SB Nation - Yorman Bazardo

Plan? Schman: What is the Astros front office thinking?

DyingQuail — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:02:20 -0000

More photos » by Pat Sullivan - AP

Just give us a sign, Ed.

I just got finished reading this piece by Brian McTaggart. I read it; I read it again, and then I thought, "Sonofabitch." Why? Because I can't discern a single line of thought from McTaggart's interview that would indicate there's any kind of plan for the Astros. I don't need a blueprint, but at least some sort of trajectory, and if not a trajectory, at least an indication that our front office is in fact in touch with reality.

Why the fuss? Here are the selections:

The first task for the Astros is re-signing their own free agents, a list that includes impact players in shortstop Miguel Tejada, closer Jose Valverde and reliever LaTroy Hawkins. Houston likely doesn't have enough payroll flexibility to retain all three, and Tejada's future with the club would be at third base instead of shortstop.

Ok. So Wade is allegedly gunning for two of the three. My guess would a pairing of Tejada, plus a reliever and that spending would pretty much close off payroll for the 2010 season. $7.5 million in 2010 for Tejada is what I'm guessing we'll offer and I imagine that Hawkins will look for at least a $5 million deal coming off the season he just had (if you don't prod the raw numbers, he looks stellar).

So our main objective for 2010 is to bring back a SS to play 3B at age 35 or 34 (honestly, I'll never get Miggy's age right). And then sign a closer-esque reliever. After that, the goal, ostensibly, will be to plug the roster with in house pieces for the league minimum and hope that of Bud Norris, Feliepe Paulino, Yorman Bazardo, and Wesley Wright at least two can perform at or around league average for the course of the season.

But wait, we apparently also have a void our outfield. This one was news to me. Of our current corps of minor leaguers, I think the only "stenghth" we might have is in the outfield. Am I wrong?

Nevertheless, Ed Wade had this to say about our "situation" in the outfield:

"From the standpoint of position players with both Jason Michaels and Darin Erstad being free agents, our extra-outfield situation at this point is an issue," Wade said. "I'm not saying we wouldn't bring both guys back, but both are free agents, and we have to recognize we have a void now."

Really? A point at issue? The services of two veteran bench warmers who happened to play outfield at some point in their career is really worth a likely $2-3 million in their two contracts? Yordanny Ramirez, Reggie Abercrombie, Brian Bogusevic (just to name our AAA OFers, but not to slight the Gaston's and Locke's of the world) couldn't slot in their spots for less than $1 million? Interesting.

So from that point, I can't tell if Wade is conceding that he can only spend enough to sign one of the Valverde/Hakwins/Tejada trio because if he signs two of the three he can't afford to round out the bench, or not. But in all honesty, that has me worried.

Next up, something that's be eating at me for awhile, but Wade's quote brings it to the surface:

"If we can mix and match with Geoff over there and provide more offense, that's something we have to pay attention to," Wade said.

I get that Blum is allegedly an über-utility IF. But if Wade is really gunning for Tejada, why did he re-sign Geoff Blum so early? A piece like Blum seems best signed in January or February when someone like Blum hears things like "league-minimum" and "major league job" and jumps at the opportunity to sign after sweating it out all offseason.

There's also discussion of Wade looking to trade for a SP, but who does he trade? For whom? And why?

And it's at the point in the article that I started over, re-read and realized that Wade is literally just slapping duct-tape on this team and hoping it all holds. But with what purpose? I don't know. If Drayton's taking a hard line on the payroll because he doesn't want to lose money this year, why not just hold everyone we have in place? Offer arbitration to our FAs, and then whoever rejects it, take the picks and fill the slots with in house players at league minimum? If everyone rejects arbitration, we have a payroll of $80 million on opening day and we get finally see what are farm system actually has in it, and that seems more entertaining than the Ed Wade duct-tape ball that's being rolled right now. Hell, just throw some money at Hawkins and have someone we trust to close baseball games and still save Drayton a sizable chunk of change to invest in the 2010 draft.

Wade doesn't seem to be trying to make the roster better, he seems like he's trying to plug leaks on a sinking ship—but will still end up taking on water. And I have myself back to, what is the Astros objective for 2010 and beyond? Does anybody see it?

None of this is to say that I don't think the Astros can compete as assembled, or attempted to be assembled, in 2010, but my concern is that is there are plans for 2011, 2012, and beyond? Or is it going to just be duct-tape and prayers for the foreseeable future?

Breaking Down Arnsberg: What Are the Astros Getting?

davoag — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 13:00:27 -0000

More photos » by Darren Calabrese - AP

Is the criticism of Brad Arnsberg justified?

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In case you missed the FanShot from last Friday, the Astros hired a new pitching coach. Brad Arnsberg comes with a reputation as a young pitcher-killer, but was loved by all his staffs and seemed to be able to work some magic with 'reclamation projects.' The World Wide Web was abuzz with articles about his abundance, or lack thereof, of talent. A fine hat-tip to clack and AstroAndy for linking to them.

What I wanted to do, though, is to see if it was warranted. What we're really worried about here are young pitchers, right? Guys 24 years old and younger are in the prime area for suffering from over-use. There are two different models out there currently used to predict injuries to young pitchers. Both were researched pretty thoroughly, but it's hard to tell if they're good predictors of injury potential or just good at explaining what happened in the past.

When I went back to research Arnsberg, I looked at every staff he had from 2000 in Montreal to 2002 with the Marlins and through his five-year tenure in Toronto. I focused on all the pitchers he had that were 24 or younger. This is a bit of a departure from the model, since they stop at 25, but since two-thirds of his stops were of the one-year variety, I downgraded the age a year. The two methods I mentioned were Tom Verducci's theory on an increase in innings from year to year, most recently laid out here. The other was Pitching Abuse Points (PAP), first published back in 1998 by Rany Jazayerli here. I believe it's been tweaked a bit here and there since then, but it's a good starting place for the discussion. My results after the jump...

