 PM

Been tied up all day and not able to compile a minor league report like I had planned buto one quick note. As EE stated Lance McCullers was promoted from AA to AAA...well that has changed slightly...instead McCullers will make his MLB debut Monday in a spot start in the place of Brett Oberholtzer.

Big T

05-17-2015, 09:24 AM

I am back! Sorry guys, it has been a terrible couple of weeks, but all of my assignments have been turned in and now I am just waiting on final grades t make sure that I will be graduating! Anyways, Looks like the Astros are back to their wining ways. I am very excited to see the debut of Lance McCullers this afternoon. I saw where they brought him up two days ago. What happened to Oberholtzer? Didn't he just make his first start and look pretty decent?

Mike

05-17-2015, 10:58 AM

eagle eye

05-17-2015, 06:29 PM

Not just a blister on his pitching hand, the same blister that had kept him out for the first 6 weeks of the season. And Big T is right, Obie looked good for the 3 innings he pitched until the top layer off the blister partially tore off. 15 day DL is only the start. Obie has been dealing with this blister for 2 months and they thought he was okay because it appeared to callas over. Maybe Obie needs to soak his hand in brine to toughen his hand up. (Old Nolan Ryan trick.)

> Astros have won 5 straight since their last loss to San Francisco last week. Angels lost toT Baltimore today so the Astros lead in the division is now 5.5 games.
> The Astros record of 25-13 is the best in Astros history after 38 games.
> The Astros swept their second 4 game series in a row with their win today over Toronto.
> The Astros lead MLB in home runs with 57, 2nd in stolen bases, and the relief pitchers are #1 in ERA in the MLB. Not to mention top ten in many other categories. All this with being ranked 28th in total hits and 2nd worst in MLB in K's.
> In the last week The Astros are 5-1 losing last Tuesday to San Fran in the 1st of a 2 game set and 5 straight with a win over San Fran and 4 in a row over Toronto.
> Looks like Preston Tucker is starting to feel at home at the Juice Box. He's hitting .333 with 4 doubles among his 7 hits with 3 runs scored and 3 RBI's. I was surprised as can be when the Astros kept Tucker when George Springer returned from his concussion DL and sent Robbie Grossman by to Fresno.
> The Astros big 3 in their starting rotation Keuchel, McHugh and Feldman all won their last start after sub-par efforts last time out. Keuchel is 5-0, McHugh is 5-1 and Feldman is 3-4. Roberto Hernandez is the hard luck guy so far because having quality starts in all but one start he can't buy any run support. His 1-3 record is not really indicative of the way he's pitched so far. Shoot there's 4 relievers with more wins on the staff.
> As mentioned by Big T and KABrother88 Lance McCullers will make his MLB debut against Oakland tomorrow night. Originally called up to AAA late last week he never made a start there when he was tagged as a spot starter after Obie reinjured his blister. We'll see how he does but I don't expect a lot, not because he's not good enough but because he's making his first MLB start. I would imagine he'll be more nervous and excited than we will ever know. It's a big jump from AA to the bigs you certainly can't blame him if he stumbles a bit. Hopefully, the bats will provide him with some run support to help calm him down a little.
> Houston has been called by members of the media as being two years ahead of schedule as far as their playoff relevance. That ain't a bad thing and with guys like Preston Tucker and Lance McCullers coming up to the big club and Carlos Correa on track with his promotion to AAA it's beginning to look like the future is now.

eagle eye

05-18-2015, 06:53 PM

I'm watching the Astros right now and I'm impressed so far with McCullers. With 2 out in the 2nd inning he's already got 3 K's. It really doesn't look like he has any semblance of nerves. He certainly has good stuff. Big T may finally be getting his dominating power pitcher. I know, I know it's waaaaaay early but you can't help but hope. The problem is with those 2 out in the 2nd he's already thrown 39 pitches. He will be fortunate to last 5 innings. An oh-by-the-way double with one out followed by a K and a walk to put men on 1st and 2nd. Houston gave McCullers a 1-0 lead after 1 but he's struggling here a bit. The ump is squeezing him IMO on the outside corner. Gotta love McCullers Batman shoes. Up to 45 pitches. Single for Sogard 1-1 but I swear this stupid ump is not giving McCullers squat. He missed strike 3 on a 2-2 pitch and the graphic for the strike zone clearly showed it was a strike. Runners on 1st and 3rd with a 1-2 count. He needs to get this guy. Dammit, 3-2 count with 53 pitches. Lost him on an overthrown pitch. Bases loaded and the pitching coach made a trip to the mound to try to settle McCullers down. This ump is screwing McCullers. 1st pitch was a strike and Alan Ashby made a comment about the ump. Pitch 2 in the count and a ground ball up the middle but the put out is made by Altuve. Inning is over but nearly 60 pitches after 2 innings ain't good. Houston needs to string together some hits to give the kid a rest. Lucky only 1 run scored.

eagle eye

05-18-2015, 07:27 PM

McCullers had a nice 10 pitch 1-2-3 inning in the 3rd.

Bottom of inning the Astros loaded the bases with one out and Evan Gattis did the only thing to kill an inning---hit into a 6-4-3 double play.

Samuel Deduno put on the 15 day DL with a lower back strain. It just happens to coincide with the official call up of McCullers. Broadcast team said McCullers will make at least 2 starts.

Top of 4 - two fly ball outs (8 total pitches so far) What's happened to this ump? 2 borderline pitches called strikes? Wow. Nice play by Chris Carter on a ground ball. Completed the play tossing to McCullers. 14 pitches in the inning. Only 79 pitches but with 55 after 2 that ain't bad.

Btm of 4 - men on 2nd and 3rd with one out and Houston doesn't get squat. Jason Castro having a terrible night at the plate. Two weak AB's and Marisnick can't pick him up with a weak flyout for the 3rd out.

eagle eye

05-18-2015, 07:57 PM

McCullers night is over. Hinch pulled him after giving up a 2 out double. He threw 93 pitches and what really did him in was a 36 pitch 2nd inning. Depending on if the runner scores he will have either given up one or two runs in his MLB debut. He ended up with 5 K's and 3 walks. Joe Thatcher in for McCullers. Thatcher gives Houston 2 side arm throwers. One lefty (Thatcher) and a righty (Pat Neshak).

Houston has squandered some primo scoring opportunities and they are oh-fer with runners in scoring position tonight. The run they scored in the 1st was done without a single official at bat. Altuve HBP, (stolen base), Villar sac bunt-Altuve to 3rd, George Springer walked, Evan Gattis sac fly.

Thatcher struggling with 1st batter (Reddick). 11th pitch in the count strike 3, side retired. McCullers on the hook for only one run. McCullers can't get the win but he did a really nice job for his first big league start. You can see he's got really good stuff. Mid-90's fast ball, good curve and good change up. I can't wait for his next start this weekend.

eagle eye

05-19-2015, 10:44 AM

I mentioned in a previous thread about Lance McCullers "Batman" cleats. They are the most unusual pair of shoes I've seen on a pro baseball field.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2469344-houston-astros-pitcher-lance-mccullers-wears-sick-batman-cleats-in-mlb-debut

Big T

05-20-2015, 04:47 PM

Astros take another today 6-1 as Dallas went seven innings giving up one earned run. Gattis hit a 2 run bomb to left in the win. The Astros are now 27-14 which blows my mind. At this point I am just hoping that they are going to be able to sustain this level of play throughout the season without having to go out and acquire a big name at the deadline. Lets see if we can't keep this momentum going and if needed bring in players from within the system to help out such as McCullers, Appel, and Correa. Why go out to eat when you have all of this food in the oven at home? To sell off half of the system for Johnny Cueto would be counter productive. BTW, Houston is on Cole Hammel's no trade list so no Hammel's for the Astros.

eagle eye

05-22-2015, 08:02 AM

Heartbreaking loss yesterday in extra innings. Scott Feldman was hammered for 5 runs in 6 innings but Houston came back with 5 of their own. They scored 3 in the 7th, 1 in the 8th and Preston Tucker hit his first MLB home run to tie the game in the 9th. Unfortunately, the Tiger's Clayton McCann hit a walk off home run to end the game in the bottom of the 11th off Tony Sipp. The Tiger's David Price mowed down 12 Astros hitters in his 6 2/3 innings looking like the Cy Young candidate that he is. That is until the 7th when Houston finally got to him and tagged him with 3 runs on singles by George Springer, Hank Conger and Jonathan Villar and a triple by Evan Gattis. Before that Price was unhittable and Houston looked to be in the midst of a long disappointing day. It was ultimately disappointing when Clayton McCann ended the game with his 2nd career home run and his first out of the park HR as his first round tripper was an inside the park HR.

Samuel Deduno was put on the 15 day DL because of low back strain. The doctors have prescribed rest for his aching back that has been giving him trouble since spring training. Deduno being put on the DL coincided with the activation of P Lance McCullers who made his first MLB start on Monday and will make another start against Detroit on Saturday.

As for Wednesday's win over the A's, I was at that game and Dallas Keuchel seemed to regain his form by pitching 7 innings allowing only one unearned run. He did struggle a couple of innings including getting out of a bases loaded one out jam in the 4th and he got in a little trouble in the 6th when the A's scored with men on 1st and 2nd and Chris Carter committed a fielding error to allow the runner on 2nd to score. Keuchel's ERA dropped from 1.82 to a, now league leading, 1.67 ERA. I was worried that the Astros were going to waste another great outing by Kuechel but Evan Gattis' 2 run monster shot in the 7th gave Houston a lead they would not relinquish. Houston put up 3 insurance runs in the 8th to give Houston a comfortable 6-1 win.

There was one play that blew me away and that was a broken bat looper over 1st base hit by George Springer in bottom of the 8th. Springer was hustling right out of the batter's box and he showed some speed stretching out a bloop single into a double that was easily accomplished by Springer's speed. Springer's hit followed a lead off single by Luis Valbuena and ignited the 3 run inning the Astros had in the 8th. That play blew me away and put an exclamation point on all the ways Springer makes Houston a much better team when he's on the field. You have to say he's a true 5-tool player despite his rather anemic .205 BA. I really look for his average to improve dramatically over the next few weeks and the rest of the season. It's hard to remember he's only got 4 months of experience in the majors. The kid needs some time to settle in to be the player he will ultimately become.

Weird stat of the week. Houston leads the majors with 62 home runs and they also lead the AL and 2nd in the majors in strike outs with 385. The Cubs lead the majors with 395 K's.

eagle eye

05-24-2015, 06:48 AM

Lance McCullers nailed the 1st win in the 4th spot in the starting rotation all season. He went six complete innings throwing 100 pitches allowing 2 runs on 6 hits with a walk and 6 K's. Not bad for a rookie's 2nd ever start in the bigs. On top of that it was against one of the best hitting teams in baseball in a Detroit team who is currently on a roll, that is until yesterday. The only jam he was in was in the 5th inning with runners on 1st and 2nd and a run had already scored when Ian Kinsler grounded into a 5-unassisted-4-3 triple play that seemed to ignite the offense in the top of the 6th. With 2 outs in the inning Preston Tucker, Chris Carter and Jason Castro had back-to-back-to-back singles that scored Tucker and tied the game at 2. After a pitching change Marwin Gonzalez singled for the Astros 4th straight hit of the inning scoring Chris Carter to give the Astros a 3-2 lead which held up until Luke Gregerson recorded the final out of the game giving Houston a victory and broke a two game skid to the Tigers. The Astros, the leading home run hitting team in baseball got it done yesterday playing small ball. The Astros getting their first run of the day on a Jose Altuve sac fly that scored Marwin Gonzalez from 3rd which gave Houston the early 1-0 lead. That lead didn't last long as Detroit came right back to score a run to tie the game in the bottom of the inning on a double by Anthony Gose which scored Jose Iglesias who singled right before Gose's at-bat.

Man, are Jose Altuve and Jake Marisnick in some epic slumps or what? Marisnick's BA has fallen in the past month from .386 to .278. His troubles seemed to begin when AJ Hinch moved him out of the 9th spot to 7 in the batting order. Marisnick was not hitting squat and the going off the success Marisnick had hitting in front of Jose Altuve Hinch tried him at lead off which Altuve hitting 2nd. That didn't work either and it seemed to spark a decline in Altuve's success at the plate. Marisnick is currently back in the 9 hole but it hasn't helped much as he has gone from .299 to .278 in the past week. When Marisnick was moved to lead off Altuve's BA was in the .360 range, in fact his season high BA was .368 but, for the last 2 and half weeks Altuve has been unable to buy a hit. His BA has tumbled down to .294. Altuve is still making contributions with his hustle and defense and as in yesterday's game a sac fly for an RBI but we all hope Altuve and the rest of the Astros figure out what the hell is going on and start hitting the damn ball.

Speaking of hitting the damn ball, Roberto Hernandez will take the hill for Houston today at 12 o'clock-ish for the series finale in Detroit. Hernandez has pitched well enough to get wins here lately but he can't seem to get any offensive support from his teammates. Hernandez (3.99 ERA) will face Anibel Sanchez (5.60 ERA) and going by stats Houston should win the game. Will yesterday's win help Houston break out of a collective team hitting slump? Who knows but of all the good things Houston has been doing hitting consistently hasn't been one of them. Houston has been making some pretty average pitchers look pretty darn good (David Price excluded).

What do you want to bet Lance McCullers gets to hang around for another start? I think he deserves it. BTW did McCullers wear his Batman cleats yesterday? I couldn't tell. He did have an embarrassing moment in the 5th inning. His first pitch of an intentional walk to Miguel Cabrerra sailed over Jason Castro's head allow a runner on 2nd advance to 3rd. It was shocking and funny to see a big league player do that.

Here's an article from Astros.com which includes a video of wild pitch I mentioned above.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/126233184/astros-prospect-lance-mccullers-earns-first-win

eagle eye

05-24-2015, 03:34 PM

I usually recap the past week on Monday but I've got a little family get together tomorrow for my son, Chris, who will be leaving for boot camp next weekend. He has joined the US Army and has volunteered for Special Forces training. He's a Lamar grad in 2010 and he's finally acting on a desire he's had to serve our country. That's tomorrow.

This past week the Astros had what would be called an up and down week as they took 2 of 3 from the A's at home highlighted (for me) with a win on Wednesday afternoon that Chris and I were at the Juice Box for as Dallas Keuchel ran his season record up to 6-0 and ran his ERA down from 1.82 to a now AL leading 1.67. They completed their week in the Motor City taking on the Tigers in a 4-game series which the split with Detroit winning Games 1 and 2 and Houston taking the final two.
After starting the week hitting .316 Jose Altuve continued his struggles at the plate finishing the week on Saturday with a .294 BA. AJ Hinch gave Altuve a day off today in hopes that a little rest will help get his bat going again. To be honest, he could probably use the day off tomorrow as well but I seriously don't think he'll sit two games in a row.

The Astros continue to be able to score late in games to either salt away games they are leading or stealing games when they are behind. Their record now stands at 29-16 and they are now 6.5 games up on the second place Angels who lost today to the Red Sox. Did anyone on this thread believe Houston would be in this position nearly 2 months into the season? Yeah, even the optimist, me, didn't think things would be this good.

The Astros begin the final week of May in Baltimore who currently stand at 19-22 in fourth place but only 3 games back of AL East division leader Tampa. Dallas Keuchel takes the hill in a special Memorial Day game time of 12:35 CDT and he'll face off against Wei-Yin Chen (1-3 2.90 ERA). I probably won't be on line tomorrow so Happy Memorial Day--a day that means so much more to me now that my son will begin serving his country one week from tomorrow.

Cudos to the Astros who's big 6th inning lead by an Evan Gattis home run to lead off the inning and a huge 3 run pinch hit 3-run home run by Preston Tucker with 2 outs in the inning. This enabled the Astros to turn a 7-3 deficit into a tie game. Also, a tip of the cap to Jason Castro who had a huge 2-run base hit to give the Astros with two outs and the bases loaded to give the Astros a 9-7 lead in the 7th inning. The Astros added an insurance run in the 8th on a Marwin Gonzalez single scoring Preston Tucker who doubled earlier in the inning. Luke Gregerson gives up way too many runs for a closer to suit me but he's getting the job done. He got his 12th save in 14 attempts but it wasn't without some drama. A one out HR by Miguel Cabrera tightened the score to 10-8 and during the course of the inning Gregerson ended up with 2 out and men on 1st and 3rd when he got Nick Castillanos to ground out to Valbuena to end the game. Gattis got triples in yesterday and today's games to give him his 2nd and 3rd trips of his career. He had a good week at the plate finally pushing his BA above the Mendoza line at .201. Chris Carter continues to struggle and the way Jon Singleton is tearing it up at AAA Fresno the two could swap places in the near future. Another guy worth mentioning is Lance McCullers. The guy showed some moxie in his first start early in the week and actually held the Tigers to 2 runs yesterday. With the lack of consistency shown by Roberto Hernandez and Brett Oberholtzer coming off the 15 day DL this week could we see a major change --- like McCullers staying up and Hernandez going down? Could be as Houston seems to be continuing to filter up young players from the minors. With Carlos Correa continuing his good hitting could he be next? Marwin Gonzalez seems to be worried as his production at the plate has been picking up this past week. Getting mighty interesting in H-town.

eagle eye

05-27-2015, 07:17 AM

It had to happen eventually but it sort of stung when Dallas Keuchel suffered his first loss of the season on Monday. Keuchel made two mistakes all game and the Orioles hit both out of the park for a pair of two run homers that gave them a 4-3 victory. Keuchel pitched very well except for two pitches he left up and had to watch them fly over the fence. The Astros offense had a slew of base runners and plenty of opportunities to score a lot of runs but they couldn't generate a meaningful hit. The Stros had the chance to score twice the 3 runs they ended up with but they couldn't get it done. The hell of it all is it was Keuchel's first complete game of the season. What a kick in the teeth? Last season Keuchel lead the majors in complete games with 5 but his record was 4-1 in those games. So, this is not a new experience.

The offense could have scored more than the 4 runs they ended up with but they couldn't get a hit when it counted, again. At least until the 7th and 8th innings when they scored 2 runs in each inning to help Scott Feldman get his 4th win on the season and even his record up to 4-4 with a 4-1 victory over Baltimore to even the series at 1 apiece. It's looking like maybe AJ Hinch has found a combination he likes at the top of the order with George Springer leading off and Jose Altuve hitting second. Hinch looked at rookie Preston Tucker in the 3 hole but he didn't provide any spark there last night. Luis Valbuena, who has been hitting 3rd was moved down to sixth and he actually came through with 2 hits and 2 RBI's. Chris Carter, hitting 7th had an RBI and run scored, and Jason Castro, hitting 8th were responsible for the other RBI in the game. Feldman went 6 innings allowing 4 hits and the one run with 3 walks and 2 K's. Pat Neshak, Chad Qualls and Luke Gregerson combined to shut out the O's in the final 3 innings. Gregerson notched his 13th save on the season.

Remember, the Astros play a get away game at 3:35 this afternoon with Collin McHugh (5-2) against Ubaldo Jiminez (3-3). The Astros return home after today's game to begin a 3 game series with the White Sox. Lance McCullers will get his 3rd start in that game.

eagle eye

05-28-2015, 11:50 AM

Houston lost to Baltimore in the series finale yesterday by a score of 5-4. They lost on a home run given up by Tony Sipp in the 8 inning on the first pitch he threw. It's kind of the same way Houston has been beating people. Houston tried to make one of their patented late inning comebacks in the 9th. They had 4 really hard hit balls but 3 of them were fielded and resulted in an out. Pinch hitter Jonathan Villar ripped a ball to left that nearly sailed over the head of the O's left fielder David Lough. Nearly is the key word as Lough tracked down the ball for out #1. George Springer was up next and hit a sharp grounder up the middle that would have been a base hit if not for the quick reaction by O's closer Zack Britton who caught the ball and completed the put out throw to 1st. Jose Altuve camp up next and doubled down the left field line to give the Astros the tying run in scoring position. Preston Tucker was up next and he smashed a ball to deep left field that he thought was out of the park at first but, again, David Lough tracked down the ball and caught it on the warning track. Game over. It was another frustrating night for Houston as they out hit Baltimore 11-10 but couldn't get hits when they had runners in scoring position. In fact it wasn't just a failure to hit it was the fact that most of the time is was due to Astros hitters striking out. At least that's the way it seemed. The Astros only had 5 K's in the game with Preston Tucker having one and Chris Carter and Jason Castro with 2 each and both times there were runners in scoring position.

This team is doing what Big T predicted early on about Houston striking out a lot. They are 2nd in all of baseball in K's with 437---after 2 freaking months! They have got to find a guy who can teach these guys some plate discipline. Only the Chicago Cubs are worse at the plate than Houston racking up 451 K's so far. Houston set the MLB record for K's in a season in 2013 with 1,530. Projected at the current rate Houston would top out at about 1630 K's for the season. That just sucks and the worst part is if all the home runs go away for long stretches Houston won't stay in first place in the division for long. BTW, Chris Carter became the 3rd leading strike out leading in MLB history by getting punched out 212 times in 2013. So far he's tied for the lead for most K's with the D-Rays Stephen Souza Jr with 65. Times 4 (we're roughly at the quarter mark of the season) and that gives Carter 260 K's for the season which would be good for #1 on this dubious list. Please stop killing me with all these K's!!!!! This should be on the top of AJ Hinch's and the Houston front office's list of important things to do---get guys who at least make contact with the freaking ball.

Carlos Correa in a game the other day hit a home run completely out of the stadium! Here's an article with video of the mammoth HR.

http://m.mlb.com/cutfour/2015/05/27/126911550/top-prospect-correa-crushes-ball-out-of-stadium?partnerId=as_mlb_20150527_46515366&adbid=603582558467588097&adbpl=tw&adbpr=241544156

eagle eye

05-29-2015, 10:20 AM

Tonight's game between the Astros and the White Sox will feature two the brightest prospects in baseball, Lance McCullers and LHP Carlos Rodon. Rodon was discussed on this site at length when the Astros had the first pick in the 2014 draft. The Astros opted instead for RHP Brady Aiken who never signed his contract and went back into the draft pool for 2015. Aiken's draft stock will undoubtedly fall like stone since it was found he had to have Tommy John surgery earlier this spring. I would think that the Astros front office is kicking their own arses over this one. The White Sox picked Rodon with the 3rd pick and he actually made his first MLB start this season, a win, against the Reds on May 9th. This will be Rodon's 4th career MLB start tonight as he carries a 1-0 record with an ERA of 4.03 into the game.
As for McCullers, he was drafted in the 1st round, 41st pick overall, in the 2012 draft. This was the same draft that Houston selected SS Carlos Correa. This will be McCuller's 3rd MLB start as he sports a 1-0 record with a 2.53 ERA into the game. It is looking like McCullers could be sent back to the minors after this start as Brett Oberholtzer is scheduled to come off his minor league rehab assignment next week. It could be a really difficult decision though if McCullers pitches well. He showed a lot in a no-decision in 4 innings of work in his first start last week against the A's which the Astros lost 2-1. He struggled through his second inning of work in that game but only allow one run to score, the only run he allowed in the game. He got his first win last Saturday against the Detroit Tigers going 6 innings giving up 2 runs with 1 walk and 6 K's as the Astros scored 2 runs in the top of the 6th to take a 3-2 lead which the McCullers and the bullpen make hold up for the win. If McCullers pitches well tonight then the Astros could be in a spot like last year when Collin McHugh was brought up for a spot start and pitched so well he never went down. It make you wonder if Roberto Hernandez is getting a little ansy or maybe Oberholtzer is wondering if HIS job is safe. You gotta love the quality of the pitching that make these decisions so difficult.
Should be a good game but you have to wonder what could have been if Houston had taken Rodon last summer.

KABrother88

05-29-2015, 03:03 PM

I was a big Rodon fan going all the way up to the draft last season but felt the Aiken choice at 1.1 was a good move for the potential of sustained success and spreading the talent out vs Rodon being viewed (and correctly at that) to have a short minor league career. In the end, the Aiken pick didn't work out but even after all the backlash the media gave Houston claiming they were trying to manipulate the draft and then later the MLBPA stepping in, they sure don't mention much about how Aiken threw just 13 pitches this year and ended up having TJ surgery. Guess that's good work by Houston's medical staff.

Speaking of the draft the 2015 edition is set for June 8th and Houston will be very active very early picking at #2 and #5. The number #2 pick is compensation for not signing Aiken and is not a protected pick this year meaning if they do not sign the player taken here they will not receive another compensation pick next year. Look for them to take a more singable guy here and potential save to potentially get a high ceiling guy that might slide (exactly what they did in 2012 saving with Correa and able to land McCullers). Names to keep an eye on as potential picks revolve around a trio of SS, a pair of college pitchers, and a couple outfielder with good bloodlines.

Per the MLB.com rankings there are as follows:
1.) Brendan Rodgers - SS (HS)
2.) Dansby Swanson - SS (Vanderbilt)
3.) Carson Fulmer - RHP (Vanderbilt)
4.) Alex Bregman - SS (LSU)
5.) Dillon Tate - RHP (UC Santa Barbara)
6.) Daz Cameron - OF (HS)
7.) Kyle Tucker - OF (HS)

There have been reports out of Arizona that they will not select Rodgers at 1.1 and instead appear to looking as Swanson. Rodgers is the top player in the draft in almost all, if not all publications.

Dillon Tate is getting a lot of attention as the guy that Houston take at 1.2 if they aren't taking Rodgers and some people have him as the top college arm.

Cameron and Tucker are getting some run of late. Cameron is the some of former All-Star & Gold Glover Mike Cameron. Tucker is the brother of Astros OF Preston Tucker. Wonder if they could still go high end if they think they Tucker will still be at 5 and give them their discount there?

KABrother88

05-29-2015, 05:12 PM

Looks like McCullers might stay a little longer...Scott Feldman to the DL and Michael Feliz will be called up from AA to pitch out of the pen. Feliz was just called up from A+ and had only made 1 appearance in CC. We will see what is moves are made when Obie comes back

eagle eye

05-31-2015, 09:04 AM

Obie will obviously slide into Feldman's spot in the rotation. I'm really surprised that Houston jumped Feliz all the way up from A+ ball. I would have thought that maybe they would give Mark Appel a look. He could actually go the same route as Carlos Rodon when he was brought up in April in that he could gain a little confidence pitching out of the bullpen and give him a taste of the atmosphere in the bigs. It's hard to imagine that Feliz is farther along than Appel. I'm sure there are guys in AA and AAA who would be better choices but that's why I'm here in my study and they are they actually making the decisions.

Thanks KABro for the draft info. It's really very timely info considering the draft is a week from tomorrow. Seems like you can never go wrong by taking pitching but if they take a position player I want one of the main criteria to be that the player makes consistent contact and DOESN'T strike out a lot. I am really tired of Houston's main club whiffing at the alarming rate they do.

Is it just me or is everyone watching baseball games frustrated at the inability, or unwillingness, of batters to make adjustments to either go the opposite way of the shift or to lay down a bunt for a single. I really don't care if it's your 3, 4 or 5 hitters. You can undermine the shift by putting guys on base. George Springer and Jose Altuve were both robbed of base hits yesterday because of the shift. They hit the ball right back up the middle of the field in an area that, in the past would have been a hit, only to have the 2nd baseman or SS playing behind the 2nd base bag and getting an easy out. I don't know if it's tradition or ego or what it is that makes a batter who is known as a pull hitter unable to go opposite field to get a hit. Wasn't it Yogi Berra who once said, "Hit it where they ain't."? Seems like there's a lot of open area when teams go into the shift. Why teams can't seem to take advantage of this strategy is beyond me.

KABrother88

05-31-2015, 11:56 AM

Really what's odd to me is how Luhnow values low strike out guys in the draft but then goes and aquired high K rate guys via trade and free agency.

eagle eye

05-31-2015, 04:29 PM

It's the last day of the week and also the last day of the month. Let's review both.

This week was not a good one for Houston as they lost their first back to back series of the season. Overall they were 2-4 for the week losing to Baltimore on the road 2 games to 1 and losing this weekend's series with the White Sox 2-1. The common thread in this week's games was the inability of the Astros to get a hit with runners in scoring position. Not only that but between some questionable base running and some lousy base coaching, particularly by 3rd base coach Gary Pettis, Houston cost themselves several runs this past week. One disturbing thing that has become a trend over the past two weeks is that inability to get a meaningful hit when the opportunity presents itself. The week began with Dallas Keuchel suffering his first loss since August 14th last year. It was partly Keuchel's fault as he gave up two 2-run HRs in a complete game where two walks and the two dingers was just about the only thing Keuchel allowed the Orioles and despite 11 hits by the Astros they couldn't get one when they needed one to score more runs and Houston lost 4-3. Today was kind of like that as the offense banged out 10 hits, 5 were extra base shots but between poor base coaching, poor base running and lack of a hit that mattered Houston was shutout 6-0 by the White Sox. It didn't help any that Roberto Hernandez wasn't on top of his game allowing 5 runs in his 5.2 innings of work. If Scott Feldman was healthy Hernandez could very well have been the odd man out in the Astros starting rotation based on today's work coupled with the strong showing of Lance McCullers in his 3 starts since he was called up around 10 days ago. Michael Feliz did a nice job finishing off the game by pitching a strong 9th inning in today's game. After giving up a leadoff double he retired the next 3 batters with little trouble for a scoreless inning of work in his MLB debut.

