I'm in the Chicago area for the next two weeks for my younger brother's graduation. My whole family went to the Cubs / Red Sox game last night (Tim Wakefield vs. Glendon Rusch), which the Red Sox won easily thanks to the offensive force that is Kevin Youkilis. You might have heard of him as The Greek God of Walks, which he is called in "Moneyball" because of his extremely high OBP's in the minor leagues. Oh, and he was my brother's "player of the game" - we each pick a guy (usually an unknown - it's more interesting that way) that we think is going to have a good game. He picked Youkilis, who was 3-for-5 with a single, double, and HR - I picked Jason DuBois, who was 0-for-4 with an error. Yikes.

Roy Oswalt dominated the Blue Jays last night, allowing 2 hits and 0 walks in 9 shutout innings. I believe that lowered his season ERA to 2.85, which is damn, damn good. Jason Lane continued his recent extra-base-hit barrage with another HR, and Willy Taveras (who has raised his average 50 points in his last 10 games or so) was 3-for-4. I think I already said this, but I I've been a little harsh on Taveras - compared to a guy like Chris Burke, who is 25 and has already had a huge year in AAA, doing what Taveras is doing (hitting .297 / .336 / .392 with 17 SB / 3 CS)at the age of 23 while skipping AAA entirely is impressive.

Well, we're off to breakfast with the folks. The 'Stros start a 3-game set against the Orioles today - we'll see if we can keep that offense in check.

After taking 2 out of 3 from the Mets in NY (a road series win??), it is clear what the Astros need to do:

SIGN JOSH PHELPS!

The former Baseball Prospectus cover boy has had a rough few years, and was released a few days ago by the Devil Rays (from great prospect to being released by the D-Rays....ouch). However, he was hitting .266 / .328 / .424, which isn't all that bad, and he has a career 857 OPS against lefties. My preference would be to move Berkman back to LF (his natural position), and platoon Todd Self and Phelps at 1B (their natural positions). This makes Chris Burke a backup again, but I'm sure Garner can give Berkman, Lane, Biggio, and our 1B platoon the occasional day off to play Burke. Heck, I wouldn't mind seeing a Burke / Lane / Berkman OF, though it would be rough defensively. It's looking more and more to me that Taveras is overmatched my major-league pitching.

Anyway, Phelps is only 27, he's cheap, and he can rake against lefties. What's not to like?

The Astros lost yesterday's game 11-9, battling back after a 9-1 deficit through 3 innings. Rookie starter Wandy Rodriguez gave up all 9 of those earned runs. He seems to have the same problem as Ezequiel Astacio - good control, good strikeout potential...very, very hittable. They're both young, though. It was good to see our offense get going - Morgan Ensberg had a solo HR, Lance Berkman had a 2-run HR, Chris Burke had 2 doubles, etc.

Things looked bleak for the Astros about 15 minutes into the game today - Roger Clemens gave up 3 runs in the 1st, and we've scored a total of 18 runs in his 11 starts. But a 5-run 1st, highlighted by back-to-back HR's by Ensberg / Lane, gave us a lead we wouldn't relinquish. Willy Taveras left the game with an apparent hamstring injury, making an interesting question out of "Who's our CF tomorrow?" Palmeiro? Lane? Self? We'll see.

St. Louis 2, Houston 0 (Shutout #10)

Game Notes

- Willy Taveras missed a squeeze bunt with runners on the corners and 1 out, leaving Adam Everett (who went 3-for-3) stranded between 3rd and home. He pulled the bat back to bunt the ball, but then inexplicably decided not to bunt the ball. After a solid start to the season, Taveras has dropped down to a 640 OPS, and in my opinion would be best utilized as a pinch runner / defensive replacement. Unfortunately, we can't do that, unless we want to put Lane in CF and give up on defense. Look for a lot more Taveras and little offensive improvement.

- Andy Pettitte pitched out of trouble several times, and ended up with a very solid 7 IP / 5 H / 1 ER / 0 BB / 5 K line. He's pitched quite well lately, and he actually might be more attractive trade bait than the 18 million dollar man, Roger Clemens. Pettitte is also not likely to be part of the next contending Astros team, so while it would be nice to have him around, it might be a good idea to see what we could get for him.

- Todd Self went to 3-2 counts in his 3 plate apperances. Although he went 0-for-3, he made Carpenter throw a combined 25 pitches at least in those 3 AB's. Mike Lamb pinch-hit for Self in the 8th and flied to RF on the 1st pitch. If Self can keep battling pitchers like that, he's sure to put up a decent BA and OBP. He looks infinitely more comfortable than Chris Burke, who (to my untrained eye), appears to be flailing at every pitch he swings at. Maybe that's just his style, but it doesn't like an effective one.

- Brad Ausmus lined out hard to Pujols and So Taguchi in RBI situations. As overrated as Ausmus is, he's been swinging the bat better lately, and currently has a .325 OBP, better than Taveras, Everett, Viz, Lamb, and Lane.

- Russ Springer: 1 pitch, 1 450-foot blast to Albert Pujols. A 5-pitch walk to Reggie Sanders. A hard-hit GIDP from Grudzielanek on a 2-0 count. An Abe Nunez flyout. Springer had an 8.62 ERA coming into today's game; how much longer is he going to last?

- Bottom of the 9th inning: Berkman singles, Ensberg K's looking (sometimes, like when you're 3 outs away from a loss and you're down 2 strikes, you NEED to swing at anything close, Morgan), Chris Burke lines to 3B for a double play. It's fitting the game ends like that - we hit a number of balls hard but right at Cardinals.

This morning, I'll be watching the Roger Federer vs. Rafael Nadal match in the French Open semifinals. Should be a good one.

It's Carpenter vs. Pettitte tonight. Quintero's debut will have to wait, since Garner has said he's going to have Quintero catch Rodriguez and Oswalt. I'm really looking forward to seeing Quintero's bat and arm. It might be nice to get an occasional extra-base hit from our catcher. Hopefully Jason Lane gets some playing time, with either Self or Burke in LF.

There have been some Clemens-to-the-Rangers rumors lately. Texas certainly has more prospects to offer than the Yankees if we do decide to trade Clemens. I don't know what else to say about this, except it's just a rumor, so it's not that big a deal yet.

I agree with the comments from my previous post - it seems strange to play your top prospects at positions they're unfamiliar with (Burke in LF, Self in RF). I don't really understand it myself. Packaging Biggio with Clemens to NY makes sense on paper, but I just don't see Biggio getting traded. It would be a good move for us, freeing up space for Burke, Lane, and Self, but I just don't see it happening.

Although I haven't seen Wandy Rodriguez pitch yet, I'm impressed by his 1 / 11 walk-to-strikeout ratio through 2 starts. He's been hittable, but if he keeps that ratio solid, he should be all right. Of course, I said the same thing about Ezequiel Astacio, but it's hard to put up good numbers when you give up 10 HR in 19 IP.

Well, the Grand Canyon is still there, and still pretty grand. I'm back from my first river trip of the season; what did I miss?

Humberto Quintero has been called up to replace Raul Chavez, who is out of options and is likely to be released. Sweet! Quintero was hitting .299 with 7 HR and 28 RBI at Round Rock, he's just 25, and he's slated to keep catching Roy Oswalt and Wandy Rodriguez, who I guess is our 5th starter now? Is Astacio our long reliever out of the bullpen?

Our OF last night was Chris Burke / Willy Taveras / Todd Self. I like the idea of getting our rookies plenty of playing time, but it seems strange to have a 2B as our LF and a 1B as our RF. If we're going to play Berkman, why not let him play RF and Self play 1B. Actually, why not play Jason Lane? Yes, he's going through a slump, but does he really deserve to lose starts to two rookies who aren't OF's to begin with? Lane's still slugging .450, and he had a big pinch-hit 2 run double last night - let the man play.

I read something before I left that I forgot to talk about - Phil Garner says he doesn't want to 'wear the rookies out' too early in the season. Um, Phil...who's more likely to wear down: a 25 year old rookie or a 39 year old second baseman who has seen his offense drop after the All Star Break for 2 straight years? Give Biggio more days off, especially if Chris Burke is now on the team.

Good to see Lance Berkman is starting to get his swing back a little bit. Although he struck out looking with the bases loaded and 0 outs in the 1st inning, he had a walk and a HR in his next 2 AB's, and he was 2-3 with a walk in yesterday's game. Keep it up, Lance.

Well, that's all for now. Comment on stuff that I've missed these past 10 days, so I can catch up.

Yesterday's 7-6 loss to the D-Backs was 'encouraging', if you can ever call a loss that. Andy Pettitte was knocked around, with a

5 IP
11 H
1 BB
4 K
7 ER

line.

But then the bullpen came in and did a nice job, with Harville, Qualls, Burns, and Astacio combining for 4 IP and 0 ER. (Mike Burns had looked excellent so far, and I like the 'inventiveness' of having Astacio pitch an inning in what is essentially a bullpen session day for him. Speaking of Astacio, his ERA isn't pretty at 6.88, but his 4-to-17 walk to strikeout ratio is impressive for a 25 year old.)

And the offense showed signs of life late, led by Palmeiro and Biggio's 3 hits, Mike Lamb's 3 walks, and Todd Self's 2 run PH homer in his first major league plate appearance (Congrats, Todd!) The 'Stros loaded the bases in the 9th inning with 2 outs, but Adam Everett lined out hard to Troy Glaus, and that was that.

Couple of news and notes:

Phil Garner says Jason Lane and Orlando Palmeiro will be splitting time. This a blow to my fantasy team, but I don't disagree with it at this point - Lane has seen his late-April 1000 OPS drop all the way down to 707, and his .281 OBP is awful. He's going through the first 'slump' of his career (only because he hasn't played enough in the past to have a real slump), so it makes sense to play Palmeiro a little more (you can't argue with his 349 / 396 / 488 line and solid defense) while Lane works through some kinks. I just hope that Lane wins back the job fairly soon, since Palmeiro is much better suited to a 4th or 5th OF role.

Craig Biggio continues to stay hot with 3 hits last night, but I can't help but be concerned about his playing time. So far he has played in 38 of the Astros' 39 games; the last two years, he's played in 153 and 156 of a possible 162 games. And in those past two years, his OPS has fallen from 775 pre-All Star Break to 744 post-All Star Break in 2003 and 843 to 759 in 2004. In other words, Biggio is 39 years old, and playing a difficult defensive position - he needs more days off, because it's clear that he has worn down in the 2nd half the past two years. This is where Chris Burke could come in handy; unfortunately, he's in AAA. So as much as I hate to do this, I think we need to give Viz (or Bruntlett, I guess) at least a weekly start at 2B. Otherwise we could be looking at an exhausted Biggio in August and September.

Lance Berkman is starting to make me just a little nervous. I'm confident he'll be fine, but he's late on everything - 90 mph fastballs down the middle of the plate become foul balls into the LF stands. He's still only had 34 AB's this season, so he's got plenty of time to pick it up, but if his bat slows down just a little bit, that 6 year / 85 million dollar deal may not be such a bargain; Lance is already 29 years old.

