The reeling Stros (11-16) get a nice boost today as the club’s best hitter — Lance Berkman — is expected to play tonight in the Stros’ game against the Braves (17-11) in Atlanta. Berkman has been rehabilitating his right ACL over the past six months after surgery on his knee that he injured while playing flag football last November. Here is the Stros’ press release on the activation of Berkman.
Although the Stros have not yet announced the player who will be dropped from the 25 player roster to accomodate Berkman, my sense is that it will be either Brandon “Home Run” Duckworth or Chad Harville, who had a rough outing in last night’s game in Atlanta.
Update: Just to show what I know, the Stros announced this evening that they sent rookie Chris Burke (-4 RCAA/.222 Ave/.265 OBP/.244 SLG) to AAA Round Rock to make room on the roster for Berkman. Inasmuch as Burke is blocked by Bidg at his natural position of second base and has not hit well enough so far this season to merit a reserve role in the outfield, he is probably better off at Round Rock where he can play every day. However, the Stros probably will not carry 12 pitchers on the 25 player roster for long, so another roster move is likely in the near future.
The already weak-hitting Stros have been struggling at the plate this season without Berkman, who is legitimately one of the best hitters in Major League Baseball right now. To appreciate just how good a hitter Berkman is, consider his runs scored against average (“RCAA”), which is a statistic that Lee Sinins developed to measure how many more runs a hitter generates compared to the number of runs an average hitter creates.
As noted several times on this blog, RCAA is particularly valuable to evaluate hitting because it focuses on the two most important things in winning baseball games — that is, creating runs and avoiding making outs. RCAA basically computes the number of outs that a particular player uses in creating runs for his team and then compares that number to the amount of runs that an average player in the league would create while using an equivalent number of outs. Inasmuch as the hypothetical average player’s RCAA is always zero, a player can have either an RCAA that is a positive number — which indicates he is an above average hitter (i.e., Barry Bonds) — or an RCAA that is a negative number, which means he is performing below average (i.e., Brad Ausmus).
Moreover, RCAA is a valuable tool to evaluate hitting ability because it provides a good measure for comparing hitters who played during different eras. Inasmuch as RCAA measures a player’s hitting ability against that of an average player in the player’s league for each particular season, a player’s lifetime RCAA is an accurate measure to compare players from different eras — it essentially measures how each player performed against an average player in his era. On the other hand, comparing other hitting statistics — such as on-base average, slugging percentage, and batting average — is often skewed between players of hitter-friendly eras versus players of pitcher-friendly eras.
Berkman is well on his way to being the best hitter in Stros history. After a 55 RCAA/.982 OPS 2002 season and a 40 RCAA/.927 OPS 2003 season, Berkman had an incredible .566 SLG, .450 OBA, 1.016 OPS, 69 RCAA in 160 games during the 2004 season. He has a .980 career OPS (i.e. on-base average + slugging percentage), compared to the league average of .777 during his career, and 254 RCAA in 775 games.
Berkman’s 236 RCAA over the past 4 years ranks 8th in the past half century for players of the age 25-28:
1 Mickey Mantle 322
2 Frank Thomas 320
3 Barry Bonds 319
4 Hank Aaron 256
5 Manny Ramirez 250
6 Willie Mays 246
7 Jeff Bagwell 239
8 Lance Berkman 236
T9 Todd Helton 228
T9 Frank Robinson 228
Not bad company.

Last time we checked in on them, the Stros were coming off a successful homestand and feeling pretty good about themselves. However, after an atrocious roadie in which they lost five straight (including three shutouts) to the division-leading Cardinals (15-8) and the pathetic Pirates (8-15), the Stros (10-13) came home licking their wounds. And after frittering away yet another strong Rocket pitching performance in the Friday night opening game of the weekend homestand against the Cubs (12-12), things just didn’t look good at all.
However, the Stros’ bats finally came alive against the Cubs’ sore aces Wood and Prior in the Saturday and Sunday games, and the club won both games comfortably. So, the Stros come into their upcoming three game set against the Pirates feeling at least competitive at the plate again.