As for the month of May, it's been like two different teams or maybe just both sides of the same coin. The Astros record for May is 15-12 with an overall record of 31-20 and a 4.5 game lead in the AL West with the 2nd place Angels due to play Detroit at home tonight. Regardless of the outcome tonight Houston will still end the month in 1st place in their division with either a 4 or 5 game lead over their closest division rival. As is usual for a season some guys have good months and others not so much. Jose Altuve has struggled and he has tumbled from a season best .368 BA to a .296 BA to end the month. He has really struggled at the plate. He will throw in an occasional multi-hit game but then he goes back to a 1 for or an oh-fer game or series of games. While George Springer's BA has come up from below the Mendoza line to a much healthier .222 you know he's capable of much better. A guy who has fallen off the table over the last two weeks is 3B Luis Valbuena. In just this past week, playing in 5 games he's gone 0-3, 2-4, 0-5, 0-3 and 0-4 for a combined 2-19 stretch that has really hurt his own stats but killed the Astros. He fallen from a .224 BA to begin the month to his current .188.
Chris Carter has begun to show some of the hitting that made him the best hitter in baseball the last half of 2014. He began the month with a .160 BA and finished up the month with a .190 BA. Still not great I know but he's getting at least one hit a game lately and he's not striking out the way he had been prior to the last two weeks. Houston also has seen the emergence of some minor league talent. First Preston Tucker came up as a temporary replacement for an injured George Springer. When Springer came back Tucker had done so well they sent Robbie Grossman down to the minors and kept Bam-Bam on the big league roster. Lately, the Astros have gone with Springer, Altuve and Tucker at the top of the lineup. They've been hitting but they haven't been able to mesh when they hit so run production isn't there as yet. Next came Lance McCullers who came up as a replacement for Brett Oberholtzer to make a spot start or two. He has pitched well enough to last through 3 starts and with Scott Feldman missing significant time due to a torn meniscus in his knee McCullers could remain with the big club for a while. Roberto Hernandez has been less than impressive in his last few starts and when Houston gets healthier or when they get tired of him struggle he could very well be gone by the trade deadline. Speaking of players being lost due to injury the Astros lost SS Jed Lowrie to a thumb injury suffered sliding into a base. He will be out until after the All Star break. With Astros #1 prospect Carlos Correa tearing up AA ball and getting promoted to AAA speculation is Correa may see Minute Maid Park sooner rather than later.
One thing I have to comment on that has been true all season, Houston plays much smarter baseball in 2015 than they did in 2014 under Bo Porter. Under Porter teams were taking extra bases because throws from the outfield were not on target or missed the cutoff man or were too high to force runners to stay at their current base because the ball could be cut off and runners gunned down. Houston gave up big innings because of these very things. I never really thought much of Porter as a manager and while I had a lot of skepticism about AJ Hinch the team has played much better fundamental baseball since he took over the team. The 3rd base coach needs to pull his head out of his ass and stop getting base runners cut down at the plate because he misjudged either the outfielder's arm or the speed of the base runners. I'm talking about being cut down by 4-6 steps, these are not close plays at all. This is not being aggressive on the bases which I support this is bad coaching in the box.
The pitching continues to be very good for the most part. Dallas Keuchel is proving that 2014 was no fluke and he's carved out a 7-1 record so far after recording his second consecutive complete game, this time a win over the White Sox recording a career high 11 K's. I hate to jinx anything but he sure looks like a left handed Greg Maddux in the way he pitches. Collin McHugh has been solid with Feldman improving his overall record to 4-4 with a win in his last start before he was injured. Lance McCullers has looked like he could stay on with the big club. There's no doubt he has the stuff to pitch in the bigs, he just needs to find a little more consistency. Brett Oberholtzer looked good in his one and only start earlier this month but he has been struggling with a blister on this throwing hand since spring training. Hopefully, he has learned how to take care of that issue and shows the stuff he showed last season. Roberto Hernandez is 1-2 in 6 starts in May and his 4.92 ERA overall and his 5.96 ERA in May aren't all that great. To me, Hernandez is leaving the door open for a Michael Feliz or a Mark Appel to come up and take his job. The relievers have been statistically one of the best units in baseball and they are a big reason for Houston having the best record in 51 games in franchise history. What was once broken is now fixed even though closer Luke Gregorson scares me.
I'm encouraged by the prospects coming up, I'm hopeful the veteran guys in slumps can turn things around and I'm sure we'll start getting timely hits to score runs again. I'd love to see somebody replace Luis Valbuena because while he's been better than Matt Dominguez overall there is definitely room for improvement. Considering how much Houston has struggled at times this month, particularly the past 2 weeks, I'm glad to see the month of May over with. I'm hoping as Houston flourished in May in 2014 followed by a dismal June the Astros will come out of a rough May this season to a hot June similar to their April start to the season. New month, new challenges.

Big T

06-03-2015, 08:54 PM

Three in a row for the Stros against the Orioles. Tonight Lance McCullers pitched a four hit one run gem and Carter went yard twice and Springer once. Astros go for the four game sweep tomorrow.

KABrother88

06-03-2015, 10:00 PM

Incredible game for McCullers...CG, 4 H, 1 R, 11K, 0 BB

eagle eye

06-04-2015, 02:31 AM

Big T it's beginning to look like you've got that dominant #1 type you've been wanting. It was reported he hit 96 mph with his 100th pitch. A complete game in his 4th mlb start? Wow. The series finale has Dallas Keuchel looking to avenge his only loss of the season 10 days ago against the same pitcher, Yen-Wei Chen. Both Keuchel and the Houston offense were to blame for that loss. Both should be looking for some payback.

How about Chris Carter breaking out of hibernation? He's on an 11 game hitting streak that has seen him hitting .389 over that span. He went 2-3 last night including two solo jacks that brought his BA above .200 (.205) for the first time in 2015.

The Stros are 34-20 at the 1/3 point in the season, best ever in franchise history.

Dallas Keuchel won AL Pitcher of the Month for May after winning the award for April too. Only Randy Johnson has won that award in back to back months in Houston franchise history.

Does anyone but me notice how often we see some accomplishment by this team is a franchise record? We are literally in the midst of an historic season. Let that sink in for a minute. Each and every day we are watching history being made! After a decade of disappointment this is freaking awesome!

eagle eye

06-06-2015, 11:03 AM

The Astros are kicking their own arses lately. I know they have their moments and despite all the historical milestones they keep eclipsing they have one Achilles heel---hitting. Ironic isn't it? The lack of consistency at the plate is killing them. The seems to be depending too much on the home run to score and the only reason is why is because they have holy hell doing it any other way. Of course there are exceptions but it's seems to be a really unhealthy trend for the last few weeks. Guys who started off hot like Jake Marisnick can't buy a hit these days. In Marisnick's case he seems to be not-hitting himself right to the bench. Lately, Marisnick and Colby Rasmus have been platooning in center field and it's not doing either one of them any good. Prior to the call up of Preston Tucker Rasmus and Marisnick played every day and both hit pretty consistently. When Tucker came up he hit well and he forced his way onto the everyday lineup. Unfortunately, Tucker has cooled off and Rasmus and Marisnick are ice cold right now. They aren't the only ones, Jose Altuve has only been able to hang around just short of .300 now for several weeks. He'll have one multi-hit game and back it up with 2 or 3 oh-fer's the next few games. Evan Gattis is a strange one too. He began the season horribly then in mid April he caught fire but now he's a feast or famine type of hitter. And don't get me started on Luis Valbuena. That guy has one good game a week at the plate and he's hit himself right down to the bottom of the 2nd third in the batting order. All this and we are happy the Astros are still in first place but they had better watch out because the Texas Rangers are surging. Ever since the Rangers swept the Astros on May 4-6 in Houston the Rangers have fought their way out of the AL West cellar and they now sit alone in 2nd place just 4.5 games back of Houston. Houston has been anything but hot losing 3 series since the Rangers kicked their asses. I really think maybe Preston Tucker should go back down to AAA Fresno for a little confidence boost and give Marisnick and Rasmus more PT to straighten them back out. I like what AJ Hinch has done to improve the team's defense but we seem to be missing the hitting coach, John Mallee, who moved on to the Cubs when Bo Porter was fired. Current hitting coach, Dave Hudgins, doesn't seem to have the same success as Mallee had. Hopefully, the Astros will figure it out and start hitting again soon and it wouldn't hurt to have the Rangers hit a slump pretty soon as well.

Next season the Astros will continue renovations to Minute Maid Park that began this past off season. Next year they will change a lot of the center field area including moving the fence in about 30 feet so the flag poles will no longer be in the field of play and they intend to do away with Tal's Hill. It was a unique feature of the park but many feel it poses a hazard to players having run back to center field wall to make a play. At any rate the hill will be gone.

The MLB draft is Monday and here's an article from Astros.com about the options for the Astros who have 4 picks in the first 46 selections including 2 in the top 5.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/128172772/astros-in-new-territory-with-two-top-5-draft-picks

For those interested in the draft here's a link to a page full of draft info from MLB.com.

http://m.mlb.com/draft/2015

eagle eye

06-07-2015, 04:54 AM

So this is how bad it's getting, Houston has lost 3 games in a row while the Rangers have now won 3 in a row. Their lead in the AL West has gone from 6.5 games to 3.5 games in just 3 days. The Rangers wins have come at the expense of the defending AL Champion Kansas City Royals (2 games) and the Chicago White Sox (1 game). Houston has run into a red hot Toronto Blue Jay team that has scored more runs than anyone in the baseball (296) which is 35 runs better than the 2nd place team, Arizona. Now Houston is still the MLB leader in home runs (77) but they also are 2nd in K's and 26th out of 30 in total hits. Here lately Houston is getting hits to the tune of about 1 an inning. Trouble is that's HOW they're coming as well. Yesterday Jose Altuve went 3-4 in the 2 hole but George Springer and Preston Tucker, in the 1 and 3 holes respectively went a combined 0-8. Evan Gattis went 2-4 but a combination of 6 hitters in the 5, 6 and 7 holes went a combined 0-10. The 8 and 9 hitters, Marwin Gonzalez and Jonathan Villar combined to go 3-6 including a solo HR by Villar late in the game. This is pitiful and if it keeps up Houston's hold on the AL West division lead will be gone. Houston's best pitcher, Dallas Keuchel has, in his last 3 starts, pitched two complete games and gone 7 innings in the other one and his record is 1-1. With even a smidgeon of run support he would easily be 3-0 and tied for the MLB lead in wins with Seattle's Felix Hernandez.

In their last ten games Houston has scored 30 runs. Even I can figure out that's 3 runs per game. Their record is 4-6. See what I mean? This is just awful to watch. It's been like this for a while now, if one player is in a slump the whole damn team is in a slump. The trouble is one player can get hot but it doesn't help pull the rest up with him. The team needs to collectively get hot and it hasn't happened in almost a month. Remember when this team had a 10 game win streak? Seems like a long time ago doesn't it. I don't want to be all gloom and doom, it is just the first week of June after all. But, the Astros have some real issues and not just with their bats. The starting pitching is becoming a real concern. With Keuchel you know you're going to have a chance to win but if he doesn't pitch a shutout it's 50-50 whether he can get a win. Collin McHugh is second on the team with wins at 6-2 but he's been giving up runs in bunches lately. The big difference is he's getting run support! Last outing he gave up 4 runs in the 3rd inning but the Astros came right back in the bottom of the frame to score 5 and it held up for a 5-4 win. In his last 3 games McHugh is 1-1 and hasn't looked that good. Scott Feldman was getting his groove back and leveled his W/L record to 4-4 when he went on the DL with a meniscus tear in his right knee. Brett Oberholtzer can't stay healthy and when he has pitched it wasn't all that great. In his 3 starts in 2014 he is 0-2 and has given up 4 or more runs in all of his outings and he's only lasted into the 4th inning in two of his starts. To say Obie is a disappointment this season is an understatement. Lance McCullers was brought up to fill in for Oberholtzer and has really been a breath of fresh air. In 4 starts he's gone 2-0 (Houston is 3-1 when he pitches so far) with a 1.88 ERA and his last game was a complete game win over Baltimore this past Wednesday. The complete game was his first in the big leagues and the 11 K's he notched in the game was a pro career high. To say he's filling in nicely for Feldman is an understatement. The 4th starter in the rotation has been Oberholtzer, Brad Peacock, Asher Wojciechowski, Sam Deduno and McCullers. This spot has been an abject failure including McCullers who got a no-decision in a Houston loss in his first MLB appearance. The rest of McCullers' starts have been in Feldman's spot in the rotation. Michael Feliz made an appearance in a relief role and looked really good and if this spot in the rotation he could be the next man up to try to lock down what has been a black hole in the Astros rotation this season. Then there's the 5th starter's spot. (I'm shaking my head thinking about this one.) Veteran Roberto Hernandez is 2-5 in 11 starts this season with a 5.18 ERA. It's really worse than that though because in his last 3 games he's pitched a combined 16-1/3 innings giving up 16 runs on 26 hits, 6 walks with 8 K's with an 0-2 record. So who do you bring up to fill this spot in the rotation? Mark Appel? Vincent Velasquez? Josh Hader? Are any of these guys ready for the bigs yet? Or, will Houston wait until the trade deadline looms and go after a veteran? If Houston continues to slide it could very well be too late for any infusion of talent for a division race by then. "Houston, we have a problem." An old clichéd line but it really applies here. Hopefully, Houston can salvage on win in Toronto with Collin McHugh facing a really dreadful R A Dickey in the series finale.

One interesting note from the announcers in yesterday's game. For a team that leads the majors in home runs the Astros are not effective at all against the fastball. Houston hitters are much more likely to tee off on a slider or curve ball or a change up while the predominant sound vs the fastball is 'whiff'. I don't recall the numbers that back up this fact but man, is that weird or what?

eagle eye

06-07-2015, 03:59 PM

Collin McHugh needs to go talk to Dallas Keuchel because Keuchel has experience in the bullpen letting a win become a loss. After battling for six innings and walking off the field with a 3-2 deficit he watched the offense come alive for him again as it did in his last outing vs Baltimore. What was once 3-2 lead for Toronto suddenly became 6-3 advantage for Houston after a 4-run 7th inning. McHugh qualified for the win and had to feel pretty good. At the time it didn't matter that Houston couldn't capitalize in the top of the 6th on a bases loaded situation that resulted in zero Astros runs because Houston had the lead now. It didn't even matter when Houston had men on 1st and 2nd and didn't score in the 8th because the bullpen never gives up 2 run leads. Well, almost never. Pinch hitting in the ninth spot left handed hitting Munenori Kawasaki, he of the .143 BA, reached down on a low and away pitch and doinked it to the opposite field for a double to begin the Jays 9th inning. It was just pure luck Kawasaki even got wood on the ball coupled with the fact that the outfield was way in because the little Japanese player has zip for power. It didn't matter the ball landed just fair and bounced into the field boxes. Jose Reyes singled next to score Kawasaki to draw the Jays up to a 6-5 deficit. Closer Luke Gregerson was in trouble with a one run lead and the speedy Reyes on 1st with nobody out. Gregerson got 3B Luke Donaldson to line out to LF for out #1 and Reyes still at 1st base. Then it got weird. Jose Bautista popped up in the infield by 2nd base. Jose Altuve should have fielded the ball but SS Jonathan Villar called him off and he promptly ran into Reyes would was standing on 2nd base tripping over him with the ball falling helplessly to the ground. Despite a protest by AJ Hinch the play was not ruled interference by Reyes and the Jays had men on 1st and 2nd with one out. The next batter was Chris Colabello. Gregerson tossed a breaking ball that was not fielded cleanly by C Hank Conger and the Jays pulled off a double steal. Now with Reyes on 3rd and Bautista on 2nd with one out Gregerson was in a full blown jam. With the count at 1-2 Colabello hit a Gregerson slider back up the middle for slow rolling base hit that scored both runners for a walk off game ending hit. Gregerson gave up 3 runs on 4 hits for his 2nd loss of the season and his second blown save on the season. Will Harris gave up a solo HR to Bautista in the 7th to cut the Astros lead from 6-3 to 6-4. It looked like a minor inconvenience at the time until the 3 spot Toronto put up in the ninth made the home run the difference in the game. This loss had to be a punch in the gut for the slumping Astros who, I'm sure, were confident they would wrap up the win and move on to Chicago to face the White Sox tomorrow feeling pretty good about themselves. It didn't work out that way and now Houston has now lost 4 straight, their longest losing streak of the season, with their confidence shaken up pretty good. The only good thing is the rest of the AL West lost today except Seattle who is losing to Tampa Bay in the 5th by a score of 1-0. So, essentially, Houston didn't lose ground in the division but they sure blew a prime opportunity to gain a game today.

The Astros were 3-4 for the past week. Not terrible until you realize that they lost the last 4 in a row and got slapped around in those losses except for today when they gave the Blue Jays an early Christmas gift. The plane flight to Chicago is liable to be fairly quiet but you never know. As fans we kind of wear losses like today's on their sleeve but players often times have to just shake it off and move on. Being swept by the Blue Jays makes me want to punch a wall, I can't imagine at least some of the Astros players feel the same way. The big question going forward is, will Houston get pissed and go on a new winning streak or will they fold up the tents and sink lower still into the losing quagmire they are in. Last weekend Houston lost 2 of 3 to the Pale Hose at home so who knows what's in store for them in Chicago. Lance McCullers hopefully can repeat his dominating performance from earlier this week. Maybe it's McCullers who can lift up the team on his shoulders and break out of this losing streak. Unlike last week's matchup of promising new comers when McCullers faced off against Carlos Rodon McCullers' opposite number will be veteran Chris Sale who has a 5-2 record and a 3.27 ERA.

Draft tidbit: Since tomorrow is the beginning of the MLB First Year Player Draft I thought a little Houston draft trivia wouldn't hurt. Both of Houston's 2010 first round draft picks OF Delino Deshields Jr (#8 pick) and P Mike Foltynewicz (#19) are both no longer with the team. Deshields was left unprotected for the Rule 5 draft and the Rangers picked him up at the 2014 Winter Meetings. He made his big league debut this season and was named AL Rookie of the Month for May hitting .296 with 22 runs scored. Foltynewicz was traded to the Braves along with Rio Ruiz and Andrew Thurman for Evan Gattis and minor league prospect James Hoyt. We all know the impact Gattis has had for Houston while Hoyt has struggled at AAA Fresno so far this season. Foltynewicz made his first MLB start for Atlanta earlier this season and so far he is 3-2 in 7 starts with a 4.29 ERA. Deshields and Foltynewicz were part of Ed Wade's final draft as GM. The next year Jim Crane bought the Astros from Drayton McClain and Jeff Luhnow took over as the Astros GM.

Another draft trivia tidbit: The Astros own the 2nd and 5th picks in the 1st round of this year's draft. No other team in MLB history has had two picks in the top 5. This draft could set the table for Houston's success for years to come. Not only that but Houston also has the 37th and 46th picks overall giving them 4 picks in the top fifty. Experts are saying that Houston could actually get better value with the latter two picks assuming they hit on both of them.

KABrother88

06-07-2015, 07:04 PM

IT'S HAPPENING! Carlos Correa has been called up to the Majors!

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 06:22 AM

eagle eye

06-08-2015, 07:35 AM

IT'S HAPPENING! Carlos Correa has been called up to the Majors!

Is this move a reward for his true progression to the bigs or is this a desperate move by a team that is struggling? Preston Tucker was good for the first 2 weeks he was called up but he's been struggling lately. I'm worried the Astros are bringing up Correa to jump start their current slump even though he may not really be ready for the move.

eagle eye

06-08-2015, 07:38 AM

Another name that had been trending to the Astros at the 1.2 spot is LSU SS Alex Bregman. He's one of the top 7 guys I mentioned earlier but as of late there has appeared to be a lot more mocks with Houston going his direction. In fact, MLB.com's draft experts Jim Callis and Jonathan Mayo pegged Bregman here in their final mock today. He would probably slide to 2B as a pro and a good comparison I've seen is to Dustin Pedoria.

One article I read this weekend on Bleacher Report said that Houston could conceivably draft 2 shortstops with the 2nd and 5th pick because they would be the best available. That would be crazy and unprecedented. But, according to the article not a bad move if that's what happens.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 07:52 AM

I've always wanted Houston to know for sure that Correa was ready before calling him up. One thing I can see as a plus as far as the timing is that Correa is breaking a slump at the plate and starting to get hot again. If he can continue that hot streak at the MLB level it might give him the confidence he needs to be successful. I do think the timing is poor in the sense that his first MLB game will be against Chris Sale but Correa has killed LHP this season so we will see what happens

Also, it was reported this morning Houston is calling up our #4 prospect Vincent Velasquez from AA. He is REALLY good but just had trouble staying healthy at times. He will make the start in Wednesday.

Big T

06-08-2015, 10:07 AM

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 10:40 AM

Annddd Here comes Vincent Velasquez! Yeah, I think the Astros hit the panic button after the sweep by Toronto. They know that this is do or die. Velasquez is the potential ace of this staff in a few years in my opinion. His stuff is off the charts.

A lot of scout agree with that statement, as do I. When he's on and healthy he's a beast...as evidenced by his 7 no hit innings last Wednesday. He's been dominating AA since coming off the DL which he had been on all season. It's refreshing to see the future getting the call ups after watching them progress through the minors the last few years.

eagle eye

06-08-2015, 10:45 AM

Velasquez is a bit of a surprise but Lance McCullers came up straight from AA and he's doing fine so far but is Velasquez really more ready than Feliz or Appel? Again, the Astros are on top of this and they know first hand about their players but it's hard to imagine that a guy in AA is better than a AAA pitcher. As I mentioned in an earlier post that No 4 spot has been a black hole that has not been properly filled all season. If Velasquez has the success McCullers has, woo-boy! I think it's safe to say that, as far as the Astros are concerned, the future is NOW!

Big T

06-08-2015, 05:11 PM

Oh, BTW, it's draft night and the D-Backs are on the clock with the 1-1 pick. Astros have the 1-2 and 1-5 picks tonight.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 05:14 PM

Arizona goes with Dansby Sawnson who most people had pegged there. Houston is on the clock!

Big T

06-08-2015, 05:15 PM

Dansby Swanson, SS from Vanderbilt goes 1-1 to the D-Backs. Astros are on the clock.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 05:17 PM

Gimme Rodgers!

Big T

06-08-2015, 05:19 PM

Astros take SS Alex Bregman out of LSU.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 05:19 PM

But I'll take Bregman too. I have liked him since he was a freshman at LSU

Big T

06-08-2015, 05:27 PM

Rodgers is who I wanted as well but he just went 1-3 to the Rockies

Big T

06-08-2015, 05:29 PM

I think at the 1-5 slot the Astros will take the SEC pitcher of the year out of Vandy Carson Fulmer.

Big T

06-08-2015, 05:39 PM

Well... Astros took Preston Tucker's little brother Kyle Tucker at 1-5. A bit of a surprise.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 06:10 PM

I'm not surprised by it...he was a trending name at that spot and with Tate going at #4, Tucker was a good pick at 5. Supposedly a much better all around player than Preston and a chance at giving a finincial discount

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 07:07 PM

Brady Aiken goes #17 to Cleveland. Slot bonus for #17 this year is 2.3 million.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 08:08 PM

An interesting name that is still available right now (currently at 32 with Houston picking again at 37) is Daz Cameron. He was one of the top 7 guys I mentioned a few days ago as being in consideration for one of the 2 top picks for Houston. He has slid and if Houston thinks they can save enough on the deals with Bregman and/or Tucker, then I wouldn't be opposed to us snagging Cameron if he's still there at 37...and I expect him to be since his signability has to be a question mark at this point.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 08:47 PM

And it happened...Love it! A guy who at one time was the top draft prospect but still a top 6-7 guy on the majority of boards. Houston has selected the #4, #6, & #7 overall prospects according to MLB.com. I think there is a good chance to sign all 3 as well.

KABrother88

06-08-2015, 09:06 PM

And I absolutely love Eshelman...guy who isn't flashy but flat out doesn't walk people...will be a back end of the rotation guy and be there in a hurry

2013:
3 BB in 116 IP

2014:
8 BB in 123 IP

2015:
7 BB in 130 IP

Total:
18 BB in 369 IP

KABrother88

06-09-2015, 09:18 AM

Been reported that Cameron slipped due to having a $5 million dollar asking price. The #37 pick carries a slot bonus of ~1.7 million so Houston needs to save ~3.3 million to hit that number (realistically I think Cameron would be crazy not to sign for something in the $4 million range). #2 carried ~7.4 million and #5 carried ~4.2. Eshelman at #46 is looking at ~1.3 but I feel we reached a little and in turn could save a couple hundred thousand. Would not be surprised to see Houston go after some senior arms today in an attempt to create more savings opportunity. Day 2 kicks off at 11:30

eagle eye

06-09-2015, 11:31 AM

Day 1 was a pretty good haul so I am anxious for what today will bring. Speaking of which Houston has made their 3rd round pick (#79 overall) and it's a RHP from TCU named Riley Farrell. A guy MLB.com says could move to the big club in a hurry and he'll be a guy used out of the bullpen. He's had a lot of success at TCU as a reliever. He's a junior that is 6'2" and 200 lbs. KABrother8 is better at digging up the 411 on these prospects than me so I defer.

KABrother88

06-09-2015, 11:46 AM

Electric fastball-slider combo guy. Runs his heater up in the high 90's with a really good slider when he's on. Rated the #45 prospect by MLB.com and was as high as #21 before the season started so getting him at #79 is pretty good. Reliever all the way but as EE mentioned he could be up by the end of this season. I actually watched him pitch against A&M in the Super Regionals the last 2 nights...not good results as he gave up a walk-off sac fly Sunday night and only faced 2 batters last night...hit the fist one and walked the 2nd...both came around to score later to tie the game and send it to extras where TCU ultimately won. So far we have drafted 2 HS players and 3 College players...all 3 college guys you'll be able to watch in the upcoming College Worls Series

KABrother88

06-09-2015, 12:01 PM

Looks like the first real reach to me there in the 4th round with OU catcher Anthony Hermelyn...he wasn't in MLB.com's top 200. Was listed at #230 in January by minorleaguebaseball.com...I'll have to do some research

eagle eye

06-09-2015, 12:44 PM

Does Houston have a phobia about drafting a left hand pitcher? Last year they went with Aiken who is a righty and passed the lefty Rodon and so far this draft the pitchers have all been righties. The latest is North Carolina's Trent Thorton in the fifth round.

KABrother88

06-09-2015, 02:29 PM

Aiken was actually a lefty as well...but they do tend to take a lot more RHPs for some reason

eagle eye

06-09-2015, 03:09 PM

LOL! You're right as usual KABro!

KABrother88

06-09-2015, 07:35 PM

LOL! You're right as usual KABro!

No just get my wife to believe that! lol.

One think I actually was right about was thinking Houston would get some Senior pitching during day 2. In rounds 7, 9, & 10 that's exactly what Houston did and even with with a Senior catcher in round 8. What the advantage of drafting a Senior? Well a guy who is a senior has no leverage in bonus negotiations. Basically they take what the drafting team is willing to give or they go play Independent ball for next to nothing. The slot bonus for those 4 picks are $219,600, $176,000, $164,200, & $153,400. I had seen last year where team had signed these top 10 round college seniors for $10,000 (think this is a major flaw in the draft setup). Undoubtedly Houston will do what they can to save on these picks to get a little extra money for the Cameron deal.

eagle eye

06-10-2015, 10:31 AM

I hate to bring up a subject other than the draft but good grief. This is an epic meltdown that really doesn't even equate to the rough start to the season. The Astros then at least had good pitching that enabled the Astros to hang around .500 ball. It doesn't matter how well the pitchers pitch because this offense is in full blown "sucks" mode. The Astros promoted Carlos Correa to generate a spark to the offense. It has, Correa went 2-4 with a home run last night. It didn't help that the home plate umpire couldn't decide on what his strike zone was other than it was bigger for White Sox pitchers than for Houston pitchers. Houston was trying to rally in the 9th last night and on a 3-0 count to George Springer the ump called a ball that was clearly low a strike to go to 3-1 followed by another low strike call to push the count to 3-2 and Springer then hit a fly ball to right for the 3rd out of the game. Before he got to first base on the play Springer had thrown his helmet down and was giving the ump an earful. Dallas Keuchel pitches 7 innings and gave up one 2-run homer to Alexi Abreu. That's it for 7 innings of work with 7 hits, 2 walks and 5 K's. He worked out of a bases loaded no-outs jam in the 2nd inning but he was his usual never-give-in-battle-to-the-end self. Keuchel could have gotten off the hook for the loss if Chad Qualls hadn't come in a stunk up the joint in the 8th inning. Qualls faced 4 batters to begin the 8th and this is how it went: single, single man on first gets to 3B, man on first steals 2nd, walk to load the bases and 2-run double that upped the Sox lead to 4-0. At that point Qualls night was over and it assured Keuchel would get his 2nd loss of the season. If you remember, in Keuchel's last game that was against Baltimore Keuchel left after 6 innings with a 2-2 tie and Qualls came on in the 8th and gave up a home run to give the O's the lead and the 3-2 score held up to give the O's the win. BTW that game began the Astros current 6 game losing streak. If I'm Keuchel I find a way to get Qualls not to show up when I pitch because the guy is bad news for me. It's not all on Qualls because the Astros had opportunities to score. They have had opportunities to score a lot more during this losing streak but the offense just can't produce for squat. I feel bad for Jose Altuve because the rough streak he's on seems to be working on his mind and he can't bust out of his slump at all. You may say that I need to give the opposing pitcher's credit for this streak and I say, "hogwash!". Every pitcher Houston has faced is not a world beater. I know Chris Sale is pretty good but his ERA ain't all that great this season and Toronto's R A Dickey has been next to awful all season, Houston got just 4 hits off him. The 4 run rally they had in the seventh came AFTER Dickey had left the game after the 6th and after he tossed over 100 pitches. This offense is a dumpster fire and for my money I'd bench Luis Valbuena and Jason Castro because both have just sucked lately. My expectation for those two is less than zero. I'm tired of watching them strike out especially with runners in scoring position. As a matter of fact, last night Houston was 2-8 with RISP. The only good thing is Houston is still in the lead in the AL West but that lead has now dwindled down to 2 games after Texas beat Oakland last night.

If I'm not mistaken, I believe Houston broke down and drafted a left handed pitcher. It was in the 7th round when they took 5th year senior Michael Freeman from Ok State then they took another LHP in the 9th round when they took LSU senior Zac Person. They got another LHP in the 11th round (are we sensing a pattern here?) when they took Mission Viejo, CA HS pitcher Patrick Sandoval. I'm feeling better now that we are getting some left handed arms. Now, if these guys turn out to be as good as Dallas Keuchel I'll be ecstatic!

