\u201cnot done yet\u201d<\/a> in their search for outfield help.<\/p>\nBrown could not back up the braggadocio. Failing to finalize another deal left Houston reliant on a bevy of outfielders who are either inexperienced, in need of more development or defense-first players. One of them, Brice Matthews, is a converted infielder. The results have been atrocious.<\/p>\n
\u201cTrying to match these guys up against pitchers I know they can handle and locate pitches where I know those guys can be successful,\u201d manager Joe Espada said on Sunday. \u201cOnce they get going, (I\u2019m) trying to give them an extra couple games in a row, trying to get them going that way. I want all of them to play.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s difficult. But it\u2019s the roster that we have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Espada has deployed nine different left fielders and six different center fielders during his search for stability. Cam Smith has started 72 of the season\u2019s first 79 games in right field, but boasts a .219 batting average. Of the 16 major-league right fielders who\u2019ve tallied at least 200 plate appearances, only three of them have a lower OPS than Smith\u2019s .654 mark.<\/p>\n
Smith is one of five Astros who have made at least 75 plate appearances as an outfielder this season. His seven home runs equal the total of the other four. Houston\u2019s entire outfield has produced 23 home runs. Yordan Alvarez, who has started just 12 games in left field, is responsible for four of them.<\/p>\n
Amid the absence of power or production from the outfield, Alvarez remains the Astros\u2019 primary designated hitter. Logic may suggest softening the stance to spark the outfield production \u2014 or to free the designated hitter spot for other players \u2014 but maintaining Alvarez\u2019s health is of foremost concern.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s always a possibility of me playing more out there,\u201d Alvarez said on Sunday through an interpreter. \u201cThere\u2019s no limitations for me being out there in the outfield, but we have a couple young players out there that can play the outfield really well. Also, the manager said he\u2019s trying to get me more at-bats in the lineup as a DH.\u201d<\/p>\n
Espada insisted throughout the winter that this would be the case, furthering the confusion about how Houston handled its outfield this offseason. Players deserve some blame \u2014 Brown can\u2019t swing a bat for them \u2014 but it\u2019s clear he and his baseball operations team may have either underestimated the development these players still needed or overvalued their potential.<\/p>\n
It is a problem S\u00e1nchez or someone of his ilk would help to solve. The fault is not in trading S\u00e1nchez, whose miserable two months in Houston after last August\u2019s trade deadline were marred by defensive lapses, a 25 percent strikeout rate and an inability to handle the pressure of a playoff pursuit.<\/p>\n
For a front office forced to remain mindful of the luxury tax, dealing S\u00e1nchez and his $6.8 million salary made sense. Failing to allocate some of that money elsewhere \u2014 or find a more established replacement for S\u00e1nchez\u2019s potential production \u2014 did not.<\/p>\n
S\u00e1nchez isn\u2019t a perfect player, but the next major-league game he plays will be the 650th of his career. Of the five Astros who\u2019ve taken at least 75 plate appearances in the outfield this season, four of them have played fewer than 212 career games. The other is Jake Meyers, who has a career OPS+ of 88. League average is 100.<\/p>\n
S\u00e1nchez\u2019s career OPS+ is 99, but in his current state, he would not be the Astros\u2019 savior. According to Baseball-Reference, he\u2019s been worth minus-0.3 wins above replacement across his first 223 plate appearances this season. FanGraphs rates him somewhat more favorably, but still at just 0.1 WAR after 69 games.<\/p>\n
Before the trade, Loperfido had a 92 OPS+ in 122 career major-league games. That the team optioned him earlier this month in favor of another left-handed hitting outfielder \u2014 veteran LaMonte Wade Jr. \u2014 offered a damning indictment of Loperfido\u2019s standing within a shaky outfield hierarchy.<\/p>\n
Wade has played in 564 games across parts of eight major-league seasons. He is nearing a rehab assignment after sustaining a hamstring injury earlier this month. Upon his return, Wade could offer a semblance of stability.<\/p>\n
Little else of it exists, leaving Brown to dwell on his words from March. Houston had extensive conversations then with the Boston Red Sox about their surplus of outfielders, according to multiple sources briefed on the team\u2019s plans but not authorized to speak publicly.<\/p>\n
It stands to reason that those talks \u2014 and many others \u2014 will reignite for a team that should not be \u201cdone yet.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON \u2014 It is bleak to be mentioned in the same breath as the 2012 or 2013 Houston…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":719095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[373,363,99],"class_list":["post-719094","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\/719094","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=719094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/719095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=719094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=719094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=719094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}