Arnsberg oversaw 28 different pitchers in their Age 24 season or younger. His biggest year for this was in 2000 in Montreal, when 10 different young pitchers got into games. The 2000 season also seemed to be a learning year for Arnsberg as to how best to utilize pitchers. Of the 10, only one threw more innings than the previous season (Javier Vasquez, +63 IP) and only one had more than 10 PAP per start (Vasquez, 16 PAP). Carl Pavano pitched seven fewer innings than in 1999, but had a PAP/Start of 4.8 and then suffered an injury the following season. The rest all had significant drops in innings pitched and none had more than 2 PAP/start. None of the relievers in his bullpen threw three straight days and only Pavano suffered an injury the following season. Knowing what we do now about Carl, it's easy to see it probably wasn't Arnsberg's fault.

The next year he surfaced was in 2002 with the Marlins. Five guys played at 24 or younger and two of the five had jumps higher than 30 innings. Both Justin Wayne and Nate Robertson pitched over 40 innings more than the previous season, but each threw the majority of their innings in the minors, not the majors. It's hard for me to pin these jumps on Arnsberg for that reason, since their workload was controlled by the minor league pitching coordinator, not the big league pitching coach. As for the other three, Josh Beckett threw 47 less innings than the previous season and averaged 2.1 PAP per start. Pretty reasonable for a 22-year old. Brad Penny had a 69 inning drop in his workload and had 0.8 PAP/start. The other guy in this group was Blaine Neal, a reliever who saw his workload go up by six innings and was used three straight days twice that season. One of those times, though was on both ends of a double-header, when he faced just one batter in the first game. No real injury trouble here, at least not by Arnsberg's work. Beckett had the blister problems, but that's not related to overuse and Penny did have arm trouble, but much later than this.

On to the Toronto years, where Arnsberg saw an impressive group of young pitchers hit the big leagues. In his first season, he had five pitchers in the age range we are looking at. Two drastically increased their inning total (Dustin McGowan, +70, Chad Gaudin +74) while one starter also saw an uptick into the danger zone (Gustavo Chacin +36). The other two guys, Brandon League and Shaun Marcum had smaller increases or decreases, but only Chacin had any PAP to speak of. Chacin's total of 3.7 PAP/start is high, but not distressingly so and his innings increase was slight in comparison to McGowan's. Still, Chacin did suffer a major drop-off in performance and had an injury or two thrown in for good measure. Of course, his delivery is a bit quirky and he came out of nowhere to begin with, so it's hard to say whether Arnsberg led to this flameout. Certainly, the other guys on this list went on to have solid years after 2005, so we may just be dealing with a small sample size.

In 2006, Arnsberg oversaw seven young pitchers, including newcomers Casey Janssen, Ty Taubenheim, Jeremy Accardo and Davis Romero. Accardo, Romero and Dustin McGowan all had inning increases but the rest saw their totals drop. Janssen was the only pitchers with more than 1 PAP/start and his was exactly one. Marcum saw his total drop by 35 innings and had a PAP of 0.8 while League had a slight drop in innings, but was used twice three games in a row. Taubenheim moved from a starter's role in the minors to the bullpen in the majors, which explains his 60-inning drop. None of the evidence here supports the conclusion that misuse led to any injuries.

In 2007, there were only four pitchers in our age-range, including two holdovers, League and Taubenheim. Newcomers Jesse Litsch and Josh Banks both saw increases, though Litsch saw his total rise by 29 innings, just underneath the magic threshold. Litsch also had just 0.7 PAP/start, meaning he wasn't throwing a ton of pitches. League saw his total drop by 59 innings, in part due to injury (I think, though I can't find it anywhere). Taubenheim had his total rise by 15, but was not used in more than two straight games, so he didn't really get overworked.

Litsch was the only pitcher considered young in 2008 and he saw his total innings drop by 11, but his PAP jumped up to 4.2 per start. More distressingly, though was how he was used down the stretch. From August 21 to September 29, Litsch started nine games and threw 61 innings and 980 pitches. He totaled 88 PAP for an average of 9.7 per start, a huge jump over the beginning of the season. He went 5-4 over this stretch and had an average game score of 62.4. Those were both reasons why he pitched so much, I'm sure. He was doing so well that the Jays wanted to keep him pitching to keep them in the race, as the team got to 12 games over .500 on Sept. 12. However, Litsch was pretty much abused during this stretch. He was used once on two days' rest, throwing 49 pitches over three innings and was used once on three days' rest in the back half of a doubleheader. Litsch threw 110 pitches over 5 1/3 innings.

In 2009, Litsch was shut down in April and finally had Tommy John surgery in June. I think it's safe to say that his usage pattern at the end of 2008 may have led to this, but we can't be certain. Arnsberg's last year with Toronto saw five pitchers in our age-group, including Litsch. Ricky Romero, Brett Cecil, Mark Rzepczynski and Brad Mills made major-league debuts and all but Mills saw increases in their inning totals. None saw jumps of over 30, though they all had more PAP than in Arnsberg's past. Romero tallied 6.3 PAP/start and saw his innings jump 14, while Brett Cecil had a jump of 24 innings and 2.1 PAP/start. Rzepczynski made the jump straight from Double-A and saw an increase in 28 innings while having a PAP of 3.8 per start.

What does this mean? Arnsberg gets blamed for the injuries to Marcum and McGowan, but in their formative years with the club, you can see he really didn't do much to hurt them. Only in 2008 did his usage patterns significantly change, and that also coincided with a new manager, Mr. Old School Cito Gaston. This is a classic example of a guy from a bygone era trying to throw pitchers out there like they did in the '70's and hoping it will work. In 2008, for example, Gaston used pitchers on short rest six times, while the American League average was just 3.7. In 2009, he was right in line with the league average of 3, but it still shows that he used his pitchers differently than most of the league. Arnsberg didn't like it, and clashed with his manager as was chronicled here and here. I'm not sure you can blame Arnsberg for what happened to Litsch but you definitely can't blame him for Marcum and McGowan. B.J. Ryan also can't be blamed on him, nor can A.J. Burnett, as both guys had either a history of injuries or a jump in innings before coming to Toronto.