Check out the Astros.com home page linked below and scroll down to the picture of Carlos Correa with a young fan in Chicago who returned his home run ball (and probably got the bat he's holding in the picture). The home run ball had to be special because it was from his very first big league round tripper he hit in the 9th inning off White Sox closer Zach Duke. Correa also stole his first base in the bigs in the top of the 6th with Carlos Rodon still on the mound. Of course it do any good because there were two out and Hank Conger popped out to 1st baseman Alexi Abreu in foul territory to end the inning. Christ, this team is so impotent at the plate a case of Viagra may not help! The picture along with a short text was front Correa's twitter account.

http://houston.astros.mlb.com/index.jsp?c_id=hou&sv=1

eagle eye

06-10-2015, 09:22 PM

I am officially pissed at this team. Starting pitching really good for a debut by Vince Velasquez, an amazing night for Carlos Correa and not bad for George Springer and the only reason I'd keep Jason Castro in the lineup is for his ability to throw out base runners trying to steal. Now the relievers, probably due to the stress of not being able to make a mistake because the offense can't score try to guide the ball with bad results. Monkey balls. I am so frustrated I think I'm having a heart attack. Good night Irene this makes 7 in a row.

puddin tane

06-11-2015, 12:29 AM

puddin tane

06-11-2015, 12:30 AM

I was bashing Gattis early...but I've moved on....Carter sucks

eagle eye

06-11-2015, 11:50 AM

More lefties would mean facing more right handed batters shooting for the Crawford Boxes?

Lefties in a right hand dominated staff is needed and Dallas Keuchel doesn't have a problem giving up home runs at the Juice Box. If you have a hitter's park like MM you draft pitchers that are ground ball type pitchers. That why Jose Lima was good at the Dome and sucked at MM Park, he was a fly ball pitcher. The Dome was a pitcher's park whereas MM is not but if you are a ground ball pitcher you can pitch anywhere. Not everyone is going to be as good as Keuchel but you always need a quality lefty as a starter and reliever. Besides, if you have a guy who can throw in the mid-nineties there won't be that many balls pulled anyway!

eagle eye

06-12-2015, 01:05 PM

The Astros had a much needed day off. A chance to get away from the ballpark, away from their struggles at the plate, away from the frustration of a 7 game losing streak. Is one day enough? Maybe, and I guess we'll see when Houston comes back to the Juice Box to face the Seattle Mariners. You'd think Houston was about to get healthy in a hurry playing a Seattle team that is 7 games under .500 and in 4th place in the division but you have to remember the M's were a playoff team last year and they do have good players. The Astros will need to continue to get good pitching and play good defense to hold the Mariners down. It isn't the best of news for a team on an extended losing streak to face one of the best pitchers in the AL in Felix Hernandez. Hernandez leads the AL in wins with 9. Add to that, Hernandez is 9-2 in 12 starts so far in 2015. Think about that for second, 12 starts and 11 decisions. Having just one no-decision game after two and a half months of the season is pretty phenomenal. Houston's best pitcher, Dallas Keuchel is 7-2 in 13 starts. A little run support and no Chad Qualls and Keuchel could easily be 10-1 and that's still 2 no-decision games. So, Houston had better of figured it out because breaking out of this offensive slump won't be easy, at least tonight.

eagle eye

06-13-2015, 09:18 AM

The world is not coming to an end after all. Houston broke out of their slump in huge way beginning with the very first inning sending 12 men to the plate and scoring 8 runs in an inning for the first time since 2008. This included home runs by Luis Valbuena and Jason Castro who both ended extended oh-fers during the 7 game losing streak leading up to last night's game. Carlos Correa added his first Minute Maid home run in the second and Chris Carter actually hit the train above the left field wall with a monsterous home run of his own in the 5th inning.
The real highlight of the night was the performance of starting pitcher Brett Oberholtzer who went 8 innings allowing only 3 hits, 2 walks with 5 K's. It was his longest outing of 2015. He hadn't gone more than 5 innings in his previous 3 starts. He did a great job of holding the Mariners down all game. So good, as a matter of fact, he and reliever Joe Thatcher, who pitched a strong 9th inning striking out 3 batters while walking one, combined for a shutout of the M's. Did I mention that the final score was 10-0?
The surprise of the night was the Astros chasing Mariner's pitcher Felix Hernandez after just 1/3 of an inning in which he allowed 8 runs on just 5 hits, two of which were homers and two walks. The lone out he recorded was a strike out of Correa who was batting sixth in the lineup last night.
The disappointing news from last night was that Jose Altuve, trying to leg out an infield single stained his right hamstring when he crossed the first base bag. He was out on the play but it was clear he had hurt himself as he limped back to the dugout and was seen headed to the locker room almost immediately after reaching the bench. It was announced later in the game that Altuve would be day to day with his injury and he would miss today's game for sure.
One observation I have, and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but despite legging out an infield single in his first at bat which triggered the 8 run outburst he still got the hit on hustle, not a sure enough base hit. It seems to me that this slump has Altuve pressing and he's trying to muscle out hits. In a word, he over-swinging and he's over-anxious at the plate. His demeanor at the plate isn't calm but nervous as he fidgets with his gloves and batting helmet before stepping into the box between every pitch. It's sort of like golf, the harder you try the worse you do and that's the pickle Altuve seems to be in IMO. When he's on his game he doesnt' try to pull everything, he uses the whole field. He's gotten frustrated because even when he does get solid contact it goes right to somebody. The trouble has been the last few games he hasn't gotten solid contact on anything. It's even spilled over in his base running as he's been gunned down being too aggressive on ground balls when he has managed to reach 3rd base. I have issues with 3B coach Gary Pettis but the last two times Altuve got himself thrown out leaving too early trying to score was all on Altuve. The bang-bang nature of those plays the base runner is clearly to blame.
Carlos Correa seems to be all he's cracked up to be. Slick fielder with a strong arm, good hitter who looks like the type of player who can hit for average and power and he seems to be a good base runner. At first glance worries I had about the Astros rushing him up to the bigs as a Band-Aid for their current slump have been eased. You watch him play and he looks ready to be a big leaguer. BTW, that's a good thing!

The Astros play an afternoon game today beginning at 3:10 PM. A good thing about last night's easy win was that several position players got to come out of the game early to get some extra rest. With Brett Oberholtzer's nice outing last night the bullpen got an extra day of rest except for Joe Thatcher who shut the door on the M's in the 9th last night. The Astros need to continue building on this winning stuff because the Rangers don't look like they are going away. The beat the Twins last night to remain 2-1/2 games back of the Astros and the Angels seems to be finding themselves some too as they are only 3-1/2 back. The M's are going with rookie P Mike Montgomery who the M's got in the spring in a trade with Tampa Bay. He's 0-1 with a 2.08 ERA. He was called up and made his first MLB start for Seattle on June 2nd. He went 6 innings giving up only one run on 4 hits against the Yankees who came back win the game late 5-3. His second outing was June 7th against his old club Tampa Bay. In that game he went 7 innings giving up just 2 runs on 5 hits a walk and 3 K's. I guess Houston isn't the only team with bright young pitching talent. Houston is sending Collin McHugh to the hill. Should be a good game to watch if this confounded rain won't give us a break.

eagle eye

06-14-2015, 08:44 AM

The Astros must have felt bad about beating up Felix Hernandez Friday night because they returned the favor in the person of Collin McHugh. To be fair McHugh has been giving up runs in droves in his last few starts but this is undoubtedly his shortest outing as a major leaguer. The 3 innings he lasted were hard to watch as he gave up 8 runs in those 3 innings. The most damage was done by the M's Logan Morrison who had a 3 run home run in the 1st and a 2 run blast in the 3rd. On the TV broadcast they said they had heard that on the Astros radio broadcast Steve Sparks said that he thought he read LoMo's lips on a dugout shot of the M's bench. Sparks said he thought LoMo said that McHugh was tipping off his pitches. Seems like a believable possibility given his tattooing of McHughs pitches. With the Astros loss and wins by Texas and the Angels the Astros division lead is down to 1.5 and 2.5 games respectively.

Jose Altuve has said his hamstring is feeling much better than it did when he hurt it on Friday night. Sounds like there may be a chance he could be back in the lineup today.

According to an article in Yardbarker.com the Astros and Rockets are teaming up again in relation to ComCast Sports Network. This time they intend to sue the sports network over the mess that was made of the broadcast deal for the two teams.

http://network.yardbarker.com/mlb/article_external/the_astros_and_rockets_are_suing_comcast/18961618?mb_edition=4685&linksrc=mb_favorites_head

eagle eye

06-15-2015, 08:54 AM

The past week Houston played six games. The beginning of the week saw the Astros on the road in the middle of what would be a seven game losing streak. The were coming off a brutal loss to Toronto in which they had a 6-3 lead late in the game but gave up the lead and suffered the loss in the 9th inning. They went from Toronto to Chicago and the White Sox continued the spankings sweeping our guys and it wasn't even really close in any of them. The Astros had a day off on Thursday and it must have had a real positive effect on the team because they came out on Friday night vs the Seattle Mariners and the best pitcher record wise in the American League, Felix Hernandez, and forced him to tap out in the 1st inning after he gave up 8 runs in 1/3 of an inning. Houston went on to shut out the M's 10-0. This included 4 HR's in the game including Carlos Correa's first MLB home run at the Juice Box, 2nd in his brief career. It was a different story in Game 2 on Saturday when the M's beat up Collin McHugh but at least he lasted 3 innings before giving up the 8 runs Seattle scored in the game. There was also a question of whether McHugh was tipping his pitches as well. A late run saved Houston from a shutout but the 8-1 loss seemed all to familiar considering the past week. Was Friday night's run outburst just an anomaly? That had to be the question going into Sunday's game but that question was answered more emphatically than on Friday night as Houston scored 13 runs in another shutout performance by Lance McCullers, who got his second win in his brief time in the bigs as he no-hit the M's for 5 innings before giving way to the bullpen. He was pulled partially because by the end of the top of the 5th Houston had the game well in hand with a 10-0 lead and partly because he had thrown 90 pitches to that point. McCullers was backed up by Tony Sipp, Joe Thatcher, Will Harris and Josh Fields who each pitched a scoreless inning to preserve the shutout. Houston won the game 13-0 in a 3-1/2 hour marathon that was pleasant because Houston was winning. Speaking of the 90 pitches, the home plate ump was squeezing McCullers pretty bad. I don't know if I'm just being a homer here but in the last month it seems like the umps in this league have made life miserable for Houston pitching with roving strike zones and just flat calling strikes balls. It certainly happened yesterday to McCullers. Hank Conger, who was behind the plate yesterday and he had to make a couple of trips to the mound in what looked like a mission to calm McCullers down as he looked rather upset and the non-calls he was getting.
Two things happened this past weekend, one good and one not so good. The good thing was Houston broke the 7 game losing streak and in doing so seemly broke their offensive drought as well. The not-so-good thing was in Friday's game Jose Altuve strained his hamstring in his second at bat of the big 1st inning when he tried to leg out an infield hit. He missed the rest of the game Friday as well as the 2 games this weekend. Personally, I think the time off will do Jose a lot of good. He was struggling like crazy at the plate rarely even making solid contact. Sometimes taking a step back and taking a breath is just what the doctor ordered. So, even in a perceived bad happening more good can come of it.
This past week saw Carlos Correa make his major league debut. By the end of the week he had hit hit first two big league home runs, driven in his first MLB runs and stolen his first big league bases. Everyone who talks about him has nothing but praise for his talent and potential and everyone agrees he's major league ready. As fans we can't expect him to just light up big league pitching but if everyone is right, it won't be long.
Another good thing is the emergence of George Springer. He had a heckuva week including early in Chicago as he was one of the few bright spots in the lineup at the time. Good to see the young talent on this team taking it's place in the Astros lineup. The days right now are pretty sunny but the outlook seems to be even brighter down the line.
The starting pitching has even taken a turn. Michael Feliz was brought up and he looked very good in his first outing, dominant even. Then they added Vincent Velasquez and sent Feliz down after his lone appearance. Now McCullers and Velasquez have added a healthy dose of power to their rotation. Velasquez' performance earned him more big league starts and the dominating performance by lefty Brett Oberholtzer on Friday night give Houston's rotation a completely different look. The look of the rotation changed even more when, after another poor outing against the White Sox, Roberto Hernandez was demoted to the bullpen. His value there showed up early in Saturday's game when he came into the game in the 4th after Collin McHugh got bashed around. For his part, Hernandez did a much better job of pitching than in his recent starts. The rotation is now Dallas Keuchel, McHugh, McCullers, Velasquez and Obie. If McHugh doesn't find an answer to his problems PDQ we could see another young arm, like Feliz in the bigs or they may just ride it out until Scott Feldman comes off the DL.
Currently Houston has a 2.5 game lead on Texas and a 3.5 game lead on the Angels after both lost yesterday. It is nice to see the Astros get off that losing streak they were on. We'll see if they can keep producing offense as they face the Rockies in a 4 game home and home series followed by another go-round with the Mariners in Seattle. Hopefully the team gets on another winning streak. I could certainly handle another 10 games in a row to the good. I'll bet the Astros wouldn't complain either.

KABrother88

06-15-2015, 02:26 PM

#5 overall pick Kyle Tucker signed today for $4 million. His bonus slot was at $4,188,700 so not a huge savings there needed to sign Daz Cameron. Majority of any savings was going to come from #2 overall Alex Bregman anyways. He will not be able to sign until LSU is done finished at the College World Series. I would assume Cameron would be one of the last, if not the very last guy from the top 10 rounds to sign in order to save as much on other guys for his bonus. Houston currently has 4 of their top 10 round picks playing in Omaha.

#2 overall Alex Bregman went 2-4 with a run scored in LSU's opening game 10-3 loss to TCU

2nd rounder Thomas Eshelman out dueled #8 overall pick Carson Fulmer (5.2 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 8 Ks vs 6.0 IP, 4 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 7 K) but Vandy rallied scoring 3 in the bottom of the 9th to win 4-3.

3rd rounder Riley Ferrell struck out the side in the 9th in TCU's win over LSU. Ferrell needed only 11 pitches to record the 3 Ks.

9th rounder Zac Person did not pitch in LSU's loss to TCU

eagle eye

06-16-2015, 09:25 AM

[QUOTE=KABrother88;43995
#2 overall Alex Bregman went 2-4 with a run scored in LSU's opening game 10-3 loss to TCU
[/QUOTE]

I was eating at Buffalo Wild Wings Sunday afternoon and a guy stopped by my table with an LSU shirt on and he asked me what I thought of the MLB draft. I was wearing an Astros hat so I reasoned he was interested in what I thought of Bregman. I told him I was happy, that it seemed like we got some nice players but only time would tell how they transition to the pros. He told me he's been watching LSU baseball for years and he assured me that, in his opinion, Bregman was MLB ready right now--that Bregman was in the top 5 of all players to ever play at LSU. I said that considering LSU has turned out some pretty darn good players over the years that was high praise indeed. The guy said he felt like Bregman may only have a brief stay at either AA or AAA before landing in Houston with the big club. Maybe so, but I'll be happy if he makes a good showing in the minor leagues the rest of the summer. I didn't say that to this guy because you could tell he was extremely high on Bregman and I didn't want to be negative anyway. KABro, I was wondering what you thought of Bregman. The only time I saw him play was Sunday in the TCU game and he looked pretty good. I think the LSU fan at BWWs to see the CWS game but it was in rain delay until after he left.

Astros beat the Rockies last night. Keuchel was awesome for 5 innings then I think he got a little tired. He benefited from some run support for a change and also some damn good defense particularly by George Springer who made two diving catches of fly balls that saved Keuchel's bacon both times. Keuchel pitched a perfect game through 5 innings--no hits and no walks--but as he had gotten to the 80 pitch area he was maybe a little fatigued or the second time through the lineup the Rockies sort of figured him out a little. 6-3 was the final with Keuchel getting the win. Springer has come alive since Carlos Correa came to town. Extra motivation or happy coincidence but Springer has been on fire the past 4 or 5 days. Correa, BTW had his best game at the plate since coming up to Houston. He went 3-4 with a run scored but it was second best to Springer who went 3-4 with 2 home runs, 2 RBI's and 3 runs scored. Springer, who at one time had a sub .200 BA is now hitting .269. It's nice to see him coming alive at last since his on-fire start to 2014 prior to the injury that sidelined him the rest of the season. It will be harder and harder to raise the BA because the more ABs you have the less impact a big night has but I wouldn't be surprised if Springer doesn't end up around .280 or .290 by the end of the season.

KABrother88

06-16-2015, 10:48 AM

I'm a big Bregman fan and have been for a while. If fact I remember telling a buddy of mine in 2012 that Bregman would be a top 5 pick when he became available for the draft (little did I know it would be to Houston). You could just tell as a freshman starting at SS on a really good LSU team he had that IT factor. The question I have is if he is slated to be such a fast riser, where do you put him? Correa and Altuve aren't going anywhere and even if Bregman became a trade chip it wouldn't be until next summer after he's been in the league for a year (MLB rule states a player can not be traded until 1 year after he is drafted). I'm not sure I can see him sliding to 3rd cause I'm not sure he has the arm strength...he was projected to move to 2nd as a pro. With that pick though you are not drafting for need...you are selecting the best player available with other variables such as signability coming into play. I am with you though EE in the sense that I would like to see him in the minors this season though then try to sort it out in Spring Training. But isn't it awful nice to have an abundance to talent?!

In other news remember last year when Houston's database was hacked private info including scouting reports and trade conversations were leaked to the public? Well after the FBI got involved the investigation has led the Feds to St. Louis...and not just some geeky Cardinal fan mad at Jeff Luhnow for leaving...it seems to be in fact the St. Louis Cardinals organization that hacked the system as the NY Times is reporting. This will be very interesting to see what MLB does with this as it's not something that has ever knowingly happened in profession sports.

http://nytimes.com/2015/06/17/sports/baseball/st-louis-cardinals-hack-astros-fbi.html?referrer=

eagle eye

06-16-2015, 11:37 AM

Wow. Not since the Patriots got caught filming Jets practices has something like this happened. This could be very interesting.

Big call to Astros fans to step up. Somehow the Kansas City Royals fans have figured out a way to stuff the All Star ballot box. As of yesterday Altuve is now 2nd in fan voting for the starting line up in the All Star game. I don't like the fan voting being the exclusive way to determine what the All Star starting lineup is. Somehow the Royals have managed to slam votes for their players and suddenly 8 starters for the AL All Star team are KC Royals. Altuve's competition has been the Royals Omar Infante who, statistically speaking isn't even in the same ballpark as Altuve and that's with the current slump by Altuve included. Infante's numbers, as a matter of fact, are a joke compared to Altuve's. The guy who you might think would be a big competition for Altuve is Seattle's Robinson Cano but he's hardly in the discussion and even his numbers can't compare to Altuve's. This is so unfair. So, I'm calling on all Astros fans on BRI to get busy and place all 35 of your eligible votes for Altuve on the Astros website or on the MLB.com website. When I have time I will post the top 2nd base stats and you will see that Altuve deserves to be an All Star and not just as a backup, he should be the starter. Let's get going BRI'ers, lets help set things right. Your votes count and while your at it get your friends and family to weigh in too.

Speaking of Altuve he's back in the lineup today. Here's today's (1:10 PM start) lineup:
1. George Springer RF
2. Carlos Correa SS
3. Jose Altuve 2B
4. Evan Gattis DH
5. Chris Carter 1B
6. Hank Conger C
7. Domingo Santana LF (Call up for Colby Rasmus who is on funeral leave)
8. Luis Valbuena 3B
9 Jake Marisnick CF

P - Vince Vasquez (0-0, 0.00 ERA)

KABrother88

06-16-2015, 02:38 PM

Houston has reached agreements with several other top 10 round picks within the past couple of days and here is what we're looking at at the moment

1A - Alex Bregman
Slot - $7,420,100
Signed -
Saved -

1B - Kyle Tucker
Slot - $4,188,700
Signed - $4,000,000
Saved - $188,700

1C - Daz Cameron
Slot - $1,668,600
Signed -
Saved -

2 - Thomas Eshelman
Slot - $1,325,700
Signed -
Saved -

3 - Riley Ferrell
Slot - $765,600
Signed -
Saved -

4 - Anthony Hermelyn
Slot - $522,700
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $272,200

5 - Trent Throrton
Slot - $391,500
Signed - $325,000
Saved - $66,500

6 - Neator Muriel
Slot - $293,100
Signed -
Saved -

7 - Michael Freeman
Slot - $219,600
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $119,600

8 - Garrett Stubbs
Slot - $176,000
Signed -
Saved -

9 - Zac Person
Slot - $164,200
Signed -
Saved -

10 - Scott Weathersby
Slot - $153,400
Signed - $5,000
Saved -$148,400

Total Savings Thus Far:
$795,400

eagle eye

06-17-2015, 07:56 AM

The Astros won yesterday and they put up 8 runs in doing so. It's nice to see the team hitting again. About the time I'm ready to trade Luis Valbuena for Elmer Fudd he has a game where he hits the ball and yesterday his two hits were both home runs as he accounted for 4 of the 8 runs scored. The 8 runs were needed as Vince Velasquez making his second MLB start was far from sharp. He was only able to last 4.2 innings and he allowed all 5 Rockies runs as he depended far too much on his curve ball rather than his 96 MPH fastball IMO. Live and learn for the rookie isn't unexpected. One good thing is he's still 0-0 record-wise but after giving up those 5 runs his ERA has ballooned to 4.66 but a few scoreless innings will bring that down.
Domingo Santana was brought up to fill an opening when Colby Rasmus took off for funeral leave due to the death of his grandmother. Santana, in his first MLB action had a nice day. He was solid in the field and he went 1-3 in the game getting his first MLB hit and it came with a runner in scoring position and he scored his first big league run 2 batters later when Valbuena hit his 2nd HR of the game. Nice job by the young man. It seems like every opportunity a rookie has to perform on the big club they do a good job. The only exception I can remember this season is the trouble Asher Wojciekowski had as he began the season in the starting pitching rotation.
Jose Altuve was back in the lineup and he got a solid single in his first at-bat in the 1st inning that drove in George Springer who singled and moved to 2nd on a balk by Rockies pitcher Chris Rusin.
The Astros won their half of this home-and-home 4 game series in Houston and they play Games 3 and 4 in the series beginning in Denver tonight. Brett Oberholtzer (1-1, 2.25 ERA) faces Kyle Kendrick (2-8, 5.87 ERA) in tonight's game.

Did I mention that I am really happy Houston got their ahem together and started getting their games back on TV? If not, I guess I just did.

I wonder if there is anything more on the tampering case by the St Louis Cardinal organization has come out? If so, I haven't seen it.

KABrother88

06-17-2015, 08:03 AM

Updated:

1A - Alex Bregman
Slot - $7,420,100
Signed -
Saved -

1B - Kyle Tucker
Slot - $4,188,700
Signed - $4,000,000
Saved - $188,700

1C - Daz Cameron
Slot - $1,668,600
Signed -
Saved -

2 - Thomas Eshelman
Slot - $1,325,700
Signed -
Saved -

3 - Riley Ferrell
Slot - $765,600
Signed -
Saved -

4 - Anthony Hermelyn
Slot - $522,700
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $272,200

5 - Trent Throrton
Slot - $391,500
Signed - $325,000
Saved - $66,500

6 - Neator Muriel
Slot - $293,100
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $43,100

7 - Michael Freeman
Slot - $219,600
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $119,600

8 - Garrett Stubbs
Slot - $176,000
Signed -
Saved -

9 - Zac Person
Slot - $164,200
Signed -
Saved -

10 - Scott Weathersby
Slot - $153,400
Signed - $5,000
Saved -$148,400

Total Savings Thus Far:
$838,500

Also 8th round pick Garrett Stubbs has signed but the number has yet to be released. Cal State - Fullerton was knocked out of the College World Series yesterday so Houston can now begin negotiating with 2nd rounder Thomas Eshelman.

As I had mentioned in an earlier post, the reported asking price for Daz Cameron was $5 million and that is why he fell so far. To meet that number, Houston will have to save $3.3 to $3.4 million on the other picks.

The total bonus number Houston has to work with is $17,289,200. Going over that number results in one of 4 penalties:
Up to 5% overage = 75% tax on overage.
5%-10% overage = 75% tax on overage AND loss of 2016 1st round pick.
10%-15% overage = 100% tax on overage AND loss of 2016 1st AND 2nd round picks.
Over 15% overage = 100% tax on overage AND loss of 2016 1st round pick AND 2017 1st round pick.

By this Houston can go to $18,153,660 (additional $864,460) without losing a pick. The penalty for going that high would be being taxed $648,345.

Not sure how willing Houston would be to go into the less that 5% range but I know in how they value the draft they will not sacrifice 1st round pick.

KABrother88

06-17-2015, 08:45 AM

Also of note Alex Bregman went 4-5 yesterday batting out of the lead off spot (normally hits 3rd)...he's now 6-9 at the CWS

eagle eye

06-17-2015, 10:38 AM

KABro, I want to run something by you in regard to your post about the draft money pool and signing Daz Cameron. You contend that Houston may not want to exceed the 5% overage which would mean they would sacrifice next year's 1st round draft pick. My question is this, in this last draft with such high picks and multiple picks in the top 45 don't you think it may be worth even a draft pick to get this class signed? It is widely accepted that Houston's 2015 draft is among the best in baseball and with Houston likely to end up, at best (that's if the Astros fade and don't make the playoffs this season), or highest draft pick in 2016 would be in the high teens or early twenties that wrapping up such a talented draft class would be worth losing a draft pick? I sort of do. I think that the Astros would never let scenario 3 or 4 even enter into a discussion but scenario 2 doesn't seem too big a price considering the circumstances. After this year we will truly see how good Jeff Luhnow and his staff are as they find themselves in a realm of having to restock their organization with late round draft picks. Luhnow comes from the Cardinals who seem to be perennial contenders and that's what we hope for Houston but right now the building blocks for the Astros future is on the table now and must be locked up while the opportunity is there. Am I wrong? Am I missing something?

KABrother88

06-17-2015, 11:24 AM

eagle eye

06-17-2015, 11:34 AM

Well the 2015 draft was really considered to be a pretty weak draft. I would have to do some research in regards to the 2016 draft to see the early strength in comparison.

Quick comparison of the MLB.com player grades (20-80 scale) to the 2014 draft:

2014
65 grade - 3 players
60 grade - 10 players
55 grade - 20 players

2015
65 grade - 0 players
60 grade - 2 players
55 grade - 18 players

There are a couple reasons I wouldn't expect Houston to sacrifice their first rounder in 2016 though. First is because how much Luhnow values building through the draft. Second is without the slot bonus of a 1st rounder it really limits what you can do oversigning people because you are looking at your top pick having a signing bonus in the $1,000,000 range if you pick middle of the 2nd round.

Okay, that makes sense especially about the 1st round slot bonus. I get that but I when the pundits write about Houston having a top 5 draft, especially getting the value pick of a Daz Cameron, it can be confusing to a fan. While I don't doubt the numbers I find it hard to believe that Houston draft picks graded out so low. While there was no clear cut shoe in number 1 (or 2) pick the draft was deep in ++ players from just the SS position. So, I guess I can disagree about the quality of the draft but time will tell us if I'm right or full of a lot of hooey. The one thing that makes sense to me is the value of the slot bonus. That really is a big deal and is enough to make me agree with you so, short story long, you answered my question of, "Am I missing something?", with a resounding yes!

KABrother88

06-17-2015, 12:50 PM

eagle eye

06-17-2015, 02:13 PM

Those grades aren't for the Astros selections...those are of all of the players in the draft. In 2014 Houston had a 65 (Aiken) and 2 55s (Derek Fisher & A.J. Reed). In 2014 they had 3 55s (Bregman, Tucker, & Cameron). I was using those number to show how this weak this draft was compared to the past and show that sacrificing a 2016 pick might not be worth going overboard on a weaker draft when you could possibly get the same caliber player in 2016 in the middle of the draft depending on its strength.

I agree with you about not wanting to sacrifice a 1st round pick but it's because of the slot bonus thing not because I don't like the talent we drafted earlier this month. I understand that the rankings of the players is generally accurate but if it was an exact science ranking players then the baseball pundits and football guys like Mel Kiper Jr and Mike Mayock would be freaking gods! I really don't subscribe to the notion of passing on the now in favor of MAYBE getting something better later. Even now you can't say whether "later", meaning next year, will offer a better pick than Daz Cameron is touted to be right now. To have the attitude that we can do better next year is sort of a slap in Cameron's face isn't it? This discussion started as what Houston needs to do to be able to sign Cameron who slid from a high first round talent to the beginning of the 2nd round or A compensation round because he wanted too much money speaks of his value as a player and in some ways his business acumen. I also think that player rankings can be misleading. Maybe less so in baseball than football but the pro sports trash heep is piled high with 1st and 2nd round busts. You really don't know what you will get until the player gets to see how he makes the transition from college to the pros or, in baseball's case, from high school to the pros. 3-5 years is generally a good barometer for a draft class for a team or the sport in general. I agree with not sacrificing a 1st round pick but for just the one reason. I think if you like a player you try your best to sign him because future drafts are like a Forrest Gump box of chocolates, you never know what you'll get. Keep in mind too that we have 4 players that were the basis of MLB experts saying Houston had a top 5 draft that were selected within the first 42 picks of the whole doggone draft. Next year we won't have a 3rd pick at number 37 overall. Our 3rd pick will likely be in the 70's or 80's and you can't tell me the 77th overall pick is better than a 1st round caliber pick in A compensation round or the beginning of the 2nd round. Scenario 2 is acceptable to me to sign Cameron. A fine is nothing compared to the money baseball teams make. Losing a first round pick and the slot bonus that goes with it---not so much but there is no reason Houston has to come up with 5 large anyway. Cameron may look at the upward pointing arrow in Houston and decide that maybe 3 will do. You just never know.

KABrother88

06-18-2015, 06:22 AM

eagle eye

06-18-2015, 10:57 AM

Man Correa is killing it. Through 9 games he's hitting .359 (14-39) with 3 HRs. His 14 hits are a franchise record for most hits in a players first 10 games...and he's still got one more to try to extend it.

Not just Correa, about the same time Correa got to Houston George Springer has been en fuego. With both hitting 1-2 at the top of the lineup it's been a heckuva punch for the Astros.

One bit of bad news, Jose Altuve reaggravated his hamstring and that's not a good thing. He could be out for a while now. Hamstring injuries are a son-of-a-gun and they can keep a player sidelined for weeks. Especially when you hurt it a second time.