Mike Lamb is still struggling, so I'd like Todd Self to get a few starts at 1B, but I have to give Lamb credit for some tough AB's last night - he drew 3 walks, and saw at least 8/9 pitches or so in all of them. I expect him to bounce back to his career 745 OPS; I just hope it's as a backup corner infielder / pinch-hitter than as our starting 1B for the entire season.

Adam Everett is looking better at the plate - he had 2 hits last night, and could have easily had 4 - his liner to Troy Glaus ended the game, and he also lined out to CF. I hope he keeps hitting hard ground balls and line drives, because early on in the season he kept hitting weak flyballs and popouts; not what you want to see from a guy with his speed. Willy Taveras is sometimes guilty of this same thing. His swing looks a little long to me,

Speaking of speed, how come Everett has fewer SB attempts (4) than Biggio, Lane, and Ensberg?

I had almost forgotten about Nomah! when it comes to next year's FA crop. He'll be an interesting case this offseason - who's going to want to give him a multi-year deal with his injury concerns? I'd love a similar one-year + incentives deal that the Cubs gave him this year. Sign him and Ramon Hernandez, and you've got an offense again.

After thinking about it, I agree with Scott Barzilla's comment in the last thread - we don't need to trade for Sweeney. Even with him, we're not a contending team this year. What we do need is to sign or trade for free agents in positions that we are weak at - currently, it looks like catcher and shortstop fit the bill. Ramon Hernandez is certainly the best FA catcher available this offseason (Jason LaRue a distant 2nd), and Rafael Furcal and my dark-horse favorite Placido Polanco (yes, he can play SS) are free agents at SS. Maybe insurance will cover some of Bagwell's contract if he can't come back, and we could sign one or two of those guys. Perhaps the ideal situation is this: I've read that the Phillies are interested in trading Placido Polanco and Ryan Howard as a packaged deal (they should be; they have Chase Utley and Jim Thome at 2B and 1B). It would probably take quite a bit to trade for that package, but that's a hell of a bounty - one of the more underrated players in baseball in Polanco, and one of the best 1B prospects in the game in Ryan Howard. I'm not exactly sure what the Phillies need (bullpen help? Starting pitching?), but we should be on the phone trying to find out.

Tonight's lineup:

Taveras / Lamb / Biggio / Berkman / Ensberg / Lane / Everett / Chavez / Oswalt

I guess Lamb is a decent fit at the #2 spot - he rips fastballs, and he might see a few more hitting 2nd. I really hope Jason Lane gets it going soon - we need a 850 OPS from him.

The trade-for-Mike-Sweeney idea has hit a snag - he's signed through 2007, and his contract increases if he's traded. I still think he'd be a perfect fit, but it looks a lot less likely.

However, as is evidenced by the Pirates's recent claiming of Mike Restovich off waivers, there is no shortage of right-handed hitters who can play arguably the easiest defensive position there is (1B) and put up some solid offensive numbers. There's no need to break the bank looking for one. I guess the silver lining to Bagwell's injury is Morgan Ensberg can finally rest easy knowing that he should start pretty much every game at 3B this year, barring injury.

GM Tim Purpura has made, in my opinion, some solid 'cheap' moves in the last month or so, nabbing Tom Martin, Brooks Kieschnick, and Humberto Quintero in the Tim Redding trade. Here's hoping he can make at least one more, and find a cheap RH bat to platoon with Lamb and Self at 1B.

I almost forgot hidden option #5 at 1B: Trade for Mike Sweeney!

I can't take credit for the idea - this was posted on the Astros ESPN forum, but I kind of like it. The Royals are unspeakably awful this year, and Sweeney is making 11 million, so you'd think they'd trade him without much hesitation. Ideally we trade them something like Lamb and a decent prospect (Rodriguez? Gothreaux? Brooks Conrad? Luke Scott?) for Sweeney, and play Todd Self at 1B for Sweeney's inevitable injuries. Yeah, Sweeney's not worth 11 million, but as of right now we have a pretty gaping hole at 1B and the Royals should be pretty desperate. I think that Sweeney is only signed for one year, so if Bagwell is determined to come back, and I'm sure McLane will give him every opportunity to, he can come back next year to try and cement his Hall of Fame chances (he should be a lock anyway).

Joe Morgan and Jon Miller, the generally excellent ESPN Sunday Night Baseball announcers, mentioned the idea of trading Biggio to a contender that needs a 2B (Yankees?) at the deadline. I think it's an interesting idea, but it won't happen. McLane would never allow it - you don't trade players that you've built statues in honor of out front of the stadium. Clemens, maybe - Biggio, no.

Quite a game tonight - Brandon Backe pitches a 4-hit shutout, and Morgan Ensberg goes for 3 HR and 5 RBI!

Backe really had a serious curveball working tonight - if batters can't lay off it, he's going to rack up the K's. He really seems to feed off the crowd's energy at home - maybe that explains his ridiculous splits (4.26 ERA at home, 4 / 21 walk-to-strikeout ratio, 7.54 ERA away, 7 / 10)

Ensberg had a 3 run HR in the 1st (opposite field), and 2 solo shots to LF in the 5th and 8th innings. He's now hitting .325 / .419 / .581 (exactly a 1000 OPS) with 7 HR and 18 RBI, and is looking like the Ensberg of 2003. What's even more impressive is that he did this hitting in front of the fearsome foursome of Viz / AE / Ausmus / Backe. He has to move up in the batting order, hopefully to the 2 spot, because...otherwise....Palmeiro is going to start there a lot. And that might mean a lot of what happened in the 1st innings: Taveras walks. Palmeiro sac bunts to 2nd. It happened again in a later inning, but Taveras stole 2nd first, and Palmeiro sac bunted to 3rd. As good as our pitching has been, it is RARELY worth sacrificing an out for a base, particularly early on in the game. Jimy Williams was particularly fond of that move; I hope Garner doesn't make the same mistake his unpopular predecessor made.

However, the game was overshadowed by Jeff Bagwell's announcement that he will have shoulder surgery next week and will miss 3 months. I had mixed emotions upon hearing the news - Bagwell has been a great player for a long time, and we'll miss him, but if there was some kind of surgery that he could have had, why wouldn't he have had it earlier or during the offseason? Regardless, it's a shame that it has come to this. I honestly don't expect Bagwell to come back at all - will he want to hurry back if / when we're out of contention by the time he can play again?

The big question this brings up is who's on 1st? It looks like the options are:

Mike Lamb
Todd Self
Lance Berkman
Jose Vizcaino

I'm sure you can guess who I'm going to eliminate first - Viz is below-average offensively and defensively for a MIDDLE INFIELDER, much less a 1st baseman. Every box score that has Jose Vizcaino batting 5th or 6th as a 1B cuts me to the bone.

Of the next 3, I'm pretty tired of moving guys to positions they're not used to (Lamb as an OF, Viz as a 1B, Burke as a LF). So leave Lance Berkman in LF. That narrows it down to Lamb and Self. Man, I really wish they could platoon, but Self has the nerve of hitting lefty. He also has the nerve of putting up .400 OBP's wherever he goes, and he certainly has a better glove than Lamb. I think you see where I'm going here. However, it's true that Self has never played at the major league level before, so he should have an adjustment period. I can only hope that Garner will be patient with him, since Self could provide us with a much-needed OBP boost at the top of the lineup. But wait - you can't have your 1st baseman bat at the top - he has to be in an RBI spot! Well, the Dodgers seem to be doing ok with Hee Seop Choi batting 2nd.

Anyway, Lamb is a known commodity - he'll hit around .280 / .350 / .475 or so (his career average is .280 / .336 / .411, so I might even be overstating his case), which is pretty strong....for a pinch hitter, or a backup 3B. It's not great for a 1B. And his glove is rough. I'm not saying Self will be the next Bagwell, but he just might be the next Mark Grace, and put up something like .300 /.400 / .450. Man, I hope Self gets some playing time, because it's not like Mike Lamb is going to get any better.

I took the last few days off to finish up my 1st year in grad school at NAU; I needed to finish a take-home final and turn in final grades for 2 classes I teach. I've got a full week off until the family starts to arrive for some river rafting, so I'll try and post a little more often. Another great start for the Rocket last night - he had 10 K's through 5 innings and ended up going 8 strong. The offense was provided from a 2-run bomb from Biggio, hitting in the 3 spot, and Lance followed with a solo HR. I can't argue with batting Biggio 3rd; he's bee the 2nd best hitter on our team, behind...Morgan Ensberg. Do you really want a guy with a .403 OBP hitting 6th, in front of Everett, Ausmus, and the pitcher? Well, he was last night. That's dumb, Garner. Ensberg's currently at .301 / .402 / .487 and needs to move into the top 3. Hell, it wouldn't be the worst idea to bat him leadoff - Taveras is down to a .313 OBP.

Ensberg / Biggio / Berkman / Lane / Lamb / Everett / Taveras / Ausmus / P, while unorthodox, might be our best lineup, though looking at the 6-9 hitters makes my Honey Nut Cheerios want to come back up.

Here are some quotes that I finid interesting:

But Biggio is normally either a leadoff or No. 2 hitter. Why the change?

"I don't know what I'm doing," Garner said. "I'm just doing something different to see what happens."

I'm just picking on Garner here - I don't have a problem with Biggio batting 3rd. But change just for change's sake isn't the best way to manage.

"He's one of our best hitters, so if he gets an opportunity with more guys on base, it'll be better for us," Bagwell said. "I'm not really concerned about runs. What we're lookng for is RBI opportunties.

You're not really concerned about runs? RBI = runs. For RBI opportunities, we need guys to get on base in front of Biggio, which might not happen that often with Taveras and Palmeiro hitting in front of him.

I'll be very curious today to see who bats 2nd in between Taveras and Biggio. I'm hoping it's Ensberg - the only other guy I can see Garner putting there is Palmeiro or Everett, and if Palmeiro starts again, that's bad news for Jason Lane, who's on my fantasy team, and if Everett goes there, our top two hitters will both have sub-.315 OBP's. So put Ensberg there, Garner.

According to Rotoworld, the Astros released Brandon Duckworth and replaced him by bringing up Mike Burns from AAA. It's too bad Duckworth was pretty awful this year - I had hope that he'd be a league average 5th starter, giving Zeke Astacio some time at AAA, but it didn't happen. On the bright side, Mike Burns has been lights out both last year and this year, so he could provide some bullpen help. I'm not sure who our spot starter would be right now - we'd probably have to call someone up (Wandy Rodriguez?) Regardless, Burns is better than Russ Springer and John Franco. Again, the organization shows that it is not shy at all about bringing up top prospects (Astacio, Self, and now Burns). I wish Duckworth luck - he wasn't a good fit in Houston, but shit happens. I just hope that Self and Burns find a little playing time the next few weeks.

I took my last in-class final today; just need to turn in a take-home final tomorrow and I'm done with my 1st year of grad school. Then I've got a week off before a river trip.