At least one place is mad Arnsberg left Toronto, while there are a couple other places that still levy criticism. I'm not sure how Arnsberg will do with Houston, but I do know he's got a pretty good track record of keeping the young guys healthy. He'll have a tough time on his hands next season, though, as Bud Norris saw a 95 inning jump in his workload, though his PAP/start was just 0.5. Yorman Bazardo was also in the danger zone with a 34 inning jump, and his performance doesn't need any regression. The only worrying part of the bullpen was Sammy Gervacio being used three straight days three different times and once for four straight games. Of course, the 24-year old only threw more than 20 pitches in a game twice, so it's not as worrisome as it appears.

To review, Arnsberg coached for four different managers and only under Gaston did his track record go astray. Out of all his young pitchers, just three were inordinately abused: Chacin, Litsch and Vasquez. Now, we can see that Vasquez was just built to hold up to a higher workload, similar to Roy Halladay. Still, it doesn't excuse the abuse in the first place. Is Gaston more to blame for the last couple of seasons in Toronto? We can't REALLY tell, but after reviewing all this, I certainly feel better about the Astros' new pitching coach.

Astros Roster Breakdown: The Starters

davoag — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:49:44 -0000

More photos » by Dino Vournas - AP

Roy Oswalt, in a rare good mood

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To lead off the starters section, I wanted to focus a little on Roy Oswalt. The soon-to-be 32-year old had his worst season as a professional, but was that a sign of aging and decline, or just a bump in the road?

His BABiP shows he wasn't unlucky in 2009 and was right in line with his career average. He also didn't throw more pitchers per plate appearance than he has in his career, while getting the most swinging strikes he's had since 2004. He did have a slight dip in his percentage of strikeouts that were looking, but since his swing and miss percentage didn't change, I think that was more statistical noise than anything.

You can't even blame injuries for hampering his stuff, because his fastball velocity was the same as it has been for the past few years. In fact, it actually ticked up a notch, but that's probably because of the only significant difference in his performance this season, a 5% drop in the number of fastballs he threw. Oswalt supplemented with more sliders and changeups. So, speed was not an issue...was something wrong with his movement? I wish I were smart enough to put together those cool scatter charts using the PitchF/X data, but I'm not there yet. I'd really like to see if he lost movement or late life on his fastball to determine if that's what the injuries robbed him of.

Other than possibly that, it appears his main problem may have been his attitude. Clashing so publicly and so often with Cecil Cooper, Roy just didn't give off the vibes of a guy playing his best. I'm sure he was playing his hardest, since he seems to have only one speed in that regard. But I wonder if he was mentally there this season. It's the one thing we can't really quantify, attitude.

Hear that, Brad Mills? Keep The Wizard happy next season and he'll bounce back.

Onto the rest of the starting rotation after the jump...

Roy Oswalt, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 8-6, 181 1/3 IP, 4.12 ERA, 30 GS, 19 HR, 138 strikeouts, 42 walks, 1.24 WHIP, 101 ERA+

FIP: 3.76

Average Game Score: 53

BABiP:.305

GB/FB: 1.21

Pitching Runs Created: 70

Notes: Since we've already talked about Roy-Boy's career trajectory, let's focus in on his 2009 season. Is this just the pitcher Roy is now? He struggled with getting any kind of decision all season, finishing with 16 non-decisions. His BABiP was right in line with normal luck, and he still got plenty of ground balls. The concerning part is his strikeout total, but as I said, that's been pretty steady for the past four seasons. His FIP shows he should have had a better ERA, but it would still have been his highest in his career. Roy was one of the main players disappointed in Cooper. Hopefully, he'll be motivated in 2010, because with Roy feeling right and Wandy pitching well, we will have a nice front end to the rotation. About that back end, though...

Wandy Rodriguez, LHP

2009 Season Stats: 14-12, 205 2/3 IP, 3.02 ERA, 33 GS, 21 HR, 193 strikeouts, 63 walks, 1.24 WHIP, 138 ERA+

FIP: 3.54

Average Game Score: 57

BABiP:.306

GB/FB: 1.21

Pitching Runs Created:100

Notes: Wandy was the best pitcher on the Astros staff last season. To put it in perspective, the difference between his and Roy's PRC was Mike Hampton. Maybe overly simple, but pretty amazing, no? Wandy's BABiP showed he wasn't just lucky to pitch this well and his strikeout total is very impressive, especially for a lefty. You'd like to see a few fewer walks, but that's just quibbling. The other interesting thing is his game scores. At 57, it was the highest of any of the starters and showed just how good he was game-to-game. His home/away splits were still very pronounced, though his strikeout rate was about the same. Two full runs of ERA though? For Wandy to take that next step to be an ace, he needs to perform better in road games.

Brian Moehler, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 8-12, 154 2/3 IP, 5.47 ERA, 29 GS, 21 HR, 91 strikeouts, 51 walks, 1.53 WHIP, 76 ERA+

FIP: 4.75

Average Game Score: 44

BABiP:.325

GB/FB: 1.25

Pitching Runs Created: 39

Notes: Moehler started the third-most games on the team last season. The trouble was, he did not perform like a third starter. Though his FIP was lower than his ERA and his BABiP meant he was a little unlucky, Moehler was more bad than good. His strikeouts and walks were both not where they should be. Though he had a good G/F ratio, his average game score shows he was a below league average starter in most of his outings. Much was made about a few of his starts at the beginning and end of the season blowing his ERA up too high. If you added 50 points to his total game score, he still would be well belew the the baseline. As a back-end starter? Moehler probably is useful, but will be recovering from a knee injury he had surgery on. Still, for 3 million? He's not a bad option.