So SS Jed Lowrie (remember him?) got the cast off his hand where he broke his thumb way back in April and he's travelling with the team again. That was decision made by AJ Hinch and Lowrie so Lowrie could sort of reconnect with the team. In Colorardo before the game last night it was reported that Lowrie did some light throwing and he made some swings with a plastic bat as he begins getting his hand ready for playing baseball again. There are going to be questions about what AJ Hinch going to do about Lowrie when he gets back since Carlos Correa has come up and played so well. In a way, it's going to a pleasant dilemma for Hinch to consider. "I've got too many good players on this team! What should I do?" One recourse is that Lowrie can play 2B until Altuve comes back. Another solution is to platoon Luis Valbuena and Lowrie at 3rd. Valbuena has one good hitting day a week and he's made some bonehead errors in the field. To be fair, he's made some good plays too but he's made more than a good 3rd baseman should. The way Lowrie was hitting before he got hurt it could very well be a serious upgrade to the position in the field and at the plate.

Another guy who is dealing with his own injury situation is P Brad Peacock. He's trying to come back from an intercostal strain he suffered last season. He pitched in a AA game last week and felt bad afterward prompting the Astros to send him back to Houston to get checked out. With Brett Oberholtzer pitching pretty well since he finally got over the blister problems in his pitching hand it makes Peacock's chances of cracking the Astros starting rotation pretty slim. The emergence of Lance McCullers and Vince Velasquez hurt his prospects although both of those guys have had limited amount of big league starts and still have some more starts before we can say for sure one or both will stick around. Velasquez' last outing was pretty shaky to say the least. With Obie coming back showing the same form he had last season (which is a good thing) the starting rotation is seems set for the time being. Velasquez and Collin McHugh, who's been getting roughed up lately, are the wild cards right now. If McHugh can't figure out why he can't get anyone out before they score 4 or 5 runs or more a game then he may find himself back in AAA or on the street. That would leave an opening for Peacock, at least until Scott Feldman gets back from his injury in mid July. It's a good situation where you can plug in talented players in if someone falters or gets injured.

Speaking of McHugh, last night during the game the TV guys, Alan Ashby and Geoff Blum were talking about McHugh and his recent struggles and they expressed concern about a guy whose best pitch is 4-seam fastball pitching in the launching pad known as Coors Field. McHugh has pitched in Denver before but not struggling to keep the ball down in the strike zone. He can't make the same mistakes because the Rockies have a pretty good hitting lineup. If McHugh struggles again then the Rox could tag him with 10 runs before the dust settles. The last time Houston lost was at home last Saturday at the wrong end of an 8-1 rout by Seattle. Guess who was pitching? Yep, Collin McHugh. He pitched well early in the season and that's why his 6-3 record is a little misleading because in his last 7 starts he's 2-3 with a 6.86 ERA. His two wins he lucked out and got big run support or he would've been 0-5. Hopefully, he irons out his issues and gets back on track. It won't hurt one bit if Houston puts up around 8 runs for him. In the previous 3 games Houston has hung 6, 8 and 8 runs on the Rox and something tells me they will have to do it again today.

The game is this afternoon at 2:10 PM.

KABrother88

06-18-2015, 01:49 PM

9th round pick Zac Person will get the start for LSU tonight against TCU in an elimination game

KABrother88

06-19-2015, 07:24 AM

Updated:

1A - Alex Bregman
Slot - $7,420,100
Signed -
Saved -

1B - Kyle Tucker
Slot - $4,188,700
Signed - $4,000,000
Saved - $188,700

1C - Daz Cameron
Slot - $1,668,600
Signed -
Saved -

2 - Thomas Eshelman
Slot - $1,325,700
Signed -
Saved -

3 - Riley Ferrell
Slot - $765,600
Signed -
Saved -

4 - Anthony Hermelyn
Slot - $522,700
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $272,700

5 - Trent Throrton
Slot - $391,500
Signed - $325,000
Saved - $66,500

6 - Neator Muriel
Slot - $293,100
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $43,100

7 - Michael Freeman
Slot - $219,600
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $119,600

8 - Garrett Stubbs
Slot - $176,000
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $76,000

9 - Zac Person
Slot - $164,200
Signed -
Saved -

10 - Scott Weathersby
Slot - $153,400
Signed - $5,000
Saved -$148,400

Total Savings Thus Far:
$915,000

Last night Zac Person was yanked after giving up 3 runs in 1.1 IP but in an elimination game like that you can't let a guy try to work through it. Alex Bregman went 1-4 as TCU won 8-4 to eliminate LSU from the college World Series. Houston can now begin negotiations with Bregman and Person. Wouldn't be surprised to see Person get a similar bonus as 10th rounder Scott Weathersby ($5,000). Was actually surprised to see 7th & 8th rounders both get $100,000. Thought with both being seniors with no leverage they would be closer to the $50,000 range at most.

eagle eye

06-19-2015, 07:59 AM

Speaking of Bregman here's a really nice play from last night's elimination game against TCU. Notice how fast he gets rid of the ball on the throw to 1B. Nice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qk_7Zs7jwBo

The Astros completed the sweep of the Rox yesterday and they scored 8 runs again. The highlights of the game were the 3 run pinch hit home run in the 8th inning by Domingo Santana, his first MLB round tripper. The other main highlight was a record tying 3 stolen bases by Carlos Correa. Correa became the second youngest MLB player to steal 3 bases in a game. The number one guy is Ricky Henderson who was about 3 months younger than Correa is. Having a 20 year old steal 3 bases in a game is rare and is further evidence of how special a player he is.
Worries about whether or not Collin McHugh can turn around his recent issue was sort of answered yesterday. He gave up just 4 hits in 6 innings worth of work. He threw 112 pitches including issuing 5 walks in the game and included some good defense behind him. Unfortunately, one of the 4 hits he allowed was a 3 run home run in the first inning to cleanup hitter for the Rox Carlos Gonzalez. After that McHugh was pretty solid the rest of the time he was on the mound. It will be good news if he did find his problem and is back on track. The 5 walks issued had a lot to do with home plate ump David Rackley who had a very tight strike zone. The zone was so tight reliever Pat Neshak though he had just throw strike 3 to Rockies hitter Brandon Barnes which would have retired the side with no runs scored. Instead the pitch was called a ball and one pitch later Neshak walked Barnes. Instead of getting out the inning with no runs after allowing a leadoff double by Nolan Arenado. Instead Neshak lost his composure for a moment and gave up an RBI single to Wilin Rosario. Pitching coach Brent Strom and Jason Castro went out and tried to get Neshak to refocus but it was clear he was still upset. In spite of being mad he was able to induce a fly ball out by Charlie Blackmon to end the inning. The run Neshak allowed tightened the score to 8-4 but it wasn't a save situation in 9th when the Rox came to their last AB. Instead of going with Luke Gregorson AJ Hinch brought in Josh Fields. It could very well be that Fields is going to be the future closer. He's got a + fastball and he's found a groove lately that has made him dominant. I used to cringe a little when Fields came in the game because despite a mid nineties fastball he had trouble getting people out. 2015 has been a different story. So far this season Fields is 2-1 with a 1.93 ERA in 20 appearances and 18.2 inning pitched. He has 31 K's and just 8 walks with a 0.91 WHIP. Just another young player stepping up making this team so much better.

One bad thing happened in yesterday's game, CF Jake Marisnick trying to leg out an infield hit strained his hamstring much the same way Jose Altuve did a week ago against Seattle. I can't find any more info about his status but it's a sure bet he won't play in the next couple of games to allow him to heal. The Astros are likely to be cautious with Marisnick because they allowed Altuve back into the lineup after missing 3 games and in his 2nd game back he reaggravated his hammy to the point where Houston has said Altuve will not be back in the lineup until he's 100% I would imagine their attitude will be the same in regard to Marisnick. The Astros have Domingo Santana already up and Colby Rasmus should be back from bereavement leave tonight give Houston some good options to go with until Marisnick can get back on the field.

One last good news item, the stupid Texas Rangers finally lost to the Dodgers meaning the Astros division lead is now 3.5 games.

KABrother88

06-19-2015, 11:31 AM

Brady Aiken has signed with Clevland who selected him 17th overall. He walked away from $5 million last year and signed for $2.39 million this year...

KABrother88

06-20-2015, 06:39 AM

Vandy knocked out TCU 7-1 last night but TCU closer and Astros 3rd round pick Riley Ferrell did make an appearance pitching 2 hitless innings issuing 1 BB, 1 hit batter and recorded 5 of his 6 outs by K. His final CWS line is 3 IP, 0 Hits, 1 BB, 1 HBP and 8 Ks

eagle eye

06-20-2015, 12:18 PM

Houston lost last night 5-2. There were two main reasons, 1) Lance McCullers wasn't very sharp and 2) the offense was not very sharp either. Lance McCullers was constantly putting himself in deep counts because he was nibbling too much at the corners instead of challenging hitters and getting ahead in counts making the Mariners hitters swing at his pitches. How do come to this conclusion? That's exactly what Seattle's starting pitcher Roenis Elias did. Seven innings allowing only 4 hits with 6 Ks and 3 BBs. It didn't matter that two of the hits were HRs because there were only 5 other base runners all game. To be fair McCullers got victimized by some pretty bad defense. I'll tell you, I like Luis Valbuena even less every day. As I've said before, he has one good hitting game a week and the rest of the time he's useless at the plate. Now his defense is getting down-right lousy. If McCullers had taken the same aggressive chance Elias did with the 96-97 mph fastball he was firing at the M's he really could have blown them away. Highlights were few but George Springer kept his consecutive game hitting streak alive with a home run off the very first pitch of the game. Houston didn't score again until the 8th inning when Marwin Gonzalez homered on a 1-2 pitch leading off the inning. That was the end of the night for Elias but by then it really didn't matter.

Aiken is a genius. Or maybe not but the Astros are fortunate his business acumen isn't all that great.

The Astros can now get to work signing some draft picks with LSU and TCU no longer in the College World Series picture. The last thing I read was that Houston had already signed 21 of their 42 draft picks. More to come soon I hope.

eagle eye

06-22-2015, 08:53 AM

A recap of the week boils down to 2 things. 1) The Astros went 5-2 on the week and 2) they gained a game in the division lead over the Rangers.
> The Astros starting pitching in Seattle this past weekend was not up to par. Lance McCullers, Dallas Keuchel and Vince Velasquez didn't have their best stuff at all. McCullers and Velasquez couldn't find the strike zone with Velasquez having the shortest outing of the 3 throwing 93 pitches in 3-1/3 innings in the Astros lone win in Seattle this weekend. He did pretty good damage control but he went deep in counts but he only gave up 2 hits and 5 walks and only 1 run. If his outing hadn't been so short he would've qualified for the win as Houston finally got some offense that mostly came at the expense of former Astros pitcher J A Happ. Since coming off funeral leave Rasmus has hit the ball pretty well and that's a good thing. Rasmus return coincided with fellow outfielder Jake Marisnick when on the 15 day DL following injuring his hamstring earlier in the week. Houston began the week sweeping a home and home four game series against the Colorado Rockies that saw Houston pretty much dominate the Rox.
There is one thing that is disconcerting though, 4 of the seven games played this week were well over 3 hours and boy, does that make for a long game. It was primarily due to the length of time between pitches the pitchers were taking coupled with the usual gesticulation of the batters who are way too concerned about how tight their batting gloves are, how their helmets fit and a generally just killing time in the batter's box. I will be glad when MLB decides to institute a time limit between pitches. Baseball needs it and another thing that could save time is baseball getting into the 21st century when it comes to calling balls and strikes. Rootsports, ESPN, FoxSports, all the networks have that box that shows the strike zone and where the pitches are in relation to that box. I don't buy into the "human element" crap about baseball. Get the calls right. It is the only way to standardize the strike zone. IMO it would eliminate 95% of arguments that occur over balls and strikes and umps would no longer be able to squeeze pitchers or catchers that piss them off. They could give the home plate ump an ear whig and set up a tone similar to tennis that would could either sound if the ball is a strike or if it's a ball. Either way, umps get the call right and neither the batter nor the pitcher can bitch about it.
We begin the new week in first place, a position the Astros have held since mid April, which is just the best ever after a decade of frustration and loss. Hopefully Houston can keep up the pace but there is still 3 full month left in the season and the margin for error is pretty slim but at least they are in the conversation. The Rangers got hot there as they closed the gap to 3.5 games after being in 5th place in the division at one time. The Angels are in 3rd place but they are getting hot at they have gone from 7 games back at one time this month to just 5.5 games back and they now seem to have an Albert Pujols who seems to be earning his big contract at last. Bad news considering the Astros go to LA to face the Angels for 3 games to start the week.

eagle eye

06-23-2015, 09:35 AM

Houston lost the first game of their series in Los Angeles with the Angels by a score of 4-3. Brett Oberholtzer gave up just 2 runs in his 5.2 innings of work. Unfortunately, one of the 4 hits he gave up was a two run home run to the recent hot as hell Albert Pujols. That was in the 5th inning and gave the Angels their first lead of the game at 2-1. Pujols hit a 2-out solo shot of Josh Fields in the bottom of the 7th to extend the lead to 3-1. Houston came back to score two runs in the top of the 8th to tie the game but Chad Qualls came into the game in the bottom of the inning and set the table for the go ahead run to be scored by allowing a lead off single to Erick Aybar and allowed him to advance to 2nd on a wild pitch. He got Efren Navarro to pop out for the 1st out of the inning. AJ Hinch pulled Qualls at that point and call upon Joe Thatcher who promptly walked Matt Joyce and to make matters worse the Astros allowed Aybar to steal 3rd on the play. At this point Thatcher was out and Will Harris came in. Daniel Robertson laid down a bunt that scored Aybar for the go ahead run that got charged to Qualls. Harris retired the next two batters but the damage was done and the Astros didn't mount any sort of threat in the 9th.
The one bright spot was that Jose Altuve returned to the lineup and he hit the ball solidly including hitting a 2 RBI double in the 8th inning to tie the game. Last week against the Rockies AJ Hinch challenged a safe call on a stolen base. After review the replay showed the base runner came up off the bag momentarily and Carlos Correa had kept the tag on the runner through the play. The call was reversed and the runner was called out much to the displeasure of the Rockies fans. The runner beat the throw but when he popped up a bit after his slide into the base he was off the bag and was ruled out. Well, darned if it didn't happen again last night. Albert Pujols tried to advance to second from 1B when a pitch got away from Jason Castro. Pujols clearly beat the throw but Jose Altuve held the tag on Pujols through the play and, by golly, if the same thing didn't happen again. AJ Hinch challenged the safe call and even though it wasn't as clear as the play in Denver last week Pujols had a narrow gap between his leg and the bag and he was called out. Again, much to the chagrin of the Angels fans, and Pujols, he was called out. Pujols got his revenge in the best way possible with 2 home runs resulting in 3 Angels runs in the game. BTW, I don't understand why you even pitch to Pujols when he's hot like he's been lately. Both of his home runs came with two outs in the inning and with 2 strikes in the count. It's an old baseball axiom---don't let the other team's best player hurt you. Last night the Astros let Pujols do just that.

KABrother88

06-23-2015, 11:03 AM

eagle eye

06-23-2015, 02:49 PM

The Astros have now signed 27 of their 42 draft picks leaving 15 left to get under contract, 4 in the top ten picks. Deals should get done for Houston's top pick Alex Bregman as well as P Riley Farrell and P Thomas Eshelman soon since LSU, TCU and Cal State-Fullerton have been knocked out of the CWS. Cameron is waiting to see if Houston can come up with the dough to pay him the 5 mil he was demanding prior to the draft.
It would be nice to see Houston go 42 for 42 in signings but I don't think they will go 100%. But, if the last four picks unsigned in Houston's top ten sign then they would be 18 of their top 20 picks signed. The 2 not signed in the second ten are LSU's LHP Zac Person who is free to negotiate now and LHP Patrick Sandoval from Mission Viejo Cal High may be weighing his options but his season just ended when he pitched a 2 hitter to win the California State Division II Southern Section title game on June 6th. Sandoval is committed to go to USC so it may take a little cheese to entice Sandoval NOT to go to hot girl heaven at SC.
If he doesn't sign and the rest do (assuming a lot, aren't I?) then Houston will have 19 of their top 20 draftees under contract. That would be pretty sweet.

eagle eye

06-24-2015, 10:40 AM

Houston went off last night on the Angels whooping them 13-2. A bunch of hits (16 - should have been 17 but an infield was deemed an error on the 3rd baseman) and long balls (3) and 4 BBs. One good thing was Houston hitters only had 8 K's which is better than the double digit K's they have been recording en masse lately. Carlos Correa had a big night going 3-6 with a monster 3 run home run in the 2nd inning. Luis Valbuena had his one good hitting game of the week and last night it was really good. He went 3-5 including 2 HRs with 3 RBIs and 3 runs scored and NO K's! For Valbuena that is close to a miracle. Chris Carter is being patient at the play drawing a good amount of walks but in the last 7 games he's 6 for 28 with 12 K's. He has 3 BBs (I thought it was more than that) with 4 runs scored and 4 RBIs with 1 HR. We are still waiting for him to try to figure it out again. Another guy I'm worried about is Evan Gattis. He is still driving in runs but he isn't hitting very well. It looks like he is swinging for the fence on every pitch. If nothing else if he just cut his swing down with 2 strikes he could salvage some of his ABs. Right now he isn't striking out all that much but he's popping up a lot or he's hitting slow rollers which tells me he's just not getting the sweet spot of the bat (duh!) that could turn into solid hits if he backed off his swing a little. Like Biggio did at his best, choke up a bit try to just make contact. Gattis would be dangerous if he did that. Jose Altuve looked a lot more comfortable in the batters box last night than I've seen him in a while. It's translating into the solid contact we are used to seeing from him. Good sign. Last night he went 1-3 but the hit wasn't a legged out dribbler in the infield, it was a solid contact hit. One of the other outs was a hard hit fly ball to center field. I'm not going to worry about Altuve any more. We should be seeing multi-hit games from him soon.
Just watching lately I have to think that AJ Hinch will change the top of the batting order soon. With his hitting for average and the power he can generate Carlos Correa looks like a prototypical 3 hitter. Springer is doing really well as the leadoff man and Altuve has done his bet hitting (IMO) in the 2 hole. What's scary is that Correa is still a neophyte in the bigs, he's going to only get better. Scary good I think.
One last thing, something has to done about this crap that Kansas City fans have figured out how to jam All Star voting to send all their position players to the head of the line. Good Grief, Omar Infante leading all 2nd basemen in votes? The guy doesn't even deserve consideration. He should get the Clark W Griswold at the Grand Canyon consideration, a couple of head bobs and move on, and yet he's leading 2nd place Jose Altuve by over 550K votes. This is after the league cancelled 60-65 million votes they found were fraudulent. 6 of the 8 position player starters are Royals. THAT is a load of crap.

KABrother88

06-24-2015, 10:55 AM

As bad as I hate for Altuve to get screwed this is exactly what needs to happen for MLB to get rid of this crap letting fans pick the All-Star starters. I've said this since they started it but if you are going to put home field for the WS on the line in an exhibition game there is no freaking way the manager should be handcuffed on who plays. Now conveniently the manager of the All-Star team just happens to be KC manager Ned Yost so he won't do the right thing and pull all the undeserving "All-Star" starters and put in the guys to help him win the game...

KABrother88

06-24-2015, 11:12 AM

According to Astros.com reporter Chandler Rome, Alex Bregman has agreed to a deal with Houston. Now the wait to see what kind of savings and if it looks to be enough for a shot to sign Cameron.

eagle eye

06-24-2015, 12:03 PM

According to Astros.com reporter Chandler Rome, Alex Bregman has agreed to a deal with Houston. Now the wait to see what kind of savings and if it looks to be enough for a shot to sign Cameron.

Just posted on Astros.com: http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/132623718/no-2-draft-pick-alex-bregman-agrees-to-deal-with-astros

KABrother88

06-24-2015, 02:07 PM

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If this is the case that would put our know savings number at $2,489,300. The magic number to hit the Daz Cameron asking price is $3,331,300. With only 2 players left to sign other than Daz (2nd rounder Thomas Eshelman and 3rd rounder Riley Ferrell) I don't see us hitting that number. Feel like we can probably save maybe a couple $100,000 on Eshelman and maybe up to about $25,000 on Ferrell. If Cameron doesn't come off of his $5 million number Houston will have to dip into that up to 5% penalty range to pay him (extra $864,460 without losing a pick). I'm honestly think Cameron is crazy if he doesn't take 4 million and call it good. That would put him right in the range that most "experts" had him going before the draft. That being said, his dad knows how the business is so they might want to kill every dime possible while they have leverage.

eagle eye

06-25-2015, 06:25 AM

It took 13 innings and over 5 hours but Houston managed to not hit their way to a loss in yesterday's game with the Angels. They did get 7 hits in the game and only one that came when a runner was in position to score. I would say credit the pitching but the Angels has a guy who has been brought up from AAA that was getting smacked around in the minors to the tune of a 5.83 ERA. Of course I'm talking about Andrew Heaney who shut down a Houston offense that exploded for 16 hits and 13 runs the day before. Heaney went 6 innings giving up only 4 hits and one run, walking 1 and striking out 5. Did I happen to mention the one walk was intentional? In the 6th inning after Carlos Correa doubled home Jose Altuve to tie the game at one Heaney walked Evan Gattis to get to Colby Rasmus. It sort of looked like an odd move considering Gattis has been cold at the plate and Rasmus has been pretty good. It turned out to be a smart move as Heaney struck out Rasmus on 3 breaking balls to end the inning. Three pitches total is what he threw to Rasmus. The killer was having Chad Qualls in the game in the 13th. Qualls has been on a bad streak lately that continued with a walkoff base hit just over Chris Carter's head to score the winning run.
The whole Astros team had a bad day at the plate except for Luis Valbuena. Go figure. I'm also beginning to believe that Lance McCullers is taking over for Dallas Keuchel as the snake bit pitcher on the team. His record is now 3-3 and he's pitched well enough to win at least twice in his two losses.

Mark Appel has been promoted to AAA Fresno. After a slow start to the season he has really come on to pitch well in Corpus Christi prompting the move.

Houston begins a series with the Yankees today with Dallas Keuchel getting first crack at the Bronx Bombers at 7:10 at the Juice Box.

KABrother88

06-25-2015, 08:44 PM

Alex Bregman's deal with Houston was actually a shade under $6 million coming in at $5.9 million. Current total savings at $2,589,300. I've seen it reported that Daz and Houston actually have a "gentleman's" agreement at $4 million. Current savings is enough for that even if both remaining unsigned guys (2nd rounder Eshelman and 3rd rounder Ferrell) are signed at slot value. I also saw tonight where sources were saying Ferrell is to be in Houston tomorrow to sign a deal.

eagle eye

06-26-2015, 10:04 AM

Houston beat the Yankees in their series opener last night 4-0 and the story was the masterful job Dallas Keuchel did last night. It was a great bounce-back game for Keuchel who had a very uncharacteristically bad game against the Mariners where he gave up 5 runs which included 3 home runs. If you have paid attention to Keuchel's work over the last two seasons you know that Keuchel just doesn't give up homers, certainly not multiple HRs in one game. So, looking to redeem a bad game, and knowing that the bullpen was used extensively in the 2-1 13 inning loss to the Angels on Sunday, Keuchel went out and pitched a complete game shutout of the Yankees. A Yankees team that has been hot lately and currently sits in second place in the AL East. Keuchel held the Bombers to 6 hits for the game two of which came in the 9th when Keuchel later admitted he was getting tired. It was shaky whether AJ Hinch would let him finish the game but after a short conference with Keuchel after a walk in the 9th Hinch decided to let Keuchel finish what he started. Keuchel started off the 9th with two quick outs but then a hit, a walk and another hit loaded the bases with the tying run coming to the plate in the person of Jose Pirela. Pirela hit the ball hard but it was right to Luis Valbuena who threw to 2nd and got the last out of the game.
The other big story of the night was Jose Altuve. He's been in a slump the last month or so but he showed signed of breaking out of the slump after he came back a second time from a pulled hamstring as he seemed to be making more solid contact with the ball that he had been. Last night was Jose's first multi-hit game in a long time but it was hopefully a breakout game for him and a return to the form that should make him a shoe-in starter in the All Star game except for the hammer job Kansas City Royals fans have done to the AL voting process. Altuve is still in second place to Omar Infante of the Royals, a guy whose stat line looks like a joke compared to Altuve's. Jose went 3-4 in the game with 3 runs scored and 2 stolen bases. Now THAT is the Jose we've grown accustomed to the past two or three years. George Springer and Carlos Correa have cooled off a lot and it would be awesome to see all 3 clicking at the same time.
Here's a video from the game last night when in-game reporter Julia Morales introduces "Keuchel's Korner" section of the stadium with the fans in that section wearing orange T-shirts with Keuchel's image and most are wearing a fake beard in support of the Astros ace pitcher. The second link is of the TV broadcast team of Bill Brown and Alan Ashby both wearing Keuchel beards.

http://m.mlb.com/hou/video/v198126483/nyyhou-astros-reveal-the-new-keuchels-korner/?c_id=hou

http://m.mlb.com/cutfour/2015/06/26/132954570/keuchel-pitches-shutout-in-front-of-crowd-wearing-his-beard

Here's another interview from the game where Julia interviews newly signed 1st round pick Alex Bregman who was at the stadium yesterday to sign his contract. He also took the field shagged ground balls with Carlos Correa and he took batting practice with the team as well. As you'll see in the interview Bregman was to leave at 6 AM this morning for Davenport, Iowa where he will begin his pro career as a member of the A League Quad Cities River Bandits. It shouldn't take long for Bregman to move up in the Astros system as good a player as he is.

http://m.mlb.com/hou/video/topic/8009980/v197977183/nyyhou-bregman-on-joining-astros-meeting-correa/?c_id=hou

KABrother88

06-26-2015, 05:40 PM

Updated:

1A - Alex Bregman
Slot - $7,420,100
Signed - $5,900,000
Saved - $1,520,100

1B - Kyle Tucker
Slot - $4,188,700
Signed - $4,000,000
Saved - $188,700

1C - Daz Cameron
Slot - $1,668,600
Signed -
Saved -

2 - Thomas Eshelman
Slot - $1,325,700
Signed -
Saved -

3 - Riley Ferrell
Slot - $765,600
Signed - $1,000,000
Saved - $-234,400

4 - Anthony Hermelyn
Slot - $522,700
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $272,700

5 - Trent Throrton
Slot - $391,500
Signed - $325,000
Saved - $66,500

6 - Neator Muriel
Slot - $293,100
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $43,100

7 - Michael Freeman
Slot - $219,600
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $119,600

8 - Garrett Stubbs
Slot - $176,000
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $76,000

9 - Zac Person
Slot - $164,200
Signed - $10,000
Saved - $154,200

10 - Scott Weathersby
Slot - $153,400
Signed - $5,000
Saved -$148,400

Total Savings Thus Far:
$2,354,900

3rd rounder Riley Ferrell has signed but it took an over slot deal to get him...really surprising to me cause over slot deals are generally reserved for HS players to sway them away from college. By going nearly $250,000 over slot I assume that means they knew they had the funds for Cameron squared away already...hope so at least. All that said, Ferrell could potentially be a guy who you see in Houston this year.

KABrother88

06-26-2015, 07:49 PM

Being reported Eshelman has reached an agreement and will sign next week. No word on numbers

eagle eye

06-27-2015, 02:12 PM

The Astros had a two zip lead into the 7th inning as Vincent Velasquez had his best outing as a pro. As a matter of fact, he was only 85 pitches into the game when he got the hook from AJ Hinch after back to back one out singles. I'll bet you Hinch wishes he would've let Velasquez try to pitch his way out that jam considering what happened when Will Harris came on to pitch. First batter Harris faced was Chris Jones who promptly drilled a line drive home run to left field to give the Yankees a 3-2 lead that would end up being the final score. I believe that Hinch was trying to preserve the win for Velasquez by pulling him but Velasquez didn't look happy coming out of the game and I'll bet he looked even less happy when Jones homered. The fact was Velasquez had decided to relax and have fun pitching and not clutter his mind overthinking things. The new approach definitely worked and maybe Hinch will be less likely to pull the plug on his young pitcher in the future. Jose Altuve continued to make an impact as he went 1 for 4 and that one was a hustling infield single to 3B. He later stole second and hustled home on a bloop hit by Evan Gattis.
I really am getting tired of Gary Pettis' work as 3B coach. Early in the game he sent less than speedy Hank Conger home on a base hit by Carlos Correa to shallow center field. Yankee's CF Brett Gardiner came up throwing and if the throw had been just a little better or the catcher more attentive to catching the throw before trying to tag out Conger he would have been out without it even being close. Pettis ruined a possible big inning the previous night by sending Luis Valbuena home on a double by Evan Gattis. If Pettis holds up Valbuena at 3rd the Astros have men on 2nd and 3rd with only one out. Instead Valbuena was easily cut down at home on a play that ended up being closer than it seemed at first glance but still it was silly to send the slow footed Valbuena when the field set up in the Astros favor. The score was 4-0 after Altuve scored so the opportunity for a huge inning was right there but Pettis' over aggressiveness cost the Astros yet again. I really wish Hinch would bench Pettis and put someone else coaching 3B.