Oh yeah, the Astros are still struggling. Our offense was shut down (big surprise) by Dontrelle Willis, and Andy Pettitte was oupitched tonight by the great Brad Hennessey. Morgan Ensberg stayed hot, going 1-for-2 with a HR and 2 walks, but he made two crucial errors, and our only other offense came from 2 Craig Biggio solo HR's. We're simply carrying too much dead weight in our offense to consistently win games. Just as a reminder,

Carlos Beltran
Jeff Kent
Jeff Bagwell
Lance Berkman

are the guys we're currently missing. Yes, I know Berkman is back, but he's not really back yet. It's hard to replace that much offense. Damn hard.

The pain must be pretty bad, because Jeff Bagwell has gone on the 15 day DL for the first time in quite a while. Todd Self was called up from Round Rock to replace Bagwell's spot on the roster. Note that the DL stint is retroactive to May 4, the first day Bagwell was out of the lineup. Baseball Prospectus likes Self but argues that it might have made more sense to call up a righty who can platoon with Lamb at 1st. Unfortunately, we don't have any good right-handed bats in the high minors at the moment. Plus I seem to recall Lamb doing a surprisingly adequate job against lefties both last year and this year.

Lineup for tonight's game against the Marlins, with OBP / SLG after:

Taveras (.320 / .336)
Biggio (.360 / .500)
Lamb (.309 / .486)
Berkman (.167 / .182)
Ensberg (.381 / .433)
Lane (.296 / .474)
Everett (.286 / .350)
Ausmus (.320 / .269)
Backe (.385 / .455)

Maybe Backe should be hitting 7th.

Lane needs to pick it up fast - a sub-.300 OBP from a corner OF isn't going to cut it.

Brad Ausmus will not slug .300 this year. I'm calling it now. 2 extra base hits in 67 AB so far this year.

Good news: The Rocket passes Steve Carlton on the all-time win list with 330.
Better news: Todd Self gets called up from AAA (see comments on the previous post for more info.)

Astros win 2-1 last night, as Orlando Palmeiro (who has really had an excellent start this year, and I would argue he's one of the better 5th OF's in baseball) had 2 RBI's.

Couple of interesting things about the game:

1. Lance Berkman started in LF, and Mike Lamb started at 1B, where I think both are much better suited than if the positions were reversed.

2. Morgan Ensberg went 1-for-3 with a walk, and is sporting a healthy .381 OBP. I wonder if there's any thought to moving him up in the lineup?

There are also a few quotes, both encouraging and discouraging, from a few Astros Daily links:

1) About Jeff Bagwell's shoulder

His arthritic right shoulder is dying a day at a time. He hasn't been able to throw for three years. Now he's having trouble swinging a bat. There's no indication it's going to get significantly better.
"I have no strength left in my shoulder," he said. "My shoulder has gotten weaker year after year after year. I just can't get the bat head to the ball like I could. The pain is always there."

I feel for the guy. As much as he's struggled the past few years, take a look at his career stats. You can't blame a guy for wanting to help his team any way he can. There just comes a point when it the best way to help the team is to step aside.

2) Phil Garner, on the offense:

"You can't generate runs if you don't get on base," Garner said.

YES!! YES!! YES!!!! Baserunners = runs! Out of any single batting statistic, OBP has the highest correlation to runs scored! I love it!

"I'll look on the scoreboard and it's the sixth inning and we have one hit."

Well, that's true...but getting on base isn't all about hits. This is nitpicky, so I'm going to give Garner credit for his first statement.

3) Garner, on the win-now mentality:

The Astros are in a different position than some teams that might get such a slow start and think about going with a youth movement, Garner said.
"Our owner wants to win the World Series," Garner said. "We don't have the luxury of letting [the younger players] learn to play. We've got to win right now. So that's our objective and our marching orders. We're not playing so someone can be good two years from now. That's not the objective."

I understand that it's early in the year, and hopes of winning the World Series are still alive. But let's be realistic here. We have exactly one hitter (Berkman) who is significantly above average offensively at his position. Yes, Biggio and Lane and Ensberg are all solid, and perhaps above average, but not by a lot. I'll grant that we have a strong front 3 in the rotation, and perhaps a strong front 3 in the pen (Lidge, Qualls, Wheeler), but this is not a playoff team. Which of the following teams are we better than: Cards, Cubs, Braves, Marlins, Phillies, Dodgers, Padres.

I would have to vote 0, in all honesty.

4) Adam Everett, on stealing:

Like Phil said, I've got to get on base first," said Everett, who is hitting .210. "It's one of those things. You hit a ball good, it's right at somebody. And you hit a ball good, they seem to catch it."

Everett hits on a big point here - one of the benefits to being a patient hitter is that your walk rate is often more stable than your batting average. Sometimes you're hitting liners right at guys; sometimes you're hitting bloopers and seeing-eye grounders. But if you're a patient hitter and work counts, you should generally be able to walk fairly often.

Backe vs. 'Scuffy' Brian Moehler tonight. Seems like a good night for the offense to do some damage, but I've said that before. I'll take Lane and Berkman getting going.

Catching platoon: Garner's plan for the remainder of the season is to split the playing time between Brad Ausmus and Raul Chavez at a 60-40 clip.

Ausmus will catch Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte and Brandon Backe, and Chavez will catch Ezequiel Astacio and Roy Oswalt.

Sad as it is to say, it will be a battle to see who has the lower OPS by the end of the season.
Last year: Ausmus - 631, Chavez - 515.
Through 29 games this year: Ausmus - 567, Chavez - 541
That sucks.

Oh, and I thought Todd Self, one of our better hitting prospects (.382 / .477 / .551 ) was a 1B, but apparently he's been playing right field also (It still lists him as an IF on the official roster, but he played RF tonight. Oh, and in case you're liking that stat line, note that Self is already 26 and it's in a hitter's park - Round Rock). It's looking more and more likely that Lance will move to 1B permanently when Bagwell retires, somewhat reducing his value, in my opinion.

Today: Atlanta 16, Houston 0.
For the 4-game sweep: Atlanta 38, Houston 8.

That's all I have to say about that.

Hiked up Mt. Elden today - we lucked into a really nice weekend in Flagstaff, so I tried to take advantage. Went with a guy from the math department who hikes crazy fast, but I kept up with him and even gave him half my Clif Bar at the end. Man, what a guy I am.

I still think we basically have to trade Chris Burke. Yeah, I know, the Astros aren't going anywhere this year, but does anyone not think we're going to keep Biggio around to get to 3,000 hits? Of course we are. So where is Burke gonna play? That's right; nowhere. Trade him for...hell, I don't know. That's the frustrating thing - the Astros have no glaring weaknesses. Sadly, we also have no strengths (in our next rebuilding phase) other than Berkman, Oswalt, and Lidge. Granted, that's a pretty good trio of stars, but we're going to need more. A lot more. And by the time Biggio gets to 3,000 hits Burke is going to be 27. Trade him now for something while his value is high.

And yes, I'm pissed about this past series, so excuse my anger.

Crap, I almost forgot - check out The United States of Baseball, too (link on left).

Link Updating Time

and

Why in the name of all that is good and pure is Jose Vizcaino hitting 3rd???

Yeah, you read that right - it's that's time again. A few of my old links have passed on, and I've discovered a few new ones. Ready?

Kicked to the Curb:

Rafe has apparently gone silent at AstroInExile, so he's gone. ThrowsLikeAGirl has moved to all-baseball.com - I'm just going to change her link to their general link, because all their blogs are great. The Cub Reporter is now included on the All-Baseball.com link. Sadly, Barstool's Cheap Liquor is no more.

Jumping on the Bandwagon:

All-Baseball.Com - note the links right next to the all-baseball link: most valuable, cub reporter, etc., including ThrowsLikeAGirl. All good stuff.

TheBaseballAnalysts.com - I just discovered this site, but it seems pretty cool.

That's it.

According to the Braves announcers last night, 'don't be surprised atseeing Lance Berkman taking grounders at 1B today'. Well, if Lance can't even play LF, I'm not sure I want him starting. Also,

career games at 1B for Lance Berkman: 7

career games at 1B for Mike Lamb: 67

and

career games at LF for LB: 489

career games at LF for ML: 14

So, um, why not move Lamb to 1B and Berkman to LF?

"I'm definitely not going to retire." - Jeff Bagwell

My question is, how much pain must he be in to even be asked that question?

John Thomson vs. the Astros, after the 1st inning:

8 IP

1 H (a solo HR by Morgan Ensberg)

0 BB

5 K

Thomson is pretty good, but.....ouch. Offense....hurting.....Vizcaino...batting....3rd....

Oswalt vs. Smoltz today. Berkman will be starting. I'll be watching. Oh, and according to the Chronicle, once Berkman is activated, one of Bruntlett / Harville / Duckworth will be sent down. I know Harville had a rough outing yesterday, but I hope that Bruntlett goes down. I just don't see what he brings to the team at the moment. Viz, Burke, and Lamb can all play the IF.

Baseball Prospectus: Cocky Stat Guys Who Know What They're Talking About

The latest PTP (Prospectus Triple Play) article includes a section on the Astros. Baseball Prospectus says:

1. They're glad that Jason Lane (who had the highest EqA, .293, on the team, going into the Pirates series) is finally getting regular playing time, and even gladder that he'll stay in RF after Lance Berkman returns, with Lance shifting to LF. Left field at the Juice Box is probably the smallest OF area to cover of any ballpark in the majors, so Lance shouldn't collapse due to strain on his knee.

2. They go on a rant about Craig Biggio's 'milestones': he's only the 4th player in baseball to have 500 doubles, 400 stolen bases, 2000 hits, etc., etc. They basically say such milestones are meaningless and Biggio doesn't need them to make people realize he's had a great career.

I was flipping through BP's stats, which include EqA (stands for Equivalent Average, and incorporates BA, OBP, SLG, stolen bases, caught stealing, home park, etc., into a league-wide comparison for offensive performance) and VORP (Value Over Replacement Player - a shortstop with a .290 EqA is more valuable than a RF with a .300 EqA in Colorado, for example). I know it's early in the season, but here are some interesting Astros stats:

First, EqA for hitters:

Jason Lane .286

Craig Biggio .295

Morgan Ensberg .280

Willy Taveras .274

Mike Lamb .289

Jeff Bagwell .270

Adam Everett .234

Brad Ausmus .220

Chris Burke .179

Luke Scott .161

and VORP for pitchers:

Roger Clemens 17.2 (2nd in all of baseball behind the Immortal Jon Garland)

Roy Oswalt 9.4

Andy Pettitte 9.2

Brandon Backe -1.2

Brad Lidge 5.5

Dan Wheeler 4.5

Chad Qualls 2.7

Chad Harville 1.9

So it looks like we'll have a decent "top 6" group of hitters when Berkman gets back (note that Taveras's EqA is helped by his stolen bases), though he obviously can't replace Everett or Ausmus, a strong front 3 in the rotation in Clemens / Oswalt / Pettitte, and a solid front 4 in the bullpen in Lidge / Wheeler / Qualls / Harville. In other words, pretty much what we knew going into the year.

Pittsburgh 7, Houston 4

We set the table...where's the food?

