SB Nation - Darin Erstad

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?

Astros' OF Michael Bourn wins National League Glove Glove

HighLeveragePerformer — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:47:19 -0000

More photos » by Paul Beaty - AP

NL Gold Glove winner Michael Bourn snags a fly ball. MB ranked 4th in UZR for all NL OFs, and 5th in UZR/150...A legitimate winner of the Gold Glove. Refreshing.

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From potential bench player, to actual ballplayer.

Out of of TCB dog house, and onto our list of bright spots.

Call it what you will, reason it however you wish, Michael Bourn proved just about every prognosticator, projection system, baseball insider, and cynic wrong with his 2009 season. At this time last year, nobody, this blog included, expected much of anything out of Mike. If he could avoid getting benched it would be a great success.

Think about that. When the Astros made their ill fated run towards the post season in 2008, Darin Erstad was getting significant time in CF because Bourn couldn't hold his own with the big leaguers. Meanwhile, Brad Lidge was mowin' 'em down in Philadelphia. Ed Wade looked the buffoon that most make him out to be.

Fast forward a season, and Wade looks quite...dare I say it...savvy. Our 26 year old centerfielder was a four win player, en route to having a bounce back season that would make Lidge himself smile. A 74 win club with the oldest roster in the game normally can't have that many positives going into an off season, and the Astros are no exception. Throughout the 162 game season however, a speedster whose roots are in Houston made us smile no matter how far away the Cardinals got in the standings.

Now there's this, confirmation of Michael Bourn's ascendancy into the class of a respectable ball player. With his first Gold Glove in just his second full season as a major leaguer, Michael doesn't need to look over his shoulder anymore, worrying that his job may be usurped at the next strike out our meek fly ball.

His game has the potential to expand even more, which is the incredible part of this story. I fully expect him to work just as hard this winter to hone his craft and return to Florida with more defined skills and an even better appreciation for what it takes to succeed in the bigs.

Congratulations to Michael Bourn. Humility seems to be his calling card, but deep down, it must be a great feeling to prove people wrong and to do so in convincing fashion. Question marks abound with the Astros, but out in center we're golden.

Torii Hunter Gold Glove #9

Rev Halofan — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:42:05 -0000

More photos » by Chris Carlson - AP

G O L D (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

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The Angels added some hardware Tuesday with Centerfielder Torii Hunter collecting his 9th career gold glove and his 2nd as an Angel in as many seasons with the club.

Suffice to say that shortstop Erick Aybar was absolutely robbed in the awarding of the prize to Derek Jeter. Angels 3B Chone Figgins at least lost out to Evan Longoria, a competent fielder.

The official announcement is at MLB.COM's website.

Angels Franchise Gold Glove Winners (Official Team Site Listings has not been updated since 2004)

Torii Hunter	OF	2009

Torii Hunter	OF	2008

Orlando Cabrera	SS	2007

Darin Erstad	1B	2004

Bengie Molina	C	2003

Darin Erstad	OF	2002

Bengie Molina	C	2002

Darin Erstad	OF	2000

Jim Edmonds	OF	1998

Jim Edmonds	OF	1997

J.T. Snow	1B	1996

J.T. Snow	1B	1995

Mark Langston	P	1995

Mark Langston	P	1994

Mark Langston	P	1993

Mark Langston	P	1992

Mark Langston	P	1991

Devon White	OF	1989

Devon White	OF	1988

Bob Boone	C	1988

Bob Boone	C	1987

Bob Boone	C	1986

Gary Pettis	OF	1986

Gary Pettis	OF	1985

Bob Boone	C	1982

Rick Milller	OF	1978

Ken Berry	OF	1972

Jim Spencer	1B	1970

Bobby Knoop	2B	1968

Bobby Knoop	2B	1967

Jim Fregosi	ss	1966

Bobby Knoop	2B	1966

Vic Power	1B	1964

Roster Breakdown: The Infield

davoag — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 18:40:35 -0000

More photos » by Kathy Willens - AP

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This process took a little longer than I expected. In part two of my review of the roster, I looked at every infielders' (including catchers) statistics and make some notes about last season and their future. Not necessarily scientific, but there is some interesting information in here. Friday should see part three, a look at the outfield. Till then, let's see what happened with the first half of the roster...