Despite last week’s losing streak and a 1-10 road record, the Stros are only a game or two below where I thought they would be one month into the “B.B.R” (“before Berkman returns”) portion of the season (Berkman is pictured left on a rehab assignment at AAA Round Rock). One month into the season, the Stros hitters have not hit quite as well as I thought they would, but their pitchers have pitched even better than I thought they would. Except for some managerial malpractice by Phil Garner in hitting Everett (.240 AVE/.326 OBP/.400 SLG) at lead-off for most of the season and in inexplicably giving Lamb (.262/.354/.571) — whose grand salami off of Prior was the key hit in Sunday’s win over the Cubs — roughly half the at bats of Luke Scott (.154/.250/.205) to date, the Stros probably would have won a game or two more.
As expected, hitting has been the problem for this Stros club. As measured by the all-important statistic of runs created against average (“RCAA” explained here), the Stros are tied with the Brewers (11-13) as the second-to-last hitting team in the National League through the first month of the season, above only the utterly incompetent Pirates. Only Lane (.295/.330/.557) Lamb and Bags (.263/.366/.434) have positive RCAA’s, although frankly CF Taveras (.267/.333/.387) has to be rated a pleasant surprise at being able to maintain a -2 RCAA through the first month of the season given that his defense has been generally superior (he threw out three Cubs at the plate over during the weekend series). Similarly, the -2 RCAA of SS Everett — whose defense has been typically superior and who has shown signs of becoming at least an average National League hitter this season — is probably acceptable at this stage of the season. Finally, after a hot start, Bidg (.265/.322/.434) has tailed off to a -1 RCAA, but at least his track record indicates that he will improve as the season progresses.
On the other hand, Ausmus (.231/.310/.269), Burke (.238/.289/.262), Ensberg (.246/.342/.377) and Scott have all have -4 RCAA, meaning that each of them have produced four fewer runs than an average National League hitter would have produced so far this season using the equivalent number of outs that each player used. Ausmus has been particularly awful, even by his notoriously low standards. In 57 plate appearances, Ausmus has had 10 singles, two doubles and five walks — it’s clearly time to give the newly-acquired Quintero a chance with the big club. It is almost certain that he could not be worse than Ausmus.
Although getting Berkman back will certainly help, the Stros hitting problems are more than one great hitter can cure. Bags’ power drain — his slugging percentage last season and this season is down over .100 points from the 2001 season — appears to be permanent. Ensberg still has not regained the stroke from his breakout 2003 season, and at age 39, Bidg is certainly no sure bet to hit much better than an average National League hitter this season. Moreover, the Stros’ top hitting prospects at AAA (LF Todd Self) and AA (CF Josh Anderson) have shown little power in the minors. Consequently, absent a trade for another slugger to complement Berkman, the Stros are likely stuck with this group of generally unproductive hitters for the remainder of the season.
Meanwhile, the Stros’ pitching has been nothing short of remarkable so far this season. Ranking fourth best in the National League behind only the Marlins (14-9), Braves (15-10), and Cardinals, every pitcher on the Stros’ staff except for “Home Run” Duckworth and Backe have a positive runs saved against average (“RSAA” explained here), and Backe has actually pitched reasonably well except for this adventure in St. Louis. The ageless Clemens leads the National League in RSAA through the first month of the season and the remainder of the staff members appear to be on their way to solid seasons. Accordingly, if the Stros can simply figure out a way to be an average National League team in hitting, the Stros’ pitching is good enough to carry the club into contention for at least the Wild Card playoff spot.
Some food for thought — is it time for the Stros to use some of their pitching talent in a trade to acquire more hitting? The Stros are loaded with at least five top pitching prospects at AAA Round Rock (Astacio, Wandy Rodriguez, and Jared Gothreaux) and AA Corpus Christi (Fernando Nieve and Jason Hirsch). Perhaps dangling Burke with one of two of those prospects would generate interest from a pitching starved club such as the Reds so that they would dangle one of their young slugging outfielders. Adam Dunn, Austin Kearns, or Wily Mo Pena would sure look good in a Stros uniform.
The Stros need to make some hay during the upcoming home series against the hapless Pirates because that series is followed by a seven game road trip to Atlanta and Miami, two places where wins are rare. Pettitte pitches the Monday game before Ezequiel Astacio gets his first Major League start in the Tuesday game. After the following seven game roadie, the Stros return to MinuteMaid Park on Thursday, May 12th for a seven game homestand against the Giants (13-11) and the Diamondbacks (14-10). If the Stros come into the San Francisco series with at least a 16-17 record, then my sense is that they would still be on course for this season.

