Spencer Arrighetti and A.J. Blubaugh with two scoreless innings apiece this morning; Arrighetti walked one and Blubaugh allowed a hit and struck out one.
Can it be possible for "more baseball" to ever be a bad thing? I don't think so. As an aside ... Spoiler
I was a little disappointed that the prospect game only went six innings. I was hoping to see a few more kids involved.
Yesterday was release day, as 17 prospects got the axe: https://www.milb.com/corpus-christi/roster/transactions/houston-astros Dauri Lorenzo was the biggest surprise for me, but nobody shocked me. Really hoping we see some aggressive assignments in a couple weeks.
After those releases it appears that Houston is under the 180 man stateside limit required for opening day. Should be about a dozen kids that were able to move to Florida from the DSL. with the schedule change, the FCL will be even more of an ESL/rehab league than it used to be.
After today’s releases, here’s how many draft picks remain in the system for each draft: 2015: 2 (Bregman, Tucker) 2016: 1 (Whitley) 2017: 5 (Mushinski, Julks, Bielak, Meyers, McCormick) 2018: 5 (Pena, Salazar, Dubin, France, Hensley) 2019: 9* (Kessinger, Brewer, Barber, Brown, Henley, Stubbs, Gusto, McDonald, Arias) 2020: 3 (Santos, Daniels, Whitcomb) 2021: 13 2022: 16 2023: 19 *JC Correa was picked in the 38th round in 2019 but didn’t sign until 2020; he is still in the system.
Damn, 8 years later and only 1 player remains from the draft and he likely will never appear in an MLB game
Yep it was a really bad draft for Luhnow. Rogers turned out to be a good player and Toro had a career, but otherwise pretty much nothing.
17, 18 and 19 all look solid Was 19 the last Luhnow draft or was he gone already? He was still here right, and got the axe following that season?
Gaston’s release doesn’t make much sense to me, but who really knows what’s going on at the lower levels.
I'm betting Arrighetti throws pitches in the big leagues before the end of May, possibly April. Hopefully he is the next pitching surprise our organization develops
Doing some reading today reminded me the number of prospects in a system was reduced from 180 to 165 this season as part of the minor league CBA. So there may be another round of cuts coming (and/or fewer guys getting to come over from the DSL). Players on the big league roster, on the 60 day IL, or in the DSL do not count toward the limit.
One other note on the reduction in the domestic reserve list: going from 180 to 165 means an increase in quality of minor league free agents. I think this is something Houston has recognized and aimed to take advantage of, as they’ve signed more minor league free agents this offseason than in prior years. Guys like Drew Strotman, Mitchell Kilkenny, Luis Contreras, Wander Suero, Chris Gittens and others might have been retained by their former teams if the limit hadn’t been reduced. Something to keep an eye on if one of those guys ends up breaking out.