The Astros play this afternoon, right now as a matter of fact. It is Brett Oberholtzer (2-1, 2.81 ERA) vs Masahiro Tanaka (4-3, 3.17 ERA).

eagle eye

06-28-2015, 12:53 PM

Brett Oberholtzer didn't have it yesterday. He had a chance to get out of a bases loaded situation but instead he gave up a grand slam to Brian McCann in the first inning. Obie had a stare down earlier in the inning because he felt home plate ump Rob Drake was not calling strikes when he should. In the second inning Obie again struggled as he retired the leadoff batter on a fly ball but then Brett Gardner doubled and Chris Young homered to extend the Yankees lead to 6-0. A-Rod was the next batter and whether it was intentional or not Obie threw inside on him and Drake promptly tossed Obie out of the game. After 1.1 innings and 50 pitches he was done for the day. To add insult to injury immediately after the game the Astros optioned Obie to AAA Fresno. In the press conference after the game AJ Hinch said that it was not how Houston does business in reference to Obie seemingly throwing at A-Rod immediately after giving up another home run. If you listened closely you caught a tidbit of how the Astros will need pitching because in the last two games and 3 of the last 4 the bullpen has been used extensively. It looks like Houston is coming down hard on Obie but I really think it's more about the need for some bullpen help. I look for Obie to be back if not for his next start but the one after that. For Obie's part he swears he wasn't throwing at A-Rod.
Houston got down 6-0 in the first two inning but Houston fought their way back as they chipped away and finally tied the game in the bottom of the 5th. The Stros comeback began in the 2nd when Chris Carter doubled in Domingo Santana for their first run and George Springer followed that up with a single that scored Carter. Carter came back in the 4th with a solo HR which cut the Yankees in half at 6-3. Carlos Correa homered in the bottom of the 5th driving in George Springer and the next hitter, Jose Altuve also homered to tie the game. The Astros had a chance to blow the game open in the 7th when Correa doubled, Altuve walked and Evan Gattis walked to load the bases. Luis Valbuena and the recently called up Jon Singelton both made outs to end the threat. I have made my feelings know about Valbuena and a guy in June hitting just .197 is minor league material. I appreciate the fact that Valbuena has 19 home runs which is pretty high on the AL list but he has disappointed far too many times to just give him a pass. It was the 19 HRs that make him more favorable than last year's 3B Matt Dominguez, but not by much. Jon Singleton had been tearing up AAA pitching in Fresno and when the Astros had to put Chad Qualls on the DL Houston decided to give Singleton another chance. All he's done so far is strike out which is why he got sent down to begin the season anyway. Valbuena went 1-5 in the game and through the 3 games vs the Yankees he's 1-10 with 2 walks and 3 Ks with no RBIs and no runs scored. Singleton has been just as bad going 0-4 with 3 Ks yesterday in his only action since being brought up. Houston needs to have some consistency in their lineup but with the lead league in both Ks and HRs this may be something we just have to live with.

Earlier this week Chad Qualls got put on the 15 day DL with a pinched nerve in his neck. This is a condition he's been trying to play through for a while but with yet another blown hold that resulted in another L in his record in his last appearance against the Angels this past Monday he decided to tell the trainers about his problem. That game, by coincidence was Obie's previous start further highlighting Obie's bad week.

Scott Feldman has started throwing off the mound and he was upset he didn't throw better. AJ Hinch said that he got mad was a good sign that he was close to returning after he suffered a torn medial meniscus in his right knee on May 27th. There is still no time table for Feldman's return but the fact that he's pitching off a mound is very encouraging.

Michael Feliz is celebrating his 22nd birthday today but he won't be celebrating with his teammates at AA Corpus Christi because Houston called up Feliz to fill a spot left by the optioning of Obie to AAA. Feliz has had one fill-in stint for Houston this season and this time it may be a little longer and may include his first big league start. Feliz has an A+ fastball and he adds to the power in the line up began by Josh Fields and has continued with the call ups of Lance McCullers and Vincent Vasquez.

eagle eye

06-29-2015, 08:33 AM

You know this past week seemed better than it actually was. Now 3-4 for the week isn't horrible but when you lose 3 one run games you wonder what might've been. A 2 of the one run losses were to the Angels and the other was a bit of a heartbreaker to the Yankees. Vince Velasquez had his best outing since being called up earlier this month and after 6.1 innings and 85 pitches he was pulled by AJ Hinch and the next batter up was Chris Young who promptly belted a 3 run homer to give the Yanks a 3-2 lead. That's how the game ended up on Friday night. Hindsight being what it is maybe Hinch should've let Velasquez pitch his was out of the 1 out-2 on jam. The Astros did finish the week with a 4 game lead in the AL West but things have flip-flopped a little in the standings. The Rangers who had been en fuego were only 3 games back at the beginning of the week but they have cooled off -- a lot -- to the tune of 2-8 in their last 10 games is now in 3rd place in the division behind a semi-resurgent Los Angeles Angels team who have got 6-4 in their last 10 who are now in 2nd place. Two one run losses to the Angels hurt as the Astros bullpen, that has been one of the solid rocks of the team faltered mightily this past week. Chad Qualls blew a game vs the Angels and by the weekend he was on the disabled list with a pinched nerve in his neck. A condition he's been trying to pitch through but after costing the team another game early in the week he finally told the trainers about his problem.
Dallas Keuchel was beat up early in the week but he came back on Thursday with a gem of a game. Yet another complete game and this time it was a shutout and the offense actually gave him some run support for a change in a 4-0 Astros win. Collin McHugh had two very strong outings this week resulting in two wins. The best of them was yesterday with McHugh going 8 innings allowing only 2 hits in the game and zero runs. He shut down the Yankees offense completely. He is now tied for the team lead in wins with Dallas Keuchel. As a matter of fact both have identical 9-3 records. This also means that the Astros are the only pitching staff in the AL with two pitchers with 9 wins or more. Pretty cool, there.
At the other end of the spectrum you have Brett Oberholtzer. Early in the week he had pitched a good game and left with a lead and it was given up by Chad Qualls (reason he finally confessed he was hurting) and on Saturday afternoon he gave up 6 earned runs in 1.1 innings of work. He had run ins with the home plate ump who he felt was squeezing him and after a 2 run home run in the 2nd inning he threw a pitch inside on A-Rod and the ump tossed Obie and the Yankees CC Sabathia had to be restrained at the dugout by Yankees manager Joe Girardi to stop him from going after Obie. Not only did Obie get tossed but he was sent down to AAA immediately after the game. It was reported that AJ Hinch called Girardi and told him that the perception of Oberholtzer going after a player is not the way the Astros do business. Oberholtzer's demotion punctuated that statement with Obie continuing to assert that he was not throwing at A-Rod but rather trying to come inside and the pitch just got away from him. Obie needs a little cooling off period and the Astros have sent a message to the league they are not a dirty playing team. Michael Feliz was called up from AA Corpus Christi yesterday to fill Obie's spot in the lineup. It is not clear if Feliz will get the start for Obie or if it will be Roberto Hernandez.
Scott Feldman began pitching off a mound this weekend and this is a signal his return will not be long in coming. Someone, somehow has to fill that 4th starters role. It appeared Obie was rounding into form before his meltdown on Saturday. Now the candidates are Feliz and Hernandez at least until Feldman's return. The 4 spot has been a black hole all season for Houston and it is wide open for someone to take hold of it and make it his own.
3 more games until the halfway point of the season. Seems like a blur doesn't it? Houston has owned the AL West lead since mid April. That seems surreal doesn't it? Ten games over .500 in wins and leading the AL in home runs and stolen bases on one hand and owning the worst batting average in the AL on the other. I can't help but wonder if the whole thing is about to come crashing down at any moment. I have replaced resignation for ineptitude that has haunted the Astros for 10 years with worry they can't maintain this level of excellence long enough to make the playoffs which is a full 3 months away. Where's my xanex?

KABrother88

06-29-2015, 01:42 PM

615581778934239232

615599490846851072

As I expected, $4 million looks to be enough to sign Daz Cameron. There will also be an extra $23,500 for the Eshelman deal that has already been agreed upon.

eagle eye

06-29-2015, 05:23 PM

With agreement in principle with Cameron and Eshelman with just the signing formality to be done this means that Houston has signed their first 12 picks in this year's draft with only high schooler Patrick Sandoval yet to be signed. This also means that Houston has agreed to terms with all but one of their top 21 picks and leaving only 9 more deals to work. I really believe this signing percentage is pretty phenominal! Jeff Luhnow and the front office for the Astros has done a really good job of targeting their draft picks as well as being able to sign them after the draft. The exception was their failure to sign 2014 #1 pick as well as #5 pick Jacob Nix. The Astros actually had agreed to terms with Aiken contingent on his physical which took place prior to signing the deal. At that time the Astros doctors found an anomaly in Aiken's pitching arm. The Astros discovered that Aiken's Ulnar Colateral Ligament to his elbow was under sized and while he wasn't having problems at the time a red flag went up and he was likely to have problems with it in the future. At that time Houston dropped their offer from the original $6.5 MM deal to $5 MM. Aiken wasn't interested so he passed. As it turned out Aiken tore the UCL ligament and had to have Tommy John surgery this spring. He tore it in his first game of the spring. Aiken was still drafted earlier this month by Cleveland with the 17th pick in this year's draft but, of course, Cleveland is betting on the come with Aiken because the earliest he'll see a field for the Indians is 2016 and if the TJ surgery history tells us anything it may be 2017 before he's really 100%. That's assuming he comes back to 100% at all. What did it cost Aiken to pass on the Astros? $2.606 MM dollars. He signed with Cleveland for $2.394 MM. Only time will tell if Aiken will develop into the player he was projected to be but right now it doesn't look like Aiken made such a great deal. Now Jacob Nix failed to get signed because his signing was contingent on the Aiken signing. No Aiken then no Nix because of the loss of slot money with Aiken not signing. KABrother88 can tell you much more clearly than I can when it comes the slot money thing. Now, only time will tell if Houston came out smelling like a rose or not by losing Aiken and gaining LSU SS Alex Bregman and the jury is still out on whether Bregman is better than, or at least more valuable than LHP Carlos Rodon who the Astros considered taking instead of Aiken. Rodon has been really good so far as he has already made the bigs earlier this year as Lance McCullers faced off against Rodon way back in May a battle of rookie big leaguers. Rodon won the battle that day but neither pitcher factored into the final decision. So, in reality we need to keep an eye on Bregman and Aiken over the next few years and factor in Jacob Nix too. Nix went back into the the 2015 draft and he actually did better than if he signed with Houston when he became the 3rd round pick of the San Diego Padres. In the meantime after 10 starts in the IMG Academy, a post high school graduate training ground, Nix had improved his fastball up to the 95-97 mph range and improved his changeup and he developed a curve ball. The loss of Nix alone could prove to be a much bigger loss than Houston ever expected.

KABrother88

06-29-2015, 06:47 PM

Watching the career comparison of Bregman/Cameron vs Aiken/Nix will be an interesting follow. I added Cameron because with out the Bregman pick we probably don't have the funds to make a run at Cameron. But really it could be an Aiken/Nix/Marshall comparison. If you recall the rumor was when Houston dropped their Aiken offer it was believed they were trying to work the system using a "bogus" Aiken physical to make a run at 21st round pick Mac Marshall. Obviously now it's apparent that Houston wasn't lying about Aiken's UCL but I'm sure that additional savings had Aiken taken the $5 million offer would have been applied to Marshall. Marshall was originally thought to be a tough sign due to his firm commitment to LSU...well money talks and Marshall ended up playing JUCO in the spring to be draft eligible...he parlayed that into a 4th selection from the Giants.

Sandavol isn't going to be a tough sign I think. However, I've been seeing a lot of people thinking Houston is going to use that additional 5% without losing a pick penalty. If that is the case they can get close to a $1 million dollar offer to Sandavol.

eagle eye

06-30-2015, 09:59 AM

Ah, to be young and good at a sport. Nothing like a $1MM contract for a high school graduation present!

Astros, Angels and Rangers all won last night so no change in the division standings.

Lance McCullers pitched his best game since he was called up last night. He shut down a prolific Royals offense and had his longest outing as a big leaguer going 7 strong innings. The only blemish was solo home run by Salvador Perez to lead off the 7th. Otherwise he worked hard, got out of a couple of jams and he also got to enjoy some run support as well. It's funny how much better 4-2 looks than 3-2.

I saw an interesting stat on Root Sports before last night's game. Keuchel and McHugh are a combined 18-6 W/L while the rest of the staff combined 11-15. It would be 12-15 now with McCullers' win. Wow!

Keuchel goes tonight for Houston vs KC's Danny Duffy (2-3, 5.44 ERA with 34 Ks in 43.0 innings of work).

Altuve is inching closer to Omar Infante in the All Star Voting. Big A was over 400K votes down last week but the updated count has him around 230K behind. Altuve outdid Infante last night in the field and at the plate. Infante went 0-4 on the night batting 8th while Jose went 1-3 with a walk hitting 2nd. He scored a run and drove in a run, both because of a solo home run to lead off the 3rd inning.

Chris Carter and Luis Valbuena are duking it out for worst hitter on the team. Valbuena actually leads Carter by BA .199 to .198. Val went 2-4 with 2 runs scored and K last night while Carter went 1-4 with a run scored, an RBI on a home run and 2 Ks and a walk. Jon Singleton, who seems to be trying to join the mediocre race went 1-2 with 2 runs scored with 2 walks and a K. It was Singleton's best night at the plate since being called up last week. His BA is now .167.

Neither George Springer nor Carlos Correa did squat last night. Both went 0-4 and were a non-factor offensively. Hopefully they get better. Springer, when he did his best hitting, was going with the pitches thrown and using the whole field. During his recent slump he's swinging from his heels for the fence. He needs to back the truck up a little and get back to what was working so well for him. He had gotten his BA up to .289-ish and now it's back down to .262. We all know he can do better.

eagle eye

07-01-2015, 10:22 AM

The month of June is gone, in the history books but Houston is still in first place in the AL West (that makes 80 days now they have led the division), They are 4 games up on the Angels and 5 up on Texas. The Rangers cooled off considerably in the last couple of weeks but at one time they were within 3 games of the Astros in second place but have fallen back a little bit after going 3-7 in their last 10 games. The Angels started to get hot about the time the Rangers faltered and they beat Houston 2 out of 3 games in a series last week in Anaheim.
Jose Altuve when through an extended slump during June but he is breaking out of the slump and looking like his old self in the past week. George Springer continues to make highlight plays almost every game for Houston on defense but he's fallen off after a hot beginning to the month. Carlos Correa has also come back to earth at the plate after beginning June on fire. Here lately he looks a bit uncomfortable at the plate but it didn't hamper him from getting what was described as a little league home run at the time when a long out to center field turned into a misplay by the left and center fielders allowed the ball to drop in for what was officially called a double with a two base error when Yankee center fielder Brett Gardiner fell down trying to pick up the ball which allowed Correa to score. Correa is more than solid at SS making hard plays look routine and making routine plays look way easier than they are.
Except for one bad outing against Seattle Dallas Keuchel has been pretty darn spectacular. 2 complete games this month giving him 3 for the year tying him with two other pitchers in baseball with 3 CGs. Last Thursday against the Yankees he was magnificent getting a 4 hit complete game shutout in the series opener. Keuchel closed out the month last night with a dominating performance in a 4-0 shutout win over Kansas City. Unless the Seattle game messes him up Keuchel could get his 3rd consecutive Pitcher of the Month Award. After some bad starts at the end of May and beginning of June Collin McHugh has found himself and he's actually tied for the team lead in wins by a starting pitcher with 9 (this was until last night). Lance McCullers has been pretty good since being called up and he had a good June. His record doesn't reflect how good because he couldn't buy any run support or the bullpen couldn't hold a lead. He finished the month 3-2 in six starts with a 2.11 ERA. The low ERA should tell you a little something about how well he pitched. The problem with McCullers has been he can't get past the 5th inning because his pitch count is over 100 pitches by then. That is until his last start against KC this past Monday. In that game he attacked the strike zone more and stopped trying to nibble around the corners. In that game he went 7 innings giving up just a solo home run in the 7th to KC's Salvador Perez which was one of just 4 hits given up by McCullers in the game. If McCullers has really found something the Astros could have a real strong 1-2-3 punch in their starting rotation. Vincent Velasquez was called up and has pitched well enough to stay with the big club. Velasquez had even more trouble than McCullers with high pitch counts and until his last start he didn't make it past the 4th inning of any of his starts. In his last start last Friday against the Yankees he changed his approach and, like McCullers, showed his capabilities. In that game he went 6.1 innings and threw only 85 pitches and he was pulled with a 2-0 lead. I think Hinch was trying to help protect the lead and give his pitcher confidence but Will Harris came in and promptly allowed a 3-run homer to Chris Young of the Yankees that turned a 2-0 lead into a 3-2 deficit which ended up being he final score. Velasquez is due up to begin July in the series finale against KC today and we'll see if he is really on to something. The fourth spot in the starting rotation continued to be a black hole where no Houston pitcher had found success. That is until the return of Brett Oberholtzer. He showed his 2014 form and actually looked like the 4 spot problem was finally resolved--that is until last Sunday when Obie gave up 6 runs in 1.1 innings and after throwing inside on A-Rod he was tossed from the game. It didn't end there because immediately after the game Obie was optioned to AAA Fresno. Michael Feliz was called up from Corpus to fill his spot on the roster but the starting pitchers for this weekend's Boston series have not yet been announced. Roberto Hernandez just sucked as the 5th starter in June and he was demoted to the bullpen. He's had to come out for long relieve a couple of times including last week when Obie got tossed and pitched very well. Long relief may just his cup of tea going forward. Scott Feldman has continued his rehab from the knee injury that has kept him out since May. He began pitching off a mound last week and any day now he could be going to a minor league rehab assignment with his scheduled return after the All Star break. The bullpen was solid for most of the month but since around June 15 they have shown some chinks in their armor. Gregerson, Neshak, Qualls and Harris have blown holds or saves that cost Houston some wins. Chad Qualls was placed on the 15 DL last week after blowing a save in Seattle because of a pinched nerve in his neck that he's tried to pitch through for over a month. In 8 appearances in June Qualls in 0-2 with an 8.44 ERA--yeah, I think he was struggling.
The offense, like it has been all season has been sporadic. Often times more cold than hot but Houston still has managed to win more than they've lost. In June they went 15-14 and that includes a bad stretch where they lost 7 in a row. In their last 3 series they lost to the Angels 2 games out of 3, split a four game series with the Yankees and won a 3 game series with KC by winning the first two games. The Royals came into the series with the best record in the AL but I'm glad to say our Houston Astros finished the month as the team with the best record in the AL after smashing the Royals in the first two games of the series. All in all, June wasn't terrible but after a shaky May I think I would love to see Houston have a really good July.

KABrother88

07-01-2015, 07:05 PM

Updated

1A - Alex Bregman
Slot - $7,420,100
Signed - $5,900,000
Saved - $1,520,100

1B - Kyle Tucker
Slot - $4,188,700
Signed - $4,000,000
Saved - $188,700

1C - Daz Cameron
Slot - $1,668,600
Signed - $4,000,000
Saved - $-2,331,400

2 - Thomas Eshelman
Slot - $1,325,700
Signed - $1,100,000
Saved - $225,700

3 - Riley Ferrell
Slot - $765,600
Signed - $1,000,000
Saved - $-234,400

4 - Anthony Hermelyn
Slot - $522,700
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $272,700

5 - Trent Throrton
Slot - $391,500
Signed - $325,000
Saved - $66,500

6 - Neator Muriel
Slot - $293,100
Signed - $250,000
Saved - $43,100

7 - Michael Freeman
Slot - $219,600
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $119,600

8 - Garrett Stubbs
Slot - $176,000
Signed - $100,000
Saved - $76,000

9 - Zac Person
Slot - $164,200
Signed - $10,000
Saved - $154,200

10 - Scott Weathersby
Slot - $153,400
Signed - $5,000
Saved -$148,400

Total Savings:
$ 259,200

All 12 top 10 round picks have now signed. With the current savings Houston can afford to go up to $1,123,660 to the 5% overage. Any bonus over $100,000 after round 10 counts towards your pool so realistically Houston could offer Sandavol $1,223,660...should be plenty if Houston chooses to go into the 5% overage.

eagle eye

07-02-2015, 10:14 AM

Next guy to sign is Sandoval. To me if Houston gets the top 21 rounds of picks signed this draft, from a signability aspect, is a huge success. The last eight draft picks are from the following rounds (not counting Sandoval); 22, 23, 27, 34, 35, 37, 38 and 39. I know that even if Sandoval doesn't sign this still isn't anything to sneeze at. Good job Jeff Luhnow and staff. This is going to be the last draft with so many opportunities at the top of the draft to finish laying the groundwork for the next decade. I think the Astros under the ownership of Jim Crane and guidance of Jeff Luhnow has done a great job. I think the only glitch was last year when Houston went with Brady Aiken over Carlos Rodon and now they have neither. That puts a little more pressure on Alex Bregman and Kyle Tucker to be good. Maybe not just good but great.

Last night Houston completed the sweep of the Royals with a narrow 6-5 win but it could be a very costly win. In the 5th inning after a Marwin Gonzalez homer and a walk to Jason Castro KC starter Edinson Volquez came inside on George Springer and hit him in the right hand right at the heel near the thumb and wrist. There is talk about Springer going on the DL. Big loss both on the field and at the plate. After Springer got hit and took his base Jose Altuve had a base hit scoring Castro. Evan Gattis followed with a single scoring Springer and Altuve. Gattis was overly aggressive trying to go to 2nd on the play and he was easily cut down for the first out in the inning. It didn't matter because Valbuena and Carter had bad ABs and struck out to end the inning but not before they had taken a 5-3 lead in the game after scoring 4 runs in the inning. Springer left the game in the 6th when Domingo Santana pinch hit for him and Santana remained in the game.
Vincent Vasquez pitched very well again after a rough start to his night. He gave up two runs in the 1st and another in the 2nd to put Houston down 3-0. But he settled down and retired the next 14 of the next 15 batters taking him into the 7th inning for the 2nd start in a row. In the 7th Vasquez walked Salvador Perez and got Alex Gordon to strike out for the 1st out. At that point, Just like the Yankees game last Friday, AJ Hinch pulled the plug on Vasquez' night after 6.1 innings and just 88 pitches. Josh Fields came on and gave up a single to Alex Rios and got an out on an Omar Infante flyout. Then came Jarrod Dyson who tripled to left-center scoring Perez and Rios to tie the game at 5. I wonder if Hinch regretted giving the hook too early on Vasquez--again. As a result of Josh Fields' failure to hold Vasquez failed to qualify for a decision for the 5th time in 5 starts. If I'm not mistaken that is an MLB record (in futility). Vasquez has to be wondering why he keeps getting an early hook when he has been pitching so well. I believe if Vasquez finishes the 7th then it's set up for Neshak in the 8th and Gregerson to close the 9th. Game over, Astros win 5-3. But, because Hinch pulled Vasquez instead of letting him finish the 7th we'll never know.
One other interesting thing was KC seemed to be taking target practice on Houston best hitters last night. After Springer was hit in the 5th Jose Altuve was hit in just the same way only on the forearm instead of his hand by new Royals pitcher Kevin Herrera to lead off the 8th inning. That clearly pissed off the Houston crowd and Altuve was lucky he avoided being hit in the hand or the elbow. Being hit in either place with a 97 mph fastball may have done some damage. When Neshak came on in the 8th there was already one out recorded by Joe Thatcher who started the inning. Neshak got Lorenzo Kain to ground out to short bringing Kendrys Morales, the Royals cleanup hitter to the plate. With a 1-2 count Neshak hit Morales and many people thing it was payback for Springer and Altuve. At that time both benches were warned about throwing at hitters but the message was sent, Houston will not put up with their players, especially their best players, getting hit. Neshak retired the next batter on a groundout to end the inning. In the bottom of the 7th Houston scored a run to go up 6-5 and when Neshak and Gregerson closed out the game that became the final score.
Houston swept the Royals, the Central Division leader and that's after splitting with AL East 2nd place NY Yankees. Houston is proving they can play, and win, against the big boys. Their current 47-34 record at the halfway point of the season is tied for best in franchise history. They have been in the division lead now for 81 days. It's ironic that 81 games is the halfway point of the season. The next ten games beginning tomorrow with be big because Houston will be on the road for all of them. They begin with 3 in Boston followed by 4 in Cleveland and they finish the road trip with 3 in Tampa Bay. All 3 teams are either 4th or 5th in their respective divisions but all have been playing better of late. Houston will definitely face Indians starter Carlos Carrasco who was one out from a no-no last night against the D-Rays. If Houston can go say, 7-3, they will go into the All Star break looking pretty darn good in the division race. The Rangers last 11 days before the AS break is not picnic. They finish their series with division leading Baltimore tonight then return to Arlington to face the Angels for 3. They then take on Arizona for two followed by 3 with San Diego. In their last 9 games before the AS break they could easily go 5-4 which means they lose ground to Houston. The Angels face the Rangers followed by Rockies for 2 and Seattle for 4. The Angels could easily go 5-4 in their last nine games as well. Houston, if it goes as I project could actually have a 7.5 game lead over the Angels and 8.5 over the Rangers because Houston plays the extra game. Not bad.

eagle eye

07-02-2015, 03:00 PM

Despite hopes that George Springer would not miss any time on the DL because of being hit in the wrist by a pitch from Royals pitcher Edinson Volquez were dashed this afternoon when the Astros put Springer on the 15 day DL with a broken wrist. In truth this will keep Springer off the field for 6 weeks. This is a huge loss for the Astros who will have to deal with Springer's loss until the middle of August. Last season Springer played about 6 weeks before a season ending quadriceps injury on July 20 and now he will be out for an extended time this season. Both these injuries are sort of flukish but still part of the game. I don't think Volquez hit Springer on purpose but it doesn't make the loss of one the best players on the team any easier to take.

In other news the Astros have called up Dan Stailey from AAA and he will make the start on Friday night against the Red Sox. Maybe KABrother88 can explain why the Astros brought up Straily and passed over, yet again, Mark Appel who has pitched better than Straily overall except for a slow start in AA to begin the season? Curious.
Straily, who is 6-6 with a 4.06 ERA at Triple-A this season, has 70 strikeouts in 77 2/3 innings. In his only season as a full-time starter, he went 10-8 with a 3.96 ERA in 2013 with Oakland, starting 27 games.
"He's got some experience to take from, he's gone down [to Fresno] and pitched very well, pitched deep into games," Hinch said. "He's earned the opportunity. We've run through a number of starting pitchers so far, some we expected, some we didn't expect, but when we acquired Dan, we expected him at some point to contribute and now is his opportunity." -- from Astros.com

Carlos Correa has been named AL Rookie of the Month for June by MLB.com.

Correa, who made his Major League debut on June 8, hit .287 with nine doubles, five home runs, 15 RBIs, four stolen bases and a .543 slugging percentage in his 21 games in the month. Among AL rookies in June, Correa ranked first in OPS (.852), doubles, RBIs and in slugging percentage. Additionally, he ranked tied for first in home runs and third in hits and in batting average.
Correa is just the sixth Astros player to win a Rookie of the Month Award and the third in the last two seasons, joining right-handed pitcher Collin McHugh (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=543521) (September 2014) and outfielder George Springer (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=543807) (May 2014). Correa is also the second Astros player to win an AL monthly award this season, as left-handed pitcher Dallas Keuchel (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=572971) won the AL Pitcher of the Month in April and May.
Defensively, Correa has committed just one error in his 83 total chances this season for a .988 fielding percentage.
At 20 years old, Correa is the youngest position player to play in the Major Leagues this season. He's also the youngest player to start a game at shortstop for the Astros and the youngest position player for Houston since infielder Derrel Thomas debuted for the club in 1971. -- from Astros.com

One last news item; the international signing period began today with Houston signing Dominican Republic OF Gilberto Celestino.

The Astros have signed teenage outfielder Gilberto Celestino of the Dominican Republic. The package is worth $2.5 million, according to industry sources.
The deal for Celestino, ranked No. 7on MLB.com's Top 30 International Prospects list (http://m.mlb.com/prospects/2015?list=int), includes a $2.25 million signing bonus and $275,000 for college.

More (http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/134053914/astros-sign-free-agent-of-gilberto-celestino) -- from Astros.com

KABrother88

07-04-2015, 08:20 AM

I think Straily was called up more due to lack of options than anything and he has big league experience. My guess of the next starter called up if one is needed will be Mike Hauschild...he's quietly been a pretty solid pitcher in our system for the last few years. I just don't think Appel is ready at this point so I don't see the need to call him up. He had a very rough outing in his AAA debut giving up 7 ER in just 3 IP. He followed that up giving up "just" 3 ER in 5.2 IP but allowed 9 hits. I also would have liked to have seen Tony Kemp called up to take the place of George Springer instead of Alex Pressley...we've already seen what Pressley can do and is personally rather something else...

So I was doing a little research on some of our unsigned draft picked and noticed something interesting. We took LHP Sandavol in the 11th round and he's been get the majority of the attention for us reaching into the 5% penalty to sign. According to MLB.com Sandoval was the #139 draft prospect. Round 22 pick RHP Cole Sands came in at #55. And round 37 pick RHP/1B Luken Baker came in at #54. LHP is always important but I'm wondering if they go after second round talent instead. Baker is basically the same player we got in 2nd rounder A.J Reed last year...a masher at the plate who is limited defeansively but also has the versatility to be a pitcher...he's also from Conroe so you have to wonder what kind of discount, if any, he would give the hometown club. The signing deadline is in 2 weeks (July 18th) so there is plenty of time to get one of them signed if Houston tries to make a run

eagle eye

07-05-2015, 07:27 AM

First, my posts here have been ridiculously long. Sorry about that, I'm going to try to do better.

Friday Houston won in a back and forth affair that Houston eventually won in extra innings 12-8. Dan Straily did pretty good but I thought he got the hook a bit early. Especially considering Josh Fields promptly gave up the hits that ultimately erased a 5-2 lead at the time. I think AJ Hinch has given the hook prematurely to Straily and Vincent Velasquez. If you are looking for a fault in Hinch that would be one I would point out. Carlos Correa was the hero of the night going 3-6 with a solo HR and a huge single in the 10 that gave Houston the lead for good. Altuve got hit in the arm again. This time around the elbow. It didn't matter as he went 3-5. It was a big night for the offense as everyone who played got at least one hit on the night. It wasn't such a good night for the bullpen as Hinch had to use every reliever he had on the night which leads to...........

Saturday afternoon was a different story. Everything good about the offense was bad. Houston did have six hits and 5 of them led off an inning but Houston's bats were non-existant for the most part. Lumberton native Taylor Buchholz tossed a complete game for the Red Sox and came within a strike of pitching a shutout. Jose Altuve led off the 9th with a single. Preston Tucker flew out and Carlos Correa grounded out bringing Luis Valbuena to the dish. With a 2-2 count Valbuena singled to center field scoring Altuve to break up the shutout. Evan Gattis flew out to end the game. Collin McHugh, needing to go deep for Houston after the bullpen was used up the night before. Unfortunately, McHugh was off his game yesterday. Despite this fact he battled and got himself into the 6th inning before he just couldn't do any more good. He got one out in the 6th and then gave up a single and a double to make the game 4-0 when Hinch had seen enough. He brought in Roberto Hernandez and he got out of the inning without any more damage. In the eighth Hernandez gave up 2 runs which made the score 6-0. The final score was 6-1 after Houston's minor rally in the 9th. Not a good day for our boys but tomorrow is another day, as they say.

