Myers shelled, Astros fall

A night after erasing a four-run deficit for the first time this season, what is the first thing the Astros do? They go and concede an early five run lead. You have got to love those Astros. This one was a rare poor start by Myers, who conceded four home runs last night after allowing just seven in his first fifteen starts. The Brewers took the second game of the series, winning 7-5.

We've been pretty awful in getting on base this season, and part of that has stemmed from the fact that we are absolutely awful at drawing walks (we've been ok lately).

In our last nine games we have picked up 38 walks at a rate of 4.2 a game, whereas in the previous 69 games we had an average of 2.2.

In our last six games we've had marginally more strikeouts than walks 34/32. Our season strikeout to walk ratio is 4:1. For reference our pitching staff's K:BB ratio is a less than impressive 2:1.

Gametime now so I'm making this a brief post.

Comrade Castro's diary

Every week we take you behind the scenes of the Astros' Youth Revolution as comrade Castro gives us his take on the week.

29th June 2010

Revolutionaries always look better in black and white, or so I have been told, but this look is quite hard to achieve in real life, so I think I would stump for Khaki. All the great revolutionaries wear Khaki, but the leader of our cadre, Mr Mills says no. Since says it would be impossible to convince our Glorious Leader to change our uniforms I settled for Khaki underwear, covert style.

At least we have red stars on our caps, a sure sign of victory.

This week was my first week in the major leagues, and I was called up with comrade Johnson and comrade Bourgeois. Not only that but comrade Banks and comrade Navarro have joined us too. Youth is therefore on our side, therefore it will be only a matter of time before we overthrow the mocking Redbird and snarling Cub in one fell swoop.

Comrade Banks must have angered our glorious leaders, as he seems to have disappeared after one start. There have also been whispers of defections in our ranks, even to our dreaded rivals the Rangers, who have just inflicted a most painful defeat upon us. They do not even have proper names. Last week we faced one pitcher called C.J. Wilson. Not to have a proper name is a fate worse than death.

I did a lot of reading up at Stanford, but there were a couple of important works on revolutions that I seemed to have missed. Utilising this knowledge I went to more senior comrades, but my plans for a brass cannon have not been heeded, it could be installed on top of our fortress Minute Maid, and fired to signal each victory over our fallen enemies. Also comrade Cruz has told me it is not allowed to build barricades down the first base line to stop our opponents reaching first base. This seems highly unfair, as I believed if John Keel could use them to such good effect so could we. After all the reading I have done, it seems to not have equated much into practical know-how.

I wonder who this small woman, this Minute Maid could have been, and what she must have done to warrant us naming our home after her. How small must she have been to be described as minute? Perhaps she was so small that she could evade detection before slaying her enemies. I will ask comrade Berkman, he has been around since before the Time of Troubles.

This article in no way reflects the opinion of Jason Castro or any of the Houston Astros players.

Astros overcome four run defecit, take opener 9-5

We've been a pretty lousy team this season, and many things have hurt us. One of them has been our inability to score runs, especially when we fall behind early. Yesterday's 9-5 win over the Brewers was the first time this season we have erased a four-run deficit or more. All season.

That is pretty bad, and our inability to win blowouts is even more jarring. Last night saw 14 runs scored combined. This was just our third win in 14+ ballgames, and we've only won eight in 10+ ballgames. And considering the Brewers scored five runs against us last night, we were lucky to get the win, considering that was only our fifth time we've won a game when our opponents have scored five runs or more.

So to recap, if it is a high scoring game, the Astros are pretty much fubard.

And do not get me started on comebacks. This was the first time the Astros had erased a four run deficit in a game and won it. Our previous best was April 21st, when we were 4-1 down against the Marlins (Bud Norris-Josh Johnson game), and we went on to win 5-4. So if we fall behind in games, we are also fubard.

At least the drubbing we took to the Rangers the night before 10-1 signals the end of Interleague Play, in which the Astros went 3-12. Score.

Norris first start back from the DL was average, taking 97 pitches to get through 5 innings, and he got smoked on a couple of very average pitches. His throwing error to Feliz at first got the Brewers on the board, and he will be annoyed over that. Other than that, a pretty satisfactory win considering out comeback, scoring 7 unanswered runs: Chacin, Lopez, Byrdak, Lyon and Fulchino combined for four scoreless innings. Lyon in particular, came into the game in a tight spot in the seventh and struckout all four batters he faced.

6 walks and 14 hits was impressive for our offense, especially without Berkman, who got a day off. Feliz had a good day, Chris Johnson got his first walk of the season in the majors, while Michael Bourn seemed to snap out of a slump he has been mired in for quite a while going 4-6 with 2 runs 2 RBI and a home run. In the 20 games coming into the series his line was .192/.244/.260 and just four steals.

Brett Myers faces Yovani Gallardo, 7.10 CT.

Rangers do a number on Astros

The gulf between the two teams was painfully obvious last night, as the Texas Rangers inflicted a fifth defeat of this season on the Astros. To boot they gave Roy Oswalt a good shellacking, as the ace stays 2 wins behind Joe Niekro.

The Rangers are 16-2 in their last 18 games, so perhaps the Astros have been genuinely unlucky to play them at their most red hot. They've scored 129 runs in those 18 games at a rate of 6.9 a game, conceding just 50 runs (2.8/g). Now that really is fantastic. Josh Hamilton's line for June is an awesome .470/.495/.850, and that equates to a 1.345 OPS. He's scored 23 runs, and has 30 RBI, including 9 HR in those 23 games, and has a 20 game hitting streak on the go.

We are now 3-3 since Sunday's callups.

With all that said, Sunday was another case of the the Astros' spluttering offense, and a rather poor showing from our middle relievers. Bourn had an RBI single, and Castro went 2-3, but apart from that, no real bright spots. Chris Johnson committed his fifth error of the season, which is more troubling. Six singles was all they managed against Tommy Hunter and friends.

We now head off to Milwaukee, then round off the first half of the season with a trip of San Diego, before facing the Pirates and Cardinals at MMP.

Rejuvenated Astros spurred on against Rangers

The Astros ended the Rangers' run of 11 straight wins, emerging victorious 7-4 last night. Five days on from callups, and the team look fresh, invigorated and happy to be on the field. Seven runs can be considered an offensive explosion the way things have gone for Houston in 2010, and their seven extra-base hits was a season high- a night after they had hit six for the first time this season (their previous high was 5 extra base hits, achieved twice in June).

