HOUSTON \u2014 Two months before the trade deadline, the Houston Astros are already addressing their biggest need.<\/p>\n
Houston is in agreement with veteran left-handed hitting outfielder LaMonte Wade Jr. on a major-league contract worth $1 million, two sources told The Athletic on Thursday, offering depth at a position where little of it exists.<\/p>\n
Wade, who has not appeared in a major-league game this season, opted out of his minor-league contract with the Chicago White Sox last week. He slashed .250\/.420\/.441 across 201 plate appearances with the White Sox\u2019s Triple-A affiliate in Charlotte. In parts of seven major-league seasons, Wade has a career 105 OPS+ and .341 on-base percentage.<\/p>\n
Though Wade made 30 of his 44 starts at first base for Triple-A Charlotte, he will almost certainly be asked to play outfield for an Astros team searching for stability at the position. Most of Wade\u2019s major-league experience is in right field, but Cam Smith\u2019s presence and recent breakout mean Houston is likely to play Wade primarily in left field.<\/p>\n
Only three outfields in baseball have a lower batting average than Houston\u2019s. Only one \u2014 the Miami Marlins \u2014 has a higher strikeout rate than the 27.5 percent clip Astros outfielders have produced. Zach Cole and Taylor Trammell, the team\u2019s two primary left-handed hitting outfielders, have struck out 43 times in 115 plate appearances this season.<\/p>\n
Wade\u2019s career 21 percent strikeout rate is almost two percent below league average. In Triple-A Charlotte this season, the 32-year-old journeyman walked 45 times and struck out just 43. That plate discipline alone is an upgrade for an Astros team struggling to find any consistency among its outfield.<\/p>\n
Across its first 63 games, Houston has started eight different left fielders and cycled through six center fielders. Significant injuries to incumbent center fielder Jake Meyers and offseason acquisition Joey Loperfido have skewed the numbers, but even at full health, Houston\u2019s outfield profiled as its weakest position throughout spring training.<\/p>\n
General manager Dana Brown spent the offseason searching for someone to stabilize it. He dangled displaced third baseman Isaac Paredes in every discussion, watched a division rival beat him out for Brendan Donovan and after a winter full of conversations, could not consummate a deal with the Boston Red Sox.<\/p>\n
Brown\u2019s efforts yielded just Loperfido, the former Houston farmhand reacquired from the Toronto Blue Jays in mid-February. Afterward, Brown delivered the sort of bold assurance that has come to define his tenure.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not done yet,\u201d Brown proclaimed without prompt, perhaps accentuating the skepticism still surrounding his outfield.<\/p>\n
It took a few months, but perhaps Brown\u2019s declaration rang true.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON \u2014 Two months before the trade deadline, the Houston Astros are already addressing their biggest need. Houston…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":684500,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[373,363,99],"class_list":["post-684499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-houston-astros","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=684499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/684500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}