The profitable Astros and an owner with a tin ear...

Judging from the comments to the ChronBlog run-down of Jim Crane's comments to the Wall Street Journal, (You know, the "private company/give me a check for $10Mil comments) there are a couple of things the general public isn't getting about the current state of the Astros.

The big thing is, yes, the Astros are a private company, but they happen to ply their craft in a public stadium.  This means that the public does have a substantial stake in the team.  What that doesn't mean is that Astros fans should tell Crane how to spend his money, but it does mean that he's at least somewhat obligated to try and build a successful franchise.  Not legally obligated for sure, but in that unwritten way that sports teams are part of the civic fabric.  Where he has no obligation to the fans is to not be an idiot.  Jim Crane comes across, at times, as a grade A idiot in interviews.

Then, there is the fact that, believe it or not, Crane is really not going to need much buy-in from Astros fans for this team to be successful.  I know what you're saying, that he can't make a going concern of it with no ticket sales but I'd argue he's not going to lack for ticket sales, nor do they matter all that much.  What's really important to this team's financial success is the success/failure of Comcast SportsNet: Houston.  If that is a financial success then the Astros will be as well.  Even IF Astros fans decide the team is not worth watching, there are going to be enough games where the stadium is full of Rangers, Yankee, Red Sox, Angels and fans of other teams to keep the Astros in the black.  Anyone ready for Minute Maid Park to be listed as the worst home-field advantage in sports?  Because that's what's getting ready to happen, at least for the next couple of years.  And, with dynamic pricing now a big part of the Astros ticket selling strategy, it's likely they'll make more money on those Houstonians with other allegiances than they will on the hard-core Astros fan anyway.

Whatever the record of the team, this is still (on paper) Major League Baseball.  It will be marketed as such and it really doesn't matter if the Astros are a major league caliber team or not.  What matters is that their opponents will be, on most nights, and that will be enough to keep enough fans streaming through the turnstiles, paying a lot for bad beer and marginal concessions or deciding to tune in and watch on TV at levels sufficient to keep advertising revenue flowing in.

In short: The Astros don't need the Astros fan any longer to make money.  They don't even (really) have to win.  As a matter of fact, the more they lose to opposing teams at home the more those teams are going to come and watch, and be willing to pay ever higher-prices for the privilege of seeing their favorite Nine beat the crap out of the hapless home team.  Financially then it might be the best policy for the Astros to keep losing.

That's a scary thought.

Yup, Happ is an Astro

Last night he gave up a moon shot HR to Albert Pujols.


Welcome to the team sir.


And don't worry, those Pujols home-runs DO come back down eventually, it only seems like they're going to reach orbit.

Lance Berkman's new best friend.....

...is A-Rod.


If Rodriguez was still bombing HR's and 600 was in the rearview mirror then Yankees fans would be raking Lance over the coals.

Adios Lance...

The Great Astros fire sale of 2010 continues.


Too bad they didn't get anything worth-while back for their two top players isn't it? Ah well, what do you expect from the worst-ran franchise in Houston?

Now you have a lazy-assed Carols Lee and a group of marginal-in-the-majors daily players to look forward to for the next couple of years. Well, that and a couple of pitchers (Myers, Wandy) who would be third or fourth staters, at best, for most major-league teams. How bad is it? Ed Wade is seriously considering signing Myers to a multi-year deal to make him the 'anchor' in the rotation.


Yikes.


On the bright side: Bourne can steal a base (or three). If only Hunter Pence would accept coaching they might have something to build on......

Bye Roy...

Have a cheese steak for me would ya?

On the surface this looks like a good deal for both teams. Philly gets an ace for a (hopefully) deep playoff run, and a staff anchor for next year, the Astros get younger, and more arms in the system. They also get a solid #2 starter in Happ that shows the potential to be around for many years.

Now, if the 'Stros could just find a sucker trading partner for Lee and a team needing Berkman we'd be onto something.


Until then, this is a good start.

Opening day has come and gone....