Willy Taveras and Craig Biggio combine to get on base 9 times tonight (Taveras: 3-3 with 2 walks; Biggio: 3-for-4 with 1 walk), but the rest of the lineup went 5-for-30 with 0 walks. Ezequiel Astacio made his first ML start, and looked pretty good, although hittable. His final line:

6 IP
7 H
1 BB
4 ER
7 K
2 HR

I was pretty impressed, considering it was his first start. On the other hand, it was against the Pirates.

Chad Qualls took the loss, in a weird 8th inning - the first two runner reached on balls that were more errors than hits, then he walked Ward on 4 pitches, Wilson lined a single to LF, and some other guy blooped one to LF. Then a double play and groundout. Only one hard-hit ball, but a little lack of control. Not that much to worry about.

The Rocket goes tomorrow, then Backe and Oswalt go against the Braves. I read that Berkman had to leave his latest rehab game due to "knee soreness". Crap. Might be a few more days or a week or so before he's back.

Nice start for the Astros tonight - Pettitte has cruied through 3 innings, and our offense is showing signs of life:

Top 1

Taveras flies out.
Biggio singles. (Should have been called out at 1st - close play though)
Bagwell walks (Biggio steals 2nd on a 3-0 pitch)
Lamb singles, Biggio scores.
Lane flies out to deep center, Bagwell to 3rd, Lamb to 2nd.
Ensberg doubles to LF on a 3-2 pitch, Bagwell and Lamb score.
Everett grounds out

We haven't done much since then, but that's a pretty good start to a game. If Lamb keeps swinging the bat this well it's going to be tough to sit him when Lance comes back. But who do you sit out of Ensberg / Lane / Bagwell? I guess give any of them the occasional day off, and clearly Lamb would be the top pinch hitter off the bench.

Couple of Astros wins over the Cubs (against Wood and Prior!) since my last post.

Brandon Backe had another interesting outing in the first win (7-3), where he put up the following line:

7 IP
6 H
2 BB
8 K

Backe has managed a lot of strikeouts so far this year (7 BB, 28 K in 30.01 IP, an excellent ratio) , but he's also allowed a .298 batting average to hitters. I expect this number to drop a bit as the year progresses. One thing to note is that Backe is an extreme flyball pitcher (32 GB, 42 FB so far this year), so it is of utmost importance that we start our best defensive OF when he plays (in other words, no Lamb in LF).

The Astros drew 6 walks in that game, which is a good sign for a team that isn't going to hit for a great averae.

Roy Oswalt followed that yesterday with a subpar performance (for him), but he made big pitches when he needed to, and got a lot of help from the offense, particularly in the 5th inning, which went:

Single (Chavez)
Flyout (Roy O)
Single (Taveras)
Single (Biggio)
Strikeout (Bagwell)
HR (Lamb, on an 0-2 pitch)
Walk (Lane)
Walk (Ensberg)
HR (Everett!)
Strikeout (Chavez)

This was also the first time this season that Garner has batted Taveras leadoff and Everett 7th. In fact, the lineup on Sunday (Taveras / Biggio / Bagwell / Lamb / Lane / Ensberg / Everett / Chavez / Oswalt) is probably about the best we can hope for until Lance gets back. I also like starting Lamb in LF fairly often until that happens - although he's pretty much a butcher defensively, left field at the Juice Box is ridiculously small, and Luke Scott and Chris Burke haven't done well so far.

I guess the question now becomes: what happens when Lance comes back? Oh yeah, and Zeke Astacio is set to start tomorrow, so one more person needs to go down.

My opinion: send Luke Scott and Eric Bruntlett down.

This gives you an OF of Berkman / Taveras / Lane / Palmeiro / Lamb (emergency), an IF of Ensberg / Everett / Biggio / Bagwell / Burke (MI) / Lamb (CI) / Viz (super-UTIL), and Ausmus / Chavez at C.

Ideally, both Lamb and Burke would see a lot of playing time, with Burke starting over Biggio at least once a week (I stand by my start-Burke-when-PettitteTheGroundballer-starts), filling in for Everett occasionally, while Lamb gives Bagwell a day off a week to rest his shoulder, and can occasionally spell Ensberg or Lane against tough righties.

Well, that's it, I guess. Oh, and I'm pretty sure Taveras is going to keep starting everyday in CF. He's been a success so far.

Jill's right - sometimes I get a little baseball-crazy. Wilco was in town Wednesday night for a concert, and I got there about an hour early and met with my crazy friend (but good taste in music) Ben "The Reverend" Helford. Don't ask me why he's The Reverend...if you met him, you'd understand. Anyway, we get in line, I scalp my two extra tickets for a small profit, and we go in. The opening act was so-so, and Wilco finally took the stage around 8:30 or so, I think. They play one song...and stop, because their was a malfunction with the amp on lead singer Jeff Tweedy's guitar, or something. It gets fixed (after a few minutes), and they play a lot of their new stuff from "A Ghost is Born". It's pretty awesome, I gotta say. Then they leave, but for the first encore they play "Spiders" (or jmaybe it's called "Kidsmoke", I don't remember) and it ROCKED. One of the best live songs I've ever heard. After that Jeff Tweedy throws (and I think breaks) his guitar, I think because there was more malfunctioning with his amp. Oh, and he also grabbed someone's video camera in the front row and took it away from them.

Anyway, good concert. The Orpheum is a cool venue - not crowded at all, no smoke, kinda cheap beer.

Oh yeah, the Astros game yesterday. Well, we lost 3-2 to the Cubs. Clemens pitched well, but once again our offense couldn't do much. Bagwell had a HR, but other than that we just can't seem to get it going. Berkman should be back soon; when he returns, my vote goes to sending Bruntlett down, ending the Burke-in-the-OF experiment, and making Burke the backup middle infielder, and giving Everett and Biggio an occasional day off. I just don't want Burke taking playing time away from Jason Lane in LF, who has certainly paid more dues than Burke is. Alternatively we could try and trade Burke, but I don't know what we need, unless someone is offering us a solid offensive catcher or shortstop, both of which are hard to come by. I guess a guy like Mike Cameron would work too, but Taveras has been surprisingly good.

Sorry for the long delay. Looks like I didn't miss much Astros action, though - they've been shutout in consecutive games by Oliver Perez and Kip Wells. It doesn't look like any one guy is to blame, but it's a shame we haven't been able to take advantage of our dominant starting pitching so far. Even when Berkman gets back, he'll essentially be replacing Luke Scott / Chris Burke, who have been bad, but not that bad. Not Brad Ausmus or Adam Everett or even Jeff Bagwell bad. So a lot of guys have to pick it up.

Baseball Prospecuts mentioned Everett favorably in their latest Power Rankings: He's improved his walk rate for 11.1 walks / 100 PA, which should make him a viable leadoff man once a few more singles start dropping in.

I was in Vegas this past weekend (well, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, actually) for a trip with the guys. It was great - good weather, cheap rooms, plenty of poker. I did all right (JT was the big winner, when he finished 3rd out of 120 players in a $40 buy-in tourney - he won $428, I think, and Todd won about $200 the first time he sat down at a poker table in Vegas), but you don't really go to win money - you go to break even. The combined 8 hour drive there-and-back wasn't that bad either (except for Hoover Dam...ugh.)

Anyway, I'm back, so look for a recap of tomorrow night's Clemens vs. Maddux matchup. Will the Astros score a run for The Rocket? Should be a good one - two Hall of Famers going against each other.

Brandon Duckworth gave up 8 runs in 4 innings against the Cards yesterday, but that's a little misleading - he gave up a few swinging bunt singles, and Willy Taveras misplayed a fly ball to CF which turned into a 2-run triple. He still didn't pitch well - 4 walks/0 K's in 4 innings - but it wasn't as terrible as you might think. The offense made a nice comeback after falling behind 8-1 - we took a lot of pitches, Adam Everett had a bases-loaded double, Raul Chavez had 3 hits, and Morgan Ensberg had a HR off Julian Tavarez. We couldn't catch up all the way, though. The bullpen also looked tough, with 4 innings of scoreless work.

Clemens vs. Mulder today. Bagwell gets a day off and Lamb (a lefty) bats 3rd instead of Lane. Looks like Garner is falling in love with the lineup-by-position - a 1B has to bat 3rd, regardless of who it is.

The Astros signed Tom Martin to a AAA deal with Round Rock. I like it - John Franco has been terrible, Mike Gallo isn't any better, and Martin has had some good years in the past. Now if we could replace Franco with Martin and Springer with Mike Burns I'd be happy.

Pretty solid 8-7 win for the Astros last night - the game wasn't that close until Brady Clark hit a 3-run bomb off Lidge in the 9th. Pettitte looked pretty good, getting tons of ground balls - I think Ensberg had 9 chances at 3rd, and he made some really nice plays. The bottom of the lineup did most of the damage - Lane, Ensberg, Burke, Ausmus, and Taveras all had good offensive performances. Chad Qualls looked good in the 8th, Franco hit the only batter he faced, Chad Harville came on and pitched pretty well but walked Jeff Cirillo with 2 outs, and Lidge came on, gave up the HR, but retired Junior Spivey.

Scott Barzilla has an awesome new article up at AstrosDaily about the Astros ideal lineup construction (link in the upper left of the AstrosDaily page). I won't spoil it for you - go read the article!

Holy crap Oswalt is good. His line: Nine innings, four walks, seven punchouts, one run, zero walks. Money. If Clemens and Pettitte hold up and Backe continues to impress, there's no doubt in my mind that we'll contend. That rotation is simply too strong.

Everett finally snapped out of his early season funk, going 3-for-4 with a leadoff homer and a stolen base. He's still only batting .216, so he's got to keep up the hitting if he wants to stay in the leadoff spot. Otherwise I say we hand over the position to Lil' Willy, who has done everything in his power to earn it. He's 13-for-48 with five walks and five swipes so far (That's .286, .354, .429 in 50 PAs). I hope Garner values his OBP and speed over his inexperience. Unfortunately, I can definitely see Garner reinserting Biggio in the leadoff spot sometime soon. I say, So what if Taveras has little experience... he's good.

Speaking of speed, what's with all the stolen bases? The Stros had four more steals last night. And it's not just Willy T doing all the running. JASON LANE has FIVE!!! WHAT'S GOING ON?!? Oh yeah, and Lane leads the team in every single offensive category. He's batting .368 with 5 homers, 12 RBI and 8 runs. Looks like he and Brian Roberts will go 40-40 this season.

Nomar hurt his groin today. It looked painful. I can't say I'm not a little glad that the Cubs' playoff chances took a hit, but you never applaud an opponent's injury. Unless it's Sox-Yankees.

I also saw that Berkman took batting practice with the team before Wednesday night's game. That's good news: we need him back, and soon. After our series with Milwaukee, eight of our next 10 series are against contending teams (Two against Chicago and one each against St. Louis, Atlanta, Florida, San Fran, Zona and Texas). Our only easy series come against Pittsburgh.

I've been thinking about the Chris Burke situation for some time now. I really don't think it's all that bad that he's not getting playing time. Unless we trade him, he's not going anywhere. Look at Lane: He's been riding pine for years, and he's crushing the ball now. So maybe warming the bench and getting 200 ABs isn't a travesty.