I’m as much of a baseball stathead as the next guy, but I must admit that it never occurred to me to compile the creative statistics that are featured on this imaginative new blog — Plunk Biggio.
The blog is “dedicated to Craig Biggio and his (probably unintentional) Quest to break the all time major league career record for getting hit by pitches.”
Hat tip to the always alert Charles Kuffner for the link.

After a short but successful 3-1 homestand, the Stros (8-7) hit the road for a weekend series in St. Louis (9-5) and then a series in Pittsburgh (5-11) during the first part of next week before returning home on Friday the 29th to begin a six game homestand against the Cubs(8-8) and the Pirates.
The most recent homestand featured this Stros club’s strength, which is solid starting pitching. The Rocket, Brandon Backe, Roy O, and Pettitte all had strong performances, and the only reason the Stros didn’t win all four games was that they couldn’t muster a run in 12 innings in Clemens’ game against the Braves. Oswalt’s performance (9 IP, 4 H, 1 R/ER, 0 BB, 8 K’s) was particularly masterful as he mowed down the Brew Crew in a little more than two hours with a devastating combination of a 95 mph heater and a 70 mph curve. By the way, the 27 year old Oswalt is well on his way to becoming the best pitcher in Stros history. After 2.97 ERA/21 RSAA (RSAA explained here) and 3.49 ERA/22 RSAA seasons in 2003-04, Oswalt is off to a 3.41 ERA/3 RSAA start in his first 4 starts. He has a 3.12 career ERA, compared to a league average of 4.25 during his career, and a 108 RSAA in 124 games. Roy O already holds the Stros record for career RSAA:
1 Roy Oswalt 108
2 Billy Wagner 99
3 Mike Hampton 76
4 Dave Smith 75
5 Octavio Dotel 67
6 Nolan Ryan 60
7 Wade Miller 56
8 Don Wilson 55
9 Joe Sambito 53
10 Larry Andersen 45
By the way, if you want to miss one of the Stros’ games this weekend during the St. Louis series, you may want to make it tonight’s game. The Stros trot out fifth starter Brandon “Home Run” Duckworth to the mound against the Cards’ power lineup, so this one could get ugly fast.

On the heels of this post from a couple of weeks ago, the Stros announced yesterday that they are retiring former centerfielder Jimmy Wynn‘s number 24.
The ceremony honoring Mr. Wynn will be on Friday, July 8, before the game against the Dodgers.

After starting the season with a promising 4-1 homestand, the Stros (5-6) stumbled on their their first road trip of the season over the past week. The Stros lost five of six games on the trip, with the Mets (6-6) sweeping the Stros in three close games to begin the trip. Then, after the Stros blew out the Reds (6-5) in the first game of their weekend series, the Reds came back to win two close games to take that series.
Despite the disappointing road trip, the Stros are about where most everyone expected them to be 11 games into the season. Until slugger Lance Berkman returns (probably in a couple of weeks or so), it is unlikely that this Stros team has enough hitting to do much better than win as many games as they lose. In fact, unless changes are made, it is highly unlikely that this Stros team can win more than 85 games even with Berkman.
I hope Stros management is open to making changes because the Stros’ pitching staff is every bit as good as I predicted and, barring injury, good enough to carry the team to more than 90 wins. Through two weeks of the season, the Stros pitching staff is ranked second only to the Marlins (6-6)in the National League in runs saved against average (“RSAA,” explained here). With the exception of Brandon Duckworth‘s typically mediocre performance in today’s game, every Stros pitcher has been above-average in their pitching performances to date.
Although it’s a bit dicey to make firm conclusions less than 7% into a baseball season, it’s becoming clearer with each game that Phil Garner is not pushing the right buttons to maximize the effectiveness of the Stros’ meager offensive weapons. He continues inexplicably to bat the light-hitting Everett (.150 Ave./.255 OBP/.225 SLG) at leadoff even though Everett has not yet proven that he is even an average Major League hitter, much less an effective leadoff batter. Similarly, Garner continues to write the anemic Ausmus (.111/.200/.148) into the lineup each day even though Ausmus has now deteriorated to well below even replacement level performance. Meanwhile, Garner continues to sit Mike Lamb, the Stros’ best lefthanded hitter outside of Berkman, and makes such questionable moves as batting Jason Lane — arguably the club’s best hitter right now — sixth in the batting order in the final game of the Reds series.