...and the Astros, Royals & Nationals are officially eliminated from the playoff chase.

In Houston at least, the cheerleading continues unabated....

The lack of offense, bench depth and relief pitching are going to make for a long season.

Zierlein nails it.

The Astros are a lost cause.

If you want to know why they are a lost cause then you need look no further than the top of the organization, no...higher. That's right, Drayton McLane and Tal Smith. Those are the black-hats in the Western drama that has become the Astros organization of late. Those two men have done more to wreck the organization from within than anyone else, more than Tim Puprua, more than Scrap Iron and certainly more than Cecil Cooper, whose recent firing is similar to trying to solve the grafitti problem by punishing the victim.

I'm not suggesting that Coop was blameless, he certainly didn't have the tools to be a major league manager. The problem was that he shouldn't have been put in that position in the first place. Yes, he didn't have a quality car in the race, I give you that, but he shouldn't have been racing in this circuit to begin with.

Then we have the writer of wrongs who feels that a love for the game and Brad Ausmus is all the Astros need. Nevermind pitching, defense, someway out from under the bloated contract of Carlos Lee, etc. The Astros could resurrect Casey Stengal and he couldn't even get this collection of misfits over .500 (something that Cooper was at least able to do last year.)

Did he lose the players? Obviously, especially if they were wearing "really?" T-shirts under their uniforms and texting reporters (Justice among others) every time Cooper made a decision they didn't like. The thing is, no quality manager is going to want to go into a clubhouse full of spoiled children, no matter what the terms of the contract are.

What all of this probably means is that the Astros are going to end up hiring Dave Clark, who (we're told) has the respect of the clubhouse. (despite the team losing two straight since he took over, in blowout fashion) Next year we'll be told that the Astros are "competing for a championship and they'll bring in some wheezing wind-bag of a .500 career pitcher (Is Kenny Rodgers available?) some spit and bailing wire and tell us the Astros are ready to contend. They'll do this because Drayton McLane wants to turn a profit, while convincing anyone who will still listen to his schtick that he's all about winning a championship.

He's not, of course, but he is about selling tickets and concessions, something that the Astros have done fairly well up until this year. In Drayton (and Tal's) mind a rebuilding year means lost revenue, lost concessions sales and is unacceptable. It's something that's probably not even brought up in Astros board meetings. Which is too bad, because it's what desperately needs to be done.

Were the Astros serious about winning that is. Which, of course, they're not, otherwise you'd have seen Oswalt, Berkman and Tejada on the trading block before the deadline, having provided Ed Wade with a list of teams for which they'd waive their no-trade clauses.

You won't see that though, because that's not something that "makes you a champion today". You know, sort of like Tal's Hill and putting a flag pole in the field of play.

Oh, and raising beer prices.

Bye Roy.

Another season, more missed time for Roy Oswalt. *Sigh*

I like Oswalt as much as the next Astros fan. He's been one hell of an ace for the team for quite a few years now. Unfortunately, I believe his best days as a pitcher are behind him. After all, when you generate that much velocity from a frame that small things eventually have to wear out and start breaking down. Because the Astros are who they are (and Houston has the small-town sports mentality that it does) the opportunity to trade Oswalt, and get top dollar for him in return, is probably gone. It's easy, at first glance, to blame this on Drayton MacLane and his refusal to put the team into rebuilding mode. Easy, but probably not entirely accurate.

Houston is a town that grows too attached to its stars. As I stated earlier, for being the 4th largest City in America we're certainly small-town when it comes to our sports teams. We love our heroes, and we expect them to stay. We expect the teams to show loyalty and the players to reciprocate. Maybe Houston has been spoiled through the Biggio and Bagwell age, but we've also seen what happens when stars hand on too long. The Rockets faced this dilemma, and they let an aging Hakeem Olajuwan finish his fading career with the Toronto Raptors.

Give the word to blow up the team Drayton, otherwise you're going to lose all of the goodwill that you accumulated during the team's playoff runs.

Not THAT Much worse Richard....

