Well at least Castro is a lot better than people thought he would be. Most everyone laughed at that draft pick as a huge reach.

Just grim.

My cousin did not make the list. Maybe next year.

Well at least Castro is a lot better than people thought he would be. Most everyone laughed at that draft pick as a huge reach.

Is he, or has the Astros farm been burnt down and had the soil salted by the Romans determined never to be troubled by the Houstonian empire ever again?

Who the hell are these guys?

Castro has the potential to be the franchise's most successful first-round choice since Brad Lidge in 1998. Houston's only other first-rounder to reach the big leagues since then was Chris Burke, the 10th overall pick in 2001, and he never developed as hoped.

This is pretty damning. No first rounder since 1998 has had an impact at the MLB level.

Houston is just an utter train wreck. No farm, a ton of money tied up is Oswalt/Lee/Berkman who are either untradable or will refuse to be traded.

Basically they have Wandy Rodriguez and Pence as the only real assets of the club. This rebuild could take a decade.

This rebuild could take a decade.

What rebuild? What gives anyone the idea that Drayton McLane is going to ALLOW a rebuild? Why would he hire Ed Wade if he thought a rebuild was going to be needed?

-- MWE

hoping for some BBC rants in this thread.

What rebuild? What gives anyone the idea that Drayton McLane is going to ALLOW a rebuild? Why would he hire Ed Wade if he thought a rebuild was going to be needed?

A family of four can save enough money in a year to fly Grandpa in for the Holidays if they just don't go to Astros games.

Who the hell are these guys?

That was my reaction. It's "Major League" come to life!

A family of four can save enough money in a year to fly Grandpa in for the Holidays if they just don't go to Astros games.

rock. hard place.

Basically they have Wandy Rodriguez and Pence as the only real assets of the club.

That's an overstatement. Oswalt and Berkman are real assets ... and Lee still hasn't started sucking yet which I'm sure is purely due to me predicting that contract would be an utter disaster (you're welcome Astros).

Berkman's only $14.5 M this year (he's worth that) with a $15 M option next year ($2 M buyout) -- that's tradeable if he'll agree and not a killer if he won't.

Oswalt will cost $31 M over the next 2 years with a $16 M option with $2 M buyout. Hard to say where the FA market is right now but I'd take him over Lackey. Astros might have to eat a little money to get something worthwhile back but a mid-season trade of Oswalt (if he'd agree) could work out very well for them. But again that's not a killer and he'll (likely) pitch at that level.

Carlos Lee is owed $18.5 M for each of the next three years and is going nowhere. Hope and pray.

What is it about Houston that inspires such "loyalty" in its players?

I didn't realize Oswalt had such a down year--I assume that was injuries? Looks like he missed a few starts and his IP/GS was down. What really caught my eye was 14 decisions; I wondered if he had missed half the season, but he had 30 starts.

What rebuild? What gives anyone the idea that Drayton McLane is going to ALLOW a rebuild? Why would he hire Ed Wade if he thought a rebuild was going to be needed?

He's got to eventually cave, doesn't he?

That's an overstatement. Oswalt and Berkman are real assets ... and Lee still hasn't started sucking yet which I'm sure is purely due to me predicting that contract would be an utter disaster (you're welcome Astros).

What I mean is assets that can be on the next good Astro team, or bring back pieces that will be.

Lee is good, but not worth his contract and untradable. Oswalt and Berkman refuse to be traded.

So, yeah they'll provide a fair bit of value while they're on the team, but then they'll be gone before the next "core" can emerge.

Also, Oswalt/Berkman/Rodriguez/Lee/Pence is a perfectly good core, especially for the NL Central. I don't see that as appreciably worse than the Cubs core of Ramirez/Lee/Zambrano/Lilly/Dempster. The difference of course is that the Cubs system has produced enough bullpen/5th-6th starter arms and useful position players like Theriot, Soto (a bit of a mystery at the moment or he'd be in the core) and hopefully Fox. But really all the Astros need to do to be competitive is start to do about as good a job with low-level FAs, scrapheap pickups, etc. as the Cardinals.

Now, the 2011-12 Astros are looking pretty thin and that farm system ain't gonna help much. It will be a long rebuild whenever it actually starts.

He's got to eventually cave, doesn't he?

He's shown no signs of doing so yet. And the Astros have a perfectly decent core of players on the ML team, as Walt notes. I don't doubt that McLane and Wade think that all they have to do is supplement here and there.