This Stros club is going to win most of its games with its strong pitching. But the club’s hitting is so weak that there isn’t much marging for error, and Garner made his share over the past road trip. Garner needs to put Lamb in left field and leave him there and move Everett to the back end of the order. Then, the Stros’ management needs to call up catcher Humberto Quintero (acquired in the Tim Redding trade) from AAA Round Rock, where he is currently hitting .368/.428/.667. Quintero and Chavez would be a better duo than Chavez and Ausmus, who simply is no longer a major league quality player.
The Stros have a quick four game homestand this week with two games each against the Braves (6-5) and the Brewers (5-6)before going out on the road again to face the Cardinals (6-4) next weekend and then the Pirates (4-8) during the first part of next week. The Stros return home to face the Cubs (6-6) on Friday the 29th.

The Stros probable fifth pitcher in their starting rotation — rookie Ezequiel Astacio — had an impressive warm-up last night at AAA Round Rock in preparation for his Major League debut next week.
Astacio gave up just one hit — a solo yak — and one walk in seven innings while whiffing five in Round Rock’s 2-1 loss to the Iowa Cubs last night. The Cubs scored the winning run in the eighth after Astacio had left the game.
Astacio is tall (6’3″), but weighs only 150 lbs., and that may be pushing it for his weight. Despite his slim build, Astacio has wicked stuff and could be a nice addition to an already imposing Stros pitching staff this season. Astacio is one of three promising young starting pitchers in the Stros’ minor league system who could see action on the Major League level soon. The other two are Wandy Rodriguez (AAA Round Rock) and Fernando Nieve (AA Corpus Christi). Nieve threw six innings of one hit, shutout ball while walking two and striking out eight in leading Corpus to its first victory in franchise history last night.

The Stros rode strong pitching from the Rocket, Brandon Backe, Roy O. and Brad Lidge over the weekend in sweeping the Reds, 3-2, 4-3, and 5-2.
The Stros finish their first home stand of the season at 4-1, although the five runs that they scored in the Sunday win over the Reds was the most that the club has scored in any of its first five games of the season. At least Bags hit a couple of yaks over the weekend, along with taters from Bidg, Ensberg, and Lane. Rookie Chris Burke drew his first start of the season in the Sunday game (in left field) and acquitted himself well with three hits.
The Stros now go on the road for a week with an odd Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday series in New York against the 1-5 Mets, who just won their first game of the season on Sunday. Ex-Stro Beltran has not yet warmed up (.273 Avg./.304 OBP/.455 SLG.), so let’s hope he stays in the doldrums for awhile longer. After the Mets series, the Stros visit Cincinnati for another series next weekend against the Reds (3-3), and then return for a quick four game homestand on Monday April 18th with two games each against the Braves (4-2) and the Brewers (3-2) before heading back out on the road against the Cardinals (2-3) and then the Pirates (2-4).

After splitting the first two games of the season with the Cardinals, the Stros have their first weekend series of the season at Minute Maid Park against the slugging Cincinnati Reds, who are coming off a satisfying season-beginning three game sweep of the Mets. The Rocket takes the hill on Friday against the Reds’ Ramon Ortiz, followed by Backe on Saturday and Roy O. in the Sunday matinee.
It’s not prudent in baseball to make concrete conclusions based on the anecdotal experience of two games, but the Stros’ lack of hitting — particularly power hitting — is apparent. In Games 1 and 2 against the Cards, the Stros were able to score a total of seven runs on 22 hits, 15 of which were singles and none of which were home runs. Pitchers Pettitte, Qualls, and Lidge looked good in Game 2 against the Cards, but without more run production, good pitching will only go so far.