Another nugget of wisdom from the Chron's Sr. sports columnist...


After today's embarassing loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates (themselves losers to Manatee Community College) your Houston Astros are 1-6. In case you're wondering that's 1 1/2 games better than the 0-8 record Justice is mentioning.

Yes, it could be worse. Instead of winning ONE game the Astros could have won NONE. It's good to know the Chronicle values this type of hard-hitting sports analysis over competent beat reporters.

God knows what we would do if we didn't know how Ortiz thinks Wandy might be 'close to stardom'.

Is it Football season yet?

It's ONLY one game.

OK, it's only one game, one game that looked painfully like what we've seen on the worst days of Astros teams over the last few years. An anemic offense couldn't muster more than two runs against a version of Zambrano that clearly didn't have his best stuff. Roy Oswalt struggled a little bit in the beginning with his control, and two Cubs hitters deposited the balls into the left field bleachers. Oh, and Bourn got a hit. Miggy had three. In between all of that Kaz Matsui made the third out of an inning at third base (he didn't check to make sure the outfilder didn't catch the ball, was standing on third looking dumbfounded while the ball lobbed into second base), Miggy was thrown out attempting to steal second on a ball that, one can only presume, he thought had gotten away from the catcher but had, actually, just bounced in front of home plate, making for an easy play. (Hey Jose Cruz. That's your call FWIW)

After all of the sloppy, opening day mess was over, the Astros were on the down-side of a 4-2 loss. The good news is there are 161 games left to play. Of course, that could also be the bad news depending on your point of view.

Moreso than yesterday, tonight's game will give us a small peek into the prospects of this year's Astros team. Roy Oswalt is the cannon, despite the result last night he's going to throw 200 innings make around 30 starts and have double digit wins. He pitched well enough to win last night, if the offense could have mustered anything with runners in scoring position. With the rest of the starting pitching however the Astros could find themselves bringing a knife to a gun-fight. Wandy Rodriguez has been great at home. He'll need to continue that trend, and improve on the road, if the Astros are to have a chance this year. After that? Hampton, Ortiz and Moeller are unknown entities.

It was only one game Astros fans, a game that had some brief flashes of positive, but also displayed some infuriating negatives that we've seen all too often from this Astros team.

The Astros Fan 2009 Opening Day Prayer....

Dear Baseball Gods,

This year we, the Astros fan, lift our voices to you in eager anticipation for the coming year. We thank you for our bounty this decade. Thank you for Craig Biggio in his prime, before he and Jeff Bagwell took over the clubhouse and refused to make way for younger talent, thus ending the promising major league career of Chris Burke. Thank you for Lance Berkman and Roy Oswalt, two stars that shine as bright in the baseball firmament as any other for any team not owned by a Steinbrenner. And, most especially, thank you for Hunter Pence, long may he roam the outfild and continue to be a plus player on a team full of averages and negatives.

We come to you at this time, in the twilight hours of the off-season before the dawn of the first game, with a simple list of requests.

1. We pray for the season-long health of Roy Oswalt, for without him we are surely sunk.

2. We pray that something in the closing mechanism of the roof at Minute Maid gets irreversibly jammed, forcing the roof to be open all year.

Finally...

3. We pray for four days of rain subsequent to every Roy Oswalt start. Honestly...it's pretty much the only chance we've got.

If, in your wisdom, you decide that two of these requests are not in keeping with the spirit of the game, then we pray that you conk Drayton McLane on the head and bring about in him the realization that he's not doing what it takes to compete for a title every year. Maybe that way he'll either admit the Astros are rebuilding or will spend some freakin' money on some pitchers.

In Koufax' name,

Amen.




Happy Opening day (sorta - if you ignore the travesty last night*)









*Thanks Selig, you no-sense-of-history-havin' geek.

Drink Up Pirates Fans

This Year's Gonna Hurt...

[David Brown, Big League Stew]

Yeeeargh! Shiver me timbers and fly the Jolly Roger at half staff, mateys!