But then I though, Why have Burke sit when Adam Everett's out there putting up an 0-fer every night? Burke used to be a shortstop in college! Put him in! At least see what he can do there. Then we can platoon Scott, Biggio, Everett and Burke between LF, 2B and SS. get 450 ABs for each of them.

I went to the Sox-Twins game on Monday. The renovations to The Cell are pretty nice, although they're obviously copying Wrigley with the new ivy in center. Saw Carl Everett crush a pair of homers and point to the sky about five time each time he rounded the bases. I met Everett five years ago in Anaheim — The BoSox were staying at the same Marriot as our newspaper class was during a Journalism convention. He was a really nice guy; at least he stopped and talked with us for 15 minutes or so. He said he enjoyed his time as an Astro but he didn't feel slighted that he got traded.

I'm going to get tickets to a BoSox-Cubs game in June at Wrigley. I don't know how (or how much!), but I'll get them. The Wades are all coming to Chicago for graduation and a memorial service for our grandmother, Toni Cobb. She'll be missed, but she led an incredibly full life. And even in her final days she was able to bring friends and family together.

Nice peformance by Brandon Backe tonight: 7 IP, 7 H, 1 BB, 8 K. That walk-to-strikeout ratio is nice to see. Some of you might be wondering why I'm always harping on that ratio - the main idea is that pitchers have surprisingly little control over what happens once their pitch is put into play. Some pitcher have higher hit rates than others, but generally speaking, at the major league level the difference is smaller than almost anyone would guess. What a pitcher DOES have control over is the balls that aren't put in play - walks, strikeouts, and HR's. In other words, 'free outs' like strikeouts are great, 'non-outs' like walks and HR's are bad. The 'possible outs' usually even themselves out over the long haul.

The offense still wasn't great, but did enough to win. Adam Everett drew another walk - based on my previous statement that hits will even out, he might be a decent leadoff hitter yet. Luke Scott had a rough night; he's batting under .200 now, with 1 extra-base hit, but Brad Ausmus had 2 hits and Willy Taveras had a HR (!!!!), a walk, and a SB. Russ Springer got out of a huge jam created by Wheeler and Franco (who CANNOT get righties out - don't even bother bringing him in to turn a switch hitter around - lefties ONLY) by getting Brian Jordan to GIDP to Ensberg to Biggio to Bagwell. Nice job, Springer. Then Lidge comes in and does his thing, striking out two. Woohoo. Brewers next.

Last thing - "Explosions in the Sky" is the best band I've heard in a long time. Check them out.

The Astros offense sank to a new low last night when they failed to score in a 12-inning 1-0 loss, which included leadoff doubles in the 9th and 10th innings, and a bases loaded-0 out situation in the 10th when a single run wins the game. Roger Clemens has now allowed 0 runs in his last 14 innings over 2 starts and has 0 wins to show for it. There's a lot of blame to go around - Biggio and Bagwell were a combined 0-for-10, and Luke Scott and Willy Taveras both looked awful at the plate. I think everyone knew we'd struggle to score runs before Berkman came back, but even when he does come back, he won't be replacing Everett, Taveras, or Ausmus.

Peter Gammons believes the Astros will end up trading Roger Clemens to the Yankees around the All-Star Break. I think it's pretty darn likely, too - I don't think we'll still be in the race, and the Yankees sure look like they need pitching and Steinbrenner is one owner who won't balk at Clemens' 18.5 million dollar salary. What should we try and get in return? Well, looking at our current team and minor league prospects, we should have Lane, Berkman, and Scott on the OF corners, Ensberg at 3B, Biggio / Burke / Conrad at 2B, Bagwell / Self at 1B, and Quintero at C. Our biggest weaknesses on offense are at CF, SS, C, and perhaps 1B if Self never hits for power. At pitching, we've got a pretty good young group (Oswalt / Backe / Astacio / Nieve / Rodriguez / Albers / Patton, but you can never have too many pitching prospects.

I'm not sure who the Yankees best prospects are, but I can guarantee there aren't many - they've traded all the good ones (Navarro, Duncan, Nick Johnson) away in past years. So I think we might want to get a 3rd team involved somehow. A team like the Phillies, with Ryan Howard, Marlon Byrd, Placido Polanco, etc., would be a good fit. I would rank our offensive weaknesses in the following order: CF (worst - I just don't see Taveras as anything other than a pinch runner/5th OF) SS (see above comment, only not quite as strong, since SS is a slightly weaker offensive position, C (although Quintero looks pretty good now), and 1B (Self may never be a decent MLB regular).

Our intramural softball team is shaping up pretty nicely - yours truly is a David Wells (minus 50 pounds or so) on the mound - very hittable, but no walks. We've got a few former baseball players, and a few beginners who we'll stick at C and RF. All in all, should be....well, fun.

The Astros offense sank to a new low last night when they failed to score in a 12-inning 1-0 loss, which included leadoff doubles in the 9th and 10th innings, and a bases loaded-0 out situation in the 10th when a single run wins the game. Roger Clemens has now allowed 0 runs in his last 14 innings over 2 starts and has 0 wins to show for it. There's a lot of blame to go around - Biggio and Bagwell were a combined 0-for-10, and Luke Scott and Willy Taveras both looked awful at the plate. I think everyone knew we'd struggle to score runs before Berkman came back, but even when he does come back, he won't be replacing Everett, Taveras, or Ausmus.

Peter Gammons believes the Astros will end up trading Roger Clemens to the Yankees around the All-Star Break. I think it's pretty darn likely, too - I don't think we'll still be in the race, and the Yankees sure look like they need pitching and Steinbrenner is one owner who won't balk at Clemens' 18.5 million dollar salary. What should we try and get in return? Well, looking at our current team and minor league prospects, we should have Lane, Berkman, and Scott on the OF corners, Ensberg at 3B, Biggio / Burke / Conrad at 2B, Bagwell / Self at 1B, and Quintero at C. Our biggest weaknesses on offense are at CF, SS, C, and perhaps 1B if Self never hits for power. At pitching, we've got a pretty good young group (Oswalt / Backe / Astacio / Nieve / Rodriguez / Albers / Patton, but you can never have too many pitching prospects.

I'm not sure who the Yankees best prospects are, but I can guarantee there aren't many - they've traded all the good ones (Navarro, Duncan, Nick Johnson) away in past years. So I think we might want to get a 3rd team involved somehow. A team like the Phillies, with Ryan Howard, Marlon Byrd, Placido Polanco, etc., would be a good fit. I would rank our offensive weaknesses in the following order: CF (worst - I just don't see Taveras as anything other than a pinch runner/5th OF) SS (see above comment, only not quite as strong, since SS is a slightly weaker offensive position, C (although Quintero looks pretty good now), and 1B (Self may never be a decent MLB regular).

Our intramural softball team is shaping up pretty nicely - yours truly is a David Wells (minus 50 pounds or so) on the mound - very hittable, but no walks. We've got a few former baseball players, and a few beginners who we'll stick at C and RF. All in all, should be....well, fun.

Trade Chris Burke.

Let's look at what happened this offseason:

Astros do not offer Jeff Kent arbitration.
Craig Biggio, a still-productive but aging franchise icon, makes noise about wanting to move back to 2nd.
Chris Burke, the consensus top prospect in the Astros minor league system, has a huge year at 2B in AAA, then has an excellent spring training.
Craig Biggio is named starting 2B, and has started every game but 1 this year, and is still playing well. He collected his 2,654th hit yesterday.
Chris Burke is struggling to get playing time.

I think it's fairly obvious that the organization intends to start Biggio until he doesn't want to play anymore; specifically, I think the organization and the fans want to see Biggio get to 3,000 hits. Just because I disagree with the strategy doesn't necessarily make it wrong; but if it's true (and it certainly seems like it is), we need to trade Chris Burke now. He probably had a career year last in AAA - he's 25, and looks ready to start in the majors. His trade value is likely at its highest. In order for Craig Biggio to get to 3K hits, he'll need to play for at least the rest of this year and all of '06. I also think the organization would like to have Biggio and Bagwell retire at the same time: think of the stories (Farewell year for the Greatest Astros in History!) they could produce.

Do we really want to see Chris Burke on the bench for the next 2 years? In addition, we have a prospect in Brooks Conrad that may well be better than Burke in 2 years. He should be good to go in '07.

Trade Chris Burke.

Tough loss today. I thought Duckworth actually threw the ball pretty well; he just made bad pitches at the wrong time, especially to Wily Mo Pena with 2 runners on, which Ol' Wily Mo deposited 498 feet away. Our offense was hit-and-miss - an early 2 run bomb by Lane, a nice rally led by Jose Vizcaino and Raul Chavez, of all people, but then we squandered a leadoff double in the 9th by Jason Lane. I normally hate bunting, too, but you have to at least consider having Luke Scott lay one down there. The announcers say you have to "play for the win", but you HAVE to go for the tie, too. So Scott flew out weakly to CF, Chavez lined out to LF, Everett walked on 4 pitches (again, at least he's showing a good eye - strangely, Everett has 7 walks, and Jason Lane has 0.), and Chris Burke flew out to RF to end the game. Burke has a somewhat odd stance - it doesn't look like he gets much power, but he is patient. However, both he and Morgan Ensberg have a strange and troubling habit of letting perfect pitches go by with 2 strikes. If it's close, you really have to try and protect the plate.

I liked our lineup alright - Everett, Ausmus, and Biggio needed a day off - but I think we were lucky that no line drives were hit in Mike Lamb's area. Heck, Duckworth did a hell of a job keeping the ball on the ground, except for two pitches to Joe Randa and Wily Mo.

The announcers were talking about the hot start that some of the Astros minor league affiliates were off to. Here are some of our minor-league prospects that are leading the way:

Triple-AAA (Round Rock):

Humberto Quintero, C, AAA: .394 / .429 / .667, 5 XBH, 2 BB, 33 AB. Not much patience, but good average and some pop. He's better than anything else we have at catcher in the entire organization. By a lot.

Todd Self, 1B, AAA: .368 / .458 / .474, 2 XBH, 4 BB, 19 AB. Pretty much the opposite of Quintero - Self is a Mark Grace / Wally Joyner / John Olerud - type: good average, good eye, little power. It's not what you expect from a 1B, to be sure, but if you plug him in he'll be league average with a solid OBP and you can spend money elsewhere.

Ezequiel Astacio, RHP, AAA: 12.2 IP, 8 H, 2 BB, 9 K, 2 HR, 3.55 ERA. The walk-to-strikeout ratio looks good, and remember Round Rock is a hitter's park. I like him as our 5th starter, but not until August / September at the earliest, so he doesn't lose a year of free agent eligibility.

Wilfredo Rodriguez, LHP, AAA: 11.0 IP, 4 BB, 13 K, 0 HR, 2.45 ERA. Pretty impressive strikeout total, and he's a lefty.

Mike Burns, RHP (reliever): 4.1 IP, 2 H, 1 BB, 9 K, 0 HR, 0.00 ERA. Brad Lidge Lite. He's not young, so I'm not entirely sure why Burns is in AAA when Russ Springer is pitching in the big leagues. A 'pen of Lidge / Qualls / Wheeler / Harville / Burns / generic LHP isn't too bad.