Mike Hampton, LHP

2009 Season Stats: 7-10, 112 IP, 5.30 ERA, 21 GS, 13 HR, 74 strikeouts, 37 walks, 1.55 WHIP, 78 ERA+

FIP: 4.57

Average Game Score: 45

BABiP:.322

GB/FB: 1.78

Pitching Runs Created: 30

Notes: Hampy did just what we thought he'd do, getting a ton of ground balls and not really overpowering anyone. Oh, and getting hurt. He did that too. It's a little surprising Hampton gave up as many home runs as he did, but it did appear this experiment failed.

Felipe Paulino, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 3-11, 97 2/3 IP, 6.27 ERA, 17 GS, 20 HR, 93 strikeouts, 37 walks, 1.67 WHIP, 66 ERA+

FIP: 5.11

Average Game Score: 45

BABiP:.368

GB/FB: 1.08

Pitching Runs Created: 24

Notes: Obviously, anytime a hot, young prospect makes his debut and promptly posts a 6+ ERA, it's hard to be very excited. I still think his performance was somewhat affected by recovering from his 2008 injury, even if only slightly. His strikeouts numbers were great, though he gave up too many hits to win consistently. Paulino is too talented not to win more than three games next season, but it may take him a while to adjust. The Astros would pay more on the open market for a pitcher without nearly the upside of Paulino.

Russ Ortiz, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 3-6, 85 2/3 IP, 5.57 ERA, 13 GS, 8 HR, 65 strikeouts, 48 walks, 1.67 WHIP, 75 ERA+

FIP: 4.61

Average Game Score: 42

BABiP:.330

GB/FB: 1.62

Pitching Runs Created: 23

Notes: Ouch. The positives? Ortiz only gave up eight home runs and had a nice G/F ratio of 1.62. That's about it, though, as his nice start gave way to a rough time in the rotation. Ortiz wasn't as bad as his ERA indicated, but neither was he very good. He was hittable and probably was best as a swingman in the bullpen. He'll have to be that for some other team though, as I don't see the Astros bringing him back.

Bud Norris, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 6-3, 55 2/3 IP, 4.53 ERA, 10 GS, 54 strikeouts, 25 walks, 1.50 WHIP, 92 ERA+

FIP: 4.77

Average Game Score: 49

BABiP:.327

GB/FB: 0.87

Pitching Runs Created: 20

Notes: Norris had the most successful debut of any Astros rookie in 2009. He had some rough patches, obviously, but his average game score was still just a shade under average. He was a bit unlucky with his BABiP and gave up too many fly balls, but the strikeouts were there and the walks were minimized. I don't know whether he can get his control working well enough to be a permanent fixture in the rotation, but with his arm, he will have a place on the big league team for a while.

Yorman Bazardo, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 1-3, 32 IP, 7.88 ERA, 6 GS, 17 strikeouts, 22 walks, 1.84 WHIP, 53 ERA+

FIP: 5.00

Average Game Score: 34

BABiP:.323

GB/FB: 1.52

Pitching Runs Created:5

Notes: The Astros won a bidding war to sign Bazardo to a minor league deal in spring training. He joined with Bud Norris and, later, Polin Trinidad to form a potent rotation at Round Rock. Unfortunately, Bazardo may be the proverbial Quadruple-A guy. His strikeout rate has never been very good (5.3 K/9 in minor-league career), though he supplements that by not allowing too many walks. Bazardo does get a fair number of ground balls and his BABiP showed he was slightly unlucky in 2009. His ERA, though, doesn't really support the claim that his failure was all because of Tejada and Matsui. Bazardo should probably be given another shot, but he's a fringe fifth starter at most.

Wilton Lopez, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 0-2, 19 1/3 IP, 8.38 ERA, 2 GS, 9 strikeouts, 8 walks, 2.07 WHIP, 50 ERA+

FIP: 6.25

Average Game Score: 35

BABiP:.381

GB/FB: 2.32

Pitching Runs Created: 2

Notes: Lopez pitched eight games out of the bullpen, but did start two games, so he ended up in this list. A pickup from the Padres, Lopez pitched relatively well for Corpus Christi before getting a late-season callup. Lopez had a good ground ball rate for his limited sample size and his FIP was lower than his ERA (though neither were very good). He profiles as a guy who could hang around Triple-A and help the Astros out in a pinch, but I wouldn't count on him contributing much in 2009.

Brandon Backe, RHP

2009 Season Stats: 0-0, 13 IP, 10.38 ERA, 1 GS, 10 strikeouts, 6 walks, 2.08 WHIP, 40 ERA+

FIP: 7.94

Average Game Score: 41

BABiP:.375

GB/FB: 0.77

Pitching Runs Created: 2

Notes:You'll find no bigger fan of the Galveston native than me. Jeff Kent's home run to beat the Cards in 2004 wouldn't have been possible without Backe throwing a whale of a game. Unfortunately, that's all we got from him. Tantalizing glimpses at potential that never really panned out in the majors. Backe ran into a wall of injuries and ineffectiveness in 2009, refused a demotion to Triple-A and was released.