The Reds are sort of the polar opposite of the Stros, with a raft of mashers at the plate (Houston area resident Adam Dunn, Ken Griffey, Jr., Austin Kearns, etc.), but marginal pitching, at best. The Reds also started fast last season, but faded badly after the All-Star break as the club’s deficient pitching simply could not keep the team in many games. I think they will do better this season, but my sense is still that they do not have enough pitching to get to the 90 win level that is necessary to compete for a playoff spot.
The only thing that I’ve seen during the first two games that is truly baffling is Stros’ manager Phil Garner’s decision to bat light hitting shortstop Adam Everett in the leadoff spot in the Stros’ order. So far in his career, Everett has been a far below average hitter. Over the past two seasons, Everett has a -24 RCAA (explained here) — i.e, he has created 24 fewer runs than an average player in the National League would have produced in the same number of games. Moreover, Everett has a career on-base percentage of .315, which is well below the 2004 average OBP of .329 in the National League. Inasmuch as a club should not be batting someone at lead off who is merely average in terms of on base average, it goes without saying that a player who is below average in that department should not be leading off.
Although Garner’s reputation rode the crest of the Stros’ marvelous finish last season, his record during his eleven previous seasons as a manager before coming to the Stros was not good. Although Everett is a wonderful defensive player and those skills can justify playing him despite his offensive deficiencies, it is simply managerial malpractice for Garner to place him in the leadoff spot in the Stros’ order. A few more moves like that and Garner might as well hire Jimy Williams as his bench coach.
Meanwhile, over at the Brazosport News, Banjo Jones reports on a rather embarrassing problem pertaining to Alvin, Texas’ statute of former Stros star and local icon, Nolan Ryan.

With Spring Training concluded and Opening Day on Tuesday approaching, it’s time for my preview of the Stros and the upcoming Major League season.
My first year of blogging coincided with last year’s magical Stros season in which the club came within a game of its first World Series. Just to see how it would go, I decided to blog a post on each Stros game and, as it turned out, I’m glad I did. I’m not going to blog each game this season, but the Stros will continue to be a common blog topic throughout the season, and I will continue to analyze the club’s performance periodically using sabermetric-based statistics.
Last season was truly one for the ages. After falling to a season-worst 56-60 record on August 14th, the Stros won 36 out of their next 46 games, a run that included 12 and seven game winning streaks. During the last two weeks of the season, the Stros pulled out the NL Wildcard Playoff spot in a tight race with the Giants and Cubs by winning nine out of their last 10 games and their final seven straight. Then, after beating the Braves in the Divisional Series, the Stros lost to the Cards in the seventh game of a memorable National League Championship Series, coming within an eyelash of the Stros’ first World Series appearance. Regardless of that ending, the Stros’ closing kick was one of the greatest finishes in Major League Baseball history.
Coming into the 2005 season and as noted in this earlier post, it has been fashionable for baseball experts to predict that this will be the season that the Stros will finally fall from the lofty perch that they have occupied among the top teams in the National League Central Division over the past decade. The experts at Baseball Prospectus have been particularly pessimistic about the Stros.
Baseball Prospectus’ theory is that the Stros have lost two of their best hitters from last season’s club (Beltran and Kent) and will not have their best hitter (Berkman) for the first month of the season. Meanwhile, the club continues to accomodate the aging Bidg, who is blocking the development of promising rookie Chris Burke at second base. Also, the club is forced for contract reasons to continue playing the declining Bags at first base rather than placing Berkman there, which is his natural position. Throw in the Stros’ continued inexplicable reliance on the consistently unproductive Ausmus at catcher, plus doubts about whether Andy Pettitte can rebound from elbow surgery, and skepticism that the Rocket can repeat last season’s incredible performance at the age of 43, and you have a decent argument that the Stros are cruising toward a big downturn. Baseball Prospectus’ Joe Sheehan — one of the most insightful baseball writers around today — is so down on the Stros that he projects the Stros to finish 77-85, or 14 games worse than their record last season and above only the woeful Pirates in the NL Central standings.
Could it really get that bad so quickly?
Well, yes it could, but my sense is that such a dramatic downfall is unlikely. Although the Stros are coming to the end of the Bidg-Bags era, the club has an interesting mix of veteran players and youthful prospects that can still contend for a playoff spot.