Double-AA (Corpus Christi)

Fernando Nieve, RHP: 12.0 IP, 4 H, 3 BB, 17 K, 1 HR, 0.75 ERA. Whoa. Look at that line again. 17 K / 12.0 IP = good. He's moving up fast.

Single-A (Salem)

Matt Albers, LHP: 10.0 IP, 8 H, 4 BB, 14 K, 2.70 ERA. Everything looks fine here.

So that's it. Some pretty solid pitching prospects, all in all. Astacio should be ready later this year, Nieve the year after that, and Albers the year after that. I'd like to see Burns in the 'pen right now, and Quintero and Self (and hopefully Brooks Conrad, though he's off to a slow start) should all be ready for The Show next year. Quintero should finally make Ausmus expendable, and Self would make a great occasional platoon partner with Bagwell so Bags can rest his rapidly degenerating shoulder whenever he needs to.

Starting lineups for the Sunday 4/17 game (very interesting today):

Houston:

Burke (2B)
Viz (SS)
Bagwell
Lamb (LF)
Ensberg
Lane (CF)
Scott (RF)
Chavez
Duckworth

Cincy:

Jimenez
Griffey Jr.
Casey
Randa
Dunn
Pena
Lopez
LaRue
Harang

So Duckworth's reward for his 1st start this year is to have one of our worst possible defenses behind him. Viz at SS is pretty rough, but what's really strange is that Duckworth is more of a flyball pitcher, and he gets Lamb / Lane / Scott in the outfield? Yech. I feel sorry for the guy. Sure hope we can get some offense going.

I'm going to try something new today - I'll post the starting pitchers and lineups, and post comments on the game. If you're reading this, post a comment!

Big win for the ‘Stros last night, as the offense, led by Jason Lane, who had 2 HR’s and 5 RBI’s, finally scored more than 5 runs in a game, and won 11-2. Roy Oswalt pitched great: 7 IP, 5 H, 1 BB, 9 K. Pretty much how games are supposed to go. Morgan Ensberg had a big game, too, going 3-for-5 with 2 doubles and 3 RBI’s. It’s good to see guys like Ensberg and Lane pick up the offense, because we can’t rely on Biggio and Bagwell anymore. And one bright spot that I’ve failed to mention from Adam Everett, who’s hitting .167 in the leadoff spot, is that he’s also drawn 6 walks already. If Everett can keep his walk rate up, he can still hit .260 or .270, which would put his OBP right around .330 or .340. Not great, but if Garner stays obsessed with batting our 2nd worst hitter leadoff, it’s decent news.

``He's [Oswalt} taken years off my life -- not days, years,'' Dunn said. ``He throws every pitch the same. He's got great control. He'll throw a 95 mph fastball one pitch, the next one's a 69 mph curve. He's just good.''
Man, I like to hear that. When as good a hitter as Adam Dunn says “you’re just good”, that’s pretty high praise.

Russ Springer and Brad Lidge came in and combined for 2 innings of perfect relief, with 4 K’s.

Today it’s Andy Pettitte vs. Eric Milton. I’m hoping Chris Burke sees some playing time again; probably at LF, although Garner did say he intends to sit both Biggio and Bagwell for one game each this series, which is a good idea. We did some damage against Milton last time, and our lineup is full of guys (Biggio , Bagwell, Lane, Ensberg, even Everett) who have traditionally hit very well against lefties, so look for some offense. It would also be nice if Brad Ausmus could improve on his .083 / .185 / .083 line. Man, his hot spring training seems a long time ago.

So far it's been another painful, painful game. Through the top of the 6th the Astros led 3-1, but had left 17 men on base, with Lane, Taveras, and Ausmus all failing with multiple runners on. Backe starts the bottom of the 6th, gives up a single, gets a K, gives up a double. Franco comes in, gets a groundball out, then gives up a swinging bunt single to Reyes and starts laughing. It's pretty funny, blowing another lead, huh? Wheeler comes in and gets Cairo to ground to 3rd, but it takes a bad hop and Lamb can't handle it. 4-3 Mets, and once again the Mets score the go-ahead runs without ever hitting the ball hard. Defense, bad luck, and horrible offense have been the theme of the series.

On the bright side, Luke Scott has reached base all 4 times today - he's 3-for-3 with 3 singles and a walk. Backe pitched well, although he still struggles with lefties - he's lucky Cliff Floyd, Kaz Matsui, and Eric Valent weren't in the lineup. Oh, and why isn't Chris Burke starting at 2B? Would it really kill Biggio to sit for one game with a huge bruise on his forearm? It's a little early in the year to start gutting it out for the team - take a seat and let the top prospect in the organiazation play.

Couple of things before the game today. One, according to the Houston Chronicle, Biggio's going to miss a few games with a badly bruised forearm. This is a good chance to get Burke some playing time, and hopefully he'll play well, so that Biggio can get more rest in the first half of the year and not decline in the 2nd half. I only hope that I don't see Jose Vizcaino's name penciled in as the 2nd baseman today. However, I would like to see Mike Lamb get the start. 1st, Victor Zambrano, the opposing pitcher, is much tougher on righties than on lefties (3 year splits: 729 OPS for righties, 792 OPS for lefties, in a pretty large sample size). 2nd, Backe is our most extreme flyball pitcher, so it should minimize Lamb's defensive liabilities.

The Astros have scored 23 runs in 7 games, or 3.28 runs / game. Should we expect more of the same? Well....probably. We can't expect any offensive improvement from last year at any position except maybe 3rd (Ensberg, although Lamb might regress a bit), and we had BIG offensive losses in Beltran, Kent, possibly Berkman (unless he comes back at 100%), and possibly Bagwell / Biggio / Ausmus (they're all a year closer to 40 than 30). We did have a pretty rough pitching staff for much of last year, with a horrific mix of Redding / Duckworth / Darren Oliver / Pete Munro at 4th and 5th starter, so we should expect some improvement, but not nearly enough to offset the loss of so much offense. The longer we think we're going to contend this year, the more it's going to hurt our chances to be a strong team in the next few years.

I missed the first half of today's Astros-Mets game - I just started watching in the bottom of the 8th, with the score 0-0. Roger Clemens has put up the following incredible line:
7 IP
2 H
0 BB
9 K

Now Chad Qualls is in and struck out Victor Diaz. Then Marlon Anderon hits a routine ground ball to 2nd, and Biggio bobbles it and bounces the throw to 1st, so Anderson beats it out. Biggio already has one error this game according to the box score. Then they pick Anderson off, even though Bagwell didn't tag him. Reyes grounds out. Nice pitching by Qualls: a K and 2 routine ground balls.

Looking at the Astros' offense, we haven't done much either. Biggio and Bagwell each have 1 hit, and Ensberg, Burke, and Taveras each have 1 walk of Kaz Ishii. Adam Everett and Brad Ausmus continue to be offensive sinkholes, batting .148 and .095 respectively. Still think Ausmus is 'swinging the bat well', Garner?

Agonizing loss today. I watched from the 4th inning on, and the Astros led 1-0 on a Biggio walk and Ensberg RBI double. Pettitte was pitching GREAT, mixing in a high 80's fastball and some nasty breaking pitches. In the 6th, Glavine got 2 quick outs, then walked Pettitte, and allowed singles to Everett and Biggio to load the bases. He went to 3-2 to Bagwell, then threw a pitch that crossed the plate a good six inches inside. Strike three, according to Mark Wegener, and Bagwell nearly got thrown out of the game arguing the call. In the top of the 6th, Pettitte didn't allow a single hard-hit ball. Instead, he allowed a broken-bat single, a bloop single to right, a sac bunt, another bloop single to right, and a bloop single to center, and he was done, down 3-1. Don't be fooled by his overall line (5.1 IP, 9 H, 2 BB, 5 K), I don't think I've seen Pettitte this good in a long time.

Dan Wheeler came in and got out of the inning. An Orlando Palmeiro triple (good hustle play) and an Everett single got it to 3-2 , but Wheeler looked solid in the bottom of the 7th. In the top of the 8th, Ensberg works the count to 3-2 and rips a double to the LF gap. Lane hits a sinking liner to RF that Diaz misplays into a triple. 3-3, Astros. Vizcaino crushes a double over Cliff Floyd on the 1st pitch. 4-3, Astros. Brad Ausmus comes up needing to get Viz over to 3rd so a sac fly can drive him out. He fails to get a bunt down in his first 2 pitches, then K's looking on the 3rd pitch. An absolutely terrible at-bat when an insurance run would have been huge. Taveras and Palmeiro don't get anything done, although Palmeiro lines out hard to 1B.

Then...the bottom of the 8th. Russ Springer relieves, and gets Minky to fly out to RF. Then he walks Diaz on 4 pitches nowere near the zone. Then he gets ahead of Marlon Anderson 0-2 and inexplicably leaves a hittable breaking pitch over the middle of plate. Anderson pulls it though the right side, on a play that Chris Burke might have been able to make. This brings up Jose Reyes. Again, Springer gets ahead 0-2, and again leaves a hittable pitch out...but this time, Reyes grounds right back to Springer. At this point Springer HAS to get Diaz in a rundown off 3rd - he was halfway down the line. Instead he tries to get the impossible double play (Reyes is uber-fast), and Everett throws it away trying to rush the throw. 4-4. Matsui comes up and singles up the middle on a hanging breaking ball. 5-4, Mets. We intentionally walk Beltran, bringing up Ramon Castro. He pops out weakly to RF, except Biggio forgets he's not an OF anymore and it's Lane's play - they collide, ball falls in. 6-4 Mets. Garner brings in Franco to face Cliff Floyd. Single up the middle. 8-4 Mets, and that's the final. It was an excruciating inning to watch. Springer didn't pitch terribly, except for the 4-pitch walk to Diaz, but he has to finish guys off after getting up 0-2. I'm sure people were calling for Qualls and Lidge to come in, but they've both pitched a lot already - I like leaving Springer in, particularly facing Minky / Diaz / Anderson - that's not really a dangerous part of the lineup. It just didn't work out today. It's a shame, wasting a great start by Pettitte and a big day by Morgan Ensberg.

Once again, I made a long post, and my home computer obliterated it instantly.
Here's the scoop:

I'm pumped that the Astros signed Brooks Kieschnick. At first I thought Andy was just rubbing it in, but they really did. Do you think it's possible that someone from the Astros organization actually reads this blog? ...Nah. It's more likely that we've seen Kieschnick often with the Brewers, both as a pitcher and a hitter, thought he was decent, and picked him up as a project. Still, a neat coincidence.

As I wrote a few days ago, Kieschnick is a useful player. He's not dominant either as a hitter or a pitcher, but he's decent at both, so his real usefulness comes from his versatility. Why carry both Russ Springer and Orlando Palmeiro when you could carry Kiescnick, who fills both roles (middle reliever and 5th OF) and carry an extra pitcher (Astacio?) or catcher (Quintero?) instead. So you could carry two mediocrities...or one mediocrity and a good prospect. I like it.