Lance Berkman, 1B

2009 Season Stats: 562 PA, .274/.399/.509, 31 doubles, 1 triple, 25 HR, 73 runs, 80 RBIs, 7 of 11 stolen bases, 98 strikeouts, 140 OPS+

WAR: 3.0

UZR: -4.5

VORP: 34.9

Notes: Two points to consider about Berkman's season. First, his April and August splits were horrible. His slow start and power vacuum in August led to the perception that his season was a disappointment. Still, though he managed just 12 hits in April, he also walked 17 times and hit five home runs. In August, he hit zero home runs but had an OBP over .400. This also leads into the second point: Berkman is aging, but his power drop over the past three seasons is in part due to an overall power outage in the National League. The Big Puma saw his home run total fall 26 percent over the past three seasons while his extra-base hits have fallen 5 percent. That's almost exactly the same percentage that the NL extra-base hit total dropped over the same time period (5.6%). The NL home run total dropped 8.2 percent, but I'm guessing Berkman's drop in homers is beginning to be due to age. Still, if he hits 30 home runs in the next year or two with 50+ XBH, I'm guessing the Astros will be happy.

Kazuo Matsui, 2B

2009 Season Stats: 533 PA, .250/.302/.357, 20 doubles, 2 triples, 9 HR, 56 runs, 46 RBIs, 19 of 22 stolen bases, 85 strikeouts, 75 OPS+

WAR: 0.5

UZR: -1.0

VORP: 0.4

Notes: I'll be up front: I don't care for Matsui. He's overpaid, he's injured too often and he doesn't get on base enough to bat high in the order. That's just my personal preference, but I wanted to get that out in the open in the interests of being objective. Matsui's line is down quite a bit from 2008 but combine the past two seasons and its almost exactly in line with his career line of .271/.325/.387. His Runs Created totals of 64 in 2007, 61 in 2008 and 56 in 2009 have been very consistent, but his BABiP was 40 points lower in 2009 at .285 than the previous season. Add to that a good stolen base rate of 85% over his career and Matsui does have his uses. The problem is, he's a No. 7 hitter, not a leadoff guy. Matsui's numbers should bounce back some in 2010, but don't bet on another .350 OBP.

Miguel Tejada, SS

2009 Season Stats: 673 PA, .313/.340/.455, 46 doubles, 1 triple, 14 HR, 83 runs, 86 RBIs, 5 of 7 stolen bases, 48 strikeouts, 110 OPS+

WAR: 2.6

UZR: -8.3

VORP: 43.7

Notes: Tejada had the highest VORP of any player on the Astros roster last season, for good reason. Though his OBP wasn't terribly high, he did hit a ton of doubles and actually had more extra-base hits than Berkman. In fact, Tejada led the National League in doubles in 2009. Tejada also struck out just 48 times, which was his lowest total since his 104 plate appearances in 1997. Of course, the flip side of that is it was also his lowest walk total since 1997, too. Tejada's high batting average was due in part because he had his highest BABiP since 2006, 20 points higher than his career BABiP of .298. Tejada once again led the National League in grounding into double plays and put up his highest season totals since 2006 in plate appearances, RBIs, hits and sacrifice flies. I'm not sure if this was the most successful contract push for a 35-year old in the post-steroids era, but it's got to be up there on the list, right?

Geoff Blum, 3B/Util

2009 Season Stats: 427 PA, .247/.314/.367, 14 doubles, 1 triple, 10 HR, 34 runs, 49 RBIs, 0 for 1 stolen bases, 61 strikeouts, 81 OPS+

WAR: 0.6

UZR: 0.3

VORP: -0.5

Notes: Blum was the only regular Astros infielder (besides the catchers) who posted a negative VORP. His crazy hair styles and home runs off the bench were fun and zany in 2004 when the Astros were making their run to the postseason. Now? Blum's a steady defender but doesn't have great range and is aging quickly. His OPS+ of 81 is not good for any position, much less a corner infield spot. Surprisingly, Blum's numbers last season were right in line with his career line of .250/.310/.367, but moving into his age 37 season, he's probably not going to equal those numbers in 2010. Blum started 94 games at third and seven at first, but is probably better suited as being the Astros number one pinch hitter next year.

Ivan Rodriguez, C

2009 Season Stats: 344 PA, .251/.280/.382, 15 doubles, 2 triples, 8 HR, 41 runs, 34 RBIs, 0 for 2 stolen bases, 74 strikeouts, 75 OPS+

WAR:0.7

VORP: -1.1

Notes: Ahh, Pudge. Has there been a more controversial free agent signing by the Astros in recent memory? Can someone split a room between stat guys and traditional scouting guys more than Pudge? The 37-year old couldn't walk if he were given two balls at the beginning of every at-bat. He would sometimes throw out baserunners, but was never talked about as a good handler of the pitching staff. Where do we go from there? Pudge started out strong for the Astros but faded late, and did the same thing after being traded to the Rangers. Starting him and Matsui together proved dangerous for the Astros offense, as they both posted sub-80 OPS+. When 1/4 of the starting lineup can't get on base or hit for power, something's not right.