Monday's Quick Hits

davoag — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 18:28:05 -0000

More photos » by Jeff Roberson - AP

3 months ago: Home plate umpire Greg Gibson, left, points during an argument with St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa after throwing La Russa out of a baseball game against the Atlanta Braves during the seventh inning Saturday, Sept. 12, 2009, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)

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Not much going on besides the managerial search, but there were a couple of stories that caught my eye:

Could Tony LaRussa be out in St. Louis? Tony will retire rather than accept a job elsewhere, but it's interesting to think through the possibilities his leaving would potentially have. First off, would the Cards job be more enticing than the Astros job? Will that limit the managerial pool in Houston's search? Second, does that make Dave Duncan available? Could the Astros land someone like Duncan if they threw enough money at him? Just one of those stories that could create potential ripples that will affect the entire off-season.
R.J. Anderson over at D.Ray's Bay wonders if J.R. Towles makes sense as a trade candidate for Tampa Bay. Obviously the Astros don't have much faith in Towles and special advisor for the Rays Gerry Hunsicker has proven to be a fan of guys he drafted with the Astros (see Zobrist, Ben). Does it make sense for the Astros? Jason Castro will get a chance to win the starting job sooner rather than later. I don't think Houston wants to break in a young backstop before breaking in another in Castro, so I could see them taking a one-year flier on someone like Benjie Molina before giving Castro a chance to win the job by midseason. Tampa Bay also has a surplus of pitching, so maybe a swap of Andy Sonnanstine or Jeremy Hellickson would be enough to get it done.
Since we've already discussed some potential deals, would the Astros think about trading for Matt Gamel? The 23-year old is a year younger than Chris Johnson, and has a better minor league record. Gamel flashed more power in the minors, with an career minor-league OPS of .862 compared to Johnson's .726. They're apparently looking for pitching, but would they be happy with Yorman Bazardo or Polin Trinidad? Putting together a bigger deal with Wandy and J.J. Hardy might be more appealing, but an under-the-radar deal for Gamel might make the most sense long-term.
A couple of managerial notes: This report out of Boston shows the Astros have gotten permission to interview Red Sox third baseman Tim Bogar and bench coach Brad Mills. Add them to the confirmed list that includes Manny Acta, who will probably get the first interview this week. I'll have a post later today on Acta going over his background and managerial career. UPDATE: McTaggart added a couple more confirmed names in Bob Melvin and Al Pedrique, while also running down how the hiring process will shake out.

This is way the Astros season ends: Not with a bang, but a whimper

DyingQuail — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:58:48 -0000

More photos » by Kathy Willens - AP

My feelings exactly, Aaron.

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I've done pretty much anything but think about the Astros today. There were too many mixed emotions to sort through; too many other tantalizing distractions to latch onto. I've watched a dismal Fantasy Football day crush my spirits, the Texans look weak in the second half against the Oakland Raiders, talked HLP down from the ledge as he fretted about his ability to clinch our rotisserie keeper-league (he did, Congrats buddy, you earned it).

I didn't even watch the Astros game. I couldn't.

I saw the standard tweets about it on my desktop client (Tweetie) and that was enough depression for me. The most critical thinking I could bring myself to do about the Astros was a few expletive deleted texts and about five minutes worth of phone conversation between HLP and myself. I don't know why it is that I feel this way, or I have felt this way for the last few weeks, but I think the catharsis of knowing that it's over has finally allowed me to snap out of my funk.

I can still remember when the glimmer of hope I had for this season was born. BtB's Sky Kalkman emailed me the spreadsheet for his Community Projection Project and I rushed to input all the projections. Without any fan embellishment, we were something like an 80 win team. It was late December and I was shocked. Flabbergasted. Almost afraid to actually publish the result publically. I probably wrote about seven drafts of an email I never sent Sky explaining—politely—that I thought his spreadsheet was broken.

We spent the next few weeks tweaking and refining the inputs and suddenly we were an 82 win team. Then in late March Ivan Rodriguez and Jeff Keppinger landed in Houston and we quickly became an 83 win team. There was probably inflation, but a .500 season seemed realistic, and there were all the variables in place to allow for some kind of meaningful and exciting season to get underway.

April and May saw the NL Central become a smorgasbord of stories that had thrown the conventional off-season predications of how the Central would play out, out. Yet the Astros struggled for most of it and seemed destined to be mired in irrelevancy, even as opportunity knocked. I managed to avoid excess worry and pessimism during this stretch by being wrapped up in graduating from college and then not living like a member of the real world for the next month (that month will easily go down as the most enjoyable month of my life). Perhaps that's what insulated my glimmer of hope and kept me set up for the inexorable Astros-depression that has plagued me as of late (does semi-ignorance count as denial?)

June arrived and the Astros were quietly good. The responsibility of covering the team on a daily basis allowed for me to be slow to notice the fact that the Astros were stringing together victories and closing ground in the Central. So it was a very plesant surprise when I finally allowed myself to consider the possibility of the Astros becoming...contenders(?!).

By the time the All-Star break was upon us, I don't think that there were many of us who weren't starting to harbor something akin to excitement. When we opened the second half by splitting the series with the Dodgers, I'd say most of us were starting to place ourselves in the camp of believers. I know I was.

Sure, there was a mountain of statistical evidence based on macro-level measures that could demonstrate how the Astros couldn't possibly succeed, but we saw a different picture. We saw a team that had been felled by Jose Valverde's monstrously wicked calf strain, Roy Oswalt's post-WBC inconsistency, and Lance Berkman's weird odd-year-early-season-under-perfomance. We were buoyed along by the fact that Wandy, in spite of his two weeks of HR/FB regression, was pitching consistently and finally living up to all of our hopes. There was Bud Norris tilling the farm in the PCL with a low 2.00 ERA and thus the hope that our rotation could only get better—not worse.

This all led to what I'll consider to be the peak of the Astros 2009 Season: July 20th-22nd. The NL Central leading Cardinals were going to be at MMP and the Astros had quite the opportunity on their hands. Prior to the Astros three game sweep of the Cards, I wrote the following:

Unlike previous years when the Astros and their fans had to hope and pray throughout the month of September that other teams would drop the ball while the Astros took care of other opponents, the Astros will be firmly in the drivers seat this time around from July 20th on...

...I consider this series to be the keynote address to how the Astros will handle the opportunity they're presented. They're only real opponent is themselves. This is a division, and even an Wild Card race, that has proven to be anything but decided ninety plus games into the season. So the Astros, flawed as they are, have legs to stand on in the search for October baseball, but we've all yet to figure out is how sturdy those legs ar e.