Pedro Feliz had been back in the lineup the day-before against the Giants, but an 0-4 performance and an error, sinking his average even lower to .216 saw Chris Johnson back in yesterday, and the young third baseman responded with a 4-5 night, driving in three runs. Even with the offensive splurge, they went 5-19 with RISP, with the 8-9-1-2 hitters (Quintero, Bourgeois, Bourn, Keppinger), a combined 2-20 on the night. However, the rest of the lineup did enough, especially Geoff Blum and Carlos Lee, who was the DH last night. As a lineup we just have not seen this type of coordination all season. At least three or four guys have been in a slump with the bat, and it has been hard to string hits together, and get lots of baserunners. If you want to see how bad our lineup has been this season, check out AC's post on that very subject.

There was a discussion on last night's game thread about the impact batting coach Sean Berry has had on the team, and while you can say that Astros' hitters are not very patient, and seem aggressive to the point of foolhardiness, I do not know the particulars, so I will not even try to guess whether Berry is to blame or not. What I do know is that we have sucked offensively this year, in power, average, on base percentage, bottom or second bottom in every offensive category out there.

Yesterday though, they placed five runs in five innings off Colby Lewis, the starter who had limited them to 2 hits in 9 innings last week, a significant improvement.

Moehler is never lights out, but you have to praise the performance he turned in yesterday, leaving after five, and rewarded with a victory after Pence and Blum gave the Astros the lead in the sixth. The bullpen did its just and that was that, a 7-4 win, after being swept in last week's first series at MMP.

Josh Banks makes his Astros' debut tonight against C.J. Wilson. Banks has 26 major league games under his belt, with stints for the Padres and Blue Jays.

The Jason Castro Revolution in Full Swing

Two little nuggets before I get onto the hard stuff. First, it seems as if Adam Plutko, our sixth round pick is heading to UCLA, while Vincent Velasquez has finally signed. So we have got most of our draft picks signed and some of them into the minors already. Second, it might seem as if the Rangers ownership saga has gone on longer than a Nikolas Mahut-Jon Isner tennis match, here are a couple of points from ESPN Dallas' Jim Reeves.

So we had the three major changes to the roster on Sunday, Chris Sampson has replaced Wesley Wright, Tommy Manzella has gone on the DL, with Oswaldo Navarro called up to replace him. Now we have heard that Felipe Paulino is going on the 15-day DL with arm tendinitis, and the Astros will call up Josh Banks to make his start. Norris will be back in the rotation soon, but whether he will then replace Banks or Moehler in the rotation is another thing entirely. Five players from AA Corpus Christi will take part in their all-star game, and here is a piece on that. Banks is 8-5 with a 2.97 ERA in 15 starts for the Express. His K:BB ratio is a pretty average 34:22, so he will not likely blow away major league hitters.

On to tonight's festivities: I'm dubbing the period starting Sunday as the Jason Castro Revolution, not because Castro will make a massive impact, but what his arrival to the major leagues embodies. It encapsulates the start of a project ushered in by Ed Wade, a project I might add, that will take a long time to come to fruition. All the scars will not be removed from this franchise overnight. Do not expect Jordan Lyles to be called up this year, rushed onto the big leagues. This is a task that will take years of solid drafts, player development, and above all, luck, to come to fruition. Castro might have a lot resting on his shoulders, but he needs to go out and enjoy himself, feel comfortable on the field, as if he belongs there, stay injury free.

His first two games, went well from the perspective of behind the dish, but tonight it was his turn to shine with the bat, hitting his first home run, scoring 2 runs, and drawing a walk. Lance Berkman's 2 run double, and Hunter Pence's 3 run shot more than rocked Matt Cain, who lasted just 2 2/3 innings, allowing 7 runs. This type of offensive performance was a real shot in the arm for Wandy Rodriguez, whose only blemish was 2 un-earned runs, both on a Pat Burrell home run. The defense was patchy, especially Blum at shortstop, but they did turn four double plays.

Although I did enjoy the game, MMP felt eerily quiet. Very tense when Lindstrom had two men on with the score 7-5, before he struck-out Juan Uribe to end the game. Castro's first home run was an upper decker to right field (he's a switch hitter, so he was hitting from the left side against the rightie Cain), so he has some power in that bat.

The 6 extra base hits was a season high (the Astros previous high was 5, achieved twice this season, both in June). Other statoids: The Astros had gone 237 at bats without a home run until Hunter Pence hit one off Cain in the first.

The series win against the Giants was mighty impressive, considering the trio of pitchers the Astros faced, and Oswalt did well to keep close to Lincecum, who just has filthy stuff. Their are still major issues with their bullpen, as outside of Lopez, Lyon and Lindstrom Mills seems to have lost faith with everybody else. The Astros are heading to Arlington next, where Moehler, Norris/Banks and Oswalt will likely be our starters.

Myers bumps up trade value?

Another very good start by Brett Myers and the Astros beat the Giants 6-3 for their first win since...last Wednesday against Kansas City. The Astros are 2-9 in their last 11 games after winning their last three off the Rockies. That seems like a LONG time ago. Considering how bad the Astros have been this season it is quite an achievement that they are 8-7 in Myers' starts this season.

They have also won on 8 straight Wednesdays. That means the last time they lost, on a Wednesday, was April 28th to the Reds. Lets look at that time period shall we? Since that game against the Reds the Astros are 19-33. So on games that aren't played on Wednesday, we're actually 11-33. Thank god for those Wednesdays

Who has pitched on those eight Wednesdays? Myers, Rodriguez, Oswalt and Paulino have all started twice in the streak of Wednesday wins. Bizarre.

Last night the Giants were a woeful 1-15 in RISP situations. That ain't gonna win you too many ballgames. This has been Myers' MO all season, allowing quite a lot of baserunners, but being real tough in possible scoring situations.

With the three pitchers that the Astros are facing over this series, one out of three does not seem that bad, as the Astros faced Tim Lincecum the night before last, and will face Matt Cain tonight. I really think Wandy needs to sit out a start and sort things out, because just sticking him in again and again is not going to stop the bleeding. In two starts against the Giants Wandy is 0-2 with an 8.38 ERA, giving up 14 runs (9 earned) in 9 2/3 innings. Small sample size, but rough numbers.

The three callups were not the only transactions for the Astros this week. Wesley Wright was sent down to make way for Chris Sampson, who was activated from the 15-day DL yesterday. Tommy Manzella sustained a broken left finger, and was replaced by Oswaldo Navarro.

The sale of the Rangers seems quite far off then, so the chances of shipping Roy off to Arlington goes down a notch, here is what Hardball Times has to say. I'd say Roy is the most likely to be selected to the ASG in Anaheim (?).