-- MWE

So...back to Jason Castro. On a team with an average system, would he be close to a #1 prospect?

The next good Astros team? Do you realize the Astros haven't had a bad team since 1991? There's no reason the next good Astros team won't be 2010 or 2011.

In one sense, you can't blame McLane for avoiding a rebuild. The Astros haven't had consecutive losing seasons since 1990-91. Those were their first consecutive losing seasons since 1975-76 (and one of those was an 80-82 season). In the last 42 seasons, the Astros have won fewer than 70 games (in a non-strike season) just twice. The Houston Astros haven't SUCKED in over 40 years. They have never been through a genuine rebuild.

At least they don't have much exposure in the Rule 5 draft. . .

the Cubs system has produced enough bullpen/5th-6th starter arms and useful position players

I don't think that's really the problem. Ed Wade can find 6 year minor league free agents, major league free agents and waiver wire castoffs to fill out the bullpen and the bench. The big problem is they aren't producing players who can be average major leaguers to all-stars. Eventually that will doom them.

I don't think "the" Roy Oswalt is ever coming back -- and what's strange, is that it's not like peripherals have slid that much... but he's just a different pitcher.

Except for perhaps as a temporary rental, I just cannot see ever wanting to pay him a salary with 8 digits ever again.

It's a shame, because Oswalt was one of the few opponents in the Central I really liked...

John Candelaria shows up on his comp list - and while they're pretty different pitchers - I see career trend.

I try to be "glass half full" as an Astros' fan. And the farm system is on a much better track right now than it was two years ago. Most Astros fans are looking forward to the young pitchers at Lexington who are nice prospects (Lyles and Seaton made the top 10, and Dydaliwisz is another good pitching prospect, all younger than 20; one of the reviews at Hardball Times awarded Lyles the top pitching prospect in the Sally League). The AA affilate at Corpus Christi has a chance to be good, because Gaston, Koby Clemens, and T.J. Steele who all had great offensive production at Lancaster (a high offense ballpark) are likely to be in AA, and Lyles and Seaton may also be promoted to AA. The offense of Clemens and Gaston was particularly eye popping, but it has to be discounted for the ballpark (Clemens, .345, .419, .636, 1.055; Gaston .279, .368, .600, .968) With some luck, the Astros should have some farm system contributions to the big league club by 2011.

I don't think "the" Roy Oswalt is ever coming back -- and what's strange, is that it's not like peripherals have slid that much... but he's just a different pitcher

I disagree. Roy's velocity actually was up higher than it has been in several years. His pitching stats were pretty good until the last month of the season. His win totals were bad at that point because of exceptionally bad luck with no decisions, mostly caused by the bullpen. However, he had a back injury toward the end of the season, tried to pitch through it, went on the DL, and then tried to pitch through it again. He had some terrible results during that period which made his season stats worse. Also Roy had conflict with Cecil Cooper which didn't help....along with some evidence that Cooper continually tried to get Roy to pitch through injuries. One of the better actions of Wade was to take over the situation, and shut Roy down.

The next good Astros team? Do you realize the Astros haven't had a bad team since 1991? There's no reason the next good Astros team won't be 2010 or 2011.

But they haven't scored more runs than they allowed since 2006. I guess they can hobble along around .500 as long as Oswalt, Berkman and Lee are productive. Maybe catch a break and win a divison with 87 wins.

But, unless the farm system improves dramatically and quickly, they're going to fall hard in a few years.

Eventually that will doom them.
But, unless the farm system improves dramatically and quickly, they're going to fall hard in a few years.

So one would assume. But we've been saying this about the Astros for a long time.

But sure, the reason they've never been through a rebuild is because they've generally had enough flow from their system that they could rebuild on the fly. But they've also been running the 3-4 homegrown stars plus a couple big FA (Lee, Tejada, Kent, Clemens) plus dreck system with pretty good success for a while now.

Still, my point wasn't that their long-term future looks pretty bleak with that system, it was that the "next good Astros team" could be here in 2010-2011. And although it wasn't my point, I'll add that, given the current state of their system, even if they could trade off Oswalt, Berkman et al for some good prospects, they'd still probably be 5-6 years away from the next good Astros team (while stinking up the joint over the next 2-3 ... or at least so we'd expect but they'd still somehow manage 75-85 wins because somehow they always do).

Ed Wade can find 6 year minor league free agents, major league free agents and waiver wire castoffs to fill out the bullpen and the bench.