Humberto Quintero, C

2009 Season Stats: 168 PA, .236/.286/.376, 8 doubles, 1 triple, 4 HR, 11 runs, 14 RBIs, 0 of 0 stolen bases, 41 strikeouts, 75 OPS+

WAR: 0.5

VORP: -0.4

Notes: Q suffered through a bad concussion this season, but still managed to get into 60 games this season. He started some after Pudge was traded away, but didn't impress offensively. In fact, he's never hit much in the majors, with a career line of .232/.275/.325. Quintero has a strong arm and handles the pitching staff well, but will be 30 next season in his last non-arbitration year. He makes sense as a backup to someone like Towles or Jason Castro, but putting him in the starting lineup is a stretch.

J.R. Towles, C

2009 Season Stats (Houston): 53 PA, .188/.250/.354, 2 doubles, 0 triples, 2 HR, 7 runs, 3 RBIs, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 16 strikeouts, 59 OPS+

WAR: 0.0

VORP: -1.7

Notes: What to do with Towles? The 25-year old couldn't stay healthy at Round Rock this season, getting only 56 games with the Express. When he did play, Towles hit the ball well and got on base at a good clip, sporting an OPS of .842 in Triple-A. That didn't translate to the pros in either of his two stints with the team, but it should. All Towles needs is a little time and opportunity.

Jeff Keppinger, Util

2009 Season Stats: 344 PA, .256/.320/.387, 13 doubles, 3 triples, 7 HR, 35 runs, 29 RBIs, 0 for 2 stolen bases, 33 strikeouts, 88 OPS+

WAR: 0.4

UZR: 5.7

VORP: 2.8

Notes: Keppinger was a late-spring addition, something former GM Gerry Hunsicker made into somewhat of an art form. Unfortunately, Keppinger didn't work out quite as well as guys like Mike Lamb and Billy Spiers did. That's not to say Keppinger was bad, as his batting was okay for a shortstop. Again, unfortunately, Keppinger played 59 games at third base. His range and glove made him an asset defensively there, but his bat is not good enough to hold up there for long periods of time. Still, Keppinger is a useful player who makes more sense on the bench than most of the Astros' reserves.

Darin Erstad, 1B

2009 Season Stats: 150 PA, .194/.268/.328, 8 doubles, 2 triples, 2 HR, 13 runs, 11 RBIs, 0 for 2 stolen bases, 31 strikeouts, 58 OPS+

WAR: -0.9

UZR: 7.9

VORP: -8.2

Notes: Erstad was a surpringly resurgent part of the 2008 team. Of course, in that campaign, Erstad played 40 games in center field. This season? Just one appearance in center field. Erstad could be a useful player, but he doesn't have the bat to be a first baseman, even as a backup, and doesn't have the arm to play in right field. That leaves him as the caddy for Carlos Lee. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the next manager should not view Erstad as the first bat off the bench to pinch hit.

Edwin Maysonet, 2B

2009 Season Stats: 79 PA, .290/.333/.362, 2 doubles, 0 triples, 1 HR, 9 runs, 7 RBIs, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 19 strikeouts, 86 OPS+

WAR: 0.3

UZR: 8.3

VORP: 1.1

Notes: Maysonet wasn't one of the best prospects in the Astros system, but made the best debut of any Astros rookie position player in 2009. His average was high, but his OBP was not impressive. Add to that his complete lack of power and it's not like we have the next Chase Utley here. Still, Maysonet probably deserved more playing time than he got. He'd been known in the minors as a great defensive player and flashed good range in his time with the big league club. The only downside is his minor league track batting record was not very good. Maysonet had a decent season in 2008 at Corpus Christi, but was pretty terrible at Round Rock last season. That could be him reacting to shuttling back and forth from Triple-A to the majors. That could be because he's not ready to hit high-level pitching. Only time will tell.