Around MLB: Some bizarre occurrences last night. First their was the LA derby, in which the game ended on a thrown out baserunner, on what looked like an RBI single that would have tied the game, while Mariano Rivera got out of a bases-loaded no out jam in the ninth.

In wake of defeat Astros call up Castro, Johnson and Bourgeois

Castro, Johnson, Bourgeois, called up from AAA

If it was not clear before, after another shattering defeat earlier today, it was painfully obvious that changes have to be made. These may not be earth shattering moves, but something had to be done to get a team moving, since in the last week and a half it has ground to a halt.

Jason Castro, Chris Johnson and Jason Bourgeois were called up from AAA-Round Rock, while the Astros designated Cory Sullivan, Casey Daigle and Kevin Cash for assignment.

Not a Steven Strasburg-esque debut, but it will represent a landmark of sorts, the first draft pick under Wade to reach the majors. Some may feel that this callup has come too soon for Castro, and that it may be that his development is not complete to be chucking him into the major leagues. After all he has not especially been tearing up AAA .265/.365/.355. Still, his 32 walks certainly make better reading than some of the lines some of the Astros' current lineup have produced. Feliz for instance has just 2 walks in June.

As for Chris Johnson, his performances have been asking for this move all June. Compare the fact that he has been ripping up AAA pitching with Pedro Feliz's performances at the hot corner, and you wonder why the move was not made earlier. Bourgeois, playing right field for the Express had a line .345/.405/.477 in Austin (and added to that 18 steals in 24 attempts).

As for the guys out the door, they are just live bodies all three of them. Daigle is a young guy, but he gave up runs in his last four appearances coming into today's game.

Castro could conceivably make his major league debut (Johnson and Bourgeois obviously has already had a taste of the majors), in the Tuesday game at MMP between Roy Oswalt and Tim Lincecum, as we welcome the Giants to town. Although this would be complicated by the fact that Oswalt is on the hill. I think it likely that if Quintero is fit after his incident today, he will catch for the Astros' ace. Ed Wade has pointed out that these new moves should not be interpreted as bringing 'saviours' to the team, so we need not ramp up our expectations too high. Perhaps we might not suck as badly as we have been sucking of late. This is the team that is currently making the contract extending, mascot sacking Pirates look, well, not awful. The combination of the Astros' loss and the Pirates win over the Indians saw Pittsburgh creep within half a game of our intrepid Houston.

As Justice points out, it is not enough calling them up, we need to play them. They are our future as a franchise, well Castro is anyway. He points out that it is amazing that we had to get to 18 games under .500 until management said, hmmm...we might not be very good. Perhaps more moves are on the way. Maybe this means Ed Wade will start ringing other GM's and gauging interest in our players. Maybe he will finally can Pedro Feliz, just like he did for Matsui. How is that working out for you Kaz? Well he's not with the Rockies, but he is on the rocks (you see what I did there?). Matsui is batting .233 for Colorado's AAA outfit. Get yourself back to Japan, that is my advice.

Astros lose (again!), 5-4

Now turning to today's game. Houston continued a 1-8 slide as they led the game for 8 1/2 innings before Matt Lindstrom coughed up the lead in the ninth. The Rangers would go on to win the game 5-4 in extra innings.

The Astros had got off to a flyer, scoring two runs off C.J. Wilson in each of the first two innings (this is a flyer in Astros' terms). Berkman drove in Keppinger, then was driven in by Lee, before Michaels killed the inning by grounding into a double play. Feliz and Manzella then led off the next inning with singles, with Feliz scoring after a two base error by Guerrero. Manzella then scored, before Keppinger killed another rally by grounding into another double play.

Their early 4-1 lead kept shrinking, but Felipe Paulino pitched well enough for the win, getting through several jams against a very tough Rangers lineup. The game should have been his 2nd win of the season, but instead a Hamilton single off Lindstrom in the 9th tied it at 4.

Then in the tenth, with Casey Daigle on the mound, then with two outs and Bourbon on second, Mills decides to call Chacin (a leftie) up to intentionally walk Guerrero, a man who was 0-5 on the day, and face Hamilton (again!). Hamilton punishes the Astros again, singles and pretty much ends the game. Nice going there skip. My exact quote was, at the time was, "He's not seriously going to walk Guerrero to face Hamilton?" so I feel vindicated. Anyways, it means they have lost four straight, and it means poor Paulino sees another good start either screwed up by the bullpen or the offense. In this case it was really done by both.

The offense should have scored more runs during the middle innings of Wilson's start. Instead, they scored four in the first two innings, and did precious little else the rest of the game. After Paulino walked in the second, Wilson retired twelve of the next thirteen batters until Michaels tripled in the sixth. It is just awful. Something had to be done.

On a side note, hopefully Humberto Quintero is fine after he got a nasty bang on a backswing. Quite a bit of blood, but the tests came back negative, and he will not be going on the DL. Good news. We have not had much in quite a while.

Different night, same result

This guy had one start in five years coming into this season, but apart from a Pence single and a Bourn double, he might have pitched a perfect game against the Astros. Good pitching or abysmal hitting?

Since the Astros won 3-4 with the Rockies, they have gone 1-7 scoring 28 runs at 3.5 R/G, while conceding 58 (that is 7.2 R/G). That is a pretty ugly split, and in all likelihood the Rangers will win the series finale, and sweep the Astros in this current series.

Brian Moehler actually pitched pretty well last night, but the lineup, once again was clueless against an average pitcher. They scrounged just two hits against Colby Lewis (no walks either), as the rightie needed just 101 pitches to get through 28 at bats. Pence was wiped out after an infield single by a Feliz DP, while Bourn's double was the first to make it out of the infield, he advanced on a groundout, then scored on a wild pitch. Not our finest hour by far.

Moehler only made two mistakes. A walk to Murphy, then a bad pitch to Justin Smoak who hit a 2 run shot for the Rangers first runs of the night. Do you hear that? It is Texas clearing a space in their otherwise empty trophy cabinet to make room for the silver boot. Perhaps Brad Mills could do with using the boot soon? Some of his players need a good kick up the backside. Ed Wade? He could boot a few of these no-hopers out of town. At least one of our mascots has not come out and ribbed on the team on his facebook page.

