May 4 2023

Q & A With Astros Fans

Your faithful servant is on the road, so I’m offering my favorite filler by soliciting your help.

Here are 10 Astros-related questions for your consideration….

  1. Is Drew Gilbert the next big thing? And if he is, do we have a chance of seeing him this season? At A+ Asheville, the 2022 1st rounder has come roaring out with a .343 BA/ .407 OBP/ 1.051 OPS slash – 17 runs, 5 HRs, and 12 RBIs in only 18 games.
  2. With injuries wreaking havoc with the Astros’ pitching staff – the return of Lance McCullers or Jose Urquidy (guessing that Luis Garcia might be a lot longer) would be the biggest addition to the whole team. The return of Jose Altuve over Michael Brantley would seem to be the biggest boost for the offense. Is it?
  3. It is 31 games into the season. At what point do we worry that this is the real Jose Abreu? His .531 OPS is only not the worst among regulars because Martin Maldonado is still ahead of Yainer Diaz on the depth chart.
  4. Speaking of which – at what point does Diaz overtake Maldonado on the depth chart? There was a good discussion on this point between friends of the blog – uncle knuckle and Steven looking at points for and against. And GM Dana Brown seems to be getting on the Diaz bandwagon, but Manager Dusty Baker has always seemed to walk alone.
  5. Is a future promotion of Forrest Whitley or a J.P. France dependent more on their performance or on team need?
  6. If the Astros were going to put together a package (after a while) to get starting pitching help, ala Justin Verlander and Zack Greinke, would any of the following be considered untouchable…. Whitley, France, Shawn Dubin, Pedro Leon, Gilbert, Urquidy, Mauricio Dubon, Jake Meyers, or someone else?
  7. Fill in the blank – if the Astros are ___ games out of the playoffs at the trade deadline at the end of July, they should consider being sellers.
  8. Outside of Jose Abreu – I am most disappointed by ___ this year.
  9. Outside of Mauricio Dubon – I am most pleasantly surprised by___.
  10. Overall, do you believe the positive fate of the team depends on a) The return of the wounded, b) The improvement to the norm by the underperformers, c) The promotion of talented prospects, or d) Picking up external resources?

There you go – what do you think?

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59 comments on “Q & A With Astros Fans”

  1. 1. With Will Wagner literally disappearing, I think Gilbert is in line for next big thing. I would never have predicted Dirden would fall so fast in Sugarland, but the entire Sugarland team has cratered.
    2. Learning to have patience with this team is extremely difficult for me, so I will say that Brantley’s appearance is the best current medicine.
    3. I think we will start to worry about Abreu around the middle of April, 2023. The only salve for this wound is that Brown had nothing to do with it. This one is on Crane and I never thought it would turn out like this. Neither did he.
    4. After the return of certain injured players, the standings will determine when Diaz moves into Maldonado’s spot.
    5. France’s promotion probably will be determined on team need. Whitley’s promotion will probably depend on a freaking miracle or the personal advice of the person who is responsible for our minor league disaster.

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  2. I would promote Gilbert to AA now and see how he does. I saw him him play last year for Tennessee and he seems to have the same gym rat character that Biggio and Bregman exemplified. Like Altuve, he just might might be able to jump from AA to the majors. Personally, I think he can probably be an improvement from any of our guys playing center right now. I think it was a stroke of luck that the Astros were able to get him so late in the draft

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  3. 1. Be great if Gilbert is the next best thing, but I’d like to see him get to the Texas Gulf coast and see what he does there first. Maybe the first guy we should be looking at is Joey Loperfido.

    2. I think the return of the real Alex Bregman and the real Jose Abreu would trump Altuve, Brantley, et al.

    3. I’m not worried about how bad Abreu has been, but I’m sure concerned. The guy can’t even swing his bat. My concern is that there is something wrong with him and this is not slump.

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  4. Regarding Drew Gilbert. My son lives in Asheville, and has been watching DG. A bat like John Henry’s hammer – but terrible reactions and routes in the outfield. Likely to wind up a DH who seldom sees the field.

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  5. 4. If the club is still underperforming in a month, it is the GM’s job to make something happen if the manager has not. Maybe Abreu will still suck in a month. Then it’s up to Brown to find help. Same with the rotation. Our GM is going to have to provide solutions. I don’t think Brown will be as willing as his manager to keep Maldy in the lineup if the club still does not click 30 games from now.

    5. Any promotion will be based on team in need. France might show up on Saturday if Blanco/Martinez are not considered our best options.

