Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 301 | Houston Astros | Profile & Projection

Episode Date: March 14, 2021

You guys ranked the Houston Astros the 12th-best team in baseball! Was that rude? Jomboy, Jake, & Plouffe preview their 2021 Presented by DraftKings Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Time for another team profile and projection brought to you by Draft Kings. This is talking baseball. My name's Jimmy. His name's Jake. His name's Trevor. His name is BBD. Talking about the Houston Astros today. The Houston Astros, guys.

They had a losing season last year in the regular season. If you remember, they finished 29 and 31. They get the second wildcard spot. And they ride it all the way to the ALCS where they lose in game seven. but Dusty did have a plan. Now they're back again. The pitching change. Some things change.

Something's changed. Something stay the same. Jake, what do you got? Quick time out before we get into this episode. It was recorded before the O'Darizzi signing before Forrest Whitley went down. So there's going to be some things we say on here that don't make sense. If you want an updated conversation after you listen to this one, because we still talk a lot of other things here and do our over under. But if you want an updated conversation,

Before you listen, or after you listen to this one, go to the Jake O'Darizzi reaction episode, because not only do we react to the O'Darizzi signing, Jake also does a whole segment on his thoughts about the Astros, even more so after we did this TPP. Sorry that it's a little outdated. But what can you say? We're recording 30 of these and bulking them our bad. Enjoy it. Thank you guys, as always for listening.

Here you go. Yeah, man. Last year they gave Treff's twins the business, then Joklyn, and they lose George Springer. I mean, their version of Mr. October, Connecticut, built different, hard hit in New Britain. Chris Devinsky leaves from the bullpen. He had kind of passed his course. That's not a phrase you say. And then a lot of other guys that they saw throw the pill for them last year.

Sycneed went to Japan. Roberto Zuna's gone. Josh Reddick still unsigned. wouldn't be surprised if he sneaks in. I wonder if we have to do addendum season at some point. Dustin Garneau, a couple other small pieces, but I mean, George Springer, who was a part of this Houston team, he is gone.

They added Jason Castro. He'll be part of their catching platoon. A couple bullpen arms. Pedro Baezed. Did it for the Dodgers, gets lefties. Ryan Stanick, one of the creators of the opener, really. They'll be in the pen. Steve Seish and Steven Sousa Jr.,

a friend of the podcast, ad sequence. So they got some bodies in there. I mean, George Springer being gone is the big deal, Trev. Yeah, you know, regardless of how everyone feels about the ashos, this lineup bangs. And they got depth, they got a little bit of everything. So let's just read it off here. Starting with the catcher position, two solid options.

We've got Martine Maldonado back there. Then like you just said, Jake, they added Jason Castro, brought him back to Houston. At first base, we got Yuli Gireel and his crazy hair. second base our guy out two I mean everyone knows these guys shortstop Correa third base Bregman left field Brantley and center field got a guy named Miles

Straw out there right field Kyle Tucker and then D.H. bringing our guy Air Yordon back after a knee problem last year I believe it was so this lineup is stacked like I said they got depth Jim tell us

about the rotation please well guy named Zach Granky Oh, yeah. Is spearheading the rotation there? The days of Verlander and Cole aren't here right now. Cole's obviously gone. Verlander is recovering from T.J.

Framber Valdez supposed to be the number two. Busted up his left ring finger. And as of right now is listed for likely out for the season. Did we get an update on that? I was kind of shocked that it was out for the season. Which means the rest of the rotation is maybe Lance McCuller's Jr., Jose Urquitty, Christian Javier,

and Luis Garcia. Obviously, you need a bunch of more names, and a lot of people will get starts for them. But yeah, the Framber thing might be bigger than it seems right away. This is a Framber pod. We liked Framber a lot, liked what he was all about. Also, a Dusty has a plan pod. What is the plan, Jake?

What do you think makes this team tick? Obviously, this is the best team in the West. Not by our fans' rankings. Yeah, who do they have above them? A team you might be coming soon, the Oakland A's who... I got to disagree with our fans there. Yeah, there is a little bit of a John Boy media effect on this. I think Houston's still the favorite.

I'll say this, I think both teams got worse and the rest of the division caught up. The A's lost Simeon. The A's lost Liam Hendricks. Houston. I mean, Verlander's going to be out this year. Framber just got hurt. George Springer left. Catching up, not caught up.