In evaluating the Stros on this blog last season, I introduced two handy statistics that baseball sabermetrician Lee Sinins developed for evaluating hitters and pitchers. “Runs created against average” (RCAA) is the hitters’ statistic. RCAA measures the two most important things from a hitter’s perspective in winning baseball games ?- that is, creating runs and avoiding making outs. Thus, RCAA computes the number of outs that a particular player uses in creating runs for his team. RCAA then compares that number to the amount of runs that an average player in the league would create while using an equivalent number of outs. Inasmuch as the hypothetical average player’s RCAA is always zero, a player can have either a positive RCAA — which indicates he is an above average hitter (i.e., Barry Bonds, who had a +152 RCAA last season) — or a negative RCAA, which means he is performing below average (i.e., Ausmus, who had a -26 RCAA).
“Runs saved againt average” (RSAA) is the parallel statistic for pitchers. RSAA measures the number of runs that a pitcher saves for his team relative to the number of runs that an average pitcher in the league would give up while obtaining an equivalent number of outs for his team (as with RCAA, RSAA is park-adjusted). As with RCAA, a hypothetical average pitcher in the league always has an RSAA of exactly zero. Thus, a pitcher can have either a positive RSAA, which indicates he is an above average pitcher (i.e., Randy Johnson had a +50 RSAA last season) or a negative RSAA, which means he is performing below average (i.e., Tim Redding had a -15 RSAA last season).
Clearly, the biggest problem for this Stros club is going to be hitting, which was also the biggest problem of last season’s club. The excitement of the Stros’ extraordinary play during the final quarter of last season tends to make people forget that the Stros meandered around 10th among the 16 National League teams in RCAA for the first three quarters of the season. Even after their hitting picked up during their closing drive, the Stros still ended up just seventh in RCAA among the National League teams. Given that the Stros’ collective +50 RCAA included substantial contributions from the now departed Beltran (28) and Kent (12), it is certainly reasonable to question whether the Stros’ hitting this season will be sufficient to sustain a playoff caliber performance.
Part of the reason that I think the Stros will be good enough to contend for a playoff spot this season is that I expect big improvement from three players who did not contribute much hitting-wise last season — Jason Lane, Morgan Ensberg, and Adam Everett. Last season, Lane in limited play had only a +3 RCAA, while Ensberg (-12) and Everett (-11) actually reduced the Stros’ team RCAA by 23 runs. With Lane finally getting a long overdue full-time spot in the lineup, with Ensberg returning to his 2003 form (+20 RCAA), and Everett improving to become an average Major League hitter (0), I expect those three to contribute at least +40 to the Stros’ team RCAA this season, which would make up for the loss of Beltran and Kent.
Although Berkman’s 69 RCAA from last season (5th in the National League) will almost assuredly go down a bit this season coming off his injury, I do not expect a big drop off from any of the Stros’ other primary players this season. Moreover, given a chance to play, Burke is a good bet to be at least as productive as Bidg (8 RCAA) or Kent (12) at second base. Consequently, given all of the above, my sense is that that this Stros team could develop into being at least as productive hitting-wise as last season’s club.
Which leads me to make a comment about Kent. Many pundits have criticized the Stros for not picking up their $7 million option on Kent for this season, but I don’t agree. Kent is on the downside of his career and has declined in production for the past three seasons, a problem that the Stros are already dealing with in regard to aging stars Bidg and Bags. For most of last season, Kent was barely above average hitting-wise, and only a late flurry over the club’s last two weeks allowed him to achieve a reasonably decent +12 RCAA for the season. Moreover, Kent was clearly below average fielding-wise last season as his declining speed resulted in a frustrating lack of range in the field. Throw in the increasing injury risk with Kent and either Burke (my preference) or Bidg is likely to be just as productive as Kent this season and certainly far cheaper.
However, where I think Baseball Prospectus is going wrong on the Stros this season is by not recognizing a markedly improved pitching staff. That’s not to suggest that the Stros’ pitchers were all that bad last season — in fact, the staff ended the season with a +45 runs RSAA, which was 4th among the 16 National League pitching staffs. Nevertheless, even though Clemens, Lidge and Oswalt were among the best pitchers in the National League, the rest of the Stros’ staff struggled, including an aggregate -41 RSAA from the quartet of Carlos Hernandez, Brandon Duckworth and the now departed Pete Munro and Redding. Those four generally ineffective pitchers were manning at least one of the starting pitching spots throughout all of last season.