It was annoying before, but now Houston's play is downright embarrassing. Pedro Feliz is living on borrowed time. If he's not released he should at the very least be benched in favour of Chris Johnson down in AAA. Johnson might never cut it at the majors, but he should be given his chance. His splits at AAA Round Rock are pretty good .329/.362/.570. While we should not base a lot on this, he has shown some good power, he has struckout less, even though his walk tally is not great. I just wonder how you can justify sending Feliz out, with his -2.2 WAR, AND A -13.5 VORP.

As a team we just make far too many outs. This may sound stupidly obvious, but the game ends when you get 27 outs. If your lineup makes it easy for pitchers to get outs, you will not do very well. You only have to look at some of the OBPs to see that this lineup is horrendous at getting on base.

Feliz .242

Lee .259

Manzella .258

Quintero .280

Rule of thumb, if you can't get on base 3 times out of 10, you should not be in the majors. You can shrug off a bad batting average, if a guy hits lots of home runs, gets on base a lot of the time, and drives in runs on a consistent basis. Adam Dunn has been a perfect example of this (although his batting average is a respectable .284, in his career it has been as low as .220).

While we are stuck with Lee and his massive contract, Feliz really should be toast in the next month or so. It was a gamble, and it has not worked. Some of Wade's other gambles did come off, so we'll not criticise him too heavily. But it needs to be rectified. We need to stop giving the guy plate appearances. You just cannot justify your place in the middle of a lineup when you have 7 walks in 236 PA.

Then we move on to power numbers. Now we are still dead last as a team in HR, but just look at the last time these guys hit home runs (today is June 20th). Feliz May 23rd, Berkman, June 3rd. Feliz has only hit two home runs all season, but Berkman has just 2 in his last 34 games, and has a SLG% of .349 during that time period (it is .388 over the entire season). This is a guy who has a career .549 SLG%.

Capitulation, Frustration, Recrimination

So should the Astros hand over the silver boot now, or wait until the Rangers wallop them another five times?

Wandy Rodriguez might have been genuinely unlucky at times this season, but others he has struggled mightily. His 10 losses amount to the most in the NL. He's received 3.10 runs per nine innings in run support in is 14 starts, but his ERA keeps going up and up and up. It now stands at 6.09, while his xFIP stands at 4.60. Fan Graphs ran a piece on the man called the statistical aberration a couple of days ago, while Solomon on the HC has this to say about his struggles in 2010. Joe Sheehan also ranks Rodriguez as one of the five un-luckiest pitchers in 2010, based on BABIP, HR/FB and strand rate (LOB%).

There has been a huge amount of discussion on the topic of why Rodriguez has struggled, and it is clear that he's lost command of his fastball, and even his curveball. Some have postulated that he is just tired, having logged a career high innings last year at 205 2/3. Others have suggested he simply needs a rest, but I do not see Brad Mills skipping his start in the rotation when he is already having to chuck Brian Moehler in there every five days.

Another thing worth pointing out is that Wandy has struggled when he has run into adversity during his starts. The pressure seems to be getting to him, and it is not surprising considering the lack of wiggle room the Astros' pitchers are operating under. Anything less than an excellent start, and the team is almost guaranteed to lose. Anyone might crack in that situation. Rodriguez got into a mess in the third inning by losing his command against Kinsler and then Guerrero, offering them both free passes, and in the process walking in a run. After that Hamilton and Smoak made him pay, as the Rangers batted round the lineup in the 3rd. At 6-0 the Astros were done already.

Texas is an objective lesson in how to turn a franchise around. Jon Daniels has not got every decision right, but he has turned the Rangers around in the last few years to a decent team. Gone are the Kevin Milwoods and Vincente Padilla's of yesteryear. He got a decent haul for Mark Teixeria (imagine if Ed Wade could get that sort of package for both Oswalt and Berkman). Guerrero can be considered a steal at $5.5m, roughly what the Astros had Matsui, and Feliz signed to.

Dallas Morning News has a tiny snippet on Oswalt. Nothing we do not know already. The Rangers will have to wait until after the July 9th hearing, etc. etc. to clear up the ownership situation before they can make a play for no.44. Nolan Ryan meanwhile expresses his admiration for Oswalt.

Michaels helps Oswalt squeak to within two of Niekro

We beat the Royals. Check. Roy Oswalt pitched a good game. Check. Our offense stuttered again. Check. You know, I grow tired of complaining and bitching about how badly some parts of our team is performing, but heck, at least there is plenty of material to write about. You can even read this, and thank your lucky stars some of these players actually don't play for the Astros, as SI picks its all not-stars team of 2010 (and only two Astros: Berkman and Rodriguez are on there).

After two rough starts against the Nationals and then the Cubs, Oswalt has rebounded well with victories over the Rockies and last night over the Royals for back to back wins. And guess how many times Astros' pitchers have won back-to-back starts before then? You got it, ONCE. So this season, the only pitcher to win back-to-back starts is Oswalt who has now done it twice. Now a lot of this is not our pitchers fault, It has been that stinking offense, but all-in-all it is a pretty shocking stat. For Oswalt, after giving up two early runs, he mowed down KC with ease after early troubles, getting ahead of batters with 21 of 28 first pitch strikes.

And that leads me to another game where most of the lineup did diddly squat. True, the meat of the order got on base in a couple of spots, but without Jason Michaels timely interventions, we would have been scoring this one as our 41st loss of the season. The pinch hitter, and left fielder (with Lee taking the DH spot) drove in three of the four runs on the day, and this is against Kansas City and Bruce Chen. True, they have been better with Ned Yost at the helm, and this is still a pitching staff that allows 5.12 runs a game, even with the reigning Cy Young winner on its' books. It is a good thing we have avoided Zack Greinke because in all honesty we would have been ******. Instead tomorrow's game we face Anthony Lerew, and the Astros send Brett Myers to the mound. While I have no idea who this is, I gather he has been kicking around the Braves organisation for five years, so regardless I see him blanking the Houston lineup for six or so innings. Luke Hochevar would have made the start, but was put on the DL with an elbow strain.

If trades start to happen, I would not be surprised if Brett Myers is actually the first to go. He has the most upside to any of the players on the Houston roster that they will think about letting go. Jon Rauch has been stellar in the absence of Joe Nathan for the Twins, but if he were to falter before the July 31st non-waiver trade deadline, perhaps they might be enquiring about the services of Lindstrom, a great pickup by Wade. Considering the Astros' closer has another three years till free agency, I'd say he would be a no-brainer to keep.

Talking about which Astro will be selected as an all-star I think it has to be Roy. His WAR stands at 2.4, and he should have at least 10 wins, considering he's only had two starts that you could call below good, and an xFIP of 3.40.

