What's better than a little bacon to start off your Sunday Morning? H/T to DQ for pointing this link out to me.
For those of you who are college aged, or have kiddos that are, MSN has a list of the top five things your college student doesn't want you to know. Looking back on it, all of those are extremely valid in one way or another. I can thank college athletics from keeping me from gaining the Freshman 15. Man, I miss eating Chipotle, McDonalds, Buffalo Wings and Chick Fil A all in the same way, usually more than once...
Former Astro Julio Lugo was designated for assignment on Friday by the Red Sox. I being paid a lot of money to produce very little doesn't fly up in The Nation.
Any Daily Show fan should appreciate this. If I had money, Lord knows I would have handed it over to someone with the investment acumen that Dykstra obviously possesses.....nope.
Take a deep breath, and sit down. Joe Sheehan wrote about the Astros and he was pretty fair. For those who don't have a subscription (and don't worry, at this point you're not really missing anything) here's his blurb about the team:
Houston (me: 731 RS 843 RA projected: 677 RS 733 RA). Another gap in the runs-allowed projection in the NL Central, which makes me wonder if I’m not correcting enough for the unbalanced schedule and the effects it has on the numbers. The Astros have gotten surprisingly good work from a no-name bullpen, with Chris Sampson, Alberto Arias and Jeff Fulchino running ERAs lower than their collective Q rating, an LaTroy Hawkins turning in another solid season. With just two good starters on hand, the Astros will be leaning heavily on that pen to keep them in a weak division’s race. The offense has room to grow—eighth in OBP and SLG% just 12th in runs—which is the primary reason to be optimistic. Look for both more runs scored and allowed, and a finish within a few games of .500 on either side. It’s another contender squeezed out of an aging roster by Ed Wade. It's also nice to see Michael Bourn fulfilling expectations after a lost 2008.
Wow, Joe. I didn't think you had it in ya.
Baseball America confirms something that we all believed, the Astros farm system is on the rise:
It had to get better for the No. 30 organization, and it has. The low Class A Lexington rotation, with Jordan Lyles and Ross Seaton setting the pace, gives hope for the future, and 2008 first-rounder Jason Castro looks like the real deal.
Two divisional rivals, the Cards and Pirates, are two teams whose farm systems are on the decline. So wait. Pittsburgh trades away their best player (Nate McLouth) for prospects, and their system gets weaker? Sounds like the Astros, circa 2007.