As we all know, the legs weren't that sturdy. Our offense collapsed into a black hole of paltry OBP (.305) and our farm hands and scrap heap veterans were anything but consistent as the season pressed forward on the mound for us. Even Roy Oswalt couldn't hold up.

But I don't want to get to that part yet.

There was a week long period after that where it genuinely felt like the Astros were going to do it. They were going to shock all of us and make a legitimate run at the playoffs. Actually take their fate in their own hands and dispatch their NL Central rivals. Maybe it was a fan's bias, but I did. Hell, I even put my neck on the chopping block and tried to show up SBN's own RJ Anderson when he wrote about how screwed the Astros actually were. I still don't think his argument was overwhelming, completely thought out, or entirely objective, but, in the end, he was right and I was wrong if you obscure the issue somewhat.

I think this is known as the first stage of grief: denial. What I was really saying and hoping was: "The Astros are fine, there's a way these obvious defects can be overcome. I can't say exactly how, I just believe they can."

Did I partake in too much of the Kool-Aid? Probably. But I really don't see how I couldn't. It felt like the stars were aligning. It felt like my sports luck was going to turn around. It felt like the baseball gods were going to pay us back for Hurricane Ike, the Selig/McLane/Cubs/Milwaukee fiasco, Joe Creede's ridiculously dumb defensive luck circa October 2005—everything.

It happened, though. Not a bang, but a whimper. The Astros dropped a series to the Mets at home. Then dropped series against Chicago on the road were swept by a Matt Holliday powered Cardinals. At the time it felt disconcerting, but certainly nothing to lose the faith over. After all it, was still just early August. It was impossible for me to fathom that it would be the start of a 25-42 run for the Astros. Reading that number right now it still seems impossible.

The team just started to slip way in bits and pieces. Chris Sampson went down, exposing the limits of the set-up men. Alberto Arais faltered and would go down with injury and later go under the knife. Bud Norris, whose was dazzling in his debut in St. Louis, started to get shelled. Yorman Bazardo got a call up to fill in for the now comical merry-go-round of Feliepe Paulino, Mike Hampton, Brian Moehler, and the released Ortiz, but struggled as well. Every game I oscillated between the anger and bargaining phases of grief. It was either: "What the hell is (object of my ire) doing/thinking, this is absurd. I can't believe they're finding new and impressive ways to blow this" or "Please baseball gods, please, just let them pull it together. It's not to late for them salvage something."

By the time September was underway, I was in full blown depression, the fourth stage. I didn't want to write about this team, I didn't want to think about this team, I didn't want to watch this team. Every loss was too painful; every glimmer of hope from Norris or Paulino tainted by my own jadedness. As I mulled over our options for 2010, the prospect of trying to make this team a contender on the budget Drayton McLane will provide did nothing to pull me out of my funk.

In the depression stage of grief, apparently one disconnects oneself by being silent. By not allowing their thoughts to be challenged or corrected by someone who could bring hope. Even though I wasn't writing, I was still reading. Most of you have continued to find the silver lining. Me, I couldn't stop adhering to Jerry Garcia's adage that every silver lining has a touch of gray.

Sure, Bud Norris has flashed brillance, but I've been stuck on knowing that he'll turn up injured before May rolls around next year. Paulino? He'll probably be on the Wandy Rodriguez path to greatness and take until 2013 to finally arrive. Wesley Wright's conversion to starter? Could Ed Wade be any more desperate for his owner to throw him a lifeline in the form a $10 million to go grab a worth while pitcher?

I could go on, but I think you get the point. That's pretty much how I've been thinking and feeling about the Astros for the last month. It's been awful.

Sometime around 8:30PM though, I finally reached the final stage, acceptance. Was this season a disappointment? Yes. Even so, it still provided a six to eight week stretch where people believed. Where people cared. Even though there's no one thing I can find to blame the Astros soul-crushing, for me, atrophy into the team that limped their way to a 25-42 final stretch, it's ok. I'm not sure there is. This once meteorically hot team just whimpered its way through the majority of the second half to a dismal 5th place finish in the NL Central. From one game behind on July 22nd, to seventeen games back on October 4th. It's probably fitting that they were shut out.

There's always next year.

It's still too soon for me to cling to that adage with the kind of hope I did last December, but at least that's what we have to focus on now.

DEEP HURTING: Astros 8, Phillies 2

WholeCamels — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 02:18:49 -0000

More photos » by Matt Slocum - AP

This is Yorman Bazardo. He makes you sad. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

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Another rookie pitcher with a 6.00+ ERA dominates the Phillies, another bang up job by the bullpen to make a closer game a laugher, another Braves victory, and the Magic Number remains at 3.

Astros' rookie Yorman Bazardo held the Phillies to just two hits and two runs (one on a balk) over 5 2/3 innings pitched, with the Phillies hitting bolts right at the Houston fielders, while Cole Hamels for the Phillies fell victim to bloops and broken bat dribblers, and was on the hook for six of the Astros eight runs over 6 2/3 innings, the last two of which were allowed to score when Tyler Walker failed to get an out in the seventh inning. The Astros scored five runs in the seventh inning -- all with two outs.

The Astros bullpen did their job, pitching 3 1/3 scoreless innings and surviving a little "scare" in the ninth but escaping after Greg Dobbs grounded into a double play to end the game.

The Phillies 3-7 hitters (Utley, Howard, Werth, Ibanez, Feliz) went 1-for-15 with three walks, which tells you about all you need to know about the offense tonight.

God this is painful to watch.

Reds make thrilling late season run towards mediocrity, sweep Astros 6-5.

Brendanukkah — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 03:21:32 -0000

More photos » by Al Behrman - AP

Thousands of red seats showed up to honor and thank Hal McCoy for his 37 years of service to the Reds and baseball. (AP Photo/Al Behrman)

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Joe Nuxhall Memorial Honorary Star of the Game

Jeff Fulchino. He threw the wild pitch that allowed Joey Votto to score the winning run. Votto, Brandon Phillips, Drew Stubbs, and Wladimir Balentien all had big games as well.

