FCL perfect record in jeopardy again. They are down 9-1 bottom 6th. They must not have any pitchers available because they have been using position players to pitch since the 4th inning. Sandro Pereira threw 1.1ip and now Luis Rives is pitching. I won’t be surprised if official FCL games are eliminated as part of the new CBA. Lots of teams have issues carrying enough healthy pitchers and I’m sure the teams would rather just have scrimmages and minimize travel. That will make me sad because I really like following the FCL guys even though the stats are mostly meaningless.
5 more walks for Ryan Forcucci in two innings. The coming back from injury caveat still applies, but how long until it's no longer valid?
Walker Janek is whatever. I didn’t like the pick and still don’t. He is a future back up catcher and those guys are everywhere and cheap.
If Walker Janek wasn't a first round pick he would be approaching outright release consideration, minor league roster depth at best. A college player hitting .229 with a .669 OPS despite playing most of his games in an extremely hitter friendly ballpark.
Does Dana Brown even waste his time with a prospect if they don't strike out a ton? I'm perusing the numbers for our prospects this morning and every damn player with any hype or results is striking out a lot. Not all K's are the same, a lot of them are also walking so maybe they can find a better balance, but it's still a pretty loud and concerning trend. Cole, Matthews, Bush, Sullivan, Neyens, Huezo, Schiavone, Justin Thomas. Holy, Frey and Ochoa aren't too bad, at least compared to the other K monsters but even they have a number that would concern me by my previous standards. Kevin Alvarez is the only prospect with noise who isn't striking out at a concerning rate.
I haven't looked around the minors to see if it's an Astros thing or a "that's just the way baseball is now" thing.
K's are certainly higher these days. Being in the 30-35% range is still extremely high even by todays standards.
I think part of that is drafting later. By the time you get past the middle of the 1st, guys with plus hit tools are gone, especially the ones who have any power potential. I think it’s pretty clear Brown has prioritized power over contact, but that might just be because he wants the player who has the best chance of being a star, and where he’s picking, that’s the guy with power but strikeout risk.
What was the rationale behind drafting Janek? He seems to be one of the worst top draft picks in Astros history in my bias uneducated opinion
He was regarded as the consensus best catcher in the draft. His defense got very high marks (and still does) and he had enough power to dream on. The aggressive approach and swing and miss were the questions, as with a lot of late first round bats. I think people are jumping the gun a bit on Janek. His stock is down, no question. But his numbers this season should be taken with a grain of salt because he was playing up a level and got hurt; who knows exactly when he got hurt, so his bad numbers could be result of injury. Last season he was perfectly fine, above average hitter with a very low walk rate, moderately high k rate, and solid power. He also stole 30 bases last season so he’s got excellent speed for a catcher. He came out of a relatively small D1 school and plays the most demanding position on the field. He is probably not going to be a star, but there is plenty of time for him to develop into a solid starting catcher.
Alvarez is the saving grace from Dana's tenure as GM. 3 years and objectively the farm system is no better than it was before he was hired. This includes Matthews/Cam.
Yeah generally people are expecting way too much out of a player drafted 28th overall. If Matthews just continues to be what he’s been (a fringey player with high defensive value, some power, and baserunning value) that’s actually an above average outcome for a guy drafted that late.
