Astros Crawfish Boil: December 10, 2022

Welcome to the Saturday Boil!

Houston Astros News

A Houston Astros fan’s letter to New York Mets fans (click2houston.com)

Alex Bregman tells ‘Pardon My Take’ podcast about Las Vegas celebration and focus on possible repeat ($houstonchronicle.com)

Houston Astros’ Julia Morales reports on life with the team, work-family balance, her new fashion line, and more (houstonculturemap.com)

Baseball Hall of Fame: Carlos Beltran shouldn’t be left out for Astros sign-stealing scandal | Politi (nj.com)

MLB News

MLB distributes first bonuses through Pre-Arb Pool Program (mlb.com)

Money Is No Object: Mets Re-Sign Nimmo, Add Robertson, Might Sign You Next! (blogs.fangraphs.com)

What Should We Make of Jason Heyward’s Deal With the Dodgers? (blogs.fangraphs.com)

The best-hitting MLB pitchers of all time (yardbarker.com)

The best Minor League team nicknames of all time (yardbarker.com)

Oops! All Astros: A.J. Lee

AJ Lee is a six-foot, 200 lb. infielder from Annapolis, MD. Born on May 26, 1997, Lee was a 34th-round selection of the Astros in 2019, out of the University of Maryland. Taken 1036th off the board, Lee would be the first to make the majors from that position if he advances that far. Sixteen of the 109 players taken out of UM have made it to the major leagues, led by Eric Milton (16.5 WAR).

Lee signed with the Astros to a contract that included a $1,000 signing bonus. He spent the remainder of the 2019 season between the Short-season-A Tri-City ValleyCats and the Middle-A Quad Cities River Bandits. After taking the 2020 season off, he played in a total of 43 games in 2021 between the High-A Asheville Tourists, the Double-A Corpus Christi Hooks, and the Triple-A Sugar Land Skeeters. He slashed .117/.196/.175 between the three levels.

The 2022 season would see Lee begin with the Tourists. Aside from two April contests with the newly renamed Sugar Land Space Cowboys (0-for-4, two strikeouts), and one June game with the Hooks (one-for-three), he remained with Asheville for the duration of his time in Houston’s organization.

For a 13-game stretch from June 17 through July 26, Lee hit .415/.468/.634 over 47 plate appearances, but for the rest of the time, his results at the plate were somewhat more lacking. He had seven multiple-hit games through the season, including three in which he totaled three hits. On June 17, in a 13-7 win against the Rome Braves, he collected three singles and two RBI. On August 1, Lee’s time with the Astros came to an end when they released him to free agency. He hasn’t signed on with another team since then. Thanks for reading.