This season, the Stros’ pitching staff appears to be substantially stronger. Brandon Backe, Chad Qualls, and Dan Wheeler all stepped up big time during the playoff run last season and appear to be primed to become solid Major League pitchers this season. Pettitte’s recovery from surgery has been smooth and he appears ready to take his spot with Clemens, Oswalt and Backe as solid starters. Finally, one of the pleasant surprises of Spring Training has been the dominating performance of Ezequiel Astacio, one of the Stros’ fine young pitching prospects who appears ready to take over the fifth spot in the pitching rotation. The Stros optioned Astacio to triple A affiliate Round Rock to begin the season to allow him to make a couple of starts before the Major League club’s schedule requires a fifth starter, but there is little doubt that he will be back with the Stros soon. Accordingly, barring injury, this Stros’ staff could improve by 10-15 runs in total RSAA over last season’s staff, which would likely place this group in the top three staffs in the National League.
Astacio’s performance in Spring Training prompts an observation about minor league players becoming Major Leaguers. Generally, it is more common for pitchers to be able to make the jump successfully from Double A ball than hitters. Astacio and the Stros Spring Training camp’s other young stars — CF Willie Taveras and LF Luke Scott — all played Double A ball last season. All three performed well during Spring Training and have made the Major League club, although Astacio is having a cup of coffee at Round Rock to begin the season.
Nonetheless, I would prefer that the Stros have Taveras start the season at Triple A so that he can continue to develop his plate patience and power before taking on Major League pitching (.402 OBP/.386 SLG, but only 38 walks in 409 AB’s at AA last season). The Stros probably need Scott’s left-handed stick on the Major League roster at least until Berkman returns, so keeping him on the Opening Day roster is a more reasonable move, but we should all remember that — despite Scott’s unconcious hitting performance during Spring Training — he was playing high A ball at this time last year. Thus, do not be surprised when both Scott and Taveras struggle against Major League pitching.
Another reason for my optimism is the Stros’ competition within the division. Although the Cardinals still appear to be the class of the division, the Cards pitching staff’s performance last season has a collective “career year” written all over it. Assuming that the Cards’ pitching returns to a more typical level this season, look for the Cardinals to lose at least 10-15 wins off of their 105 win season of last year. Mr. Sheehan of Baseball Prospectus predicts that the Cards will have 16 fewer wins this season (89).
The other probable contenders in the division also have problems. Although the Cubs have the best pitching in the division, both Prior and Wood are having arm problems and the staff still has no clear closer. Moreover, the Cubs hitting has declined with the losses of Alou and, to a lesser extent, Sosa, so run production is a concern there, too. Unless Prior and Wood can pitch for most of the season, my sense is that the Cubs will struggle to win 80 games this season (they won 89 last season).
Similarly, although the Reds‘ hitters can flat out tear the cover off the ball, the club’s pitching staff still creates an adventure for the club almost every time a member steps on the mound. My sense is that the Reds will improve on their 76 wins from last season, but their pitching will limit that improvement to about 5-10 wins and not the 15 win improvement that the Reds will need to contend for a playoff spot.
Thus, even with the loss of Beltran and Kent, the Stros still appear to me to be an above .500 team. The offense is probably going to slide a bit with Berkman out for the first month of the season. But the starting pitching looks very good, Lidge is currently the best closer in the National League, and the middle relievers look improved over last season’s dubious group. If Lane hits as expected, Ensberg rebounds, Bags (+17 RCAA) and Bidg (+8 RCAA) maintain as well as they performed last season, and the young players develop well, then my sense is that the Stros are an 85 to 88 win team with an outside chance to take it over 90 wins if the injury bug does not bite.
90 wins would put the Stros right in the middle of the playoff race in the NL Central, just as they have been for the past decade. Admittedly, I view the Stros somewhat through rose-colored glasses (except for Ausmus), but my sense is that the club’s run of competing for a playoff spot is not quite done. And with a couple of key acquisitions a couple of years from now when Bags and Bidg retire, there appears to be no reason why the Stros cannot build around their Berkman-Oswalt-Lidge core and continue their playoff-contending status for years to come.