Laughing stock beaten by Royals

One minute the Astros were probably congratulating themselves for a five run fifth inning, onlyto see a three-run lead evaporate in a flash.

True, Kansas City benefited from numerous blooped singles and groundballs that found their way into the outfield. The fifth should have been over for Felipe Paulino before he gave up any of the seven runs he would allow, but the umpire saw something nobody else did, well except Jose Guillen, who in my opinion conned the official in the same way Jermaine Dye did in the 2005 World Series. 'See that ump? Hit my jersey! I'm just going to trot off to first base now.' He also called batters' interference on Jeff Keppinger, killing the third inning in its' tracks.

This was obviously not a great start by Paulino, but I don't think we can call it that awful. It just seemed like every ball the Royals' put in play resulted in a hit. I think Paulino was just genuinely unlucky.

Jeff Passan piece on Lance Berkman's thoughts on whether he and Roy will be traded. And all of a sudden we are the 'Disatros' again. Cannot really argue with the tag after watching last night's game. This piece seems to argue that Oswalt's trade value is even less than Cliff Lee's, but putting all the fancy sabermetrics aside (not bashing them at all), let us just step back a bit.

Oswalt is money down the stretch. Remember what C.C. Sabathia did in 2008 for the Brewers after being traded? 11-2 with a 1.65 ERA in 17 starts, 3.3 WPA.

Lets see what Oswalt has done in his last 17 starts of every season?

2001: 10-2, 2.60 ERA 8.4 K/BB ratio, WPA 1.6

2002: 11-4, 2.79 ERA, WPA 2.1

2003: injured in August, pitched September

2004: 11-4, 3.36 ERA, 0.9 WPA

2005: 9-5, 3.53 ERA, 1.0 WPA

2006: 9-4, 2.68 ERA, 5.75 K/BB ratio, WPA 1.7

2007: 8-3, 2.95 ERA, 1.7 WPA

2008: 12-3, 2.29 ERA, 2.6 WPA

2009: 6-3, 3.74 ERA, 0.8 WPA

looking at these figures I'm not sure what they really prove, apart from it is hard to beat Oswalt down the stretch. They aren't anywhere as near the tear Sabathia went on while in a Brewers uniform, but they give a nice indication, that Roy would help any team down the stretch.

If we decide to move as many players on as possible, guys like Brett Myers, who aren't tied down by huge contracts will be vastly easier to shift than Oswalt and Berkman. We're stuck with Carlos Lee. Unfortunately.

Jordan Lyles pitched a beautiful shutout last night, picking up 11 strikeouts. I know a lot of fans will want to toss him in to the majors straight away, but remember the guy is 19, and is so vital to our future as a franchise, we need to make sure we don't stress his arm out too much. A major league debut towards the tail end of 2011 sounds about right for me. If we continue at this sort of pace, perhaps we can beat out the Orioles to get the majors' worst record, and take Anthony Rendon in next years' draft. Here are some names that will be bandied around next year. Lyles and Folty would look very nice in a future rotation.

Oswalt trade to Rangers in the spokes?

I have links: links, links and more links. The sticking point according to this is for MLB to allow the Rangers to take on Oswalt's salary. Jon Heyman suggested today that the Rangers would be a longshot for either Cliff Lee or Oswalt. This is the Crawfish Boxes thread on the topic. Astros County will no doubt update the situation as it unfolds, so this link is worth keeping, and checking every now and then: Buster Olney twitters that there is nothing to the reports, and this was on a day that started with rumours about a possible move to the Mets for Oswalt, days after he had said he wouldn't be adverse to a move to the Yankees. Perhaps the Rangers got spooked, and really want Oswalt.

Latest disaster must convince Drayton of need to sell

The good news first. The Astros have signed most of their top draft picks with Foltynewicz and Kvasnicka both signing. Only DeShields is unsigned, and it is rumoured he wants a ton of money (link by way of Astros County), as his coach said 'he's asking for the moon. My guess is he's probably going to get it where he signed.' They have also signed a ton of lower draft picks, as Wade looks to add depth to the Astros beggared farm system. There are some guys who are on the rise in the Astros farm system, especially J.D. Martinez. Chris Johnson should be getting a callup at some point, having been demoted earlier this season, as he is tearing up AAA, narrowing his K percentage rate to 14.7 and an OPS of .976 in 32 games.

The bad news, we got swept by the Yankees, and were pretty comprehensively outplayed in all three games. We were not trounced, but the gap between the two teams in every facet of the game was evident for all to see. Richard Justice says we are going in the right direction, and we are, if you consider the right direction to be the worst record in the majors. Heck, then we will get the top draft pick in the 2011 draft. I am cool with that. The problem is Drayton McLane just does not learn. And neither does Justice. He goes from praising him as a model owner to slagging him off as confusing fantasy and reality.

There are a lot of players that have underperformed, notably, Wandy Rodriguez and nearly our entire lineup. Berkman, Lee, Pence, Feliz, they have all had shocking starts to the season. They all have negative WARs. Crawfish Boxes praises the signing of Brett Myers for $3.1m and shows that he has been the best pitching pickup of the season so far. Kudos to Ed Wade. If only he could convince Drayton to get rid of nearly everything on the roster and start again. That is how bad the team is.

The Astros need two half decent pitching prospects, a blue chip power hitter, and two other good hitters. If they were to get rid of Berkman and Lee they would need replacements at those positions, but would take anything to fit positions not right and centre field or at catcher. That is how many holes there are in the Astros lineup.

The problem with clearing the roster is that Lee, Berkman and Oswalt are owed a lot of money. If McLane and Wade want to shift them, they'll have to eat a lot of salary, and even more if they want something good back from them. The 2010 expenditure is $91.5m, so if you look for 2011, we won't be paying the $10m we've owed Matsui, and paid Pedro Feliz. Berkman, Oswalt and Lee swallowed $48m of the budget this year, and are owed slightly more next year. I wouldn't mind eating $18m of that, for this year and the next. That frees up $30m, and means any prospective team is having to pay $10m a year for three near all-star calibre players.

As poor as the offense has been the reala disappointment has been Rodriguez, who has experienced a massive regression in 2010, his xFIP has jumped from 3.63 to 4.48 (that is higher than his 2005 total).

Two Jorge Posada grand slams in two days did for the Astros, as did the 10 walks they allowed, while a Tommy Manzella 2 run single, and a Kevin Cash 2 run shot straight after gave Houston only a glimmer. The game also highlighted the gap between our late inning relief and our middle inning pitchers. Chacin, Daigle and Wright made a total mess of things after Moehler departed, just as they did the night before.