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  6. 6. I’d like to hold onto our # 1 pick, at least until the rest of our experts determine that he’s destined to be a DH. We already have enough of those guys. But as far as the others go, they should all be in the mix. We’d want to find a team that really needs outfielders. But who will want to help the Astros with pitching? Not many clubs. We might have to gut it out until the trade deadline.

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  8. 9. That’s a tough question because I’m not going to say Julks, with 1 BB and 22 K’s. He’s already correcting and won’t be seeing many strikes going forward. So, I’ll say Diaz, simply because he looks like a catcher behind the plate. Seems like everyone was calling him a defensive liability. I have not seen that.

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  9. 10. We’ll need help in all four facets. The rotation will definitely need help from outside. Everyone has to hit. We need a minor league spark. And we need all the inured guys due back to have a positive impact. I don’t know about McCullers, but he’s huge right now.

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    • They should be very pleased with that result. Dan, do we know any source for minor league information (I’ve already tried GoStros1) that might be able to tell us what the deal is with Will Wagner? At this point my guess would have to be a personal issue. I hope the guy is okay.

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      • I’ve been looking for a while on Wagner – it is silent out there. “What the heck Bobby” used to be a good source for Astros prospect news but I think Jayne stopped running that.
        Sorry

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      • Ooops, didn’t see you, dave. Yes, by now you probably know Will Wagner is back. Kenny Van Doren usually has injury news but can’t recall what the problem was? One thing to keep in mind is lots of levels are full, and Astros will promote floater guys instead of the prime prospects. Case in point is Shay Whitcomb belongs in SL but Machado is really good defensively. In Wagner’s case, he’s held up by another legacy, Grae Kessinger. I’d say we won’t see Wagner til July ’24 in HOU.

        [Kenny just said Wagner didn’t say why he was out, but the reporter recalls him taking a pitch to ribs in Spring.]

        Dan, Jayne Hansen gave up the ‘Bobby’ blog when she started mixing her politics (same for “Astros County”) — both talented writers, and the pandemic shut her traveling down. The fellow she had doing some news wasn’t as thorough, and it just fizzled.

        How about now, Can I ask if Jose Abreu acquisition is a failure yet? Aaand, he hits a double!

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  11. 1 – Wake me up when Gilbert gets to 500 plate appearances. Learned along time ago not to get to excited (or disappointed) in small sample. I did like that in his junior year at Tennessee he had more BB than Ks.

    2 – No doubt – Brantley, Altuve, and even Chas missing is a detriment to this offense. Julks has filled in nicely but looking at his swing rates, ratios, you have to worry that maybe the carriage is about to turn back into a pumpkin. Biggest boost I think is Altuve. I used to be a 90% stat, 10% feel guy, I’ve softened over the years on that and I feel like a big part is that first at bat. Altuve will be a welcomed addition.

    3 – Abreu had a .213 average at the end of April last year. He was not good in April in 2021. That said – he wasn’t devoid of power in those Aprils, just no BABIP. So, this one feels different. Like I told my wife, all those flyouts to CF, if only we can make sure he always bats with a runner on third and one out we would be golden.

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  13. Some folks over at crawfishboxes are talking up Ryan Clifford over Gilbert – like his walk to K ratio much better than the #1 draft choice.

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    • And also over there one of the crawfishbox commenters pointed out that Zach Daniels had been MIA for two weeks before they showed him on the 7 day IL – maybe that is what is happening with Will Wagner

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    • Gilbert is not really striking out at a crazy rate. I think it’s below 22% right now, and a BB rate over 7%. Those are pretty solid, but he is a little old at A. If he can maintain those at AA he may skip AAA and come straight to Houston sometime late next year, but he has to maintain. What has killed Lee is that he had decent ratios at lower levels, but the higher he went the worse they got, and they haven’t gotten better AAA yet. To me, DB was right, Diaz is ahead of him, and its possible Lee is nothing more than AAAA.

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  15. 4 – Baker seems content with Maldy not hitting. If you think about it – Maldy has been hitting in the .200 vicinity for years. About .050 worse than most of the roster, which translates to about one hit every four games. Now, he is checking in around the .100 mark less than everyone else, or every other game. It is probably beginning to feel even more noticeable to Dusty. When he pulls the trigger, I’m not sure, but I would think add in the rest of the offense and their struggles and way more noticeable.

    5 – I wouldn’t think you would see either France or Whitley unless the team needs it. If there are no injuries neither would see the majors because they are not taking anyones job. I would expect France first – he struggles to hit the corners but when he throws strikes he doesn’t get whacked. I’ve never seen Whitley pitch but his numbers tell me he either misses the zone by a country mile or he throws a pitch right into the wheelhouse. 98 can’t help if you can’t command.