This I'd disagree with. The Astros of the Wade era (and often before) tend to have 2-3 gaping holes in the lineup, poor back-end of the rotation and ... well, bullpens are pretty random for everybody, I can't say they're better or worse. The 2009 Astros got 89 starts from guys with an ERA+ below 80 and that's not particularly injury-related as they got 92 starts from their top 3. They were well below-average at C, 2B and 3B with a lousy bench too. That all lies on Wade and McLane and how they've allocated resources and the personnel decisions they've made.

There is a huge gap between Lyles, at #3, and Gervacio, at #4. Bushue has a chance to be a good pitcher, but I want to see full-season data first. Not buying on anyone else yet - I absolutely don't trust power numbers from Lancaster.

-- MWE

mike emeigh, as usual, is absolutely correct. karl rove will dance in a g-string in a gay bar before drayton will ever agree to actually tear the team down and rebuild.

that said,

gervacio is already a major leaguer

jiovanni mier doesn't belong at #2 on that list - he is 18, played in rookie ball, and doesn't have impressive numbers. why on earth he was even a first round pick i do NOT get. the fact that he is on a prospect top 10 list is gthe most ominous sign that the astros have next to nothing in the farm system

sammy gervacio has already made the majors and is at least a serviceable reliever

yes i know that there are supposed to be all these good players at lexington. fine. let's see if they can hit decent pitching.

as for trading carlos lee, he has said to the media ON THE RECORD more than a few times that he will refuse any trade. he can be traded next year with 2 years and 40 mill remaining (and you can NOT seriously think that drayton will eat that kind of $$$ for minor leaguers)

as for trading berkman, this is his last year, unless houston picks up next year's option, he is talking already about retirement and i would be really stunned if he agreed to any trade. he has told the media he doesn't want to be traded, but apparently he told one of the reporters off the record (during the cooper regime and he wasn't exactly a cooper fan) that there was one team to which he would accept a trade - IF they begged him blahblahblah.

as for trading oswalt, well, he did NOT like cecil cooper and he made it MORE than obvious, for 2 years straight, and he did NOT like dewey robinson, the pitching coach - he went to his old coach jim hickey and relied on that famous pitching coach lancwe berkman when he had some tough outings. so if he is happier with the brads, he might not want to be traded.

he fought all kinds of nagging injuries last year and this and cooper was a DWE who insists that pitchers pitch hurt (he ruined moren a few of em, too - the jerk) and i think that unless he comes out strong, his trade value is way down. it is an out of the closet secret that he would pitch for the cardinals (and they would fer SHER luuuvvvvv him opn that team) or the braves, who don't need pitching, or the c*bs (which would bout kill me) or the rays (he liked hickey)

i know a whole lot of guys on this here board disbelieve me, but getting rid of cooper was absolutely KEY - the guy was poison - and they might be better with someone who can actually field at short (manzella) - and towles might could actually be useful playing under a manager who doesn't hate him.

youneverknow

the ML club might not be 100 loss terrible, but i would be very surprised if we seriously contended.

as for the farm - back there again, forget any decent trades to stock it. ricciarini, under drayton's direct orders, made a serious mess of it for 4 years.

I liked Jiovani Mier. For the second round. For pick #21 that was absurd, especially with Jared Mitchell on the board.

I don't think "the" Roy Oswalt is ever coming back.

His back is pretty much shot.
Last season, on the days his back didn't hurt, he could still be jaw-droppingly good.
Unfortunately, days like that are becoming less frequent with each passing year.

There are also rumors that Berkman is fighting back issues. That would certainly account for his streaky, erratic performance over the last several years. The window for faking their way to an off-year division title or wild card with that core and a few random parts may be even shorter than we think. And after that...

The 2012 Astros may be what the Maya were trying to warn us about.

That was my reaction. It's "Major League" come to life!

1. Jason Castro, c
2. Jiovanni Mier, ss
3. Jordan Lyles, rhp
4. Sammy Gervacio, rhp
5. Chia-Jen Lo, rhp
6. Ross Seaton, rhp
7. Tanner Bushue, rhp
8. Jay Austin, of
9. Jon Gaston, of
10. T.J. Steele, of


"I never heard of half these guys, and the others suck."
"This guy is dead!"

1. Jason Castro, c
2. Jiovanni Mier, ss
3. Jordan Lyles, rhp
4. Sammy Gervacio, rhp
5. Chia-Jen Lo, rhp
6. Ross Seaton, rhp
7. Tanner Bushue, rhp
8. Jay Austin, of
9. Jon Gaston, of
10. T.J. Steele, of