Jim Crane announced yesterday that the Astros are trying to work a trade for a quality starting pitcher. I heard one rumor that former 1st round pick Mark Appel could be part of a deal.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/134642420/astros-trying-to-trade-for-starting-pitcher

Astros.com reported that Jake Marisnick, who has been out for a couple of weeks with a pulled hamstring will be activated from the DL today. To make room for Marisnick the Astros have send Domingo Santana back to AAA Fresno. The Astros elected to keep Alex Pressley on the roster for the time being. I thought maybe they would send Jon Singleton down because he hasn't hit well at all since being called up sporting a .158 BA going 3 for 19 with no homers and 3 RBIs with 9 Ks and 2 BBs. He's also been bad on defense. One of the saving graces of Chris Carter so far despite been a big disappointment at the plate has been his defense. I know Houston is hoping Singleton gets on the same track he was on in AAA but so far he has not, not even close.

Lance McCullers goes today for Houston trying to build on the nice outing he had last game when he went 7 innings and got his first win in his previous 3 starts. He faces the Red Sox rookie Eduardo Rodriguez who has the same 4-2 W/L record as McCullers with a 3.92 ERA. Rodriguez had gone through a bit of time where he was tipping his pitches by how he held his head. He worked on correcting this problem between starts and he has allowed only 1 earned run in his last two starts.

The Rangers and Angels are playing each other in a series right now and since the Angels have fired their GM they are 2-0 and have scored 21 runs while allowing only 2. They beat Texas 8-2 on Friday night and pounded them 13-0 last night. Houston now has just a 4 game lead over the Angels while their lead on Texas is 6.5 games. Both the Rangers/Angels and the Astros/Red Sox series conclude today.

eagle eye

07-06-2015, 03:36 AM

Astros lose the game and the series on Sunday to the Red Sox. The most disturbing thing about yesterday's loss is that the bullpen surrendered another late inning batch of runs. The Astros bullpen has, for the most part, been money up until about 10 days ago. Maybe a little longer than that but it's been happening at an all too alarming rate. Yesterday Tony Sipp was tagged with a 2 run home run in the bottom of the seventh right after Houston went up 4-3 on a two run Carlos Correa homer immediately followed by an Evan Gattis solo shot. Of course the defense didn't do the Astros any favors in the 6th inning when Correa and Gattis both committed errors that allowed 2 runs to score for the Red Sox. This overshadowed some good D by Houston, particularly by Jake Marisnick who threw out Hanley Ramirez at third after a single by Pablo Sandoval. Ramirez tried to go from 1st to 3rd on the play and Big Jake gunned him down on a play that wasn't even close. Then, in the 6th Marisnick slammed into the Green Monster just as he caught a lined shot by Brock Holt. Marisnick had been playing Holt shaded to the right field side of center field and he sprinted back and over to left center to make a catch that even the Boston faithful had to applaud. Throw in a couple of double plays and Houston should have gotten the win but for errors and Tony Sipp. Astros starting pitching continued to struggle as Dan Straily and Collin McHugh did Friday and Saturday. Lance McCullers fell into an old habit of nibbling too much and getting into deep counts but, unlike McHugh and Straily, McCullers was able to wriggle out of trouble. Even the one run he gave up was a masterful job of damage control as he started off the inning with men on 2nd and 3rd with no outs and only allowing one run to score. In fact, that run was the only one he gave up in his 5 innings and 101 pitches of work.
The worst thing about yesterday's loss was the fact that the Angels completed a sweep (maybe annihilation is a better word as LA scored a 12-6 win Sunday and they outscored the Rangers 32-7 in the series) to close to within 3 games of the Astros. Houston moves on to play Cleveland next for 4 games and LA gets a day off before facing Colorado in a 2 game series and Seattle for 4 games.
As for Houston, they get no break in their schedule because they square off against the Cleveland Indians who are sending Carlos Carrasco to the mound tonight. This is the same Carlos Carrasco who was one out from a no-hitter in his last appearance. He'll face Dallas Keuchel who has a complete game shutout of the Yankees and an 8 inning 4-0 shutout of the Royals in his last two starts. That would be 17 scoreless innings if you were keeping track. Both Keuchel and Carrasco are 10 game winners looking for #11.

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2015_07_06_houmlb_clemlb_1&vkey=preview_web_away&c_id=hou#game=2015_07_06_houmlb_clemlb_1,game_stat e=Pregame

Glory be! The Houston fans did it! They rallied enough over the past two weeks to vote in Jose Altuve as the starter at 2nd base in the All Star game! Two weeks ago Jose was 400K+ behind the Royals Omar Infante but he made up around 200K last week and in the final vote he won the starting job in the Summer Classic. Nice job Jose and nice job Houston fans because, in this case, Jose deserves the honor because he is clearly the best 2B in the AL, maybe the whole league.

There were 3 calls over turned in yesterday's game and I have two observations about that. 1) It's good that MLB has caught up to the 21st century in terms of being able to use the technology available to get call right. That's what we want in the end isn't it? That the playing field is leveled in team's ability to get calls correct so a missed call can't cost a team a game or a pitcher a no-hitter or any of a myriad of wrongs than can now be made right with replay. 2) When in the hell is baseball going to wake up and use some of the same technology to call balls and strikes. Pitchers and batters alike both feel like they are being treated unfair. You see it in every single game when one or the other is mad at the home plate ump for a call--or non-call. If the technology is used then everybody is working with the same strike zone every time. If you get mad you can only blame yourself if you are a pitcher or a batter if things don't go your way. The argument that it takes the human element out of the game is balderdash. The human element is what causes all the fights! Look how replay has not only pointed out the human element is not reliable but it's based on bias and the heat of the moment. You tell me umps aren't biased when he figures a pitcher is showing him up and I'll tell you that you are full of fertilizer. Instead of a pitch close baseball needs to standardize the strike zone and let the machines call balls and strikes.

eagle eye

07-06-2015, 11:08 AM

I found this item in the Bleacher Report proposing a doable trade deal the Astros could make in their search to improve their starting pitching rotation. It's logical and if agreeable for both parties. why the heck not. Thoughts?

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2515260-6-most-realistic-blockbuster-mlb-trades-that-could-go-down-this-july/page/4

KABrother88

07-06-2015, 02:37 PM

I really don't want to give up Phillips in any potential deal...I think he's gonna be a stud in a couple of seasons

eagle eye

07-07-2015, 10:45 AM

That's a hard call to make to lose a player with a lot of potential but the starting rotation needs help. McHugh, McCullers and Velsquez have been too inconsistent to depend on down the stretch. Personally, I would rather give up Jon Singleton myself. Maybe include Matt Dominguez too. Two weeks ago I would have included Luis Valbuena in a deal--any deal-- but he's been playing better and hitting better lately. I would hope he could improve on his career .225 BA which makes me really hope that Collin Moran would come along a little faster. He may be another year or two before he's really ready to make the jump to the big club. With the club in 1st place are the Astros going to commit to a real run at the playoffs? I think we'll see how committed they are to winning this year according to the moves they make at the trading deadline. The Astros, under a different regime, sold the farm (literally) to make a run at the World Series in 2004 and 5 and they were screwed for ten years after that. I don't see this regime making the same mistake. In fact, they may take a more patient approach allowing their prospects to mature with a real run at the WS next year of the year after.

Astros beat Cleveland 9-4 last night. Dallas Keuchel got his 11th win of the season pitching six innings and allowing 3 runs but he did record 8 K,s. Here lately Keuchel has to be happy the offense is finally giving him some run support. Everyone on the offense contributed at least one hit except for Carlos Correa and Chris Carter. Carter did contribute by working a walk as well as hitting sac fly to score a run but officially he was 0-3 with 3 Ks. Correa helped as well as he did walk once and he reached on a fielder's choice and he scored both times he was on base. The star of the night on offense was Preston Tucker who was celebrating his 25th birthday. He had a heckuva night going 4-5 with 2 runs scored and 2 RBIs including a solo HR in the 4th. Houston chased Cleveland ace Carlos Carrasco after just 4 innings after he gave up 5 runs on 10 hits and a walk with 5 Ks. Houston's offense scored in double figures in hits (16) and K's (12). Kind of like Big T said before the season began, lot of hits and lot K's, and he has been dead on so far.

Dallas Keuchel probably knew before he took the mound last night but he was named to the All Star game last evening. The starter won't be named until later this week but I figure it's between Keuchel and Chicago's Chris Sale.

Houston's offense is in for a little more trouble tonight as they face Cleveland's other ace, Cory Kluber. He his a really good pitcher who is second in the AL in K's but he's 1-4 in his last 7 starts with a 3.86 ERA. For the season he's 3-9 with a 3.64 ERA in 118.2 innings of work. The strikeout total is a concern because Houston strikes out---a lot. Vincent Velasquez is on the hill for Houston and hopefully in his 6th big league start he can get his first win. Heck, just get a decision of any kind would be different. Right now he's 0-0 in his 5 starts. I'll be interested to see if A J Hinch gives him an early hook like he did his last two starts. In both games, against the Yankees and Seattle, he went 6.1 innings and left with less than 90 pitches and the lead only to see the bullpen give the lead up almost immediately. I'd like to see him pitch his way out of a jam, or at least try to. A gut check never hurts a guy's progress. Back in the 90's both Mike Hampton and Darryl Kile benefitted from Larry Dierker's belief a starter needs to learn to pitch under pressure.

Luis Valbuena was out last night due to a sprained toe he hurt a couple of series ago. He could be back at any time depending on how he feels. I really don't look for him to play tonight. With only six games until the All Star break Hinch could let him sit and really get well heading into the second half of the season.

eagle eye

07-08-2015, 11:07 AM

The Astros go from the penthouse to the outhouse which following this team such a rollercoaster ride. On Monday they bang out 16 hits and score 8 runs. Last night they only managed 6 hits and 2 walks and they had the lead off man on base several times but could do nothing to capitalize. It was like a carbon copy of the first two games in the Boston series. The first a convincing win the second a frustrating loss. This time Vince Velasquez did better than he did against KC allowing only 2 runs in his 6.1 innings of work. (BTW this is the 3 start in a row he's gone 6.1 innings) The Astros offense was worse too as Houston lost 2-0. Houston had more K's (9) than hits and walks combined (8). Okay, so the pitching deserves some credit but I can't argue Corey Kluber is better than Carlos Carrasco. A J Hinch didn't give the hook to Velasquez early this time even though he went the same distance. It seemed like, while he was close to the strike zone more than in previous starts, he couldn't get a call from the ump. Cleveland was happy to stay patient in the batter's box and run his pitch count up while making him work extra hard to get out. Vince tossed 104 pitches last night which almost 20 more pitches Hinch had allowed in his previous starts. Since a hot set of games vs Boston Carlos Correa has been ice cold. Preston Tucker is now the hot hitter. Trouble is both Correa and Jose Altuve have hit a slump at the same time and hits Evan Gattis is getting don't coincide with Tucker's. Houston has two more games with Cleveland and their offense needs to get off the mat and do something. With Dan Straily making his second start tonight followed by Brett Oberholtzer on Thursday, who will be called up because after the game Velasquez was sent down to AA to rest, Houston will need a healthy dose of run support. Velasquez was sent down because his innings pitched is really mounting. His high before this season was around 124. So far he's pitched 58 innings already between the minors and big leagues. Vince won't pitch at all in Corpus, he is going there to rest until after the All Star break so he will be rested for the second half of the season. Houston can't afford to lose any more games before the All Star break because the Angels are on fire and they won again last night over Colorado by a score of 10-2. Their offense has become an unstoppable force lately. Ever since they canned their GM the team has begun to kick ass and take names. They are now down to 2.5 games back of the Astros. Houston has been playing around .500 because they can't get any consistency out of their starting pitching, offense or relief pitching. The Astros, quite honestly, are looking like the team we sort of expected going into the season. It's just that we got spoiled by a hot April and May and now we are disappointed because June and, so far, in July Houston is terribly average.

It looks like there may be light at the end of the tunnel for Jed Lowrie. (Remember him?) He tore a ligament in his thumb what seems like a hundred years ago. He's been fielding ground balls some and swinging a bat some which is encouraging but he isn't ready for a rehab assignment yet. There is still no time table for his return to the field.

One thing I like about A J Hinch is how he keeps players on the DL on the bench to keep the players feeling involved with the team. Except for rehab assignments players on the DL are in the dugout with their teammates. Geoff Blum has commented on this saying he likes Hinch's approach because so many times injured players are on their own doing rehab and at training sites and anywhere but with the team and they feel like they don't matter when they are out of the lineup. You continue to see Lowrie, Springer, Marisnick, Feldman and others on the DL still hanging with the team in the dugout of games. It seems like it is a good way to create a "family" atmosphere which cannot hurt team chemistry one bit.

Oberholtzer has apparently spent his time standing in the corner (in AAA Fresno) for his apparently throwing at A-Rod a couple of weeks ago after the Yankees pounded him for six runs in less than 2 innings. Hinch had to send a message to the league that the Astros don't tolerate throwing at batters (probably so opposing pitchers won't throw at Astros hitters). Sufficient time has passed the Astros can justify bringing Obie back to help out a struggling rotation.

Lance McCullers start has been moved back from Friday to Sunday to give him extra rest. Like Velasquez, his innings pitched are mounting and he is sure to blast he previous season high out of the water. His previous high was around 104 innings and he's already logged 87 innings between the minor and major leagues. It's been speculated that with all the young arms pushing career highs in innings the Astros could go with a six man rotation when Scott Feldman returns to the lineup. This would also benefit Dallas Keuchel and Collin McHugh as well. Keuchel leads the bigs in innings pitched with 130.1 and McHugh has 107. It looks like Houston is not selling out the future for present success and I'm happy to see that.

The Astros has agreed to terms with 11th round draft pick Patrick Sandoval a left-handed pitcher from Mission Viejo High School in California. He received $900,000, according to MLB.com's Jim Callis, which is the highest bonus given after the seventh round. The club did not disclose terms of the deal. The 18-year-old went 9-3 with a 0.97 ERA and 106 strikeouts in 93 2/3 innings this year en route to being named Perfect Game All-American. --- from Astros.com
This means Houston has signed their first 24 draft picks spanning from the 3 picks in the first round to the 22nd round pick. That, my friends, is good work.

eagle eye

07-09-2015, 10:05 AM

Damn, the Astros are not hitting themselves right out of 1st place losing last night for the fourth time in the last six games. After a two run Evan Gattis homer in the first inning the Astros were shut out the rest of the game. The Astros are making the pitching staff for Cleveland look a lot better than their season stats. I admire AJ Hinch for sticking with Chris Carter for so long but something has got to give. The guy is 6-55 hitting with 3 HRs and 3 walks. The only thing that makes him a better choice than Jon Singleton is Carter plays defense much better. Singleton looks like a stumblebum on defense. Personally, I'd rather they both sit and let Marwin Gonzalez play first base. My lineup would be this.

1. Altuve 2B
2. Tucker LF
3. Correa SS (he's in a real funk right now)
4. Gattis DH
5. Valbuena 3B (I can't believe this team is so bad offensively I actually opt for Valbuena)
6. Rasmus RF
7. Gonzalez 1B
8. Conger C (tired of Jason Castro)
9. Marisnick CF

When this team goes into a slum they all slump. It is really frustrating watching the Astros right now. Over the last couple of weeks the bullpen has been leakier than a home made dinghy. Sipp, Thatcher, Harris, Fields and Neshak have all blown games for the Astros. You could almost imagine AJ Hinch flipping a coin to see who he wants to go blow a game on a given night. Once a strength of this team it is not right now at all. Another strength of the team was scoring runs from the 7th inning on. Here lately they not only can't score early or the middle they can't score late anymore. With the Angels winning their 5th in a row and 9th game in the last 10 they have cut the Astros division lead to 1-1/2 games. The Astros are 6-4 in their last ten but they have looked bad doing it. One more in Cleveland tonight with Oberholtzer (2-1, 4.32 ERA) vs Anderson (1-1, .076 ERA) and that matchup doesn't look good for Houston does it?

eagle eye

07-09-2015, 01:42 PM

A couple of days ago I posted a link for a proposed trade scenario to acquire A's pitcher Scott Kazmir that included sending prospect OF Brett Phillips as well as SS prospect Nolan Fontana. KABrother88 replied he didn't like that trade because Brett Phillips is a stud with a world of potential. As luck would have it, today on Astros.com there was a scouting report on Phillips done by MLB.com columnist Bernie Pleskoff. KABro may just be right about Phillips. The only thing wrong with the article is he referred to Corpus Christi as Houston's Class A affiliate and we all know it's a AA club. Get past this and look at the high praise he has for Phillips and his long term potential. This isn't heresay as he has actually had a chance to watch Phillips play.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/135681938/scouting-report-brett-phillips

eagle eye

07-10-2015, 08:12 AM

The Astros stunk up the batter's box again last night getting only 4 hits on the night one of which was a solo home run in the 4th by Hank Conger. That was Houston's only run on the night in a 3-1 loss in the series finale in Cleveland. This series was eerily familiar to the previous series in Boston when Houston put up and lot of hits and runs to win the opener in the series only to have the bats go silent in the rest of the games. Brett Oberholtzer made his first start for Houston since his demotion to AAA after a meltdown against the Yankees a couple of weeks ago and he did well. He tossed 5 shutout innings before the Tribe got to him for 3 runs in the 6th. People might blame Obie for not holding the Tribe down but pitching six innings and allowing 3 runs or less is considered a quality start. If you do that you have given your team a reasonable chance to win the game--unless the bats are more limp than a wet noodle. One of the hottest players in the box had been Carlos Correa who turned frigid in Cleveland. He went 0-14 before getting a hit and ended up 1-16 in the series. That's kind of indicative of the hitting woes of the whole darn team. The starting pitching did well in the series. Keuchel went 6 innings giving up 3 runs in a 9-4 win, Vince Velasquez went 6.1 giving up 2 runs in a 2-0 loss, Dan Straily went 6 innings giving up 2 runs in a 4-2 loss and last night Obie just allowed 3 runs. Hopefully Houston can get through the 3 games with Tampa and a win or two to at least remain in 1st place in the AL West. Seattle helped us out last night be beating the Angels so Houston maintains the 1.5 game lead in the division. What I'm really hoping is a week of rest during the All Star break will reenergize the team and get them back on track.

The most interesting thing about last night's game was that Mike and Mike threw out the first pitches of the game. Ironically, Greeny did better than Golic who bounced his pitch up to the plate. You have to give Golic a bit of a pass though because he's had about 10 surgeries on his shoulder from his pro football playing days to the present. You can bet Greeny ragged on Golic because he did better with the first pitch.

KABrother88

07-10-2015, 08:19 AM

Missed this the other day but Houston agreed to a deal with 11th rounder Patrick Sandavol on a $900,000 deal. $800,000 of that will count toward the bonus pool putting them into the <5% penalty. Doubt we'll see any of the remaining signability guys strike deals but we successfully signed our top 23 picks and 34 of 42 total (81%). Of the remaining dinginess guys are Cole Sands and Luken Baker who might have just been backup plans if they couldn't get Sandavol to ink. 2 more in Connor Biggio and Kody Clemens were more of ceremonial signs than legit picks...don't think there was any real interest to sign them. Remove those 4 and its closer to 90% of our picks signed. Signing deadline isn't until the 18th so there is still a chance at more activity

puddin tane

07-10-2015, 09:20 PM

Dropped another. Something has to be done at the 1b and 3b.

eagle eye

07-11-2015, 08:23 PM

The Astros are redefining the meaning of the word slump. They got a grand total of 3 hits today and what's the worst part they had the bases loaded in the 4th inning and men on 2nd and 3rd but both situations were with 2 outs and both times the next batter screwed the pooch. To add insult to injury, in the 2nd inning with the D-Ray's Jake Elmore at the plate on a 2-2 pitch the home plate ump Greg Gibson just flat blew an obvious strike call. Dallas Keuchel, Hank Conger and Jake Elmore started off the field when they realized Gibson called a pitch thigh high on inside half of the plate a ball. Keuchel admitted later that he was so pissed he lost concentration and what should have been strike 3 and the 3rd out of the inning turned into a 3 run inning instead. The only runs scored in the game. Later, in the bottom of the 7th pitching coach Brent Strom went to the mound to talk to Keuchel and he deliberately waited until Gibson came out to tell them to wrap it up and play ball. At that time Strom gave Gibson an earful and got tossed from the game. If nothing else it was probably a morale boost for Keuchel to have his coach take up for him like that. Keuchel pitched another gem and he gave the Astros yet another quality start from the starting pitching rotation with nothing to show for it except the Astros 5th loss in a row.
After the game the Astros announced that the club was bringing up LJ Hoes from AAA Fresno. It's not sure who will have to go down but my guess it will be either Chris Carter, Jon Singleton or Alex Presley. I posted a couple of days ago a lineup I thought Houston should go with. With Hoes coming up we better hope he can play first base because I would insert Marwin Gonzalez at 3B. I think it's a little late to make a move with only one more game before the All Star break but maybe this more of message to the team that they are tired of the lack of production by the whole team. Carter would be the most impactful player to send down but we'll see what move Houston makes. With today's loss they are percentage points behind the Angels and are out of first place for the first time since mid April. Of course if LA loses to Seattle tonight the first half closes with Houston having a 1/2 game lead.

The SiriusXM All Star Futures Game will played on Sunday and feature the best and brightest of the minor leagues. The teams are divided into a USA team and a World team. The USA team will feature two Astros prospects, P Mark Appel and IF Tony Kemp. Here's a preview article from Astros.com.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/136122784/best-tools-to-be-on-display-in-futures-game

The Astros activated Chad Qualls off the DL before Friday night's game and to make room for him they sent Brett Oberholtzer back to Fresno.

The real kick in the pants; coming into the series with Tampa Bay the Rays were 2-13 in their last 15 games and had scored the 3rd fewest runs in the AL. Houston was 2nd in runs scored but they have slid down to 5th. Never fear though, they still lead the MLB in K's with 832 which is 43 more than 2nd place Chicago Cubs.

eagle eye

07-13-2015, 09:58 AM

The Astros slump is epic. I'm not saying that it is historically bad, it just seems like it. I'm not saying the team is totally terrible, it just seems like it. The were one win away six days ago from being the only Astros team to win 50 games by the All Star break and they never made it. They played two teams in Cleveland and Tampa that were not only losing but not looking real good doing that. Every starter except for Lance McCullers had quality starts but didn't get any run support. It can be argued that McCullers suffered from lack of run support even though he got more run support than any of the other pitchers did in the D-Rays series but it wasn't like 3 runs was any kind of run explosion especially when Houston blew several chances to score during the game. When a pitcher gives up 4 runs you think maybe sometimes you could get five runs once in a while. Well, not this past week. Lets look at the futility the offense went through from the beginning of the losing streak in Cleveland to the final game yesterday in Tampa.
They went 0-6 vs Cleveland and Tampa. They were shut out twice, scored one run twice, 2 runs once and 3 runs once.
They allowed a total of 19 runs in the six games (that's an average of 3.17 RPG)
They scored a total of 7 runs in the six games. (That's 1.17 runs per game)
They allowed
They stole 1 base in the six games (They were the AL leader in stolen bases going in with 68 and amazingly they are still in first place with 69)
They were 31-188 hitting for a .165 team BA.
They were a pitiful 1-28 with runners in scoring position.
What these numbers tell us is the pitching was there, you shouldn't have to toss a shutout to win and even if they had in two of the games it would only have been good enough for a tie and extra innings. (make that extra frustration) No stolen bases to speak of. They got some hits in a game or two but did not string together hits went it mattered. Shoot, in yesterday's game Houston outhit Tampa 7-5 but Tampa's hits were back to back and done when runners were in scoring position. Yesterday, I was listening to the broadcast and Steve Sparks remarked that Tampa starting pitcher Matt Moore was effectively wild meaning in his 5 innings of work he gave up 5 hits, 3 walks and he had 3 K's. What isn't in the box is the mistakes he made over the plate that Houston failed to make him pay for. Hits were there for the taking and they just couldn't do anything but swing and miss, pop up or ground out.
After a reprieve when the Mariners beat the Angels Saturday night Houston wasn't so lucky yesterday when the Angels opened a can of whoop ass on Seattle and beat them 10-3. It was 9-0 until the bottom of the 8th when Seattle finally scored. What that means is Houston is officially in second place in the AL West by 1/2 game to the Angels. So, now as of July 12 Houston ends their 3 month run as division leaders thanks to the 6 game losing streak they suffered through this past week. On Tuesday Houston was 5 games up on LA and what looked like a significant lead in the division was not after all.

Chris Carter needs to go. Going into Sunday's game he was hitting .187 which is ironic because 1-8-7 is the police code for a homicide and Carter is killing the Astros with a dead spot in the batting order. After going 0-fer 4 yesterday he is hitting .185. When he swings he doesn't look like he's generating any bat speed. His swing looks slow, like he's trying to guide the bat through the zone instead of just swinging through the ball. I've said it before and I'll say it again, several players benefitted from the old hitting coach under Bo Porter, John Mallee. Under Mallee Jose Altuve, Carter and couple of other guys flourished. Now, Altuve has taken a huge step back as has Carter and we have a lineup with only two players have a BA above .250. The rest are well below .250 and a couple are still hitting below .200. To me the Astros could use some better coaching in this regard. They especially could use some mentorship as they acclimate themselves to the big league pitching. Maybe it's AJ Hinch's philosophy of being aggressive at the plate. I don't know, but Preston Tucker can't hit a high strike and Carlos Correa can't hit balls in the inner half of the plate which should be the wheelhouse for most hitters and he's getting killed by breaking balls. The whole roster is missing first pitch strikes right down the middle of the plate and whiffing on crap because they are behind in the count. Hopefully, the ASB comes as a perfect time. 4 or 5 days away from the game should help, or we hope it helps. We'll see as they host the Rangers to begin the second half of the season on Friday.

From Astros.com - Hinch names his second half rotation and notes a couple of roster moves.
ST. PETERSBURG -- Astros manager A.J. Hinch set his rotation out of the All-Star break, with right-hander Collin McHugh (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=543521) getting the ball for the series-opener Friday against the Rangers at Minute Maid Park. Veteran right-hander Scott Feldman will be activated from the disabled list to start Saturday, and left-hander Dallas Keuchel (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=572971) is likely to start Sunday.
Keuchel, who could start for the American League in the All-Star Game on Tuesday, Feldman and McHugh figure to be linchpins in the Houston rotation for the second-half playoff push. The Astros will hit the All-Star break with a league-tying 91 games played, which means they'll have more off-days in the second half to manage the rotation.

"At some point," Hinch said, "we're going to need a full rotation."
Lance McCullers (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=621121) Jr., who started Sunday against the Rays, will be a key member of the rotation as well, but won't be on a regular schedule as the Astros monitor his innings. Fellow rookie Vincent Velasquez is in the same boat, and Brett Oberholtzer (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=519085) and Dan Straily (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=573185) -- both of whom were sent down within the past few days following their starts -- figure to be up again to contribute at some point.
Feldman has been out since late May with a torn right medial meniscus that required surgery. He made two rehab starts at Double-A Corpus Christi, and his return will bolster the rotation. He was 4-4 with a 4.80 ERA in 10 starts, including seven quality starts.
All the while, the Astros will be searching the trade market in the next few weeks to try to add a veteran starting pitcher to the mix.
Worth noting
• The Astros called up outfielder L.J. Hoes from Triple-A Fresno to start Sunday's game against the Rays, giving them an extra right-handed bat against Matt Moore (http://www.mlb.com/r/player?player_id=519043). Starting pitcher Dan Straily was optioned to Triple-A. Hoes was hitting .327 with 21 doubles, three triples, three homers and 47 RBIs in 70 games at Fresno.

eagle eye

07-13-2015, 12:09 PM

Just announced, Dallas Keuchel will be the starter for the AL in the All Star game tomorrow night. Not bad, Dallas, not bad.

KABrother88

07-13-2015, 03:32 PM

Dropped another. Something has to be done at the 1b and 3b.

Jed Lowrie will be the starter at 3rd when he comes off the DL...don't be surprised to see Valbeuna/Carter shipped at the deadline. A name to watch as a potential future 1st baseman is 2014 2nd rounder A.J. Reed. Just got promoted to AA after hitting .346 with 23 HRs and 81 RBI in 82 games at A+. He looks to be on track for the call sometime next season. Meanwhile I do agree something needs to be done for the stretch run

eagle eye

07-14-2015, 10:46 AM

A J Hinch has had to consider innings pitched for his young pitchers. Now, the second half of the season Houston has more days off, way more than they had in the first have, than most other clubs. This will help Hinch juggle the rotation enough to give his young pitchers, Lance McCullers and Vince Vasquez, who will shatter their previous highs of innings pitched in a season even with steps to limit their appearances. The will have Scott Feldman, who comes off the DL this weekend, to add into the mix. He has Brett Oberholtzer in his back pocket in AAA. He can even call up a guy to two for an occasional spot start. Then there is a deal that could land a top starter at the trade deadline. The latest rumor from CBS Sports is that Houston will target Reds ace Johnny Cueto. That would be a nice addition for sure. There is one more option, Mark Appel. So far this season Appel has been leapfrogged to the bigs by McCullers, Vasquez and even Michael Feliz and though he just pitched in relief he has been on the big league roster. The Astros have been patient with Appel. He started the season slowly again this season but he has really come on and his performance in the All Star Futures game on Sunday he pitched a very impressive inning for the USA AS's. He showed a fastball in the 97-98 mph range with good breaking balls and self admittedly he has found a consistent command of the strike zone that he's been lacking most of the season. If he really has found something we could see Appel in an Astros big league uniform by September, if not sooner.

