Astros Buy-Low Pitcher (Near) Lock
by Diggertim on Nov 6, 2009 3:19 PM CST
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Today the Phillies announced they will not extend a contract offer to Brett Myers, who was actually their opening day starter this year. Admittedly, ex-Phils to the Astros are not as definite as ex-Broncos to the Texans, but he is a guy Ed Wade drafted, and seems to really fit the bill for what they will be looking for. How about a 'dream' scenario of Myers, Randy Wolf, and Billy Wagner being added to the staff, with Hampton, Valverde, and Brocail gone?
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I can see Wade having interest in Brett Myers, given the Phillies connection. But how will that sit with McLane? The only reason I say this is: (1) Myers has a prickly personality with the media; and (2) Myers has that public assault on his wife charge in his past. McLane dropped Lugo because of a wife beating charge. McLane also wants everybody to be good guys with the media. (Myers isn’t just prickly with the media…also apparently with teammates. He almost got into fight with Cole Hamel during the World Series.)
Myers could be decent. Who knows. He was awful this year but a lot of that was due to a ridiculously high HR/FB rate.
You just reminded me, I’ve forgotten to bring this up in the past and it’s not related to Myers, but since we’ve been discussing Russell Branyan lately… he’s also had domestic abuse issues. I too had wondered whether Drayton would tolerate that crap.
I wasn’t aware (or didn’t remember) the charge against Branyan when he was with the Indians. It’s certainly not as notorious as the Myers and Lugo incidents. And it seems less severe, in criminal terms, than those incidents. But I have no idea how strictly McLane would react to past incidents in a player’s background. We often assume that the Lugo incident tells us McLane would nix certain players, like I speculated in my previous post, but we may be reading too much into the Astros’ swift DFA of Lugo. Lugo was an Astros’ player who allegedly assaulted his wife in the vicinity of Minute Maid Park in view of a security guard. It’s kind of hard for McLane to ignore the situation.
Was he fighting or motivating?
I was hoping for a Game 7 just to see what Cole Hamels could do.
by Timothy De Block on Nov 6, 2009 11:08 PM CST up reply actions
Myers made some remarks (like, “I didn’t think you will still be around this team?”) aimed at Hamels’ comments after his WS loss. Team officials separated them before more could happen. Even if it was a totally misdirected effort, my guess is that Myers may have thought this was a way to motivate Hamels, somehow trying to snap Hamels out of his passive reaction to the loss.
Got to like these comments from Myers in today's Philadephia papers:
Myers said Amaro gave him no reason for the decision not to attempt to extend the relationship between the team and the pitcher. "I was just like, ‘OK, thanks for putting up with my (stuff),’ "…
Hopefully I’ll be playing against the Phillies and when I do I want the roughest treatment the fans can give me – when I’m pitching. I’m an opposing player – you have to give it to me." …
Myers is open to working as a starter or a reliever with a new team.
"I’ll just go out there on the market and see what happens, dude," he said.
Dude, I think someone ought to see if you can still be starting pitcher.
by clack on Nov 6, 2009 5:11 PM CST reply actions 1 recs
Normally I wouldnt mind taking a shot on him at starting
but at the same time we don’t have a bunch of back up options waiting in the wings if we need to move him to the bullpen.
Pass!!
No thanks. He just isn’t a good starting pitcher. I am not even going to look up stats here, I am just going off of many games I’ve seen him pitch (or should I call it soft toss for BP).
He is a headcase who imo, would at best be average. What’s the upside? What’s the point? We can do better.
The upside is that he has decent velocity with a plus curveball, he has been a good starting pitcher prior to injury (3.91 ERA in 198 IP in 06), and he has been a closer (21 saves in 07). He isn’t that old either (29). The downside is that he is still in the process of coming back from injury and he probably is a headcase. He would have to be pretty cheap to take a chance on him, but let’s face it….cheap gambles probably are what the Astros have to look for.
He only became a headache when he was moved from closer to starter or starter to closer. If you sign him to a contract and tell him he’s going to fill this role I don’t think he’ll be much of a headache. Or you explain to him that they’d like to use him in either capacity and he agrees to a contract knowing his role he won’t be a headache.
He became upset with the organization when they switched his role, and I believe he also was upset with being sent to the minors.
by Timothy De Block on Nov 9, 2009 11:04 AM CST up reply actions
I could buy into that
As long as he’s traded at the mid way point.
by Timothy De Block on Nov 10, 2009 9:32 AM CST up reply actions
actually wouldn’t be a bad idea. I’m guilty of being a Penny fan but it’s sad b/c as many times as his arm has fallen off there are always teams that value Penny some.
I’m a big Penny fan as well. He proved last year that the arm works ok. I watched a few of his starts and I feel like fatigue was a big issue for him which is understandable – he’s not exactly in the best shape and he’s been on the sideline for quite sometime. Hopefully he works on the arm strength over the winter so he can get back to his work horse days. He keeps the ball in the park and minimizes the free pass. Let’s just put it this way – he couldn’t be worse than Hampton.
Rich Harden
He felt like he was “over-used” last year in Chi and is unlikely to be back. Rumor is that Seattle is hot on his trail. Not sure of what kid of contract he will garner, but I would assume that injury issues and last season’s inconsistency should provide a middling salary for his talent.
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