Felipe Paulino will start the series against the Royals in Kansas City. The Astros have Monday off.

Lee blasts a hole in Rockies

Carlos Lee seems to have put his struggles behind him, as the Astros finally hit a home run in three games at Coors Field, a grand-slam in the tenth inning that saw Houston take the game 6-2. On balance Lee has not had a good season, he is still hitting .227, but his numbers before and after May 2nd are striking. Up to May 1st, Lee's line was .176/.222/.224, with no home runs, five RBI, 16 K/4 BB, as the Astros went 7-15 in those 22 games. After that period Lee's figures are a more presentable .257/.289/.500, with 9 HR, 29 RBI. The Astros are 16-20 since May 2nd.

In the last fourteen games, Lee's line is even better, picking up 16 RBI in that period, and owning an OPS of .981 (1.000 is generally considered very good for those not in the know). The Astros are 9-5 in that period.

The Astros were awful pretty much everywhere in April, but you are not going to win many games when your middle of the order goes AWOL. If your biggest power threat (Berkman was out of the lineup for much of April), takes a month to hit his first home run, then you are in deep, deep trouble. Berkman, Lee, Pence and even to some extent Pedro Feliz seemed to have turned corners in the last month or so, but the offensive production still is not great. We get nothing from Manzella or Quintero, and the 199 runs they have scored this season is easily the worst in the league, averaging at 3.32 per game.

Apart from the grand slam, the Astros scored the other two runs on a ground ball double play, and an RBI single from Bourn and left a slew of baserunners stranded in scoring position.

The other budding success story is that of Felipe Paulino who has really come on in his last five starts. He is still stuck with one win on the season, but he's lowered his ERA on the season to 3.82, not bad for a man who was considered our fifth starter coming into the season, but it his last five starts that have really dazzled. In those five starts the Astros are 4-1 (the most important thing), while his ERA is 1.75 over that time period, and has struck out 27 batters over 36 innings, allowing just one home run and no steals. The only thing that is still slightly up his his walks, totalling 16 in 5 starts, which is just over 3 a start.

Roy Oswalt starts for the Astros at 2.10 CT, as the Astros try and take the series from the Rockies. Thank our lucky stars we don't have to face Ubaldo Jimenez. We would make him look better than Steven Strasburg.

Draft summary, Astros beat Rockies

I'm not going to give an exhaustive summary of the draft, as that can be found elsewhere. The Crawfish Boxes' coverage of the draft has been exemplary, and they have dredged up pretty much everything you need to know on all our draft picks.

I was a bit disappointed our first pick, not because Delino DeShields isn't a good prospect, I think he's very projectable. He just was not a pick who inspired rapture. DeShields has been talked about as a second baseman even though he played centre field at high school. So he'll either be a leadoff hitter, or second place behind Bourn if he reaches the majors soon. He's one of the fastest guys in the draft, and has a good swing.

As we lead up to the draft, more and more whispers linked DeShields to the Astros, and it seems they feared the Blue Jays would take him if they didn't, so they declined to wait until #19 and took him at #8 instead.

Our next two picks pitcher Mike Foltynewitz and switch-hitting catcher (who will be developed as a third baseman) Mike Kvasnicka seem to want to sign up on the spot, so we won't need much above slot money to get them, according to these comments at least. Folynewitz was not talked about as a first rounder, but experts thought he might sneak in there, and most reaction has been positive about him as an arm. He's got a low-mid 90s fastball and a good change.

Vincent Velasquez came next, and other names that stand out are Adam Plutko, Austin Wates and Jacoby Jones. Bobby Doran (our 4th round pick) and Ben Heath (5th round), but sound like they'll sign from their comments.

The first thing you noticed as day 1 continued was the lack of the impact bat. The Astros balked at signing a Michael Choice, Josh Sale or even Zack Cox (who does not fit that mould, but was one of the names of the marquee bats tossed out before the June 7th). This might be down to the fact that these guys might want $4m+ or a major league contract. As nice as it would be to draft someone who might project the way someone like Jay Bruce did for the Reds, the Astros need to sign deep into this draft.

We also seemed to be drafting nothing but pitchers with big builds, catchers and 'toolsy' outfielders. The thing I noticed, especially in the early rounds is that we were looking for a third and second baseman (DeShields and Kvasnicka), and they are the two holes we have in our organisation, with no-one really that good on the major or minor league rosters (sorry Jeff K, you've been heroic this year, but you're no Craig Biggio).

Castro will hopefully take over from Quintero at some point this season, while Mier is struggling a bit this season. This makes me think that the Astros have ditched what they used to call drafting the best player available rather than the one that suits the organisations' needs best, but the lack of an impact bat suggests to me that Ed Wade and Bobby Heck might know something we don't. Goodbye Berkman, Lee or Oswalt? It would certainly jettison a lot of payroll, and might bring us a blue chip power prospect from somewhere. This however, does not take into account Drayton McLane, or the fact that all three have very burdensome contracts, which will put off most/all teams in this current climate.

And looking at last night's game, boy do we need some pop in that lineup. Even with two guys that should be 30-100 guys (Lee and Berkman), one who might be that in the future (Pence), and a guy who was not far off that four years ago (Feliz), we are still far and away not only the worst offensive team, but we can't hit home runs for beans. We can't even get extra-base hits at COORS FIELD.

So bizarrely, we only won the game last night because Brian Moehler pitched very well after a first-inning hiccup that saw him give up two runs, and a strong performance by Lopez, Lyon and Lindstrom. Our four runs were scored on a line drive single, two ground-balls and a blooper from Carlos Lee. Hey didn't we really tear the cover off the balls tonight guys? Four double plays certainly came in nifty, as did a very good catch by Jason Michaels, playing in centre field for Michael Bourn, who was given a day off.

In the third game of the four game series Felipe Paulino will get the nod. The youngster has the hottest arm on the rotation, recording a 1.69 ERA in his last four starts.

(Thanks to Astros County for the link), San Francisco Chronicle writer John Shea talks about J.R. Richard's debut, who struckout one more than Strasburg in his major league debut. Not bad striking out Willie Mays three times in your debut.

Berkman to the Yankees? I would not hold my breath.

Myers keeps on dealing

The first note to make is that the Rule IV draft starts today (June 7th-9th), starting 5pm CT, and I will be tweeting live as things unfold. Crawfish Boxes provides an excellent link which suggests that Zack Cox might be holding out for $6m odd and a major league contract, which seems to price him out of the Astros range. And I thought he'd be one of the guys that would have been signable. Josh Sale it is then for #8.