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    • So the team must need France because he’s starting tomorrow.
      No announcement of whose spot he is taking – I’m guessing Gage

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  16. 6 – is a tough question. So many variables. First, who. Second, how much time they got on the contract? That would determine the payback. I’m gonna say Gilbert is untouchable – but not because I think he is awesomesauce, but because I don’t know. We could end up underselling him like the Red Sox did with Bagwell or we could end up ripping someone off on this short stint of success like we got treated with Singleton. I don’t like dealing in the unknown so I would sit on him until I could get a read on what I got.

    The question is what pitchers are out there? Corbin Burnes seems a candidate – due 10 mil this year, one year of arby left at probably 15ish – and plays for a franchise that could see resigning him impossible and thinking they can get even more for him in July of 2023 than July of 2024, not to mention he was not happy about his arbitration hearing. He doesn’t seem to win as much as his ERA suggests he should – but neither did Cole before he got to Houston. If Burnes is available, this year, no one should be untouchable, that includes a package that would include Urquidy and Gilbert. Heck a package that includes Urquidy, Lee, Gilbert and Perez could do it as well as free 3 for 1 on the 40 man. Burnes, like Verlander and Cole deals before him, changes the face of the franchise, so if it took more, I would at least have to listen.

    If Urquidy is out long term I could see a trade for someone like Brad Keller. Not exactly a star (OK not really even above average) he could come along and eat some innings if the worse case happens and we are not looking at any of the three of LMJ, Urquidy or Garcia for an extended period. He certainly isn’t the idea of a contending teams starter but would probably still be better than dipping down into the minors for a 9th or 10th starter needed for say, 10 starts, and is a FA at the end of the year that you could easily let walk and would probably only cost some pitcher at A we never heard of.

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  17. 7 – They shouldn’t be sellers. Even if they are 10 games out and at .500 or slightly worse, this team is young, could finish the year, shrug it off, and reload. There are no pending free agents on this roster of consequence. It’s Brantley, Stanek, and an option on Neris (club). Shouldn’t sell on that. Now you are at 40-50 all star break next year, that could have some sellers momentum.

    8 – Abreu. And then disappointed in Abreu again. Outside of that – Garcia. He had momentum, he had just won 15 but he had to change everything about his delivery. Showing up for the WBC with those changes not ironed out, and then trying to throw in the WBC like he was in midseason form, its all speculation but you can speculate a lot from that. Honorable mention to Dusty – he has a catcher that can hit LITERALLY twice the rate, with more power, who is playing pretty well defensively when he plays, but he is sticking with the 36 year old that will be lucky if he can get his average up to .150 before the end of June.

    9 – Julks. I am not in the belief that his next 83 PA’s will be as fruitful as the first 83, but they have been critical at a time the offense is missing so much.

    10 – The return of the wounded. Altuve, Brantley, McCormick, LMJ, now Urquidy and Garcia, that’s a lot of talent. Add that back, and they are winning. Not to mention that despite being treated with kids gloves Yordan has missed a bit. I wouldn’t be mad about adding a good starter for down the stretch because I don’t think that we will be so lucky that we get all 3 starters back.

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  18. 8. The state of sports journalism / information. As posed in the previous comments, why is there no information on Will Wagner? He hasn’t played since 4/18. It has to be personal or injury. I couldn’t find a real writeup for the 4/18 game…just the nonsense, condensed recap that milb.com throws out there. It’s possible the Corpus Christi Caller Times had something worthwhile, but I’m not going through their paywall to search beyond the minimal story from the game that included nothing. What about the Hooks’ radio announcers? Maybe they tweeted something. Nope, not that I could find. Baseball-America has him assigned to Sugarland…but I think that’s incorrect. Again, I’m not a subscriber anymore so I’m only looking at freely available information, but as far as I can tell they just listed him there when the Astros sent him to milb camp in spring training. Maybe everyone in America was just too busy covering the NFL draft to do the other parts of their jobs for a few weeks.

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      • That’s great, surprising news. I hope he’s mentality and physically well. MILB/MLB should be required to provide accurate player information. No way he was simply sitting on the bench from April 18 to May 5.

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  20. The now Garcia-less Astros – took a big lead – gave up a big lead and then scored late to win it.
    Yordan’s 3 run homer and Tucker’s two run homer are the critical blows.

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  21. Right now, every win is a big one. The Astros pitched better than four runs worth. Two big hits from the usual suspects. Need someone new to step up today.