Key Plays

The Astros made some plays and there was some exciting defense, but they lost so screw them. They're not getting recapped anymore.
Jonny Gomes hit a home run in the second inning to give the Reds the lead.
Drew Stubbs hit a home run in the third, then Joey Votto walked, went to third on Phillips's single, and scored on Scott Rolen's sacrifice fly. Two runs! Tie game!
Wladimir Balentien hit a double to lead off the fourth inning. He moved to third on Craig Tatum's sacrifice fly, and scored when Justin Lehr bunted to the pitcher, and Yorman Bazardo threw it away. Reds lead, 4-3!
Balentien scored again in the sixth inning. He singled, and Tatum bunted him to second. After Jay Bruce struck out, Drew Stubbs singled to bring in Balentien. Tie game!
Joey Votto and Brandon Phillips singled to begin the seventh inning, putting runners on the corners. Scott Rolen came up and struck out, but not before Jeff Fulchino threw a wild pitch and Votto crossed the plate with the winning run.

via FanGraphs

Other Notes

The Reds are only three games out of fourth place. Here we come!
Jeff Keppinger hit two home runs - in the same game! It was the first time he'd ever done that.
This was the second series against the Astros that the Reds have swept in Cincinnati this season. The Reds have won seven in a row against the 'Stros.
The Astros hit five home runs off of Justin Lehr, which tied a club record. The last Reds pitcher to give up five homers was Brandon Claussen on July 18, 2005.
Jonny Gomes became the third Red to reach the 20 homer mark. He's only one behind Joey Votto for the club lead.
Juan Francisco drew a walk. ZOMG! His ML walk rate of 50% is blowing away his minor league numbers.
Coco Cordero has pitched - and gotten a save in - the last three days and four of the last five. Let's hope for a blowout tomorrow.

Final - 9.16.2009	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Houston Astros	0	0	3	0	2	0	0	0	0	5	12	1
Cincinnati Reds	0	1	2	1	0	1	1	0	X	6	11	0
WP: Jared Burton (1 - 0) SV: Francisco Cordero (37) LP: Wesley Wright (3 - 3)

Complete Coverage >

Can the 2010 Astros be competitive?

DyingQuail — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 12:00:29 -0000

More photos » by Dave Einsel - AP

My opinion: 2010 hinges on this man's performance.

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I'll admit from the outset that this depressing for me to write for two reasons. One, of course, being that it's depressing that I can't find anything worth writing about the 2009 Astros and two being that I am left wondering how the 2010 Astros can do better than their 2009 version. This ominous thought has been lurking in the back of my mind since I did an interview with Fred Fauor a few weeks ago in which the topic of how the 2010 Astros should assemble themselves left me clawing for any semblance of hope (which is a sports fan's best friend in times like these).

The logical place to start this conversation is payroll. A team can't build something if it can't afford to buy the requisite building materials. Everytime I have tried to account for the dollars and cents of the core of the Astros roster for next year I've totaled $75 to $82 million. This roster includes (with best guess efforts for arbitration bonuses and salary escalation):

Lance Berkman
Carlos Lee
Roy Oswalt
Wandy Rodriguez
Hunter Pence
Michael Bourn
Jeff Keppinger
Kazuo Matsui
Tommy Manzella
Miguel Tejada (anywhere from $6 million to $11 million. The latter would actually be his fair market value at 3B if he replicated 90% of his offensive production from this year, assuming a cost of $4.5 million per WAR)
LaTroy Hawkins (anywhere from $4.5 million to $7 million to be our closer)
Bud Norris
Felipe Paulino
Brian Moehler
Yorman Bazardo
Sammy Gervacio
Alberto Arias
Chris Sampson
Wesley Wright
Tim Byrdak or some a near equivalent LOOGY
Humerto Quintero
Jason Castro
JR Towles or Brian Bogusevic
Rounding out the roster with relief pitchers that will have an average price tag of $1.25 million

This would be a young Astros team compared to their previous few versions, so there is of course the ability to infer hope from it because the projections for many of these players has a wide range of variance. But is that the kind of hope that we as Astros fans—especially most of the regulars here, who all have a far more sharply objective view of baseball—want claim? Can we even claim that as hope? I guess the answers to that are personal and subject to one's own preferences.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) for you, the readers, I get to work out my thought process in front of you. For those who just want to move past this discussion, I'll do this after the jump.

If we have learned anything from the 2009 version of the Astros it is this: A seemingly stacked offense is not a good way to build a baseball team. The fact of the matter is, and will continue to be, that the core of our line up has skill set that is high slugging percentage relative to on-base percentage. This, as we now are so painfully aware of, does not an offense make. There's just no consistency in such a skill set and that fact was exacerbated by poor managerial strategy by the man at the helm of the offense, Cecil Cooper.

Even if the Astros front office decides to spare us the indignity of having Cecil Cooper continue to pull all the levers of the 2010 Astros, offense will not be our strong suit. This leaves us to the lesson we all learned in 2005: If you've got pitchers who pitch well, the team will perform well. As of right now, the only starting pitcher I put on the list above who I have confidence in is Wandy Rodriguez. I hope that Roy Oswalt will pitch well on a consistent basis in 2010, but his continued climb into his thirties, combined with his worrisome back issues, don't fill me with the confidence that the Wizard once inspired.

Dratyon McLane has already announced that payroll in 2010 will be lower than payroll in 2009, and has cited attendance this year as the motivation for this reduction. If payroll is scaled down to match in the loss in attendance revenues this year, than would place the Astros at somewhere within a million or two dollars of $90 million. That doesn't leave a lot of dough to fill out the bench and bullpen, while also buying the services of another top-tier pitcher to complement Roy and Wandy.