I'm not sure on this one, but I believe that Brett Myers became the first Astros starting pitcher to have a winning record improving his record to 4-3 last night with another controlled performance. He lowered his ERA to 3.01, lasting 6 2/3 innings, allowing just two runs to the Cubs, giving the Astros their fifth win in six games, and winning their sixth series of the season (two of these have now come against the Cubs). He has allowed just five earned runs in his last four starts with an ERA of 1.69 over that span. His WHIP on the season at 1.388 is a bit worrying, but that has been his rep over the years, even when he pitches well that he allows quite a few baserunners. He's also 3-0 with a 2.89 ERA in seven starts at MMP. He's currently looking like quite a steal, if he can stay healthy for the rest of the season at $3.1m and a considerable coup for Ed Wade.

Importantly, the right hander has reached at least six innings in all his starts, and has got to seven in seven of his twelve starts. The Astros went 5-2 on their homestand and now head way above sea level to face the Rockies. It will be tough ten game roadtrip with stops in New York and then Kansas City. At least Houston will miss Ubaldo Jimenez, who pitched last night, earning his 11th win of the season.

In support the Astros posted six runs, which was enough for Myers, with Carlos Lee's 2 run home run, and Feliz's 2-run single enough for the Astros. Lopez and Lyon got the ball to Lindstrom (lots of L's), who picked up his thirteenth save of the season.

The Astros now sit 3 1/2 games behind the Cubs (who are third) in the NL Central standings.

Cubs prick Astros bubble

Before getting on to the topic of last night's game, I'll just run through some more things on the amateur draft. Maybe it is just me, but after covering the Astros for about five years day in day out, this year's interest in the draft has been more intense than I can remember. Perhaps Astros fans realise that this is the one area where the club can really improve.

Most of the coverage seems to be about our #8 and #19 picks in the first round. Once again, the Crawfish Boxes coverage has been top notch. They have provided excellent summaries of Delino Deshields (thought by many to be the man for the Astros' second pick), Josh Sale, Zack Cox and Michael Choice. I personally think Deshields sounds far too like Michael Bourn to have much need of him, but we could do with a power corner infield bat, with the regression and eventual decline of Carlos Lee looming. Sale or Choice at #8 would be the smart money, with the Astros looking for a pitcher at #19.

Meanwhile Drayton McLane makes a most extraordinary statement: “That decision is going to be made by Ed Wade,” McLane said. “I have never influenced the draft. I don't know them.”

In light of what happened in 2007, and Derek Dietrich and Brett Eibner went unsigned in the 2007 draft because they wanted more than slot money, and it is alleged that McLane told Purpura not to sign them because Selig was still angry with him over the Carlos Lee 6-year $100m contract sort of contradicts this.

Although apparently Ed Wade has $8.5-10m to spend on this year's draft, which is suspect because they spent $4.1m in 2008 and $6.5m in 2009.

As for last night's game, it was a rare disappointment with Roy Oswalt on the mound. He was a little unlucky in the fourth where he might have escaped unscathed, but once the Cubs started scoring it was hard to stop them, and the Astros were never going to reach nine runs, considering they have managed it once all season.

The sooner we can get Tommy Manzella, Humberto Quintero and Pedro Feliz out of the lineup the better. I suppose Jason Castro will feature at some point this season, and I would not be surprised if Feliz is released Matsui style if he does not break out of this 2 month funk he has going on.

Paulino's promise shining through

His statistics look rather ugly, in part because of three very bad starts, one in May against Colorado, one in July against the Giants, and his penultimate start of the season against the Reds. His season ERA 6.27, would have been 4.47 if you take those three starts out, which is not too awful. The loss record 3-11, just shows how awful the Astros were for portions of 2009, especially in September, when Paulino lost 5 straight starts, in large part to Houston's poor offense.

Last year, no pitcher got less run support than he did, 2.35 runs per nine innings in games he started. This year he's getting only 2.76 runs per nine innings.

In Paulino's last four starts the Astros are 3-1, while the right hander has a 1.61 ERA. In his first seven starts his ERA was 5.72. He's got the stuff to blow away teams. His last two starts have proven that, he has a fastball that reaches up to 97, and has excellent pitches in his changeup, slider and curveball when he has command of them. As Crawfish Boxes shows, this was not a fluke win, but a pitcher who is rolling and has some very good weapons in his arsenal.

It was a very good pitching performance last night, keeping the Cubs to one run in eight innings. Matt Lindstrom did what he could not in his last few appearances, retiring the Cubs in 1-2-3 fashion to close out the Astros fourth win in a row.

These sorts of victories show that Houston is not a bad team, merely an average one playing very badly. Every member of the lineup has slumped at some point (apart from Keppinger, and maybe Bourn). Some have woken up (Pence, Lee and Berkman), while some are still in slumber (Pedro Feliz, sporting an abysmal .564 OPS, [in comparison Adam Everett has a career .642 OPS]), and lightweights who should be playing AAA ball (Tommy Manzella and Humberto Quintero).

Quintero and Manzella's offensive output is laughable, and even though our erstwhile catcher did us the great favour of ridding the club of Tim Redding (the Padres loss, our gain), that was five years ago, talking about resting on your laurels. The $4.5m the Astros are paying Feliz is looking like a bit of a waste, and I would not be surprised if he gets cut at this rate, or traded (for a bat boy and some pine tar).

Extraordinary end results in another win

The Astros bizarre win yesterday afternoon lifted the Astros up to 20 wins, and was their third straight against the Nationals after dropping the opener 14-4.

They should have had this one in the bag, as a good start by Brian Moehler and home runs from Kevin Cash and Lance Berkman helped them to an early lead. And yet they mucked up again, in the ninth too, as a poor play by Lee and a blooper by Christian Guzman have the Nats an improbable 4-3 lead. Then a Berkman sinking liner (which should have been caught in right field, had Washington not had infielder Guzman there) scored Michael Bourn, before Carlos Lee's 2 run shot sent the fans home.

I the Astros are going to start to dig themselves out of this 20-34 hole, they'll need Pence, Berkman and Lee to start mashing it. Pence has arguably been the better of the 3, even though his WAR on the season is at -0.4. You would expect him to have more than 7 doubles, and his 9 walks is pretty diabolical for a middle order guy (.308 OBP just will not cut it). However he's not striking out a lot (only 23 so far), so this tells me his BABIP (his Batting Average on Balls in Play) is low, so he might just be unlucky, hitting straight to fielders. After being rested on May 7th, in the next 25 games he has a 1.007 OPS and a line of .343/.381/.626 (BA/OBP/SLG%). Compare this to his line before May 7th, and .210/.233/.290.