In other news, Phil Garner is not the smartest man alive.

"The season is still very young, but Garner likes Ausmus hitting seventh and Taveras eighth. Garner realizes the No. 8 hitter doesn't see a lot of good pitches because he's hitting in front of the pitcher, but he feels Taveras has the instincts to handle the job.
"He has a pretty good eye," Garner said. "If they're pitching around him, he's got a good eye and he stays on the ball good. To me, that's a real plus."
Garner also likes having Taveras hitting closer to leadoff man Adam Everett and No. 2 hitter Craig Biggio.
"If (Taveras) gets a stolen base, the pitcher bunts him up, and now Everett's on base and you've got Biggio," Garner said.
"You've got three rabbits right there in a row. If you're going to do something, you've got to get them in a row. If I've got Ausmus in between, you lose your rabbit flow. If we get to a point where Brad's not driving in runs or not hitting the ball well, then we may have to make an adjustment."

Wow....where to begin?

1. Taveras has a good eye, huh? Well, Adam Everett had all of 17 walks in 385 AB's last year. Maybe Taveras should hit leadoff?

2. If Taveras gets on base, he needs to at least get an opportunity to steal, instead of the pitcher bunting him over ON THE FIRST PITCH, as in the first 2 games.

3. "and now Everett's on base and you've got Biggio?" Wouldn't it be great if Everett was just on base? Unfortunately, he's usually not.

4. Well, actually you don't have three rabbits in a row - the pitcher still separates them. And as I hope Garner realizes, Biggio is NOT a 'rabbit' anymore - he's not nearly as quick as he used to be, and I hope he doesn't steal too often, particularly with the big bats coming up.

5. Wow, he actually said "rabbit flow".

6. "If we get to a point where Brad's not driving in runs or hitting the ball well.." Like all of 2003 and 2004? If Garner expects anything out of Brad Ausmus offensively, he's going to be disappointed.

Jack, you got your wish: we signed Brooks Kieschnick to a minor deal. Whoop dee doo.

Game 2: Astros 4, Cardinals 1

Now THAT'S how a baseball game is supposed to go.

Andy Pettitte: 6 IP, 4 H, 1 ER (on Reggie Sanders' solo HR), 0 BB, 3 K
Chad Qualls: 2 perfect innings, making it look easy

In the 3rd inning, Craig Biggio doubled (good hustle play into 2nd) and Jeff Bagwell singled him in in a nice AB (got up 3-0, took 2 tough pitches, stayed with a breaking ball and hit a liner)
In the 6th, Ensberg singled, Scott K'd (tough start for him, he's 0-for-6), Lane singled, and Ausmus GIDP'd on the 1st pitch.
However, in the 8th, Garner learned from the past, as once again, Ensberg singled, Burke pinch-hit and popped out on a tough pitch to bunt, Lane singled, and Garner pinch-hit with Mike Lamb, who triped to RF, driving in 2, and Taveras hit a hard grounder up the middle for the final 4-1 score.
Lidge closed out the 9th, although not without a little scare.

Overall thoughts:

Adam Everett better start taking some pitches if he wants to stay in the leadoff spot. Prime example: Pettitte has a great 9-pitch AB in the 3rd before striking out...and then Everett pops up to SS on the 1st pitch. Um...bad? Everett needs to take the Taveras route and hit hard ground balls and line drives, because he is NOT a power hitter, and he needs to get on base. A lot.

Craig Biggio, 39 year old legs and all, is off to a hot start, just like last year. Before I start whining about how Burke needs to play, how about a compromise: if Burke gets the occasional (weekly?) start and plenty of pinch-hit AB's, this should keep Biggio a little fresher, so he might not collapse in the 2nd half. A silver lining, if you will.

Luke Scott is pressing.

Andy Pettitte looked good, throwing a lot of strikes, and getting his usual ground balls. Again, I think Burke should start when Pettitte does, because he's such an extreme groundballer and even the most rabid Biggio fan can't say Biggio is better defensively.

Chad Qualls is SOLID. 6 up, 6 down, including striking out Jim Edmonds on a Maddux-like pitch: starts inside to lefties, curls back over the middle of the plate. Man, what a sweet pitch.

My main worries so far are Everett leading off, Taveras hitting 8th (AFTER Ausmus, which completely wastes his speed if the pitcher is just going to bunt him over - by hitting before Ausmus, maybe Taveras can steal a few bases when he gets on to avoid the inevitable Ausmus GIDP.) Regardless, a four-in-a-row of Taveras / Ausmus / P / Everett is going to make for a LOT of late-game maneuvering or offensive suckiness.

But a win's a win, especially over the Cardinals.

Game 1: Cardinals 7, Astros 3.

Post-game thoughts:

Roy Oswalt pitched pretty well (6 IP, 7 H, 1 BB, 2 K), but once again struggled to finish off hitters once he got ahead in the count. He also seems to get frustrated on the mound when he doesn't have close calls go his way. He needs to be able to control his emotions better.

Adam Everett is not a good leadoff hitter. He's in there for his speed and his defense. But he went 0-for-4 (with a walk, at least), and never really hit the ball hard. With the bases loaded and 2 outs, down 4 runs, Everett swung at the 1st pitch he saw and grounded out to SS.

Craig Biggio is going to get off to a hot start just like last year, which is more bad than good, because Chris Burke is a superior player and Biggio is going to decline in the 2nd half, just like he has the last 3 years.

Morgan Ensberg is not a cleanup hitter. Sometime he's TOO patient, which might sound strange coming for an OBP freak like myself. With 2 on, 2 out, and a 3-2 count, Ensberg took a fastball from Tavares that looked low but was close, and got called out on strikes. I'm all for patience, but in that situation, you can't let a close pitch go by.

Jose Vizcaino and Orlando Palmeiro are going to see more pinch-hit AB's than Chris Burke. Which makes me want to cry.

Man, I hate Jim Edmonds.

Opening Day Updates:

Top 1: Walker ground-ball single up the middle, Rolen reaches on a bad throw by Everett, Edmonds reaches out and hits a dinky 3-run HR. 3-0, Cards, and Roy's terrible luck continues.

Bottom 1: Everett pops up (BAD). Biggio singles to LF. Bagwell GIDP's on 1st pitch (ugly swing).

Top 2: Oswalt settles down, looks good, but has trouble putting Molina away after getting up 0-2. Gotta have quick outs. 1-2-3 inning though.

Bottom 2: Ensberg with a sharp grounder to 3B that Rolen makes a great play on. Scott gets down 0-2, battles to 2-2, and K's. Lane doubles to LF on the 1st pitch (hanging breaking ball), and Ausmus grounds out weakly to 3B.

Top 3: Oswalt gets no close calls, and Eckstein singles to RF on a 2-2 pitch. A nice inside fastball gets Walker to pop to SS. Pujols grounds to 3B but Ensberg for some strange reason tries to go to 2B and everyone is safe. Oswalt gets Rolen to GIDP. Roy has thrown 50 pitches through 3 - he needs some quick outs, and some plays turned behind him.

I took the day off of school and headed down with a friend to Phoenix to watch the Diamondbacks-Cubs game. I'd been to two games at the Bank One Ballpark before, but my friend had been to a lot more, so he knew where to get free parking, what the best food deals were, etc., so it was pretty awesome...until the game started. Well, unless you were a Cubs fan.

Javier Vazquez started for the Diamondbacks. Here's how his first inning and two-thirds went:

Single
Wild Pitch
Line out
Ground out (1-0 Cubs)
Single
Single
Single (2-0 Cubs)
Strikeout

Groundout
Double (by Zambrano)
Single (3-0 Cubs)
Single
Single (4-0 Cubs)
Double (6-0 Cubs)
Strikeout
Double (7-0 Cubs)

and he was done. OUCH. Oh, I have him in both my fantasy leagues. *Shudder*.

The Cubs pretty much coasted from there, although Zambrano had control issues and was relieved after only 4 and 2/3 innings (no win for Big Z) and made gestures that the umpire needed glasses and was subsequently tossed. Then mop-up time consisted of a bunch of Diamondbacks singles and Ramirez and Lee HR's for the Cubs. So not the greatest game, but it was fun anyway.

Then we listened to the Illinois - UNC game on the drive home. HOLY CRAP. If the game was half as good to watch as it was to listen to, it was a damn good game. The announcers were going crazy the entire 2nd half! Man, what a game. Good for Roy Williams. Too bad his whole team is leaving, practically.

So Astros Opening Day is tonight at 4:05 pm (here), 6:05 pm Central. I'll be watching the game on MLB.TV, which is AWESOME - I watched all the 'highlight reels' from all of yesterday's games (Young's 3 HRs, Adam Dunn destroying the ball, Richie Sexson, Pedro's 12 K's, etc.) in about an hour. Unfortunately for you, Andy, I don't think you can sign on in two different places, so the Astros game is MINE. ALL MINE. Bwahahahahaha!

So the batting order, as expected, is:

SS Adam Everett
2B Craig Biggio
1B Jeff Bagwell
3B Morgan Ensberg
LF Luke Scott
RF Jason Lane
C Brad Ausmus
CF Willy Taveras
P Roy Oswalt

I guess the only issue I have with this lineup is that Adam Everett has a career .315 OBP. Last year, supposedly his 'breakthrough year', he had a .317 OBP, with only 17 walks in 384 AB's. He is 25-for-28 in SB's, lifetime, an excellent rate, but he just doesn't get on base enough to be hitting in the top part of the order.

"Part of our game will be we'll have to run a little bit," Garner said. "We'll hit and run a little bit, but we do have some power potential, too. We do have a chance to be a complete offensive team -- not one dimensional or even two dimensional. We have a chance to be a multi-dimensional offensive team. How it's going to play out? I don't know yet."

This quote makes me a little nervous. If Garner runs with Everett (13 SB / 2 CS last year) and Taveras (55 / 11), that's fine. If he runs with pretty much anyone else (Biggio: 7/2, Ensberg: 6/4, Berkman: 9/7, Bagwell: 6/4, Ausmus: 2/2, even Chris Burke is only 37/14), he's just running us into outs. Generally speaking, your break-even rate for SB% is right around 60/70%, so only Everett and Taveras should be running often.

Garner said Biggio's game is "see it, whack it," so it would make sense for Garner to try to have someone on base already when Biggio comes to the plate.

Unfortunately, this is now true. Biggio has gone from 88 walks in '99 down to 40 walks in '04. That's a hell of a drop, and he's not really likely to improve in that department this late in his career, and you generally want your "see it, whack it" guys lower in the batting order, where Biggio's 71 extra-base hits might do a little more damage.


Ok, I gotta run, but I'll be watching the game tonight. Go 'Stros!