That leaves the likely candidates as Bud Norris, Feliepe Paulino, Yorman Bazardo, and Brian Moehler. However, it's hard to say that all aren't question marks in my mind. I doubt that our starting rotation will include more than two of the above to start the season, as I am sure there will be some manner of reclamation project scooped up by Ed Wade this winter. I also doubt that this unnamed pitcher will be more than a giant question mark in my mind as well. How can I be so confident that whatever Ed Wade pulls off the scrap heap will be a question mark? Just take a look at the options.

Bud Norris has flashed brilliance this season, but Wandy Rodriguez had a long and torturous journey to consistently being brilliant, so it's hard for me to place too much hope in Bud. Were Bud Norris to speed up his learning curve and provide legitimate number three services, then the Astros would have a strong rotation. Not 2005 strong, but strong enough to inspire confidence, and dare I say it, hope. Were Bazardo, Moehler, Wright (who'll be auditioned as a starter this spring, allegedly), and whoever is Ed Wade's reclamation project, to be relegated to the four and five slots, then they're imperfections and questions marks wouldn't matter as much. 2009 has been dismal mainly because 3/5 of the time there's no reason to expect good things from the guy taking the mound. At times, when injury has felled Wandy and Roy, there's almost no reason to hope for anything other than an offensive explosion to mask the deficiency in pitching.

So I've talked myself to this point: Should Bud Norris be an effective starting pitcher next year, I think that the 2010 Astros can be competitive. Do I have hope? There's a glimmer of it. Am I being unduly pessimistic? I'll leave that for you to decide. Have I missed/glossed over something? Probably. Again, tell me where I went wrong.

Dominance thy name is Bud Norris: Pirates 1 - Astros 9

DyingQuail — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 03:36:41 -0000

More photos » by Dave Einsel - AP

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I didn't see a single second of this game, so my analysis will be skin deep and emphasize what I can glean from the box score.

Things that are good (there will be no corresponding things that were bad):

Bud Norris' final line: 6IP, 6H, 1R (1ER), 7K, 1BB, 84 pitches (54 strikes).
Bud Norris' peripherals: 7 K:BB, 10.5 K/9, 8.33 K/100. That's efficiency—which in pitching gets renamed dominance.
Yorman Bazardo getting tested in the bullpen (something I've been hoping for) and producing a 3K inning. I'll take infinite K:BB ratios and 27 K/9 all day everyday from in the pen.
Lance Berkman starting a HR streak and sprinkling in a 2B for good measure.
Kazuo Matsui going 3/4 with a 2B as well.
Tommy Manzella collecting his first big league hit—a good omen, perhaps?

Whatever I've left off good, bad, or indifferent let me know.

Here's the only game recapage you actually need:

via www.fangraphs.com

Pirates vs Astros coverage ; Pirates vs Astros boxscore ; Bucs Dugout

Friday Morning Astros, etc Round Up

HighLeveragePerformer — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 11:00:27 -0000

by David J. Phillip - AP

That oughta lift your spirits, Lance.

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In case y'all haven't noticed, Lance Berkman and Roy Oswalt haven't exactly been themselves in 2009. I mean, they haven't been terrible, but each has left a little to be desired. Zach Levine gives us the optimist and pessimist perspective on each in his blog post yesterday. More than their diminished performance this year, I'm worried about their attitudes towards their futures in baseball and the Astros in the immediate future. Maybe it's just that I'm used to Astro players keeping quiet for the most part, but Lance nor Roy have come out sounding excited about playing baseball. It's a grind when you're out of the race, and it's natural to let down when you have "nothing" to play for. Perhaps a free agent signing or strong performance by a youngster (or five) will lift the spirits of our longest tenured Astros?

Our minor league affiliates named their team MVPs, and I can't argue with the selections from AAA, AA or A. Round Rock chose Tommy Manzella, Drew Locke earned the honor in Corpus, and Koby Clemens was rewarded in Lancaster. The Lexington Legends' team MVP is Brian Pelligrini, but it's more than likely that a pitcher (Jordan Lyles) was truly the most valuable member of that squad.

RJ's twitter feed informs us that five Astros have made their major league debut this season: Bud Norris, Wilton Lopez, Sammy Gervacio, Tommy Manzella and Chris Johnson. This type of factoid is common for most teams, but for the Astros it's downright nutty! Taking these five, plus Felipe Paulino, Michael Bourn, Hunter Pence, Wes Wright, Alberto Arias, and Yorman Bazardo into account, 2010 could be an extremely telling season in terms of whether or not this team is going to be competitive in 2011 and beyond.

The Astros may have lost last night, but Chris Johnson will always look back fondly on the game as the night he notched his first big league hit. Congratulations to Chris. Now Tommy Manzella needs to get his chance to do the same. Perhaps a Miggy at third base, Tommy at shortstop starting lineup is in order?

It's always fun when the big baseball websites take note of the successes of our minor leaguers, and Baseball Prospectus did just that on Wednesday in an article which analyzed the minor league leaders in various categories. Jon Gaston led the minors in HRs, and was given the usual assessment of being fortunate to play in a bandbox, and striking out too much. Koby Clemens apparently led the minor leagues in RBI with 123:

One of the bigger surprises of the year, Clemens hit .345/.419/.636 for the JetHawks, and while the ballpark and the top of the Lancaster lineup did wonders for his RBI total, this is at least some kind of step forward. He'll need to prove it's for real next year at Double-A, and his catching still needs a load of work, as in 66 games behind the plate he was charged with 18 passed balls while throwing out less than 30 percent of opposing basestealers.

Maybe he and Jason Castro can get together, and Koby can pick Jason's brain?

In their first World Cup game, the U.S. team lost to Venezuela in a slugfest, 13-9. Jason Castro managed to go hitless in five at bats, but was probably worn out from crouching so much. He looks swell in his Team USA uniform though:

Team USA faces host nation Germany tomorrow. Other high draft choices from 2008 playing on Team USA include Justin Smoak and Pedro Alvarez.

Remember when Dice K mattered? I barely do. He's coming back for the stretch run though...so take heart, Boston?