So, they're not really very interesting right now, but as the season moves on, I'm sure we'll be paying attention to the Astros run at 120 losses.
They're 10-29 right now, on pace for 41 wins. Their best player, Jose Altuve, was injured last night and was also placed on the bereavement list due to the death of his grandmother.
Grantland has a really good article about how the Astros are rebuilding: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9273233/hoarding-prospects-being-horrible-houston-astros
Some choice parts:
Stros-town!
They're 10-29 right now, on pace for 41 wins. Their best player, Jose Altuve, was injured last night and was also placed on the bereavement list due to the death of his grandmother.
Grantland has a really good article about how the Astros are rebuilding: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9273233/hoarding-prospects-being-horrible-houston-astros
Some choice parts:
Luhnow had the perfect background to take advantage of baseball's new rules. As vice-president of scouting and player development for the St. Louis Cardinals from 2006 through 2011, Luhnow presided over one of baseball's most productive farm systems — the Cardinals entered this season with the no. 1 farm system in the game, and most of those prospects were acquired during Luhnow's tenure. (According to Baseball America, more players on Opening Day rosters this year were signed by Luhnow than by any other scouting director.)
Luhnow has an unconventional background for a front office executive — he was born and raised in Mexico City, where his father worked as an advertising executive. He speaks fluent Spanish. He graduated from Penn, got his MBA from Northwestern, and worked in corporate America for years before joining the Cardinals in 2003. Not surprisingly, Luhnow is a strong believer in applying analytics to baseball, and last year he hired two writers from Baseball Prospectus: Mike Fast as an analyst in the Astros' baseball operations department, and Kevin Goldstein as their coordinator of pro scouting.
For instance, last year (the first year the new draft caps were in place), the difference in slot money assigned to the 20th and 21st picks in the draft was just $25,000. The difference between the seventh and eighth picks was just $100,000. But the difference between what the Astros were allotted with the no. 1 overall pick ($7.2 million) and what the Twins were allotted at no. 2 ($6.2 million) was a full million dollars. The no. 5 pick was allotted $3.5 million — meaning the difference in slot money between the first and fifth picks is greater than the difference between the fifth and last picks in the draft.
By tearing apart their roster last summer, the Astros guaranteed themselves the no. 1 pick again next month, and once again will have a significant spending advantage on every other team. Only this year, the advantage spreads to signing amateur talent on the international market as well. While there is no draft on foreign amateurs — yet — each team has a firm cap on how much money it can spend to sign kids from Latin America and other markets.4 Those caps are determined by "draft order" even though there is no draft. The upshot is that the Astros have $400,000 more to spend than the Chicago Cubs, who lost 101 games, and the gap only grows from there.
Two years ago, the Astros' farm system was nearly as bad as the varsity team; Baseball America ranked their system 26th out of 30 teams before the 2011 season. The system Luhnow inherited after that season was a little better; they ranked 18th last year. This year, they were ninth, and that ranking figures to only get better with time. While minor league win-loss records are mostly meaningless, it's telling that the Astros' affiliates are a combined 88-60 this year. Two years ago, their minor league teams had the worst combined record of any organization in baseball.
The pitching numbers are even worse. Humber, who threw a perfect game in the majors barely 12 months ago, is 0-8 (in mid-May!) with a 9.59 ERA, and was designated for assignment on Sunday. Peacock had a 9.41 ERA and threw 21⅓ innings in five starts before he was demoted to Triple-A. Bedard has a 6.67 ERA — and he's the Astros' no. 3 starter. When the Astros have the lead after five innings, they are just 10-6. Perhaps most amazing of all, the Astros have won just one game all year in which they were losing. Not losing after eight innings — losing at any point in the ballgame.
Their new manager, Bo Porter, tried to remove reliever Wesley Wright from a game against the Angels last week before Wright had faced a hitter — a move that most 12-year-old baseball fans know is against the rules. Then again, Porter somehow managed to convince four umpires — four guys who get paid lots of money to know the rules of baseball — that what he did was perfectly valid. So while Porter may be in over his head as a baseball manager, he seems quite qualified to join the Jedi Order.
Stros-town!