I suggested, half-heartedly, that putting Erstad in LF, instead of Lee, wouldn’t be as big a loss as it seems, because the defensive improvement would offset part of the offfensive loss. Now I feel bad about the possibility of seeing that experiment take place. Lee is out for the year, unless the Astros make the playoffs.

The statement I mentioned above about Lee was based on his normal offensive stats, which are generally in the mid-800’s for OPS. Since the All Star Break, Lee has been on fire, with a .372 BA and 1.11 OPS. (His OPS is 1.572 in August.) Even with defensive improvement, it will be hard for the team to make up for losing that kind of offense.

The best way for the Astros to overcome that kind of loss is for Berkman to get out of the offensive doldrums. Berkman has a .740 OPS since the ASB, and he is hitting .219 with a .636 OPS in August. If Berkman would get back to his “normal” OPS in the .900’s for the remainder of the year, that would go a long way. It also wouldn’t hurt if Erstad and Bourn could pitch in on the offensive side more.

The Astros called up Abercrombie to replace Lee. I’m not too excited about that move. We’ve seen him already. Try someone else. Maybe even Nick Gorneault. He has hit 3 grand slams this year.