Some interesting players have been released in the last few days:

C Bobby Estalella
RP Gabe White
P/OF Brooks Kieschnick

No, you didn't misread that last position - Kieschnik is both an outfielder and LH hitter (.248 / .315 / .444 in 306 career AB's) and a RH pitcher (96.0 IP, 110 H, 11 HR, 26 BB, 67 K, 4.59 ERA career) For his career, that's a 93 OPS+ (100 is league average) and 93 ERA+ (100 is league average, again). How cool is that? So a 33 year old who's a slightly below average hitter and a slightly below average pitcher? Why the heck would you want someone like that?
VARIETY. Why carry both a 5th OF and a 6th or 7th reliever when you could just carry Kieschnick? Put another way, we could sign Kiescnick, release John Franco and Jose Vizcaino, and bring up Brooks Conrad, or Ezequiel Astacio and be a MUCH better team for it. Kieschnick's decency at both hitting and pitching allow you to carry one extra hitter or pitcher, essentially. I think he'd be an intersting pickup, and he's a local guy (went to the University of Texas). What's to lose?

Estalella is 30 and has bounced around for a few years now, mostly because of his career .216 BA. But his career line is .216 / .315 / .440, good for a 755 OPS. The last time Brad Ausmus put up a 755 OPS was 1999, and his highest SLG% for any year is .415. Again, what do you have to lose? Sign him to a minor league deal, and let him compete with Quintero next year.

Gabe White was awful last year (6.94 combined ERA with NY and CIN) but he had put up a 2.98 ERA and a 4.05 ERA the 2 previous years, is 'only' 32 (Franco is 44), throws strikes (30 BB in his last 160.2 IP), and has put up a 3 year line of .248 / .277 / .419 against lefties (696 OPS). John Franco, by comparison, has a 3 year OPS of 637 allowed against lefties. Ok, Franco's better, but he's a lot older and probably more expensive and White can occasionaly get a righty out, so it might be worth looking into.


Also, the White Sox are already looking to trade A.J. Pierzynski. Man, that guy must be a total asshole. Nevertheless, he'd be a solid upgrade over Brad Ausmus at C, or heck, he'd make a decent backup catcher over slower-than-molasses Raul Chavez. He'd probably piss the entire clubhouse off, which would be fun to watch. Remember Mitch Meluskey? Well, imagine the fireworks with this guy.

Ok, that's all. None of these moves are likely, but they'd all be cheap, and if just one of them worked out, it would probably be worth it. I like the Kieschnick move the best - you can't underestimate versatility, particularly in the National League.

The Astros finalized their 25-man roster today - the final 3 cuts were Mike Gallo, Ezequiel Astacio, and Humberto Quintero. Thus, I present to you your 2005 Opening Day Houston Astros roster:

Pitchers (11): Oswalt, Pettitte, Clemens, Backe, Duckworth, Lidge, Qualls, Wheeler, Harville, Springer, Franco

Catchers (2): Ausmus, Chavez

Infielders (8): Bagwell, Biggio, Everett, Ensberg, Burke, Bruntlett, Vizcaino, Lamb

Outfielders (4): Scott, Taveras, Lane, Palmeiro

DL (15-day): Berkman


I know the 'official' roster has Biggio listed as an OF, but I think it's clear he's going to start at 2B by now, and our 5th OF (though I hope this never happens) would probably be a mix of Biggio / Bruntlett / Burke / Lamb...yow. That's some bad defense.

Don't get too worked up about Astacio being sent down (by the way, I watched the 2nd half of the game last night, and while the Astros bats were shut out, I saw Astacio for the first time, and he looked GOOD - nice, easy motion, good fastball, good off-speed stuff.), because the Astros won't need a 5th starter until April 19, I believe, so that should give Astacio time for a few starts at AAA, and Duckworth can work in a middle relief / spot starter role, and winner takes all when we need a 5th starter. I'm hoping Astacio does well but stays in AAA until a late call-up in August / September for a few starts; that way, he doesn't lose a year of eligibility towards free agency and he's set up well for next year.

So I can't really argue with any of the roster moves. I'm glad that Burke / Taveras / Scott all made the team, and I hope they all get plenty of playing time before Berkman gets back. If you had told me at the start of this offseason that this would be our roster, I would have been ok with it EXCEPT for the back of our bullpen. Russ Springer and John Franco????? Yeah, those Turk Wendell and Dave Burba signings worked out really well, huh? Man, I can't believe we coudln't sign one more solid reliever. Chris Hammond / Osuna / Steve Reed / Jeff Nelson....gah. I hope Springer and Franco make me eat my words, but one more solid reliever really would have helped.

One thing we have plenty of is depth. Bruntlett has played every position but C, Viz can handle all 4 infield spots, Burke can play 2B / SS / OF, and Lamb can play 3B / 1B / OF. That doesn't mean those guys are GOOD at every position, but they can play there. And Burke / Lamb / Palmeiro / Viz / Bruntlett is actually a pretty good group of pinch-hitters - Burke and Lamb could both be regulars, Palmeiro posts a respectable OBP, Viz can switch hit and GIDP, and Bruntlett has a little power. The deep bench is important, particularly for a team that looks like it's going to start Everett, Taveras, Ausmus, and a pitcher in the batting lineup. This means a LOT of pressure is going to be on Biggio / Bagwell / Lane / Ensberg / Scott, particularly without Berkman. Those 5 guys need to get off to a hot offensive start, or we could find ourselves out of contention before the month is up.

The only question left is: who goes down when Berkman comes back? Well, it probably comes down to Taveras, Scott, and Burke. In my opinion it absolutely CANNOT be Chris Burke - the guy tore up AAA last year, and needs to play. Hopefully one of Taveras / Scott is clearly better than the other, so it's not a tough decision, but if Taveras gets sent down, that makes our OF Scott / Lane / Berkman, which sounds pretty damn bad defensively, so I think Scott needs to outplay Taveras by a pretty good margin, because Taveras would BY FAR the best fit in CF.

Since we've got our roster, we can pretty safely predict our OD lineup as:

Adam Everett
Craig Biggio
Jeff Bagwell
Morgan Ensberg
Jason Lane
Luke Scott
Willy Taveras
Brad Ausmus
Roy Oswalt

That's...not a lot of offense. With that same roster, I would probably go for

Biggio
Ensberg
Bagwell
Lane
Scott
Everett
Taveras
Ausmus
Oswalt
(that might be the worst 6-9 ever)

but it really doesn't matter much over the long run. What DOES matter is we have 4 guys in that lineup who will almost certainly not have a .350 OBP: Everett, Biggio, Taveras, Ausmus. We need Berkman back, and fast, and we need 2003 Ensberg and a big year from Lane.

Well, that's about it. My overall thoughts on the offseason are we blew it with the Beltran 'deadline' (should have set it a month earlier so it didn't cost up every other good FA), a soft market for relievers, but the deals to Clemens / Oswalt / Berkman were solid.

I'd like to talk about baseball today. I really would. But I can't. Here's why:

About 5pm last night, I decided to play a 50-dollar entry fee poker tournament at Party Poker. I didn't have much planned for the night, and I need a break from 'limit' games. So I sign up, along with 419 other people, and start playing with 800 chips. I'm doing decently well when I get a call from the math lab that I work at. They need me to come in to proctor a make-up test for one of my students. DAMN! I give JT a call, hoping he can play the tournament for me, but he's not there. So I figure, what the heck, I'll just go all-in next hand, 'cause I have to go. So I go all in with Q10 of diamonds. Two guys call. One has AK. One has JJ. A queen comes on the flop. I triple up. I can't make this stuff up, I swear. Only then do I realize I can click on 'away' and it will just post my blinds for me, so I'll stay in the tourney. I finally reach JT as I'm driving to the lab, and he agrees to play for me until I get back (basically sacrificing a fantasy baseball draft to do so.) At this point I have about 1400 chips.

While I'm in the lab my roommate Mike calls, and basically orders me to go sake-bombing with him. I try and argue, but to no avail. JT calls me every 10 mins or so for an update - he doubles up with 99 vs. 68, then takes a bad beat after having the nut straight with AK (the board pairs on the river, giving an all-in guy a full house), then doubles up again, I think.

Finally I get home, and take over with about 4100 in chips. The 2nd hand I play I have 99, and double up when the flop comes 743 and some guy with AK pushes all-in. Then I don't get any decent hands for about 30 mins to an hour, putting me down to around 5600 in chips. Todd's also started watching me and giving me occasional advice (along with JT) on IM. Then I win a few hands, and I'm at right around 17000 or so with the blinds getting pretty rough (maybe 800/1600 or 1000 /2000) when the following hand happens. I have 77 UTG (this means I'm the first to act - the blinds are to my right). I raise to about 5000, I think, and everyone folds....until the small blind, one of the chip leaders, raises to 20,000, easily enough to put me all-in. I think...and think...and think. JT is unsure - Todd says call. I think it's probably a coin flip situation, meaning he has two overcards: AK, AQ, AJ, KQ, etc. But if he has a higher pair, I'm a huge underdog. I finally decide to call based on Todd's advice and the fact that I've already put in about 1/3 of my stack. My opponent flips over AK, and my 77 holds up. I double up to about 35K!

Then I play pretty tight for a while again, as it's getting close to the final table (maybe 20 guys left or so). Then I have 88 in middle position, raise to around 10000 or so (I think the blinds were 1500/3000, maybe 2000/4000 at this point), get called by the guy immediately to my left, then the big blind(a very loose and aggressive player) raises to 17000. I call, thinking of pot odds, and so does the guy on my left. The flop comes 227, with 2 diamonds. In other words, the perfect flop for me, since I've almost surely got the best hand, unless someone has a pocket pair higher than 88 (unlikely), or a 2 (even more unlikely) or 77 (no WAY). So I go all in for the rest of my chips. The guy on my left RAISES to around 50K. The big blind folds, and the raiser flips over A6 of diamonds! So he went all-in on just a draw, although a pretty good draw. But no ace and no diamonds come, and I double up to around 80,000! Huge pot for me.

Then I play pretty tight, and eventually (it takes a long time) we get down to the final table, the last 10 players. I'm either the chip leader or close to it - I can't exactly remember. I don't get many good hands for a long time, but a few other guys get knocked out, and it gets down to 5 players or so. Then I knock a guy out when I go all-in with AQ and he calls with A5. See ya. Then it gets down to 3, and the more dangerous opponent gets knocked out by a tight but not-aggressive player on a KK (dangerous player) vs. AA (tight player) hand. Remember this.

So now it's heads up, me vs. a guy that I'm pretty sure I can beat, although he has me outchipped around 280,000 to 140,000. We battle back and forth a bit, and then I'm dealt AA in the big blind. He minimum raises to 16,000 (blinds are 4K / 8K at this point). I raise to 50,000. He goes all-in!! I take a little while, savoring the moment, and then call. He flips over KK!! Tough luck for him, but no K comes, and I double up, and am now in a commanding chip lead, around 350,000 to 60,000. We go back-and-forth a bit, then I put him all-in with AJ, he calls with K6, and he hits a straight on the river - but I hit a flush on the river! So, in summary:

50+5 dollar entry fee
420 entrants
1st place pays $5250.

So I went from trying to leave this tournament to winning the whole thing, and making a cool $5200 in the process. After paying JT (after all, he did play for me for a while) and Todd (for the advice, especially on the 77 hand), I shouldn't have to worry about rent for a little while.

Anyway, I was pretty happy, and I still can't completely believe it. Gotta go teach - thanks again to everyone that helped out. Later.