The gap is smaller, but they're not caught up. I've said the other teams got better, and I think these teams got worse, so it's figuring out wherever in your heads that lands. Yeah, man, we're going to have to see what this Framber News lands at as we record this. The most recent thing we've seen is most likely out for the season. And you're going to have to see guys step it up, man. I mean, Trev, your guy Lance McCullors, Jr.

this is his year before free agency. So what does he have in the tank? Can he twirl that slider and get a bunch of outs? They've got a lot of young pitchers. At the same time, these are young pitchers that have shown us stuff. And it's going to come down to all of that. How does their depth go? When we talk about all these teams, we try to go 7-8-9 starting pitching deep.

And their 7-8-9 for this season, Trev, are going to be really young guys. So that can go one of two ways really quick. There's a lot of guys you're familiar with. That lineup is going to do it, and that's what makes them the favorite in the West IMO. But yeah, I mean, the pitching's got a lot of question marks. You know, I wish this organization didn't have the huge stain on them

because they do develop talent. You guys know I love talking about player development. So I don't know about seven, eight, nine starters deep. I get what you're saying. You need to have some horses in the pen. But I do think that anybody that they bring up, I mean, we saw it last year with Framberg. These guys are ready to go.

So George Springer is a huge loss from them, but as I'm looking at this lineup, most of the guys had down years last year, most of them. And you can make the jokes, make the jokes, do all that stuff. But this is a lineup that's built to destroy teams. And we saw in the playoffs. We saw Carlos Correa just take that lead and put the team on his back.

But I don't expect Bregman to struggle again. I don't expect Altovae to struggle again. We'll see what Brantley's got left in the tank. He's one of those guys who I think can play until he's 45 if he wants to. That's how easy his swing is. So I really love this team. They get the addition of Yordon, and I think that's a huge, huge addition this year.

If they had him in the playoffs last year, who knows what would have happened. That guy is something special. Can't forget about the type of player he, is. So I'm excited to see this team. I like the bullpen, kind of how it's shaking up now. I think that was kind of a iffy problem for them last year as well. But I like the guys they brought in. I like C-Shek.

I like Stannick. Obviously, we got Presley back there. Pedro Bias is one of those guys that kind of is shaky but gets the job done. C-Shack's like on, isn't he a minor league invite, right? Non-rust or in-vite. He's always a minor league invite. He makes a team and he ends up throwing meaningful

ending. So I like this team a lot. And I agree with you, Jim. I think that they're probably a little bit better than Oakland on paper. They've been in the ALCS four years in a row or something like that. You know, they're still pretty good. I think Altuve came out of it. I think he was their best hitter in the LCS after like he was going through like all the yips and all the terribleness. He still hit despite throwing errors, which you pointed out, Trev, was awesome.

It depends. I mean, are we still feeling the same way we felt about Granky two years ago? We, a genuine question, not pointed or searching for one answer over the other. I didn't look and like do a deep dive, but, um, because he only, was he injured last postseason? He only started one game in the CS that went seven, seven games. He, uh, I mean, forgetting, which is bad. Yeah, no, he, he, he took the pill last year for his full slate of starts.

Uh, and then in the postseason, he started, uh, he started against all. Oakland, he got knocked around a little bit, and then he had a nice bounce back start against Tampa, six innings pitch, two and run, seven Ks. Man, for me, I think it's a don't bet against that Grinky. He's 37. There's a lot of mileage out there. Everyone loves Grinky at this point. I mean, you know, you're going to get some antics.

You're going to get his fastball at 88, and then he's going to throw a power change up at 89, and it's just what's kind of going on out there. But, I mean, the last, you know, 2019. He was 33 starts with a 293. That was the last full season. Last year, 12 starts of 403, which, you know, ERA is not everything, but his FIP was still really good. Like, I think you, Zach Grinky is still Zach Grinky until he's not.

Yeah, he didn't pitch game three because he had an arm injury, but I'm guessing it was just temporary and didn't linger because I haven't heard anything about that. Astros fans, obviously you know more than us about this. But looking at the lineup, even with Springer gone, It's still pretty full, pretty balanced, pretty fun. Tucker broke out nicely. I think that some Astros fans were getting a little impatient with Kyle Tucker.

