Glimmers of Hope: The Pitchers

I guess your not very high on Happ huh. Im hopeful we will see more of his second half of last year next year.

I think Wandy will be traded this offseason, which will make the 2012 rotaion pretty weak/young.

If you were to rank the pitchers that ended the year in the rotation, I think Wandy would fall in the 15-30 range in the NL. He’s an established #2.

Norris would probably fall in the 30-45 range, although he could be a little higher. I see him improving his pitching, but I think eventually he’ll be a moderate injury risk, which lowers his value a little. That said, I think any team would love to have him in the middle of their rotation.

Myers is an innings eater and I think he’s due for a rebound season. Most teams would definitely have a place for him at the middle or back of their rotation, but sadly, Houston will be counting on him to anchor the front end of theirs. The good news is that he’ll have an opportunity to raise his trade value and bring a significant haul at the deadline.

I’m sold on Happ rebounding. He’ll never be the #3 guy I had hoped he would when Houston acquired him, but I think he is a capable starter for the time being.

If Houston held onto Wandy, it would only leave 1 major question mark in the rotation, but if he’s traded as I expect, there will be 2 completely unproven starters in the rotation to start the season (unless a proven starter comes back in the Wandy trade—as an aside, I could see a Wandy and $3M for Rosario and Bettis). Lyles and Sosa both showed flashes of their potential, but neither set the world on fire. As young as Lyles is, I’d rather see him start in AAA and be forced to dominate before moving up full time. If Wandy is gone I don’t see any way he doesn’t slot into the major league rotation. If Sosa were 24, I’d be REALLY high on him. But at 27 I don’t see much upside from where he already is, which is as a 2 pitcher hurler with good stuff but an inability to conform to a bullpen role. In my opinion this limits him to a #4 or #5 starter at best.

The good news is that (finally) the rotations in the minor league system should be strong from top to bottom. Assuming Sosa and Lyles are in Houston, OKC should feature Clemens, Keuchel and a slew of guys with solid MLB experience like Van Hekken, Harrell, Aneury Rodriguez, and Xavier Cedeno. Former 2nd rd pick Sergio Perez may still be in the mix. Other than Perez, all 6 of the other guys have a chance to contribute in Houston in 2012, with Clemens, Keuchel, and Aneury having #3 long term upside.

In AA, Cosart, Oberholtzer, Buchanan, Cisnero, and Seaton all have high enough ceilings to be excited about, and with strong seasons, all could be in Minute Maid by the end of the year. Houston has a lot riding on Cosart being their future ace.

It remains to be seen who will be the starters in Lancaster and Lexington, but there is a LOT of really interesting high ceiling depth, with the list headed by the 2011 Lexington guys (Foltynewicz, Bushue, Alaniz) and the 2011 draftees (Houser, Armstrong, Tropeano, Hallock, Dufek).

As for the bullpen, I’m not nearly as concerned as most. There was a long list of young players who were fairly productive: Escalona, Carpenter, Lopez, F Rod, Melancon, Wright, EDR, and Abreu all did well enough to expect continued major league contributions next year. I don’t believe in Melancon as the closer long term, but at this point a team as mediocre/terrible as the Astros doesn’t really need a lockdown closer, and that’s a position that won’t warrant attention until they are competitive again. A key measure of Mills’ performance in 2012 will be how well he is able to differentiate the real quality relievers from the posuers out of his list of young relievers. The minor league teams should be fine in the bullpen as well, so help could be on the way in short order and the competition for slots should be healthy. Hicks, Stoffel, Zeid, De Leon, Leon, Chowning, and on and on shows that there should be a yearly stream of new arms to try out.