Tommy Manzella, SS

2009 Season Stats: 5 PA, .200/.200/.200, 0 doubles, 0 triples, 0 HR, 0 runs, 0 RBIs, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 4 strikeouts, 7 OPS+

WAR: 0.0

UZR: -11.6

VORP: -0.5

Notes: The Great Shortstop Hope will be 27 next season and hasn't made a dent in the big leagues yet. There were a couple stories in September about how Manzella was learning from Tejada and soaking it all in, but he still needs to play. Manzella was a very consistent hitter for Round Rock in 2009, batting .289/.339/.417 in 133 games. The one good thing? Manzella is a horse, playing 521 games over the past five seasons in the minors. His defense is good, but it's hard to quantify how good it will be in the majors. In all likelihood, Manzella will be given every chance to be the everyday shortstop next season.

Chris Johnson, 3B

2009 Season Stats: 23 PA, .091/.130/.091, 0 doubles, 0 triples, 0 HR, 1 run, 1 RBI, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 6 strikeouts, -39 OPS+

WAR:-0.4

UZR: -34.9

VORP: -4.2

Notes: Johnson is one of the few Astros prospects I'm not that high on. He gets a lot of credit for being a power hitter, but only hit 13 home runs last season and averaged 10 homers per year in his minor league career. His defense at third is just passable, but probably could be as good as Blum, given time. The question is: is this Astros team ready to take a chance on a young player going through growing pains at the big league level? It's going to take an adjustment for Johnson to be a productive big league hitter, and I'm not sure the Astros can be patient enough for that to happen.

Chris Coste, Util

2009 Season Stats: 112 PA, .204/.259/.252, 5 doubles, 0 triples, 0 HR, 3 runs, 10 RBIs, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 28 strikeouts, 37 OPS+

WAR: -0.5

UZR: -10.9

VORP: -8.1

Notes: After being picked up off waivers on July 10, Coste started a bunch of games when Lance Berkman was injured and then Ivan Rodriguez was traded to the Rangers. The problem is Coste just wasn't that good, either offensively or defensively. Coste didn't hit for much power in his brief stint with the team, but did manage to strike out a ton. So he's got that going for him, which is nice. Seriously, though, by whichever metric you look at, Coste is the prototypical replacement-level player. He's only on the roster because there aren't better options. Hopefully that will change in the off-season.

Matt Kata, Util

2009 Season Stats: 52 PA, .200/.212/.220, 1 double, 0 triple, 0 HR, 2 runs, 5 RBIs, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 5 strikeouts, 16 OPS+

WAR: -0.1

UZR: 8.7

VORP: -4.8

Notes: Kata was more useful for his versatility off the bench than his play. As I mentioned at the top, I don't account much for UZR as the ONLY defensive metric to analyze things, especially when we have to extrapolate it out based on small sample sizes. Still, it appears Kata was at least a decent defensive asset on the bench this season. He's now a free agent.

Jason Smith, Util

2009 Season Stats: 27 PA, .000/.000/.000, 0 doubles, 0 triples, 0 HR, 1 run, 1 RBI, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 9 strikeouts, -100 OPS+

WAR: -0.6

UZR: 21.6

VORP: -7.4

Notes: Smith didn't get much of a chance to show anything at the big league level. What he did show wasn't good. Smith did better with Round Rock, but is probably best suited as a utility guy on the end of a bench. Smith is a free agent and probably won't be back with Round Rock.

Aaron Boone, 3B

2009 Season Stats: 14 PA, .000/.071/.000, 0 doubles, 0 triples, 0 HR, 0 runs, 0 RBIs, 0 for 0 stolen bases, 2 strikeouts, -79 OPS+

WAR: -0.3

UZR: 15.9

VORP: -3.4

Notes: Not much to say here, other than for a guy to go through what Boone did in spring training and still get 14 plate appearances in the same season...well, that's just impressive.

A little of this, a little of that: What the Astros offense can borrow from MLB's best teams

HighLeveragePerformer — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 11:00:29 -0000

More photos » by Matt Slocum - AP

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Earlier this week, Beyond the Boxscore came out with its final Power Rankings of the season and the results are not pretty for Astros' fans. 28th in baseball overall, with periphery statistics that are dreadful.

While there may be other teams that rival the Astros' ineptitude in hitting, pitching and defense, most teams manage to at least be competent in at least one of those areas, whereas our Astros are at the bottom in all three. Remember, AL teams are rewarded in their rankings, and NL clubs are punished for the differences in league strength. Our pitching numbers don't look so bad going up and down the line, until you realize that the AL teams had to deal with a lot more in the way of offensive talent than Astros hurlers did.