Now, if they can just sign an impact bat and we'll be ready to roll!

eagle eye

07-15-2015, 08:12 AM

Dallas Keuchel and Jose Altuve both did the Astros proud in the All Star Game. Keuchel started for the AL and pitched 2 innings and except for a throwing error by 3B Josh Donaldson led to an unearned run for the Nationals. Seems that Keuchel just can't get away from a certain amount of bad luck. He gave up 2 hits and the one unearned run while inducing 4 ground ball outs.
Altuve had a base hit taken away by a nice play by the Rockies 2B DJ LaMahieu and he was retired on 2 groundouts in his 4 innings and 2 ABs in the game. Altuve making contact first against NL starter Zack Greinke who struck out 4 of the men he faced in his 2 innings. Altuve also grounded out batting against SF Giants pitcher Madison Bumgarner. My point is he did not strike out at all The AL won it's 3 ASG in a row by a score of 6-3 in what was a nice bunch of events including the new and improved Home Run Derby on Monday. Now Keuchel and Altuve can come back to Houston and get a couple of days to relax before beginning the second half of the season Friday at home against the Rangers.

eagle eye

07-17-2015, 10:02 AM

Some dates that bear watching in the next couple of weeks,
> July 17 (Today) - This is final day to sign this year's draft picks. Astros geeks (like me) were watching to see if Patrick Sandoval, the Astros 11th round draft choice would be signed meaning the top 20 picks were under contract and that is a big deal. Well, on July 7th he signed a deal meaning the top 23 picks Houston made (Rds 1-21 with 2 extra picks in Rd 1) were officially signed. That left just 8 picks left unsigned out of 42 total picks. THAT is almost unprecedented. Flying under the radar of the All Star break and all the activities surrounding that Houston signed on Tuesday 23rd Rd pick LHP Matt Bower who just completed his junior year at Washington State. That leaves only 7 picks left to sign and today is the last day that can happen. Below is a link from the Washington State web site with a short recap of Bower's career as a Cougar.

http://www.wsucougars.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=30400&ATCLID=207918164

July 31st - This is the trade deadline teams can acquire players without securing waivers. In other words this is really the last day teams can made deals to strengthen their rosters for a playoff push. It's no secret that Houston has been looking into a top of the line starting pitcher to shore up their rotation. Rumors have Houston interested in the Reds Johnny Cueto and the A's Scott Kazmir. It's also no secret the Stros need a bat in the lineup. That could be as big a problem to find as a quality starting pitcher. Houston has big holes in their batting lineup where production is way below par for a team with playoff hopes. Both hot corners have been sorely lacking but the 1B spot is a black hole with Chris Carter and Jon Singleton hitting below .200 with little to no RBI product to speak of but plenty of rally killing K's. 3B has been a problem with Luis Valbuena hanging around .200 and loads of K's himself. He is leading the Astros in home runs with a career high 19 dingers so far but his feast of famine, mostly famine, is an old story I'm tired of looking at. The Astros should get a couple of players back off the DL. Saturday Scott Feldman returns to action following recovery from a torn meniscus in his right knee and Jed Lowrie looks like he won't be long getting back. He took some swings for the first time this week since tearing a ligament in his thumb way back in April. He had a very hot start at bat to begin the season and his was a tough loss at the time but after span of time with Marwin Gonzalez and Jonathan Villar platooning at short Carlos Correa was called up and has performed above expectations, which were pretty high to start with. Hopefully, Feldman isn't too rusty and comes out of the box slowly and we can only hope Lowrie takes back up at the plate where he left off. Lowrie is likely still a couple of weeks away at least and he may need to get used to the idea that he is now a third baseman.

eagle eye

07-19-2015, 03:43 PM

The Astros have had a weird weekend. Friday Collin McHugh gives up 11 hits but Texas only scored one run against him. Pat Neshak made the game interesting allowing a run but Houston scored just enough to get a 3-2 win. It wasn't without some nail biting moments. In the 9th Luke Gregerson had a man on 1st with a two out infield single by Rougned Odor and Prince Fielder at the plate. Gregerson got Fielder to ground out to Carlos Correa but that's not the whole story. The hit was a bullet right at Correa who knocked down the ball down out of self defense as much as anything else. He recovered and picked up the ball and threw to first but he didn't have that much on the throw and Jon Singleton, who replaced Chris Carter earlier in the game after Carter suffered a sprained ankle, made a really nice scoop of the ball to complete the out and end the game.
Friday Houston had no answer for the Rangers Colby Lewis. As the game progressed Texas built a 4-0 lead going into the 7th. That's when Houston got off the schnide with a Carlos Correa home run which made the score 4-1. That lasted just 1/2 inning as Joe Thatcher gave up a solo shot to Josh Hamilton to make the score 5-1. Houston rallied in the bottom of the 8th for 3 runs to get Houston to within one at 5-4. Again, the bullpen couldn't hold up as Josh Fields gave up 2 to the Rangers an Houston now faced a 3 run deficit at 7-4. The Rangers runs weren't the only fireworks in the inning as Rougned Odor was slow stepping into the batters box to lead off the inning and after an exchange of words between Odor and C Hank Conger that was about to erupt into a fight both benches cleared as the teams got into a shouting match highlighted by both managers toe to toe yelling at each other. Odor ended up hitting a triple to begin the 2 run rally so I guess you'd have to say Odor won the battle in this instance. Houston came back with 2 runs in the home half of the ninth to get close on a two run shot by Conger who got Houston to 7-6. That's as close as it got as Texas held on to win 7-6.
Today's game was maybe a carryover from the 9th inning dust up as a fired up Dallas Keuchel threw a masterpiece 7 innings allowing just two hits and no runs with no walks and a career high 13 K's. In the 6th inning DeLino Deshields Jr was called out on strikes and he tossed his bat down and stared down the ump. He stood there so long the crowd began to boo and Keuchel yelled "SIT DOWN!" twice from mound. These Astros weren't playing around. One offense Houston banged out 13 hits including 2 homers. One by Colby Rasmus in the 3rd and the other by Preston Tucker in the 7th. Both were two run shots. Luis Valbuena had a big day as he went 4-5 with 4 RBIs in the game. Maybe Houston's confrontation with Texas will keep this team fired up for the stretch run. Again, Keuchel was great illustrated by the fact that Texas didn't have a base runner after a lead off single by Josh Hamilton in the 2nd inning until Chad Qualls gave up a 2 out double to Adam Rosales. Qualls ended the inning by inducing a ground ball by Tomas Telis to keep the shutout intact. Roberto Hernandez got Texas 1-2-3 in the 9th to give Houston a 10-0 win and the series win. Keuchel improves 12-4 on the season and he proved he is the Astros ace with this dominating performance. So far at the Juice Box in 2015 he is 9-0 with a 1.12 ERA.

It's not funny but the stupid Angels just keep on winning. Friday they weathered a dominating performance by Boston's Wade Miley who had a perfect game through 5 innings and no-hitter into the 7th when Kole Calhoun doubled to lead off the seventh. Miley's line was 7 IP, 1 hit, 2 BBs and 6 Ks. Boston reliever Junichi Tazawa pitched a hitless scoreless 8th and Boston closer Koji Uehara, he of the 22 saves, came on and with two outs in the ninth Mike Trout hit a 0-1 pitch out of the park for a walkoff 1-0 LAA win. As good as Miley was for Boston C J Wilson was matching him. Wilson lasted 8 innings giving up 5 hits and 3 BBs and 4 Ks but most importantly he didn't allow a Boston run. Boston was shut down in the top of the 9th by Joe Smith setting up Mike Trout for the game winner. To make matters worse Boston was again shut out Saturday when they were the victims a 2 hit complete game shutout by Garrett Richards. The Angels got 3 runs to give them the 3-0 victory. With the Houston loss that extended the Angels division lead to 1.5 games. If Boston can salvage a win tonight that lead goes back to 1/2 game. Go Bosox, at least until Tuesday when they come to Houston. LAA head to Minnesota for a series beginning Tuesday when I will be saying, Go TWINS!

eagle eye

07-21-2015, 07:16 AM

It was a good week for Dallas Keuchel. First he gets chosen to be an All Star for the first time. Then he gets chosen to the starting pitcher in the All Star game. To end the week he blows away the Rangers in his first start since the All Star break and tosses 7 shutout innings and records a career high 13 K's with no walks. Nice week indeed. To cap it off to begin this week he is named Co-Player of the Week in the AL for his performance against the Rangers. He shared the honors with Kansas City outfielder Lorenzo Cain who had a really good 3 days after the ASG in their series against the White Sox. Cain had seven hits in 17 at-bats from Friday to Sunday. He flashed his power as well, with two doubles and two home runs. Cain had three hits and a game-winning home run in the 13th inning on Saturday in a 5-3 win. The 29-year-old led all AL hitters in total bases (15) and tied for first in home runs and hits. Congrats to both players but especially to Mr Keuchel who now leads the AL in wins.

Speaking of people with big weeks, Craig Biggio will be officially inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame next week and he's going through the final bunch of events leading up to the induction. Here's an article from Astros.com about the biggest thing to happen to an Astros player in franchise history. Biggio will be the first player who played his whole career in Houston to be inducted into the HOF so, yeah, it is a really big deal. We can only hope Jeff Bagwell gets his due next year.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/137559442/biggio-in-final-stages-of-prep-for-hof-induction

eagle eye

07-22-2015, 09:44 AM

Houston took Game 1 of their series with Boston by a score of 8-3. They have not really depended on the home run as much since the All Star break but their run production has definitely increased. Of the four games they have played since the ASG the least amount of runs scored was 3 in the opener against the Rangers. Vince Velasquez went six innings and he finally got some run support which allowed him to get his first win. It didn't look good in the 3rd when Boston kept getting these weak hits and the worst blow was a check swing double that scored 2 runs by Mookie Betts (who has been a pain in the ass in the games against the Astros). Velasquez buckled down and stopped the bleeding after Boston scored 3 runs in the inning and that was the only damage the Sox could do all night. Houston's offense had a little trouble getting on track but they finally got to starter Brian Johnson making his first start in the bigs last night. After giving up just one run in the first 3 innings Houston got all over him in the 4th scoring four runs to take a lead they would not relinquish the rest of the game. Several Astros had good nights at the plate but it seemed like everyone made a positive contribution. Even Evan Gattis despite going 0-3 on the night a weak ground ball was enough to drive in a run from 3B. Chris Carter came back after missing a couple of games with a slightly sprained ankle to go 2-3 with a home run. Hopefully a couple of days off was enough to get him going. Prior to last night's game Carter was 0 for his last 20 ABs.
Game 2 is tonight with Collin McHugh facing off against Boston's Joe Kelly.

The Angels made up for a rainout on Sunday on Monday afternoon completing the sweep of the Angels meaning they increased their division lead from 1-1/2 games to 2 games up on Houston. The Angels began a series with the Minnesota Twins last night and the Twins had no more luck than Boston did so Houston is still behind by 2. Somebody needs to cool these Angels off. Ever since they fired GM Jerry Dipoto, who had a major disconnect with Angels manager Mike Scioscia, the Angels have been en fuego. It seems like they have been 8 of their last 10 every day for a week and their 6 game winning streak is making it impossible for Houston to make up any ground. This is just July so there are 2 months left in the season but a resurgent Albert Pujols and the other hot bats in the Angels lineup is making the task of retaking the division lead very daunting for Houston.

Jed Lowrie is playing baseball again. He began a rehab assignment in Corpus Christi last night. Because he's missed about 3 months of the season with a torn ligament in his right thumb the rehab stint will last at least a week. Lowrie has to get into baseball shape again and he will need some ABs to strengthen his thumb area. It's being reported that he with work at both 3B and SS in Corpus. If Houston continues to have bad production at 1B it's a possibility Lowrie will move to 1B to help shore up the lack of offensive production there.

Vincent Velasquez was called up from AA to pitch last night and the move Houston made to make room for him was to option reliever Joe Thatcher to the minor leagues. Apparently, Velasquez didn't just twiddle his thumbs in Corpus as this article from Astros.com details. He learned from pitching coach and former Astro Doug Brocail a thing or two that helped him in last night's start.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/137925146

eagle eye

07-23-2015, 09:17 AM

Okay, I'm sick of the doggone Angels. They won their 7th in a row last night against the Twins. What's comical is you look at the standing and it shows how the teams did in their last 10 games and their current win or loss streak. Of course there's the win streak but for the past week the Angels have been 8-2. Pretty soon the losses will drop out but I wanted to know a little more so how have they done in their last 20 games so I looked it up and in 19 games played in July they are 13-3. Wow! I missed the fact that LAA played a double header on Monday with Boston and won both games. So that's why we are now 2 full games behind them in the division. We need Minnesota to win this last game tonight against them and then we need the Rangers to continue their hot streak against the Angels this weekend. If Texas can whoop up on LA like they're whooping up on Colorado in Colorado we should be in good shape. Well that is if they complete the sweep of the Red Sox tonight and at least take 2 of 3 in Kansas City this weekend. Oops KC has the best record in the AL. Stuff really has to fall right for Houston because next week beginning on Tuesday Houston has a huge 3 game series with the Angels at the Juice Box. If all plays out right this time next week we could be looking at a 2 game Houston lead with a possibility of a Houston sweep. If my calculations are correct Dallas Keuchel should be pitching Saturday against the Royals and in the series finale against the Angels. That is a good thing. First things first, beat the Red Sox tonight and worry about tomorrow then.

Houston won last night 4-2. Collin McHugh won his 11th game of the season with ties his career high with two months remaining in the season. I think it's a possibility he could win 18 games this season and that's a good thing. Preston Tucker has broken out of his slump and last night he recorded his first career multi-home run game in the bigs. He had a solo shot in the first to give Houston an early 1-0 lead and he had a 2-run HR in the 5th. Evan Gattis added a solo HR in the 4th inning. So, unlike the night before when most of the runs Houston scored was sort of small ball based last night all 4 runs came off HR's

Lance McCullers goes tonight for Houston and the Astros will face Boston's Wade Miley who ended up losing to the Angels last week despite going 7 innings and giving up zero runs and one hit. McCullers lost his last outing too, but that was against Tampa on July 12th in Tampa in the area where he grew up. He gave up a career high 4 runs in that game as Houston was in the middle of the 6 game losing streak that cost them the division lead right before the All Star break. That was the last game McCullers pitched as the Astros want to monitor his and Vince Vasquez' innings as they will easily outdistance previous highs in innings pitched. McCullers has 71 K's in his 11 starts this season. He has the second most K's than any pitcher in franchise history in the first 10 starts. He currently has a 4-3 record that would be real sweet to see extended to 5-3 by about 10 o'clock tonight.

KABrother88

07-23-2015, 11:27 AM

A deal has been made. Houston had been rumored to have been in talks with Oakland about LHP Scott Kazmir and they have now struck a deal. Houston will send RHP Daniel Mengden and C Jacob Nottingham. Kazmir is having a really good year with some tough luck. Has an ERA of 2.31 but just a 5-5 record. Both Mengden and Nottingham had very good starts at Class A Quad Cities and had since been promoted to Class A+ Lancaster were they hadn't played as well. Mengden was listed as the #22 prospect in Houston's system by MLB.com. I really like this deal to shore up the staff especially if they plan on giving McCullers and Velasquez extra rest down the stretch

eagle eye

07-23-2015, 01:51 PM

I posted a while back that Kazmir was in the trade talk rumor mill. KABro you are absolutely right about Kazmir being sort of a hard luck pitcher. It reminds me of Dallas Keuchel last year. Now we have two quality lefties at the top of the rotation. Another good thing is that this is Kazmir's last year of his current contract so if Houston and Kazmir hit it off we may get a home team discount going into next year. Another thing, Houston gave up really nothing for this deal so if they wanted to pursue a Johnny Cueto or a David Price they can still do that. Price has been in the latest rumor mills and it's been mentioned that it may be karma that Houston gets Price because his dog is named Astro. Just dreaming here.

eagle eye

07-23-2015, 05:45 PM

Houston is wasting no time in putting their new pitcher to work. Scott Kazmir will start for the Astros in Kansas City tomorrow night. To make room for Kazmir the Astros moved Vince Velasquez to the bull pen. It's a great way for him to get innings of work without overworking him. Velasquez' most innings pitched in a season is 110 and if he continues to start he will break that by a long shot. The Astros are looking to limit his innings while stretching him beyond old limits to prepare him for a full season's work in the future. As for Kazmir, he is a Houston native and he currently resides in Cypress Falls in the off season. In an interview Kazmir said he is delighted to be in Houston because he grew up an Astros fan especially the Killer B's. That bodes well for signing Kazmir to a long term deal if he works out in Houston. Not only is Houston fighting for the AL West division but they really need wins over the Royals to aid in acquiring home field advantage in the playoffs. Currently Houston has 53 wins which is 3rd in the AL. Kansas City leads all AL teams in wins with 57 followed by the Los Angeles Angels with 54. Winning the next two series will be key as Houston makes the second half push for the division and the playoffs. But, if things don't go so well all is not lost as we are not even out of the month of July. With August and September left to play they would have time if the next week doesn't go well. But that's negative and I prefer to remain positive.
Now for speculation. Just because Velasquez is now in the bullpen it doesn't mean he won't get some starts down the line. After all Velasquez isn't the only pitcher in the Astros Houston want to limit innings as Lance McCullers needs to be handled well too. These two may be the cornerstones of the Astros future starting rotation and the front office doesn't want to burn them out or get them injured from overuse. So, it is quite conceivable Velasquez and McCullers will each get work. I would think that Houston would hope they could get both men no more than 150 innings, 175 tops which would be career highs for both. It's getting really interesting in Houston. I'm paranoid waiting for something bad to happen but so far I can't be more happy that our team is winning again. All I know is those darn Angels need to hit a real slump--pronto--so I can breathe just a little easier.

Houston is currently 53-43, ten games over .500 with a winning % of .552. If Houston finishes the season with a .552 winning % they will have won 89 games and have a record of 89-73. That would be a 19 game improvement over the 70-92 record just one year ago. That is the same amount of games improvement Houston enjoyed from their 51-111 2013 season. With Kazmir is it conceivable that Houston could end up with 95 wins and that should guarantee a playoff spot if not a division win and maybe home field advantage! There I go dreaming again but that is what winning does for you. Houston signaled to their fans they are in it to win it this year. Jeff Luhnow said as much because he said the fans deserve it after suffering through the past 5 seasons with zero hope for anything meaningful. You go, Jeff! We're going along for the ride!

eagle eye

07-24-2015, 11:04 AM

Damn if the Angels didn't finally lose! The Twins took the series finale yesterday afternoon so going into last night's Astros series finale with Boston the Stros knew they had an opportunity to make up some ground in the division race. Now, it didn't seem destiny was smiling on the home town boys as Lance McCullers struggle his whole 5 inning of work. He was in trouble every single inning but he managed to pitch well enough to limit the Bosox damage to 2 runs. Boston starter Wade Miley wasn't much better. He struggled a lot in his 6 innings of work allowing only 1 Houston run. Part of that was Houston's fault because of pretty shabby base running that led to 3 base runners being thrown out on the base paths. The most embarrassing was probably Evan Gattis who singled in the 1st with 2 out. While Preston Tucker was at bat Miley picked off Gattis who obviously went to sleep on the play. Houston did come alive once Miley was out of the game. Beginning in the 7th Houston got to every reliever Boston sent to the hill scoring 3 runs to take a 4-2 lead into the 8th. The Houston crowd was really into the game, especially after Colby Rasmus pinch hitting for Jake Marisnick tied the game with a solo homer over the right field wall. The inning could have been bigger than 3 runs but Marwin Gonzalez, who hit a double scoring Jose Altuve who had singled right before him, was thrown out trying to stretch the double into a triple. Bad mistake because Carlos Correa doubled which would have scored Gonzalez and had one less out on the board. Everyone got real quiet after Big Poppy jacked a home run out on reliever Will Harris to lead off the 8th. 3 batters and 2 outs later with Hanley Ramirez on 2B Luke Gregerson came in for Harris. Bad move because the first batter Gregerson faced, Mike Napoli, hit an RBI double to tie the game. Yeah, it got pretty quiet in the Juice Box. Gregerson managed to retire the next batter, Ryan Hannigan, but not before he uncorked a wild pitch that sent Napoli to 3B. The Astros did nothing in the bottom of the 8th. Josh Fields came on for Houston in the 9th and after a bit of a struggle he retired the Bosox with a scoreless inning. Now it's here that I have to admit that I was pretty mad at the Houston bullpen after they allowed the Sox to tie the game so I didn't see the end of the game. That was my loss. In the 9th after Colby Rasmus flew out to left to lead off the inning Jose Altuve, on a 3-1 against Boston reliever Craig Breslow, jacked a walkoff home run just barely clearing the left field wall into the Crawford Boxes. When I say barely I mean it had to be reviewed to make there was no fan interference before the HR was confirmed. Astros swept the Sox with a very unlikely 5-4 win. Houston is now just one game behind the Angels as Houston heads to Kansas City for a 3 game set beginning tonight and the Angels fly into Arlington for 3 against the Rangers. (Go Rangers!)

Jose Altuve had the best game he's had in a long time going 4-5 with an RBI and 2 runs scored with no walks and no K's. Marwin Gonzalez had a nice game going 2-3 with a walk and no K's. His only blemish was being thrown out a 3rd in the 7th. Carlos Correa who has been in a slump for a while is starting to break out of it. Last night he went 1-2 with 2 BB's and a K. He's making better contact and learning to lay off the breaking balls that have been confounding him lately. Evan Gattis had a good game going 2-4 but he was picked off base twice which is never a good thing. The bottom half of the lineup was just awful going a combined oh fer 16 until Rasmus came in for Marisnick and batted in the 9 spot. He went 1-2 with that game tying HR in the 7th that ignited the Houston rally to take the lead.

Was it rust or was Lance McCullers just off last night? Who knows but, he did battle and he didn't give into any hitters pitching out of trouble in every inning he pitched. The guy has grit, I'll tell you that. That's a trait that this pitching staff has in common and it's why it makes this starting rotation so tough to face. McCullers, IMO, will benefit from the addition of Scott Kazmir because between 2010 and 2012 he flat lost his mojo. He was an Angel during this time and he eventually was gone from the Angels roster in 2011. He didn't spend much time in the bigs then. He was sent down to the Angel minor leagues in 2012 when was released and the only job he could get was with an Independent League team, the Sugarland Skeeters, which wasn't far from his Houston home. He signed with Skeeters in July of 2012. After the season he signed on to pitch in the Puerto Rican winter league. It was during this rough patch that Kaz starting relearning how to pitch. In 2013 he signed with Cleveland and pitched well enough in spring training to earn the 5th spot in the Indians rotation. He pitched so well he was named Comeback Player of the Year for 2013 and he was signed by Oakland beginning in the 2014 season. Kazmir was back and his 190 innings and 15 wins and 3.55 ERA were career highs. When Houston got him he was 5-5 but with the 5th best ERA in the AL at 2.38. What all this means is he brings a lot experience to help mentor these young pitchers for Houston. Houston gets to see him in action tonight as he takes the hill for Houston in Kansas City.

eagle eye

07-27-2015, 08:45 AM

Scott Kazmir gave us a great start to the weekend but the Astros offense went on vacation again on Saturday and Sunday. Scott Feldman deserved more than a no-decision Saturday with 7 innings of great pitching as he only allowed one run. Trouble was, Houston only managed one run for the game. Will Harris came in and gave up a walk off single to cost the Astros a loss in 10 innings. Sunday was no different as Houston again only managed one run. With Dallas Keuchel on the mound in a lot of instances that would be enough but not Sunday. He got into trouble in the 1st inning with the bases loaded and no outs when he got two ground balls that resulted in outs at home. So, no runs, bases loaded and 2 outs. If Keuchel gets out of that jam it may have demoralized the Royals enough to affect them the whole game. But it just didn't happen that way Keuchel ended up giving up 4 earned runs before the final out of the inning was recorded. In the bottom of the 2nd Keuchel gave up a rare home run to the Royals Lorenzo Cain and again there were 2 outs in the inning. Houston's only run was a lead off triple by Evan Gattis who scored on a sac fly by Colby Rasmus. It wasn't like Houston didn't have chances both Saturday and Sunday but they couldn't capitalize on opportunities as they were a combined 1-9 with RISP. Houston successfully made two guys with nearly a 5 ERA look like All Stars in Danny Duffy on Saturday and Yordano Ventura on Sunday. It was mentioned more than once that Ventura could be pitching for his spot in the Royals rotation since the Royals signed the Reds Johnny Cueto. It must have mattered enough for Ventura to shutdown the Astros offense.

The Astros won Friday and lost on the weekend. The Angels lost on Friday and Saturday and won on Sunday in their series vs the Rangers. What all that means is Houston blew and opportunity to at least pull into a tie with the Angels as they head into a really big series against those same Angels beginning tomorrow night in Houston. So, Houston is 1 game back of the Angels. A series sweep would give Houston a 2 game lead in the division but that's hoping against hope at this point. Houston's offense is more miss than hit lately and the Angels pitching is better than the Royals, at least on paper. If Houston can win 2 of 3 it will be about as good as we can ask for.

Craig Biggio's HOF induction ceremony was just what you'd expect. It was pretty succinct and he managed to thank his coaches from high school on. He gave special credit to former Astros assistant coach Matt Gallante because he helped him transition from catcher to 2B early in his career. Biggio remarked he wouldn't be standing on the podium accepting his entrance into the HOF without Gallante. He even recounted that the first Gold Glove he won he gave to Gallante. All in all, it was a great day for Biggio and his family and for the Houston Astros. During his speech of course he mentioned and thanked Jeff Bagwell and he acknowledged that in the years they played together they chanced the culture by making Houston a winning franchise and made Houston a baseball town. The only thing I wish he would have said was that he hoped he would be standing on the HOF podium very soon himself because Bagwell deserves it. It was a good speech by Biggio and regardless of what Colin Cowherd said about Biggio not being HOF worthy he certainly was and maybe it will open the door for Bagwell.

Tuesday night Houston will send Collin McHugh (11-5, 4.25 ERA) to the hill to face the Angels while the Halos counter with CJ Wilson (8-7, 3.59 ERA). Hopefully, Houston will find their offense by then.

eagle eye

07-29-2015, 11:02 AM

Collin McHugh leads a charmed life. He gives up 5 runs in the first 2 innings and goes home with a 10-5 win. Dallas Keuchel gave up 5 runs in the first two innings to Kansas City in his last start and Houston lost 5-1. This has happened several times this season for McHugh. How else can you explain a guy with a 12-5 record and a nearly 5 ERA? C J Wilson must hate pitching to Houston batters. For a guy with a 8-7 record and a 3.40-ish ERA he seems to get punished by Houston hitters. It happened again last night when he gave up 6 runs on 6 hits and 3 walks and 3 K's. Two of the hits he gave up were home runs, one to Carlos Correa in the first was a solo shot in the 1st inning and the other was to Chris Carter with one on in the 2nd. After getting down 5-1 after the top of the second Houston began hammering the ball including Carter's HR and two hit batsmen and a Jose Altuve RBI single the score after 2 was 5-4. In the Astros fourth with 2 men on Altuve again singled easily scoring Hank Conger from second. The pitcher cut off the throw into the infield and caught Altuve too far off first base. While Altuve prolonged the rundown Jake Marisnick kept on running and he was able to score all the way from 1B on the play before Altuve was tagged out. BTW, despite having a career high 5 RBI's and going 3-5 at the plate Altuve was caught trying to extend base hits into doubles and was caught both times. If there was one thing Houston is bad about is dumb base running errors. That and some poor coaching at 3B by Gary Pettis. Jose Altuve had a really good night but so did Carlos Correa who went 3-4 on the night with a run and an RBI. Evan Gattis tripled in the sixth inning with 2 out scoring Jose Altuve that gave the Astros their 10th and final run of the night. Hank Conger, Colby Rasmus and Jake Marisnick all made big contributions to Houston's offensive outburst. Let's hope Houston didn't shoot their whole wad and go back to scoring 1 run a game because the Angels will beat their butts if they do.
Houston is in a tie with the Angels with LAA just small percentage points ahead because they have played two less games than the Astros. Up tonight Houston will have Lance McCullers (4-3, 2.60 ERA) while the Angels counter with Garrett Richards (10-7, 3.25 ERA). Richards has faced Houston twice with a 1-1 record with a combined 3.84 ERA with 6 hits, 6 runs and 8 BB's with 14 K's. He hasn't faced Houston since May 10 when he one-hit the Astros to lead the Angels to a win. Needless to say the offense has got to bring it again tonight. One good thing is the Angels are without their best player in Mike Trout who is out with a wrist injury. That eliminates a lot of pop in the Angels lineup as well as a .300+ hitter. Houston needs to take advantage while they can.
Jed Lowrie may be back in the lineup for Houston by the weekend. His rehab in Corpus has gone well and the Astros are thinking he will be back late in this six game home stand. Hopefully, Lowrie's bat will come back as hot as it was when he went out way back on April 27th. Lowrie's injury is directly responsible for Carlos Correa being called up to the big club. Ironically Correa has played so well it looks like Lowrie won't come back as a shortstop it will be as a third baseman.

Linked here is an update of the list of the top 30 prospects in the Astros farm system since guys like Correa and McCullers are big leaguers now. Interestingly enough Vince Velasquez in still listed as a prospect (#6) even though he's still with the big club. Another interesting note is the ranking of recent 1st round draft choice Alex Bregman as Houston's #1 prospect. Pretty heady stuff there. In fact 3 of the top 5 prospects are 2015 draft picks!

http://m.mlb.com/prospects/2015?list=hou

Still 2 more days after today for a pre-trade deadline deal to happen. Still some big names out there to be had. Too bad Colorado's Troy Tulowitzki decided to go to Toronto. Well, he didn't decide squat, in fact, he was shocked when notified of the deal. Houston probably didn't have much interest in him since he's a SS and Houston already has that position filled very nicely thank you. It would have been nice to get his bat into the lineup. Speculation about David Price being on the trading block in Detroit was squashed when Detroit said they aren't trading him, or anyone else as they are only a couple of games back in the wild card race. Houston is leading that race by a couple of games over Minnesota but Houston isn't concerned about a wild card berth when the division is still very much up for grabs right now.