And then they were, I was going to say rewarded for their patience, but they were impatient. You're impatient. You didn't get rewarded for it. But he's had two seasons now. When he did play, he performed. He hasn't been the starter. Well, last year he played 58 games. Before that, he played, he did good.

You know, 123 OPS plus for Kyle Tucker. So I think that maybe makes it easier that Redick's gone. Yeah. And I think, A, Jordan Alvarez, Trev touched on a little bit. Go check out those stats. His rookie year, when he won rookie of the year, 87 games, 27 home runs. Do some quick mental math on that. That's disgusting.

So who is he? If he's that dude, yeah. even if he's 80% of that dude, that's still an impact ball player. Kyle Tucker, yes, I mean, Astro fans were getting impatient. He was a fifth overall pick. He came up. He was 21 years old. He's still 24.

And there's an argument he was their best, you know, best position guy last year during the regular season. So who can he be? I mean, even if he is the, you know, 840 OPS guy that he's been, that's a really good ball player. That's an upgrade over Josh Reddick. If he's better than that, yeah, I mean, that just changes this and adds more depth to the lineup. I think the thing that really jumps out to me is the center field position, and it's just kind of the eyebrow race. Springer's been there, he's been the leadoff guy, and he's been so good at it. And now they're rolling into the season with Miles Straw, who wasn't a huge prospect for them, speed guy,

and, hey, maybe they just want to see some defense. I'm chalking this up full circle that watch for Houston to trade for someone. I brought up the upcoming center field free agent class. Technically, JBJ with his team option, now that that's there. Starling Marte from the Marlins, watch out for that if they fall out of the race. Or even someone like a Kevin Pilar, Michael A. Taylor, like, I just, it's tough for me to see how good this Houston lineup can be. We're counting Jordan Alvarez and Kyle Tucker as bonus pieces where for other teams we would be saying like, you know, these are decent guys to have at the top of your lineup. Like these are their bonus pieces.

So I wouldn't be surprised if Houston's going to be in it. I wouldn't be surprised if they make a center field move for maybe one of those guys I mentioned or someone else out there. And it's just how does this pitching staff look come midseason and how does the pitching staff look come end of the year? what's scary about this team is they were awful during the regular season last year and that was 20-20 but you finish under 500 you make it to the playoffs because we have expanded playoffs for one year but because they've been there so often the light switched on boom they go and win the wild card series against the twins they go beat up on the a's and then they take the raise to game seven they were this close to being in the world series so They know how to play in the playoffs. They know how to get to the playoffs. And Dusty has a play. And they're in a division.

It's not that great. Like this team can just get into the playoffs. This is one of the teams when they say, hey, man, all we want to do is get into the playoffs. I believe them, and I believe that's what they should be doing. Don't worry about anything. Just make it to the playoffs because you understand what it takes. Like you said, Jim, four straight years in the ALCS.

This team's scary. Nobody wants to play them when it comes to the postseason. And that, I mean, to me, that's like, you can't say that about a lot of teams. I ended up on Bregman's page looking at this. Alex Bregman has already played 57 postseason games. He turns 27 to start this season. It's pretty cool. These guys are battle tested, Trev.

And I'm not saying this as a dig, but, you know, we've talked about the Minnesota Twins' playoffs struggles. And some of these other teams coming up on the list, I mean, you're going to lean into these Astros because they've been there. they've done it. And they've done it a lot. So I don't know, man. Obviously. If you got to go into Houston, if you've got to go play in Houston,

it's a tough place to go get a victory. It just is. Regardless if they got people banging trash cans or not, this team understands that ballpark. And it's a strange ballpark, dude. Like the center field is huge out there. They got the left field crawford boxes that jot out in left center.

They know how to play that. They know everything about that park. They've mastered playing there. It's very hard to go into Houston and get a win. So I just, I think this is a low ranking for them. After looking kind of at the depth that they have and the lineup,

yes, the starting pitching maybe isn't there, but I kind of feel like they're just going to figure that out. And another reason I'm kind of high on these guys is this is the team that got Ron Darling to call me out on the line. I like that. What do you think? I'm in.

