No, I’m not asking for cash. It is just that I’m on the road writing this one on the fly without access to stats unless I want to log back into WordPress every time I go pull a stat. I do not. So I will go back to a tried and true method, ask my dear friends questions, and let you take the wheel with responses. Here we go!
- Which is more likely to happen – the Astros’ offense regresses to the norm by improving, or the Astros’ pitching reverts to the norm by falling off?
- Is this team a bit like 2005 when the pitching carried the offense the whole year?
- Was 2021 Yuli Gurriel’s late-career swan song, and now he is turning into a corner infielder with no patience and power? (But boy, he sure can scoop ’em at 1st base).
- After hitting a huge 3 run homer, why was Kyle Tucker sitting? Why did Jeremy Pena need to rest the same day? Do kids in their 20s need the same amount of days off as grizzled veterans?
- Have you ever seen a pitcher his age come back from TJ surgery as the force that Justin Verlander has been?
- The biggest pleasant surprise this year is Jeremy Pena or Rafael Montero?
- Does Dusty Baker know what he is doing, or is he lucky? For instance, he lets Martin Maldonado hit in a vital spot late in the game with much better options on the bench, and he clears the bases with a double.
- It feels like the Astros are underperforming their talent but are getting better results than one might expect. Is this just a team whose core knows how to win and ekes it out over teams who have doubts?
I’d really appreciate it if you could help out with these questions.
ALL THINGS ASTROS 
87 responses to “Helping the Blogger”
Realmuto just doesn’t quite make it for me. He’s 31 and in his second year of a 115.5 MM contract and is due 23.875MM each year through 2025. While he has had good stats through last year this year may be a foretelling of things to come. His OPS and Slugging are down 15% this year and his BA is down 8%. Do we want to obligate ourselves to 80MM to get him? I don’t think so and don’t think Click/Crane would do it either.
Personally I’d rather had George Springer in our CF but that’s a moot point now. If Brantley decides to sign on for another year with options I’d look to keep him for a lot less. Hopefully, we’ll get Jake back and he’ll hit .260 plus. We definitely need to keep Tucker and Yordan unless they price themselves out of our market. As for Judge, I think Houston is one of the last places he’d want to play for and our owner ain’t going to pay $40MM a year for multiple years so there’s my 2 cents worth. I’d like to see one of our up and coming catchers given a chance just like we gave Pena a shot. I do agree we could use a “lights out” lefty in our Bull Pen.
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Yeah, you’re right. Everyone knows that only the Dodgers, Yankees and Mets are allowed to go get good players. Thank you for putting me in my place. It would totally be out of line for me to believe my team would be able to go sign the best players.
And how could I miss Realmuto’s production being off 15%, in a year when offense around the league is down 20% and the Astro’ offense is down even more than that.
Judge coming here would be as unlikely as Carlos Correa signing to play in Minnesota. What was I thinking?
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“The Sarcasm! The Sarcasm!” Hey I needed a good chuckle this morning. But I will admit that “Stranger Things” have happened. One thing I can say about the Astros management is that they have been know to surprise us from time to time.
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