The Pirates, who have averaged 89 losses since 1993, sank to the deepest part of Pittsburgh's Three Rivers on Thursday after one of its split squads lost to Manatee (Fla.) Community College during a fundraising exhibition game.

In some ways, the top of the box score says it all: Manatee C.C. 6, Pittsburgh 4.

The Sarasota Herald-Review, however, ran a very detailed story — almost 1,000 words, for your Bucco masochists — about how the Lancers did the unlikely at McKechnie Field in Bradenton.

It's only fair to point out that the Pirates lineup was filled out by guys who missed the cut in spring training. Several of the team's best players, including Nate McLouth, Ryan Doumit, the LaRoches and Stewcast guest Freddy Sanchez, did not play in the game.

Yet several guys who have logged big league minutes — like Mets' killer Steve Pearce, Brian Bixler and Robinzon Diaz — were in the no-win situation lineup, as was prized prospect Jose Tabata. Virgil Vazquez, who contended for Pittsburgh's fifth starter spot this spring, started the game for Pittsburgh on the mound.

True, it wasn't the starting nine (or anything remotely close to it) but, injuries and the MLB season being what they are, you have to wonder if the Pirates management is wondering whether Manatee Jr. College would consider a trade right now. Something along the lines of the entire roster of the Altoona Curve, (the Pirates AA affiliate) a player to be named later and cash for the entire roster of Manatee Community College.

Obviously a 'straight up' trade wouldn't be a good deal....for the Community College that is.

Hackery

If Bourn Stays Hot, Astros could breeze into the playoffs. [Richard Justice, Chron.com]...

Moneyshot quote:

Offensively, Michael Bourn could be the key to everything the Astros hope to accomplish. If he's the player Ed Wade thought he'd be when he made the Brad Lidge trade, he transforms the lineup.

His has the kind of speed that can win games, fluster pitchers and put Lance Berkman and Carlos Lee into position to drive in a ton of runs. He would transform the Astros from an artistic standpoint as well.

Last season's original blueprint began with speed (Michael Bourn and Kaz Matsui) at the top of the order. They bring a dimension of speed few other teams have.

Speed is out. Speed doesn't compute. But if you've got speed, if you can make running worthwhile, you've got a valuable weapon.

Last season's plan fell apart when Bourn didn't hit. He finished the season with a .229 batting average and 111 strikeouts. He started this spring very badly, with his averaging sinking to .167 a few days ago.

Maybe, just maybe, he's getting hot at the right time. He has been on base seven times in 12 plate appearances his last three games and raised his batting average from .167 to .219.

(emphasis mine)

12 at bats over three games, and Bourne's batting average is .010 less than it ended up last year, and this is how Justice defines hot? Nevermind that Bourne is just above the Mendoza Line as an Astro, or that he seems to be struggling to understand the geometry of Center Field defense. Nope, none of that matters.

In order to understand this you have to understand how the ego of Richard Justice effects his sportswriting. Richard's been around a long time, and he does have a decent institutional memory of Major League Baseball. He's got a list of funny quips and stories a mile long. Richard also likes to be treated as if he's important, and he likes a certain style of player. Players learn quickly that catering to Justice's twin ideals of upstanding citizenry and catering to his ego (his "I am the media" explosion is still mocked) lest you fall out of favor, is a good way to gain a friend in the media. (being a UT grad doesn't hurt either)

What gets lost in all of this however is that Justice, while a good scribe, lacks the serious analytical ability to really offer any meaningful insight into the prospects of a team.


The point of all this background is to point out that the Astros, even IF Micheal Bourn stays hot, are probably not deep enough in starting pitching or on the bench to seriously compete this year for the playoffs. On top of that, after one and a half equivilent seasons Bourn's batting average is .237 and his OPS is a miniscule .612, expecting a turnaround of epic proportions is probably putting too much pressure on a man who's got good speed, but serious issues with the other four tools required to play baseball.

Blind optimism I can understand from the fans, but from journalists whose job it is to provide insight and analysis?

Houston should expect a little better than that.