Berkman has started turning things around, after starting his season late due to injury, owning a .294 BA, but more importantly a .906 OPS, and has really been getting on base a lot during a stretch of 23 games where the Astros are a half-decent 11-12.

You really do wonder what has happened to Wandy Rodriguez, he has a 6.06 ERA in his last seven starts, and has averaged just a shade over five innings in those starts. Last year he averaged 6 1/3 innings reaching 200+ innings for the first time in his career. I watched his last start, and his velocity still seems around the late 80s, so I'm wondering whether he isn't getting the finish on his pitches, and whether last season has had some wear on his arm.

The Astros now welcome the Chicago Cubs, and Felipe Paulino, on the back of an excellent start last time out will face Carlos Zambrano, owner of a lifetime 13-7 record with a 2.54 ERA against the Astros (7-3 with a 3.21 ERA at MMP).

Winning...its good isn't it?

Here's my theory on why the Astros have been so terrible. Drayton McLane has seen the Nationals take Steven Strasburg last year, and presumably they will take Byrce Harper this year, so our glorious owner has decided that he too wants the first pick of a draft, and he'll do anything, including losing 110 games to do it.

No, in all seriousness, those two players will be a major asset to the Nationals in the future.

And while we are on the topic of the Washington Nationals, another unexpected win for the Astros last night, 5-1. Wandy Rodriguez's start, or rather the end product was good, and yet as the Crawfish Boxes points out this morning, he did take 115 pitches to get through 5 innings, and had as many lineouts (5), as groundouts (5), evidence that even though Nats hitters were making outs, they were still hitting the ball on the screws.

While everyone contributed to the offensive performance, the Astros scored four of their five runs on two hits; a Carlos Lee two-run shot, and a Pence two-run triple. They were still 2-11 with runners in scoring position, and more worryingly, they had 12 plate appearances where the batter saw only one or two pitches.

Otherwise it was a solid win, and ones that the Astros have not been getting. All facets of their game, pitching, offense, defense, and their bullpen have just not clicked at the same time. At one time or another we have had at least one, sometimes more screwing up.

Draft wise: the Crawfish Boxes are running a special on the amateur draft, check it out.

The situation last night when an umpire blew the call on the last play of what should have been Armando Galarraga was laughable, but that's life.

Berkman pulls one out of the fire

Firstly, the positives from the game. In some respects we played very well, and the frustrating thing (albeit a game we won 8-7), was that we should have won it far more easily. Brett Myers was coasting along until an error by Berkman amounted to three unearned runs, and a 4 run lead blown. They then blew another two-run lead, this time Lyon and Lindstrom were the culprits. As the fan graph showed, Berkman's walk-off 2 run single represented a 73.2% probability swing towards the Astros. It was Matt Capps' second blown save of the season.

The Myers performance was another solid one (granted he had to get out of some jams, he struckout Adam Dunne in the 3rd with the bases loaded to end the inning). His ERA shrank to 3.02, while Berkman was 3-5 with 5 RBI on the day, and was batting .227 coming into the game, and his WAR is currently 0.0 for the season, whereas in his last 10 seasons he has averaged 4.5.

The breaking news yesterday was that Roy Oswalt said he would accept a trade to the Washington Nationals. The Washington Post quotes him as saying:

"They've been playing well," Oswalt said. "They've got a good offensive club. I saw where they have Strasburg coming up. He should make an immediate impact, especially, because no one's seen him in the league, early. There's always a little adjustment period there."

As the Crawfish Boxes points out, this makes the Nationals a frontrunner, as they have the prospects, they have the payroll flexibility. Not only that, but you would effectively be adding two guys to your rotation, Strasburg and Oswalt to an already decent, if not perfect ball-club. The addition of an established ace would take the heat off Strasburg, and it also means the young fireballer has a guy who has been there and done it, a mentor if you will.

I'm not saying the Nationals have to make this trade, or should make this trade. It is entirely up to them whether they feel they have enough expendable minor league talent to acquire Oswalt. Already Strasburg's first start (due on June 8th) is creating a media frenzy, and the acquisition of the 3-time all-star would show their willingness to be a big-market team.

On other minor issues: Brian Moehler filled Norris' spot last time around, and it seems like he will do so again. What this is effectively saying is that either the Astros are extremely stupid (quite possible), or they have NO-ONE in their minor league organisation that they fancy to take a spot start. Now that is a pretty damning statement. Although with the injury to Chris Sampson, they called up Casey Daigle, who has been closing for AAA Round Rock.

This is what Scout has to say about the upcoming draft. The Astros have pick numbers 8, 19, 33, 58, 90, 123, and so on.

Stat of the day: the Blue Jays have hit 21 more home runs than any other team in the majors (91), whereas the Astros have hit only 27 all season.

And the Comedy Rolls On...

Drayton McLane and Roy Oswalt probably did not see the funny side to last night's game, but right now humour is all I've got.

The day was a beautiful response after the Astros had pulled out one of their most impressive victories of the season, a 2-0 win over the Reds thanks to a gem by Felipe Paulino. They then get hammered 14-4 by the Nationals, in part due to the early exit by Oswalt, who was tossed arguing balls and strikes. And the Astros had suffered two blowouts before Paulino's outing, losing 15-6 and 12-2 in Rodriguez and Moehler's starts (he is into the rotation after Norris was put on the DL with biceps tendinitis).

But at least May is over, right? In that calender month the club went 9-20, allowing 145 runs at 5 runs a game, scoring just 85 at 2.9 runs a game. The scored more than four runs just four times in those twenty-nine games.

Now I'm only picking one example, but Wandy has had a rocky season, and I'm just throwing it out there, but a smart GM might have sold Wandy at his peak (which last season was, he wasn't going to top that 3.02 ERA (9th in the league), or his 5.1 Wins Above Replacement. Today provides me with an example, albeit very tragic, as it was announced that former-Astro Jeriome Robertson died at the age of 32 in a motorcycle accident. This was a classic example of selling high, as Robertson, after winning 15 games in his rookie season in 2004, was traded for Willy Taveras and Luke Scott.

Jayson Stark meanwhile argues that it isn't in McLane's nature to give up on any team half-way through the season, but we've never been '62 Mets bad before.

You wonder if things will change after the deadline, and some club will be tempted to send their no.1 pick in a blockbuster somewhere for Oswalt. We'll see.