Offensively, a collection of players that struggled to both get on base and hit for much power stopped the team before it could even get started. By God the Astros were clutch, though. Don't get too excited, however. That just means our offense managed to produce more than they were expected to, given our run scoring opportunities and propensity to collect certain types of hits. A team like ours that doesn't score a lot of runs via the home run is expected to score a lot. We managed to buck that trend, due in small part because our cumulative baserunning score wasn't as terrible as other teams.

Suffice it to say, the Astros don't have a lot of bright spots as of right now. Of course, that's why teams have off seasons- to get recooperate (no, no, not bring back Cooper- you can all settle down), replenish the reserves, and to give GMs a chance to put their Ivy League educations to use trying to one up each other.

What should the Astros do, in terms of player utilization/talent maximization, to improve themselves most efficiently? I think that like in most fields, baseball teams should do their best to build their own team in the same manner as those franchises which are the most successful.

This is easy to say, and much more difficult to actually accomplish, due to the fact that there is no salary cap in baseball, and with so many players on so many different levels within one organization, it's tougher to mimic the Boston Red Sox and Philadelphia Phillies of the world than it would be for the Oakland Raiders to mimic the New England Patriots. Building a consistent winner in MLB takes time. A fact of life we ought to get used to.

Incremental changes can be made to this team in the 2010 offseason so that our climb up the rankings doesn't have to be so painful or so long in duration. That's not to say that Ed Wade can snap his fingers and make the Astros improve in certain areas. Far from it. There needs to be an organization-wide emphasis on certain statistics that give teams the best shot at competing into October. Simply stated- the Astros don't have many players who fit the bill in the categories that have the highest correlation with success in MLB.

Offensive:

BB/K: 5 out of the top 10 teams in BB/K made the playoffs

ISO (Isolated Slugging): Again 5 out of the top 10 teams in ISO made the playoffs

What can the Astros do to improve themselves in this regard? Well, not much as of now. Up and down the lineup, only Michael Bourn and Lance Berkman have shown the tendency to take walks. Carlos Lee and Miguel Tejada were completely dependent on their batting averages (and therefore BABIP) to keep their OBPs afloat. Hunter Pence showed the ability to be more patient than he was in 2008, but it's all relative.

With Miguel Tejada's future as an Astro in question, and Tommy Manzella most likely making a move to SS, it doesn't appear that our chances improve with one player substitution will improve dramatically. Manzella will most likely struggle at the plate and has never been the most patient of hitters even in the minors. Chris Johnson needs more time in AAA, and would most likely be a disaster if he was forced to be our everyday third baseman in 2010. Russell Braynan, among free agents, has played third base and would be an upgrade in both OBP and SLG%. True, his defense would be a drawback, but as I said earlier, there will be no cure alls available for the Astros. Plug him in for a year, he won't cost the team any draft picks, and see if he can hold down the fort until better alternatives come along.

JR Towles' MLB equivalent line from Baseball Prospectus projects him to be very respectable offensively in 2010. An OPS in the mid .700s would be much preferred than any free agent, or the idea of forcing Jason Castro into the mix right off the bat.

The outfield is pretty much set. Taking out Jason Michaels, Darin Erstad and even Aaron Boone and inserted competent players who will actually make pitchers earn outs will do wonders for a bench that was most certainly worth negative dollars in 2009. Asking anything more from Michael Bourn may seem greedy, but I think it's reasonable to believe that he can become an even better outfielder, base runner and hitter. With patience comes power, and while it's unrealistic to believe Mike will ever hit even 10 home runs in a season, but adding to his doubles total is a definite possibility.

Hunter Pence is still in the infancy of his career, and more will have to be asked of him in the future. Being a more selective base runner, altering his approach at the plate to allow for more productive at bats are keys to his ascendancy in the hierarchy of NL outfielders. Far too often Hunter will be taken out of at bats, left only to protect the outside of the plate against sliders. Remedying this flaw in his game would do wonders to up our run production and on base average.

Roster Breakdown: The Money

davoag — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 21:12:42 -0000

I mentioned there would be a more in-depth look a the Astros 2009 roster today and this is the first part of that attempt. My plan is to look at three different phases of the roster, starting with the monetary worth of all the players, followed by how the position players performed and then how the pitchers did. Hopefully, by knowing what the Astros were last year, it will help predict what they need to do in 2010 to be successful. Onward and upward after the jump...

Helped by the wonderful people over at FanGraphs, I charted the Astros entire roster on both their value in dollar amounts and their actual salaries, which I got from Cot's Baseball Contracts. I added all of them up to get the team's total value for the season and how much money they actually spent. I should also note before we dive into analysis that I adjusted the pitcher's values for their batting, which I'll talk about more in a minute.