    Late yesterday afternoon, I was enjoying a festive Margarita in honor of General Zaragoza down at the beach. I was wearing my newest Astro cap. And then I got ripped into by one very nasty Red Sox fan. It was like I was pounding that trash can half a decade ago! I asked her to discuss the issue with Mr. Cora and then turned my back. She went on and on until her party walked her away to the dining area. I guess there is no hiding on this planet.

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    • I was sitting at an awards dinner table this week for my granddaughter’ band. A member of the band sitting at the next table was wearing a Dodgers cap.
      I asked my daughter for a marker and flipped my program over to the back and printed GO ASTROS! on it and held it up until he saw it and his face got cloudy. The teenagers at my table were grinning at me because I let everyone know where I stand.
      You took the high road, dave. You’re the good cop. Me, well, yeah.

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    • That’s the second time they’ve let Montero go too far in the inning.Last time I forget who bailed him out but not tonight. What a waste after a good outing by JP France. I know there were a couple of cheap infield hits but the initial walk by Montero started the fiasco.

      It’s time to sit Bregman and Abreu before they cross the Mendoza line. Maybe Uncle Mike can play 1st but who’ll play 3rd? Send Hensley back to Sugarland, he’s an instant out.

      Diaz was 0 for 4 but had a couple of hard hit outs. He just needs to play more.

      What do you do with Dubon and Jake when Chaz and Altuve return? I wish Yordan could play 1st.

      Very disappointing game.

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      • Yeah Sargeh, I thought we were watching Bregman breaking out of his early season slump when he got his average back up to .247 and his OPS to .767. Unfortunately, he was just preparing for part 2 of the worst slump of his career. How can he be so bad hitting in front of Alvarez? I’d move Pena back up there unless the plan is to get Brantley back at the beginning of the week. And I sure hope Altuve shows up early. Then Chas and Jake can resume their battle for starts.

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  26. I had a bad feeling about that two out walk in the 8th. So I went to bed. I did not expect to see a 7 spot on the board when I looked this morning. It’s a shame they gave back France’s win. First time the Astro pen has been dented like that in years. And the infield could have saved their butts. Tough assignment today with Bielak and several relievers unavailable. We really let the M’s off the hook.

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  28. The Space Cowboys won 24-8 today. It’s hard to get excited about Korey Lee going 6 for 7 when the other guys give up 30 hits.

    Our Astros got schooled by the M’s AA rookie. Sure the kid’s pretty good, but we went way too easy.

    I give Bielak credit for keeping the game within reach, but I fear he’s a time bomb.

    Breggy passed the Mendoza line going in the wrong direction.

    Mr. Bill, this caustic post is intended to give you the day off from CC responsibilities.

    Good night everyone.

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  29. Best line from Geoff Blum today regarding Bielak…

    “It’s a good thing he (Bielak) is wearing orange today with all the traffic around him.” A traffic cone eh? Priceless.

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  30. I look at the team and think, they have the same players, same coaches but they are lifeless now. What gives? I feel it is the manager. Look at what The Rangers did. Pretty much the same team but a new manager that has fire in his belly. Management.

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  31. Not the end of the world. If we stick around .500 until the end of May, we’ll still be in it, and we’ll be hitting more, won’t we? Right?

    It’s time for Dana Brown to stop promising nice things and get Dusty some help, which is very difficult this time of year. And really, who wants to help the Astros get well? MLB might have already sent out the no trades with the Astros memo.

    Two things that are a legit concern for me is that Reptile’s career max regular season innings are 148. Brown, 106. So at some point these two guys will have to be shut down or limited. Especially Hunter.

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    • Yeah, considering the extended seasons and WBC this spring the Astros were going to need to find a way to get some extra rest in between starts or risk not having some guys available for September-October as it was before the injuries even started. It’s a shame the bullpen blew a number of games early because they should be the strength of this team. They should be deep enough to let Dusty pull starters after the fifth with frequency and not worry. My personal opinion is that the 100 pitch limit and targeting guys to shut down after a certain innings threshold is simplistic. The second and third time through lineups should, in theory, be far more stressful to the pitcher and their arm. If the Astros can minimize those high stress inning to Javier and Brown it greatly increases the chances they can contribute all year.

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  32. Supposedly we will be getting Chaz McCormick and Michael Brantley back this week. Unfortunately, both have been away from the MLB pace long enough that it will not be fair to expect too much from them the first week or so. In short, our win percentage this time next week could very easily be substantially lower than .500.

    If Bregman and Abreu don’t start hitting soon, this is going to get ugly real quick.

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