KABrother88

07-29-2015, 11:36 AM

You are still considered a prospect until you reach 1 of 3 thresholds. 130 ABs, 50 IP, or 45 days on the active roster. Once you cross one of those 3 numbers you then officially become a rookie. Velasquez will cross the time served barrier soon but until then he is still considered a prospect. But how bout my boy Brett Phillips jumping to the #2 prospect in our system...also moved up to #39 overall from around 80-90 and entered the top 10 OFs at #9

Big T

07-29-2015, 09:59 PM

KABrother88

07-29-2015, 10:13 PM

Astros are back in first place! Hey guys, been a while! Lol After graduating last May things kind of went mental and quite frankly haven't stopped yet. Haha But the end is in site and I am hoping to get back over here and posting more often.

Holy crap he's alive...well with football season cranking up and Houston hopefully continuing to push for the playoffs things are about to get fun.

After tonight 6-3 win over Anaheim Houston announced Jed Lowrie would be actives from the DL and start at 3rd tomorrow night. Corresponding move will be to DFA RHP Roberto Hernandez.

KABrother88

07-30-2015, 05:56 PM

Well...Houston just got a bat in Milwaukee OF Carlos Gomez but I'm honestly not a fan of the deal...along with Gomez we get RHP Mike Fiers...going back to Milwaukee is OF Domingo Santana, RHP Adrian Houser, and LHP Josh Hader.......along with #2 prospect OF Brett Phillips who I've already stated I felt like was an excellent prospect. I guess with Houston taking Tucker and Cameron in the draft they felt like an OFers were expendable but I loved what Phillips brought to the table. But anyway, Gomez will provide a decent bat but he is an exceptional CFer with good speed

Big T

07-30-2015, 09:19 PM

CASTRO!!!! Walk off three run homer! Astros are now two up in the AL West and just swept the Angles!

As for Gomez, the Astros gave up too much. Marisnik was a great CF and what he gave up on offense he made up with base running and defense.

KABrother88

07-31-2015, 03:02 PM

Well the deadline has come and gone with no additional moves although several reports had us linked to San Diego's Craig Kimbrell and Cincinnati's Aroldis Chatman (2 of the best closers in baseball). While Houston's bullpen has been really good this year, you always like a flame thrower coming out of your pen in October. Having said that I'm going to be curious to see if Houston goes this route I'm about to lay out. With the addition of Mike Fiers in the Milwaukee deal, someone has to leave the rotation. The front office has already said Lance McCullers will be on an inning limit, therefore making him potentially unavailable come playoff time if we make it (a la Stephen Strasburg in Washington a few years ago). My solution is potentially moving McCullers to the pen, therefore extending the amount of time he's available, while also potentially filling the flamethrower void in the bullpen. Currently McCullers has thrown 105.1 IP and the reported inning limit I've seen was 150. Coming into this year his career high was 104 IP in 2013. I think moving him to the pen now could potentially keep him available throughout the playoffs, and while you hate to lose a starter of his caliber what good will he do you if you burn him out before September?

eagle eye

07-31-2015, 07:31 PM

Man, it's great to see you guys posting! Missed you Big T and congratulations on the graduation. Well done!

Yep we swept the Angels and now have a 2 game lead going into tonight's game. 90 something days in first place while the Angels enjoyed 21 days. I'll put the same question to the thread that I heard last night. What is to become of the rotation with the addition of Fiers? Is Feldman (who is pitching pretty good tonight and he did well in his last outing against KC) the most likely candidate to be bumped? Maybe Fiers will take Roberto Hernandez' spot as a long reliever. Interesting question. I have also heard that Houston likes Marisnick so much they will ask Gomez to play left. So, what's to become of Colby Rasmus or Preston Tucker when George Springer returns? Too much talent? Nice problem to have. BTW, Gomez is in center batting 2nd while Marisnick is enjoying (?) a day off.

I agree that the loss of Phillips is a big blow. If Kyle Tucker is all that maybe it's not as bad as it may have been. You can't say Jeff Luhnow didn't try to land big fish by the trading deadline today. The Astros made a bid for David Price, Cole Hamels (I don't like the guy after the way he stiffed the Rangers a couple of years ago) as well as last second pushes for San Diego closer Craig Kimbrell and Reds closer Aroldis Chapman but it's not like Gregerson has been chopped liver even though he can make you hold your breathe at times. Scott Kazmir has been awesome since coming to Houston. He is literally living a dream of playing for a team he has always wanted to play for. I'd say 14-2/3 scoreless innings ain't bad in his first two starts--both wins. Both against quality teams. Gomez is in the game tonight and so far in the4th he is 0-2 with the Astros losing 1-0.

Arizona has been hot lately, coming into Houston on a 5 game winning streak. Houston needs to stay hot too!

I have an alert that a fan has been taken to the hospital at tonight's game. A man lay motionless in the stands prior to the beginning of the game. Paramedics and first responders worked on him for 10 minutes before taking him out of the stands on a backboard with a machine continuing to do chest compressions. Hopefully this story has a happy ending. God speed.

Big T

07-31-2015, 08:21 PM

So freaking frustrated. Carlos Gomez is 0-3 with an error in the outfield that lead to 2 runs scoring. Why the hell did the Astros trade for him when they have one of THE BEST defensive CF in the game in Jake who also is a great base runner. I do NOT understand this move in the slightest. Sure Jake was inconsistent with the bat, but he made up for that with defense and lets be honest, Carlos Gomez isn't that much more of a consistent hitter than Jake. Over here shaking my head. Luhnow, love ya man, but you screwed the pooch on this one.

Big T

07-31-2015, 09:38 PM

Should have been a 4-2 Astros win. Thanks Carlos Gomez.

Big T

08-01-2015, 08:33 PM

Two homers each from Correa and Conger including a grand slam from Conger and the Astros bounce back nicely from the disappointment of last night to win 9-2 and give Dallas his 13 win of the year. It was a great crowd tonight and a fun game Go get 'em Astros! Rubber game coming up tomorrow afternoon as the Astros go for the series win.

KABrother88

08-02-2015, 06:21 PM

Went to the game today...the buzz is definitely coming back into Minute Maid. Still not to '04-'05 levels but that was on another level...and it's just the beginning of August...really looking forward to the race down the stretch.

Big T

08-02-2015, 07:49 PM

I wasn't following the Astros during 04-05, I was 13 to 14 at the time, so I don't remember what it was like. The first year I really followed the Astros was the year that they went out and got Preston Willson to replace Carlos Beltran in CF. I think that was 06. So it is nice to see this level of excitment starting to build in Houston. I still don't know if the Astros have enough in the pen to out last the Angles and win the ALW outright, but barring a complete catastrophe I do believe I will be seeing my Astros in the playoffs for the first time since I have been a fan.

KABrother88

08-02-2015, 09:52 PM

eagle eye

08-03-2015, 10:35 AM

Actually we only had Beltran for the 2004 run where we lost to St Louis in 7 games in the NLCS after being up 3-2 (friggin Jim Edmonds). Beltran then signed with the Mets and Willy T took over in CF in 2005 as we advanced to the World Series. Beltran was special for us in '04 though...in 90 regular season games he hit 23 HRs, and was 28 for 28 in steals while playing Gold Glove worthy CF...but his stay was exclamated by his post season run...in 5 games of the NLDS he hit .455 with 4 HRs and 9 RBI while going 2 for 2 in steals...then in the 7 game NLDS he hit .417 with 4 more HRs and 4 for 4 in steals...so all told in 102 games he hit 31 HRs and went 34 for 34 in steals...then he got paid lol

The hell of it was the deal he signed with the Mets wasn't all that much more than he was offered by Houston. In the long run he would have made more money in Houston because of the tax rates, the state tax and the cost of living in NY state is so much higher than Texas. NY was where Beltran's career went to die. Not die actually but he never was on a team that enjoyed the success the Astros had in '04 and '05. Okay that's a lie. The Mets paid him through the nose and he was on really good teams in San Francisco and St Louis but his timing was a hair off as the Giants won the world series in 2010 when he was still with the Mets and he was traded to St Louis in the off season AFTER the Cards won the 2011 WS. To add insult to injury the Giants won the 2012 WS. In life timing is everything and Beltran's timing was lousy. If Beltran has stayed with Houston in 2005 he would have gone to the WS and, who knows, maybe Beltran's bat could have made a difference for Astros. There were guys who left like Darryl Kile who didn't get all that much more money than Houston was offering and that's not a lie. Houston was offering around $21MM a year while Kile got $24MM from the Rockies. Mike Hampton was dealt to the damn Mets and he ended up signing a huge contract with the Rockies but his success was with the Mets where he was NLCS MVP in 2000 and eventually lost to the Yankees in WS.

The Astros took care of business on Sunday winning the rubber game of the 3 game series with Arizona by a score of 4-1. Collin McHugh is the luckiest guy on the planet. Seems like every start he struggles and struggles. Sometimes it's like yesterday with him making pitches when the chips are down to get out of trouble without allowing many runs but, more often than not, he gives up hits and runs and still gets wins because he's the pitcher who gets run support. Carlos Gomez, after a poor showing on Friday where he didn't hit and he made a critical error that cost Houston the game. On Saturday and Sunday he was much better, both in the field and at the plate. The 3 runs he drove in yesterday was more than enough to give Houston the win. Carlos Correa has suddenly gotten hot as well. With the Angels being swept by the Dodgers Houston now enjoys a 4 game lead in the division and 8 games over Texas who they begin a series with tonight in Arlington.

July is in the books and all in all I'm sure Houston may want to forget a large part of the month. Houston began the month with a win over Kansas City completing a 3 game sweep which, at the time, gave Houston the best record in the AL. Things went downhill after that. They lost 2 of 3 to both Boston and Cleveland on the road and they were swept by Tampa in a 3 game series going into the All Star Break. The six game losing streak Houston suffered against Cleveland and Tampa was enough to lose their spot as AL West division leaders, a spot they had held since mid April, to the surging LA Angels. Dallas Keuchel was named the starting pitcher in the All Star game and Jose Altuve won the fan vote to be the starter at 2B so, for them, they had a good news. After the ASB Houston beat Texas in a 3 gamer and swept the Red Sox at home. Then came a road trip to Kansas City where Houston was melted in the mid western heat and lost 2 of 3. Then came the division showdown with the Angels and darned if Houston didn't sweep them to reclaim the division lead. The last game of the month was a loss to Arizona. It was the first game of recently signed CF Carlos Gomez and he didn't have a great debut going oh-fer at the plate and making a critical error to allow Arizona to tie the game in the seventh. Houston eventually lost in the 10th ending the month on a sour note.
Besides up and down play during the month the Astros front office made it clear that the Astros was in it to win it with free agent signing of Oakland pitcher Scott Kazmir, just a week before the non-waiver trade deadline, and the signing of Gomez and Milwaukee team mate P Mike Fiers on July 30th. Gomez poor start was turned around in the subsequent two game against Arizona where he was instrumental in both wins. Fiers, a starting pitcher has yet to pitch for Houston. He is scheduled to make his first start tomorrow night vs Texas. As for Kazmir, he is elated to be back in Houston. Kazmir is a Houston native from Cypress and he showed immediate dividends by going 1-0 with 14-2/3 scoreless innings in his 2 starts since coming to the Astros. Both games he started were wins with Jason Castro getting a walkoff home run to win the game in the 9th inning of a 0-0 game. After struggling most of the season the last few days of the month and the beginning of August Castro and Hank Conger hit 4 home runs in 3 games from July 30 to August 1. July also saw the return of Jed Lowrie for the first time since April 27 when he tore a ligament in his right thumb sliding into home. Lowrie has been pretty good as he is playing 3B now that Carlos Correa has taken over at short. Heading into August Houston has bolstered their lineup with a player missing for a long time (Lowrie) and incoming talent (Kazmir, Gomez and Fiers). Hopefully later in August George Springer will be back. Houston is getting stronger heading into the playoff race in August and September. In both months Houston will play a lot of division games and they will need to continue their excellence to hang on and win the AL West. From here on out they will need to avoid big losing streaks and maybe actually win 8 or 9 in a row. It all starts tonight in Arlington when Houston will face off against the Rangers. The last series a couple of weeks ago in Houston got a little testy when Rougned Odor sort of showed up Houston starter Scott Feldman earlier in the game after hitting a home run and in a later at bat he was making a big show of stepping into the batter's box when catcher Hank Conger told him to quit messing around and get in the box. Odor and Conger exchanged words and the benches cleared. That testy attitude continued the next day when Dallas Keuchel yelled at Odor to sit down after he disagreed with a called third strike. Maybe a little bad blood is brewing which will spice up this intrastate rivalry. For July Houston went 12-12 for the month and their overall record as of July 31st was 58-46 with a 2 game lead over the LA Angels that has since grown to 4 games. BTW with their 60th win came yesterday. In 2014 their 60th win came September 2nd. What a difference a year makes, huh?

eagle eye

08-04-2015, 08:29 AM

Didja ever have one of those days at work when nothing, and I mean nothing goes right? Yeah, me too. Well, Lance McCullers and Mike Fiers have one of those days last night in Arlington. McCullers WAS the AL leader in ERA until last night when he allowed 6 runs on 7 hits and a walk in 1/3 of an inning of work. Shoot it was 4 zip before he recorded his first out. Easily the shortest outing of his short career. Mike Friars came in in the 2nd but in the 3rd his world came crashing down on his head as he allowed 5 runs in the frame and that was about it except for an oh-by-the-way run in the 5th off Fiers, a home run by Adrian Beltre that was the last leg he needed to hit for the cycle in the game. I guess in retrospect it wasn't an oh-by-the-way run it was more of an in-your-face run. Houston didn't let the early troubles stop them from trying to come back. The Astros had 3 home runs in the game including a grand slam by Jason Castro in the 4th which pulled the Astros up to a 11-7 deficit but McCullers and Fiers just dug too big a hole for their teammates to dig themselves out of. Carlos Correa and Luis Valbuena both homered in the game. Correa continuing his hot streak and Valbuena got his first homer in over a month. We'll see how Houston bounces back tonight behind the pitching of Dan Strailey who was called up to pitch because Houston was forced to use Fiers last night. To his credit Fiers lasted 5 innings getting the team through the 7th inning and thereby saving the bullpen it's just that Houston could have done without the 6 runs he allowed. To make room for Strailey Houston optioned McCullers to either AA Corpus or AAA Fresno. This is not punishment for a bad outing it is just to make room for a spot starter. McCullers was so incredibly off last night it may be that AJ Hinch saw something McCullers needed to work on. Either way Hinch reiterated last night that Houston would be counting on McCullers during the stretch run. Last night's disaster ran McCullers ERA up from 2.12 to 3.17. Hopefully, Strailey who is on only 3 days rest has a little better luck against a suddenly hot Rangers lineup. Fiers first actual start for Houston is now going to be Sunday against Oakland. OBTW, the Angels won yesterday so the division lead is now only 3 games.

eagle eye

08-05-2015, 12:20 PM

I got nothing to say. Last night Dan Strailey did about as good as could be expected under the circumstances for Houston. The defense was pretty solid but the bats just were not there despite having the bases loaded in the sixth with one out and they didn't score a run. If they had scored they would have tied the game. A base hit would have given the Astros the lead but truly lousy AB's by Evan Gattis and Luis Valbuena and a bit of bad luck for Marwin Gonzalez and Houston didn't get squat from that situation and game remained 4-3 in favor of the Texans. Houston had men on 2nd and 3rd with one out in the 9th but back to back K's from Jason Castro and Jose Altuve ended the threat and the game. Houston screwed themselves and the only good thing was that the Angels lost to Cleveland in a 12 inning game that was scoreless until Cleveland got 2 runs in the 12th inning. Houston still leads LAA by 3 games. Tonight the Astros send Scott Kazmir to the mound and hopefully he can help stop the bleeding and get Houston back on a winning track. BTW as you probably already know Kazmir was named the AL Pitcher of the Month after posting an ERA lower than anyone in MLB history for the month. Kazmir was 2-0 in 5 starts in July with a microscopic ERA of 0.26. In his two starts for Houston he was 1-0 and pitched 14-2/3 scoreless innings. Kazmir follows Dallas Keuchel who was named POTM for April and May. Hopefully, he keeps it going in August beginning with the Rangers tonight.

eagle eye

08-06-2015, 08:26 AM

Honestly, can there be anything more frustrating than watching a team who loads the bases with one out and can't score a run? Tuesday night's game was frustrating and last nights game was almost an instant replay of Tuesday's frustration. Both games saw Houston load the bases and the only difference between Tuesday and Wednesday games was Houston scored one run on a bases loaded walk. Both games Houston loaded the bases in the top of the sixth inning and both games saw two weak AB's derail the threat. One of the bad AB's was by Luis Valbuena who popped out on Tuesday night in what was a really weak at bat and last night after stretching the AB to 8 pitches but Valbuena swung at the 8th pitch which was high and likely ball 3. Jake Marisnick followed with a routine fly ball to right to end the inning. Like Tuesday night Houston got the tying run on 2B with one out but a K and ground out by Gomez and Correa ended any chance Houston had to win even one game in Arilington. Scott Kazmir gave up 4 runs but the Astros crap defense in the 1st resulted in 3 unearned runs to begin the game. Kazmir's ERA actually dropped last night as he gave up just one earned run in 5.2 innings. Like Tuesday night Houston lost to Texas 4-3 and looked bad doing it. It's only pure luck that Houston is still 2 games up in the AL West because the Angels won 2 of 3 against Cleveland. Houston was riding high with a 4 game lead heading into the Rangers series on Monday and now they are only 2 up. It's getting to where I'm am beginning to hate the stupid Rangers. Houston begins a 4 game series in Oakland tonight. The fact that the games don't start until 9 o'clock could be a good thing if the hitters are going to continue to sexually abuse the pooch the way they did against the Rangers. Earlier in the season Houston was actually better on the road than at home. That was then and this is now because Houston is nearly unbeatable at home and almost incapable of winning on the road. Not good when you are in a race for the playoffs.

eagle eye

08-07-2015, 10:22 AM

The frustration didn't really subside last night it was just pushed to the background a little considering the Astros prevailed in 10 innings against the Oakland A's. Winning in extra innings was a little consolation for the fact they should have won outright in nine if not for a bad throw to second by 3B Jed Lowrie that helped the A's erase a 2 run lead in the ninth inning and tie the game at 4. It not all that frequent when you make such a costly mistake and get to make up for it but in the top of the 10th Lowrie came to bat with 2 outs and Jose Altuve on 3rd and the Astros got something they haven't gotten much lately and that's a 2 out hit that matters. Lowrie doubled to left scoring Altuve giving the Astros their margin of victory. The 5-4 win snapped a 3 game losing streak and increased their division lead over the Angels and Rangers by 1/2 game since both teams were off last night.

Altuve, Carlos Correa, Colby Rasmus, Lowrie and Carlos Gomez did all the damage for Houston last night with Altuve breaking out of big slump with a 3 for 5 night at the plate. He also stole two bases on the night giving him 30 to the season. Correa got his 14th home run of the season, a two run shot that gave the Astros their first lead of the game in the 8th inning. Except for the first game he played for Houston against Kansas City when he went 0-4 and committed an error that cost Houston the game he's been money. He made a spectacular over the shoulder catch to save extra bases and a run, possibly two, in the 5th. That was a big play at the time because Oakland was leading 2-1 at the time and another run or two may have put the nail in the Astros coffin in that game.

Evan Gattis has been in a slump for what seems like a month. I'd take bets on whether he can hit his ass with both hands much less a baseball with a bat right now. Another oh-fer night with a couple strikeouts with runners in scoring position. We really need the caveman to bust out of this funk that he's in.

It sure looks like AJ Hinch is tired of being patient with Chris Carter. Carter gets almost no playing time lately, not even as a DH. He's been platooning Luis Valbuena and Marwin Gonzalez at first giving Carter and Singleton a spot start here and there as a DH. Hinch is saying without words that going down the stretch he's going with guys who produce, the time for waiting for someone to catch fire is over. Honestly, I can see a distinct possibility that both men will not be with Houston next season. The shame is neither has a lot of trade value because both have been so anemic at the plate. Valbuena has been hitting a lot better lately and when Jed Lowrie came back was about the time Valbuena's batting average creeped above .200. I noticed the Astros starting lineup, sans either Carter or Singleton, featured every one of them was above .200 for the first time all season. Lowrie's return was big because he was hitting .296 when he got hurt and he's hitting .300 as of today. If Altuve and Correa both break out of their slumps they should both be back to .300 as well which gives the Astros a lot more punch that they've had. In the recent past, because of inconsistency from Gattis, Rasmus, Carter, Valbuena and Preston Tucker all of whom has hit cleanup there was not any threat to worry about after Carlos Correa's spot. Now, with Lowrie back and hitting pretty well pitchers have to respect his ability which means Correa has seen better pitches to hit which has made the top half of the lineup a lot more formidable. The addition of Gomez hasn't hurt one bit either.

One observation about Preston Tucker. He is strong and he's got power to all fields if the ball is belt high or lower but that kid can't touch a high strike. I know these opposing pitching staffs have seen it too. A ball up in the strike zone is like kryptonite to Tucker. If he's lucky he might get a piece of the ball and foul it off but most of the time when he swings at high pitch it's a pure D whiff. The kid is young and he will learn how to deal with pitches up but right now he's almost become a liability. But, he's not the liability Gattis and Rasmus are with their .242 and .237 BA's because Tucker has been able to maintain a solid .265 average.

Another guy who needs to get it going is Jake Marisnick. After hitting .360-ish is April he has steadily declined to the point where he is currently hitting .227. Marisnick is a terrific outfielder with a gun for an arm but he really needs to find out what is wrong with his approach at the plate. I've said it here before and I'll say it again, I don't think much of Houston's hitting coach. Since John Mallee departed with the firing of Bo Porter the Astros hitters have suffered. You see the decline of Jose Altuve, Chris Carter and a couple of the other players still around and you know Mallee could have helped them. I just don't believe in Dave Hudgens. The other thing is I like the Astros aggressive style but they have made stupid base running mistakes and Gary Pettis has no clue at 3B. He has waved runners on and gotten them thrown out without the play even being close at home on too many occasions to count. You may say, "Hey, WTF! The Astros are in first place!". I'd counter by telling you a 2-1/2 game lead ain't squat and when you get down to brass tacks you can't make those types of mistakes and win in the playoffs--IF--you make the playoffs. Nothing is settled yet. No chickens have hatched and no fat lady has sung yet. Houston needs to tighten up their game and play more consistently if they hope to go anywhere in October.

eagle eye

08-08-2015, 10:45 AM

Dallas Keuchel wasn't bad but he wasn't as good a the A's ace Sonny Gray. Houston loses 3-1. The Angels come back to beat Baltimore 6-4 to close the gap with Houston to 1-1/2 games. Texas lost to Seattle so they couldn't close any ground on Houston and they remain 8-1/2 back of the Astros. Just looking at the matchups this weekend Houston should be able to beat the A's but not against the AL leader in ERA in Sonny Gray. Gray improves his W/L record to 12-4 and he improved his ERA to 2.06 after pitching a complete game 3 hit smackdown of the Astros. Keuchel was looking to become the first 14 game winner in the AL but instead his struggles on the road come back to haunt him as he falls to 3-6 on the road. If the 6 looks familiar it should. Keuchel's record overall is 13-6 meaning he is 10-0 at home and all six losses have come on the road this season. He went 7-2/3 innings and gave up the 3 runs, all earned as his ERA jumped from 2.35 to 2.40. Nothing to sneeze at to be sure but still it would be nice to see him be more successful on the road. Luis Valbuena continues to frustrate and confuse. In his last 7 games he is hitting .391 with an OBP of .440 and a slugging % of .652. Where has this guy been? He was the only one in the Astros lineup who made any noise last night going 2-3 with a solo home run that accounted for all the Astros scoring for the game. Evan Gattis also continues to suck. He went 0-3 last night and in his last 7 games he's hitting just .192. Since the All Star break he's hitting just .227 with way more K's than BB's and his spot in the batting order has become a black hole of nothing. The hitters need to ramp it up, I wonder if anyone told them that they need to keep their eye on the ball when they try to hit? It sure doesn't seem like it. Everyone seems to be swinging for the fences and it's really hard to keep your eye on the ball when you swing that hard. Base hits and double matter way more, IMO, than homers because you demoralize opponents with that kind of pressure. A home run, especially solo shots, seem more like an aberration and it's easy to move on. String together some hits, throw in a walk or two then you have the pitcher doubting his stuff and over throwing his pitches. Trouble is, here lately, Houston strings together hits but can't come up with the one that scores runs. I hope we are not looking at a late season fade. In an interview with Carlos Gomez on Astros Bases Loaded on Root Sports Network Gomez pointed out his experience in Milwaukee just last season. The Brewers were 7 up in their division and never made the playoffs. He said the Astros needed to keep playing hard and stringing together wins. Nice advice but in their first 5 games of this road trip they are 1-4. That, my friends, is not good.

Collin McHugh is looking to do what Dallas Keuchel could not last night and that is get his AL leading 14th win on the season. He and Keuchel had identical 13-5 records going into the series with the A's. Hopefully, he can help Houston get a much needed win over the AL West bottom feeder A's. The A's send Jesse Chavez (5-11, 3.88 ERA) to the hill. In his last 7 games Chavez is 1-5 with a 6.23 ERA. Let's hope Houston can take advantage of a pitcher in a slump.

Houston made yet another deal yesterday. They signed starting pitcher from Arizona Oliver Perez. Here's a brief article from Astros.com about the deal.

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/141902124

eagle eye

08-09-2015, 01:09 PM

Even Collin McHugh, he of the unflagging luck couldn't overcome the sleeping bats of his teammates and his bid to be the first 14 game winner in the AL was swept under a rug of ineptitude. Houston had 11 base runners yesterday, 6 by hits and 5 BB's and the Astros still only managed 1 run on a solo home run by Preston Tucker. Jose Altuve went 2-5 and Carlos Correa was 0-2 but he worked 2 walks with hits by Valbuena, Rasmus and Chris Carter who went 1-4 and actually raised his BA to .182. Trouble was of all the hits with the walks Houston couldn't seem to get one of those hits when it meant something. Now after being swept by Texas in 3 games and losing 2 of 3 to Oakland they are 1-5 since they swept the Angels just prior to this disaster of a road trip. When it began Houston had a 4 game lead on LAA and 8 on Texas now that division lead is a mere 1-1/2 and 4-1/2 games respectively. Houston has one more game in Oakland and Houston will send newly acquired P Mike Fiers to the hill in his first start for Houston. He came into a game earlier in the week after Lance McCullers got bombed out of the game against the Rangers on Monday after just 1/3 of an inning. Fiers got bombed too. McCullers gave up 6 runs and Fiers gave up 5 in an 11-9 slugfest loss. Fiers will have a chance to redeem himself against the suddenly hot hitting A's.

eagle eye

08-09-2015, 06:29 PM

It's all I can do to keep from running off a string of 4 letter words. I was already pissed at the Astros for just managing 1 run up to the ninth inning. I felt a little better when Colby Rasmus got his first hit of the game in the top of the 9th, a two run no out bomb to right. This gave Houston a 4-3 lead. Never mind that there were no outs and Houston couldn't get one base runner the rest of the inning, they had the lead with 3 outs to go. In walks Luke Gregerson who had 1st and 3rd before recording the first out. Next batter, Billy Butler, Gregerson uncorked a wild pitch. Jason Castro hustled to keep the runner at 3rd but the guy on 1st was able to advance to 2nd. It was then Houston decided to load the bases to set up a double play opportunity. Coco Crisp flew out to left and Jake Marisnick fired the ball in preventing the man on 3rd from scoring. Next batter Gregerson faced was Josh Reddick who grounded back to Gregerson but it was shot that caromed off Gregerson's ankle scoring Mark Canha from 3rd. All batters advanced so the bases were still loaded with Danny Valencia up and he singled to left easily scoring Billy Burns from 3rd giving the A's a walkout win over the Astros. OMG I am pissed! Mike Fiers pitched his ass off today going 6.2 innings of 5 hit, one run ball. Oliver Perez made his first appearance getting the last out of the 7th for Fiers then it all went to shit. Between Will Harris, Tony Sipp and Luke Gregerson they gave up 4 earned runs that ultimately cost them the game. Harris got charged with 2 runs in the 8th but make no mistake Sipp screwed the pooch giving up a walk and a hit that allowed the A's to score their 2nd run in the inning. For the week Houston lost 6 games out 7. 3 to the Rangers and 3 of 4 to bottom feeding Oakland A's. Lord, I'm pissed. To make matters worse the Angels came through with a walkoff run in the 11th inning to break a 4-4 tie. With two outs the Angels had a runner on 2nd with Mike Trout and Albert Pujols the next two hitters. The O's intentionally walked both Trout and Pujols to load the bases. The next batter was David Murphy who singled to left scoring Carlos Perez from 3rd. With the win the Angels have closed to a 1/2 game of the Astros. Houston started out the week 4 games up and coming off a nice home stand and promptly go on the road and screw the hell of the pooch. The only consulation is Texas lost keeping them 4.5 back. It was crap week that featured a total vacation by Houston's hitters. The one game they scored runs the lost because it was the one game Houston pitching sucked---bad.

Houston gets a day off tomorrow while LAA travel (they really do play road games--even though it hasn't seemed like it.) to Chicago to play the White Sox. After the CWS 3 gamer they go to KC for 4. I hope they suck as bad as Houston did this week. Houston finishes their 9 game road trip with 2 in San Francisco then they return home to a weekend series with Detroit. Houston has to run a gauntlet of 13 straight games without a day off beginning with the Tigers, continuing with the D-Rays, the Dodgers to complete a 10 game home stand then they go to NY to play 3 with the Yankees. I sure hope the Astros are as pissed as I am because there seems to be no excuse for this total collapse. We'll see if this is a deal breaker for the Astros and they fold up the tents and mail the rest of the season in or if it motivates them to do turn things around and hit better. I still hate the Astros hitting coach. Even in the sub .500 season last year Houston bats didn't go this silent all season. I am going to call for Houston to fire Dave Hudgens and rehire John Mallee. There are just horses for courses and Mallee seemed to have a connection to Astros hitters. Guys like Altuve, Gomez, Correa and even George Springer could benefit from Mallee's coaching. I'll bet he could do wonders with Rasmus and Gattis because both guys certainly have potential and they are still young players.
()*(*^(&%*&$C$(*(&)(*)^(*&^$&^$#^%@%W^^&%(*&Y_()U)(U_( *%*&$&^%#&#&$#E%# -- That was me cussing. I'm not done yet but I'm done here for today.