The Astros players performed at a value worth 95.2 million this season, while the payroll came in around 106.2 million. This means the team underperformed the payroll by about 11 million dollars. I was a little surprised at this, as I mentioned yesterday in the Dave Clark story, the Astros outperformed their pythag record by six wins. I thought this might translate into value for the club. It did, but not to the extent I expected.

In fact, if we discounted the pitchers' batting, the team would have outperformed payroll by about 7 million, but some of the pitchers, like Oswalt, Wandy and especially Moehler, all were hugely affected by poor batting. Moehler went from one of the few bargains on the team to being one of the biggest detriments. Oswalt also underperformed his contract by about 3.7 million, though he was one of a handful of Astros to contribute double-figure value.

On the plus side, Michael Bourn and Hunter Pence combined to produce 33.9 million of the Astros overall 95 million value. Both are playing on pre-arbitration contracts, so were the two biggest values on the team. Wandy was also a huge value, adding 11.8 million over his 2.6 million dollar contract, but lost 3.8 million because of his hitting. That seemed a bit high to me, but as I thought about it more, the only way pitchers can't hurt their team batting-wise is to pitch in the American League, and I'm not sure Wandy would have put up the same value if he had pitched in the tougher league.

Who else were values? Jeff Fulchino came in fourth, with a 3.2 million positive difference, while Mike Hampton was fifth at 2.6 million. It also didn't hurt that Hampy added 0.8 million with his bat. Chris Sampson and Alberto Arias were the next two on the list and the last two that topped 2 million in positive difference between their contracts and their worth. Anther surprise for me was Edwin Maysonet outperforming his contract by one million.

The other side of that coin is the guys who underperform, and the worst at that was Carlos Lee. At -7.9 million, he had the biggest negative difference on the team. The only two players coming close to that were Darin Erstad and Jose Valverde, who both clocked in with negative-5 differences. Doug Brocail and Tim Byrdak were the next two on the bottom, followed by Geoff Geary and Roy Oswalt. The reason so many of these guys are relievers is that their salary greatly exceeded their worth. In fact, the only one who added positive value to the team was Valverde at 3 million. Quick shot analysis of this is that relievers really are fungible, so it's silly to pay more than a million dollars for all but the best closers. Otherwise, you're wasting monetary resources on a position you can fill many different ways.

As for Lee, that contract is an absolute albatross. His hitting is great and all, but his defense hurts the club out in left field and he won't always hit like he's doing now. On the current open market, you can definitely find a bargain that can hit 30 homers and bat .280 for left field without spending 10 million per year, much less the 18.5 Lee earned in 2009.

That's all the analysis I'm going to do now, because I'll get into more detailed looks at player performance later, but I've included the data I used for the entire team for you to peruse below. Look for more posts on the managerial hiring process too as we get more information.

	WAR	Salary	Difference
Bourn	18.700	0.435	18.265
Pence	15.200	0.439	14.761
W. Rodriguez	14.400	2.600	11.800
Fulchino	3.600	0.400	3.200
Hampton	4.600	2.000	2.600
Sampson	2.700	0.449	2.251
Arias	2.500	0.402	2.099
Quintero	2.300	0.610	1.690
Rodriguez	3.100	1.500	1.600
Gervacio	1.900	0.400	1.500
Blum	2.600	1.200	1.400
Keppinger	1.700	0.428	1.273
Maysonet	1.400	0.400	1.000
Norris	0.400	0.400	0.000
Sadler	0.000	0.402	-0.402
Towles	0.000	0.402	-0.402
Manzella	-0.200	0.400	-0.600
Kata	-0.300	0.400	-0.700
Berkman	13.600	14.500	-0.900
Tejada	11.800	13.000	-1.200
Paronto	-1.100	0.500	-1.600
Bazardo	-1.200	0.405	-1.605
Ortiz	-1.100	0.750	-1.850
Michaels	-1.200	0.750	-1.950
Boone	-1.200	0.750	-1.950
Lopez	-1.600	0.400	-2.000
Hawkins	1.500	3.500	-2.000
Johnson	-2.000	0.375	-2.375
Moehler	-0.200	2.300	-2.500
Wright	-2.100	0.425	-2.525
Matsui	2.400	5.000	-2.600
Coste	-2.500	0.460	-2.960
Backe	-1.500	1.500	-3.000
Paulino	-2.600	0.405	-3.005
Smith	-2.800	0.500	-3.300
Oswalt	10.300	14.000	-3.700
Geary	-2.000	1.700	-3.700
Byrdak	-3.200	1.000	-4.200
Brocail	-2.200	2.500	-4.700
Valverde	3.000	8.000	-5.000
Erstad	-4.100	1.750	-5.850
Lee	10.600	18.500	-7.900

Thursday Midday Astros, etc Round Up

HighLeveragePerformer — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 16:50:03 -0000

More photos » by Pat Sullivan - AP

Budddddddddd.