I like reading Trevor Ploof stuff. He's got a lot of good takes. What do you think their floor is? We all obviously think that their ceiling is winning the division. I think it's, I think that they are the front runner to win the division. How bad do you think it could get if it got bad? They have some pieces they could trade. Not a lot because like Granky's coming up, but that's a lot of money you'd have to dish.

Carlos Correa, if contract extension stuff talks are going south or are getting angry, They could move him again. I think it's about zero. I think it's about zero percent chance. I just wanted to see. Do you think there's any way their ceiling is that they're moving guys they can move? McCullors is another guy. They could move.

I'm saying no. I just want to ask you guys the question. Yes. Of course there's a scenario where that happens. If guys are hurt and they're just completely out of it, this is an organization that prides themselves on being smart. They're new GMs from the race. Like if they're out of it and they see, hey, McCullors, you're probably going to make a lot in free agency and maybe we don't want to pay you that?

I could see him getting shipped out. Yeah. I don't know about Correa. I feel like they, I mean, Correa to me, that is the guy that they want to keep and build around. And if I was them, I keep Lance as well. But there is a scenario where if things just went horribly wrong, I could see them selling off. But it's a very small, small chance. Yeah, I'm going to say no.

I mean, even if Oakland is their best, if the angels, if they can make some moves and a couple things click, like I was higher on them than I think both of you guys, Houston's still going to be in it. They have so much talent that they're in it that for what Correa means to that franchise, to trade him away as a rental, what you're going to get back in today's Major League Baseball is nothing, that you might as well just keep them in town and work on extensions while you're there. I agree. And I think the same thing, I think the same thing with Land. McCruller.

So could this team end up in trouble? Yes. And that goes back to the pinching. We did Zach Rinky. Is there a world where Zach Rinkie is old and not the same? Yeah. I mean, that's baseball. I'm not taking that bet.

And then I was just going to do a who's their second best starter. Yelene Lance McCullors. Erkidi's got some really nice numbers in Major League Baseball, but he's only pitched 70 innings up into this point. So they're going to be leaning on. Javier was good last year. Javier was good. Louis Garcia is really talented.

He was the kid that jumped in the playoff game. Too many Luis Garcia is a hot name right now. It's hot in the streets. He had that sexy hair going. So there's a world where these Astros are just leaning on too much youth and it's not there. But I still even think in that world they're going to be close enough to Oakland, the Angels, or whatever's going on in the West. This team's not selling anything. I would say zero percent chance they're selling anything.

and I think that they're going to be, you know, if it's a weak division, maybe like they're, maybe their record isn't as impressive as it's been in past years, but I think they're going to be top of the division or right there with the A's as we go. There's still a ton of a talent on the roster for sure. I think what Astros fans are hoping for here is as we see that Verlander's out. He's probably not coming back unless it's like a rehab deal. and then like who is Verlander at that point. Granky, he's a free agent.

Cole's gone. He's been gone. So like all these new kids that were talking about, Framber, or Kitty, Javier, Garcia, let's add like Forrest Whitley to that list. Yeah. You're hoping that. Have you guys seen Forrest Whitley? Yeah, but you're hoping.

Astros fans are hoping some of these guys kind of get them to where they were with Framber this year. I think spring training Framber this year, like Frambers are a number of number two. We love that Frambers are number two. We're happy Frambers number two. Those guys bump up. So next year, they're not like, oh shit, do we have no one? You want all these guys to like jump into the trust tree, not if, if only one jumps up, then like going into next year needing to sign some pitchers. McCuller's also gone. Free agent. I, you know, as soon as this Framber news came out, obviously it's a big blow to them, but

articles start coming in about Forrest with these, six, seven, right? candidate pitcher he's got i think well in this picture i'm seeing beautiful flow beautiful human being potential candidate for my hot boy list you know i like tall pitchers so look this is an organization like i said that seemingly has developed a ton of talent we we always have to mention that some of those guys were benefiting from getting signs like that's just part of it man and astros fans just got to deal with that i believe in all these players i don't think they need to do that, but they did it. All the young guys coming up

were not part of that. I'm a big fan of the way the organization is able to develop players. When you see what these guys have done when they have come up, you got to imagine the guy like Forrest, if he can stay healthy, he has an injury-prone tag. This guy could just come up and be a guy guy for them.

From Texas. I think he's from San Antonio. I love it. San Antonio Kid, not far from Houston. Corpus Christi, Jake. Yeah, the Prospect Shine is wearing off a little on him. Like, it's time, so let's see it. He's 23 years old.