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Ed Wade has two pages chock full of people who want to manage the Astros. One of the more interesting names that has been bandied about, Dave Duncan, isn't one of them. It would have been interesting to have Duncan in the mix, seeing as how he's worked side by side with TLR all these years in both Oakland and St. Louis.

Richard Justice points out that Drayton McLane's Astros have been a well run franchise. Obviously the biggest reason to think otherwise has been his neglect of the farm system and unwillingness to spend the necessary money on draft picks in the past. If Ed Wade truly has convinced McLane that it's wise to invest in the farm system, and that to fail to do so assures either the need for a high payroll or a lousy record, then this team may be able to break this recent pattern of poor drafting and struggling big league teams.

Baseball Prospectus gives a pretty even handed assessment of the Astros, suggesting that the future ain't so bright around Houston. They give the usual suggestion to trade Lance Berkman and Roy Oswalt, and also mention Darin Erstad, Brandon Backe and Jason Michaels more than probably need be, but such is their way I suppose.

The United States has clinched the top spot in the Baseball World Cup! Kudos to our young ballplayers for dominating thus far. Sadly, one player who hasn't been dominating is Mr. Jason Castro, who sports a .095 batting average in six games. That's ok, Jason- JR Towles can't do much better over here.

My thought of the day: This economic crisis the country has had to battle for the past year or so has seen large companies basically taken over by the government to ensure that reckless decision making is kept to a minimum. Now, I'm not trying to make a political statement or anything, but I think this is an interesting idea to apply...not necessarily to the economy, but to MLB teams.

Take the Astros, for instance. For years, the Astros mismanaged the amateur draft like an AIG executive looking at a balance sheet. Look at the Astros now. A shell of our former, once respectable selves. What can happen to change this? Why not let MLB make decisions for the Astros? Buy out the bad parts of the team, back all decisions with the security of the MLB brand and dig us out the hole. Once operations return to normal, pick us a new owner, and let us free. It's like nursing an injured animal back to health. Or hell, what if the Astros made an agreement with Tampa or Atlanta or Oakland to allow their GM to somehow help the decision making process in return for a prospect here, or a Roy Oswalt there? Just a thought.

Building a team the Astros way, and building a team the smart way

HighLeveragePerformer — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 11:00:29 -0000

More photos » by Jeff Roberson - AP

An entire outfield of 2009 free agents could be assembled, make less money than Carlos combined and out produce him dramatically.

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The Astros are going to have to indulge in the free agent market of 2010 in order to field a competitive team next season. I don't think that anyone here would try to argue that point. How and who are the two questions that go along with free agent signings, as in how much to spend, and who to sign?

Well, it's still too early to really get down to the nitty gritty of things, but what we can do is look back and identify bargains and trends in the marketplace. Sky Andrecheck of Baseball Analysts did just that in a recent post which looked at the free agent class of 2009 and built a team from those players. He describes his experiment much better than I ever could, but suffice it to say, bargains do exist.

Who did he select to be a part of the club?

Catchers: Gregg Zaun, David Ross

Infielders: Wes Helms, Felipe Lopez, Casey Blake, Juan Uribe Craig Counsell

Total $ spent: $15.3 million, Total WAR: 13.1

Outfielders/DH: Bobby Abreu, Juan Rivera, Scott Podsednik, Raul Ibanez

Total $ spent: $35 million, Total WAR: 23.6

Starting Pitchers: Mike Hampton, Brad Penny, Carl Pavano, Randy Wolf, CC Sabathia

Total $ spent: $78.8 million, Total WAR: 35.3

That club is good for a 71-49 record through 120 games, solid enough for a playoff spot. Bargains are easier to find offensively than in pitching, so the Sabathia signing was by leaps and bounds the most outlandish contract he chose to take on.

Painfully, let's determine the Astros' team WAR, or at least a rough approximation of it.

Offensively: The entire Astros' offense (not counting the negative values that most of our pitchers/bench has contributed) is good for a WAR of 15.1. Unlike the all free agent team, the Astros offense has gotten 43% of its output from two players: Lance Berkman and Michael Bourn.

Sort of a "fun" sidenote: Pudge's WAR in total is .8, while his Astro-WAR is .6. He's added .2 WAR since joining the Rangers....less than 2 weeks ago.

Pitching: Just counting our starting pitchers' contributions, including the negative WARs for Brandon Backe and Felipe Paulino, the staff WAR is 7.5. Add it all up, and the Astros have a 22.6 team WAR, 12.7 wins less than Andrecheck's fictitious club. Drayton McLane has also spent roughly $20 million more on the players who I used in this article, not counting fairly large contracts for relievers like LaTroy Hawkins, Doug Brocail and Tim Byrdak, and bench players like Jason Michaels and Darin Erstad.

I come to the same conclusion as Andrecheck does: it's possible to build a playoff contender just in free agency, but it's too difficult without being able to look back on things. There are plenty of ways to be successful in MLB, but it's becoming obvious that the Astros aren't doing any of them.

Vladimir Guerrero 8th Angel with 1000 Hits

Rev Halofan — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 01:32:41 -0000

More photos » by Marcio Jose Sanchez - AP

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Wednesday afternoon's Angels victory saw a rare feat occur: Designated Hitter Vladimir Guerrero recorded his 1,000th hit as an Angel, becoming the 8th player in franchise history to accomplish this feat. The 34-year-old All Star hit a 5th inning single off of Detroit's Edwin Jackson.

We have compiled a list of the 8 Angels with a thousand hits after the page break. Before you click to see the list, try a few guesses, it is not as easy to get right as you might think.

Vlad is actually the 2nd player to join the 1-K-Halo Club this season, as Chone Figgins was a week ahead of him in breaking up the Gang of Six.

Garret Anderson - 2,368
Tim Salmon - 1,624
Brian Downing - 1,588
Darin Erstad - 1,505
Jim Fregosi - 1,408
Bobby Grich - 1,109
Chone Figgins - 1,009
Vladimir Guerrero - 1,000

Torii Hunter Returns Triumphant; Angels Down O's in Extras

Rev Halofan — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 22:05:33 -0000

More photos » by Rob Carr - AP

T O R i i

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Final Score in 13 Innings in Baltimore: Angels 17, Orioles 8

After a month+ on the disabled list Angels All Star Centerfielder Torii Hunter returned to the lineup and had a clutch base hit in the top of the 13th inning to open the scoring floodgates for the Angels on Sunday afternoon after their starting pitching and reliable relievers had allowed the Orioles back into the game on three separate occasions.

(Try to write a better run on sentence than that without cutting and pasting a Steve Physioc mid-at-bat anecdote of a game other than the one he is being paid to describe)

Angels starter Sean O'Sullivan blew a 4-run lead and had to be relieved by Matt Palmer with nobody out and 2 runs across in the 6th inning. Darren Oliver pitched 1.1 scoreless to take the Angels and a two run lead into the 8th.

Palmer was in line for his 10th win of the season but Kevin Jepsen let one run come in during the 8th and Brian Fuentes let another one in during the 9th inning for his 5th Blown Save of the season. One of the outs Fuentes recorded was an Adam Jones bomb to the warning track caught by Juan Rivera to score the tying run as a sac fly, but, well, it was scary.

In extra innings, though, the Halo arms got serious. Jose Arredondo pitched 2 scoreless frames of 2 hit, 2K ball and Jason Bulger tossed the 12th and 13th for the Win.

Chone Figgins went 4 for 7 with 3 runs scored and 3 RBI. Erick Aybar scored 2 and had 3 RBIs as well in a 3 for 6 afternoon effort. The Angels loaded the bases at will in extra innings only to see each effort end in a disheartening double play, but finally they broke thru.

In addition to being responsible for creating 6 runs in the game, Figgy had the 1,000th hit of his career in the game. He is only the 7th Angel with at least that many hits. Vladimir Guerrero has 987 so, expect another party by the end of the week. Guerrero had Sunday off.

The other six Angels with more than 1,000 hits under the Halo are: Garret Anderson (2368), Tim Salmon (1674), Brian Downing (1588), Darin Erstad (1505), Jim Fregosi (1408) and Bobby Grich (1102).

Poll

Panther of the Game

Arredondo

76 votes

Aybar

15 votes

Bulger

74 votes

Figgins

137 votes

Hunter

100 votes

402 votes | Poll has closed