Well, Trev, like some people had him as a top five prospect in baseball. Now some places have him as, like, 80th. So it's, you know, when you mention injuries and you mention all of that, that's how that works. So, hey, come up and shove, and you're right back in the mix. And still, secret of baseball, nobody knows anything about prospects. Randy Rosarano was like the raised 26th prospect, and now he's like top. I agree with you. Oh, but check out the split. Check out the split I found on Fars Whitley.

I've never seen this on baseball reference, and it's awesome. In his minor league career, Fars Whitley versus younger batters has a 588 OPS versus older batters has a 908 OPS. Wow. It doesn't say what the cutoff is or the age limit or if it's service time, but you just let you know he's much better versus younger bad. Older hitters are smarter than him. If this team gets a bunch of young controllable pitchers going for that lookout,

it's going to be another five, six years of Houston dominance in the AOS. Well, not dominance because the A's have been there. But you know what I'm saying. Yeah, they've got to retain some more infield guys. That's the secret, though. That's the secret to winning in this game is having young, controllable pitchers. Yeah. No.

Does Max have a fun stat? Max is fun staff. the Houston Astros. All four of Houston starters who made 10 plus starts last season. Granky McCullors, Valdez, Javier were among the 17 pitchers in M-O-B with the lowest-average home-run distance. All between 381 and 391 feet. The only other team to have multiple pitchers in the bottom 17 was the Phillies, Nola and Arieta. So they might give up home runs, but they ain't giving up bombs.

They don't go far? Yeah. It's a strange, strange stat, Max. I like it. Wind-blown pop-ups. that go out. Those damn Crawford boxes ruining it. Yeah, those things could have stopped

a lot of those laser homers. You know what I'm saying? Treve, you with those Crawford boxes? Thick boy 2014, Treve. I've been all over that stadium. And I forget, have you gone over the monster at Fenway? I'm just blanking right now. Second deck of Yankee Stadium?

You guys were not... We'll talk about this here. Let's stay with the Astros here. Over under. draft kings has the over under at 86 and a half if everything goes well here that's an easy over for me but yeah we're talking about it's just so tough to and everyone stay healthy it's so tough to picture this astros team and we're like 84 wins like that doesn't click in my head no you know yeah in 2016 they won 84 wins they won 84 wins they won 84 wins they won 84 wins yeah they gameed

84 wins. No, man, how about this? I think this team... How about this? No, it was so huge for them, and this is going to sound really dumb, but doing well in the playoffs, because last year was supposed to be the, you know, it was coming off the cheating scandal,

and these guys are going to get booed. Oh, now they're not getting booed, and they finish the season 29 and 31. Like, if the twins beat them in the playoffs, I think we would be saying a lot different stuff about Houston. Yeah, but the fact that once they got to the postseason... They turned it on, and I think they'll have that in the tank. Like, even if they hovered them,

around 500 for a little bit and say Framber's not out for the season and he comes back or Forrest Whitley comes up and he does have a little magic in the tank like Houston, everyone is going to be waiting for Houston a click even if it doesn't start early and then when it does it's kind of like dig in because let's see what they've got and Dusty

has a plan so I'll take the over man I'll take the over as well. Is that against these guys? I'm already on the over. You know I'm on the over apparently all I do is big up. Oh, the triple sweep. That meme was pretty good Treve. It was good. Sorry, I'm so... How many unders has Trev picked?

I don't know. I didn't think it was all overs. BBD is bringing it up. BBD Analytics. It'll take a second. This is going to take a second. You've done 18 teams already? I found one, but they're split between...

I do my sheets by month, so I have to find the other sheet. Okay, BD does his sheets by... At least one. At least one under. It's got to be the Texas Rangers. It was the Rockiest, I think. Trevor's taken the under on the angels, the Mariners, the Diamondbacks,

the Rockies. Oh, it's a lot of unders. And the Orioles. So five unders? Never listen to the comments. Five unders, 13 overs. I like it. Yeah, it's not bad, Trev.

All right. Thank you guys very much. Do you want me to wait it out? Do you think you'll find it or have we moved on collectively? Just move on. All right, cool. Thank you guys very much. We'll be back tomorrow with another episode.

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