ESPN Insider: Dis-Astros in for rough 2011 campaign

His projections sound awful. I'd bet $100 that at least one Astro starter has an OBP over .350 much less the .323 he's projecting.

EDIT* Good thing he's setting the bar low now. The Astros have a record of out-performing expectations year after year, mostly because the projections are always terrible like this.

There was an article a few months ago that said the Astros in the last decade have outperformed pre-season projections more-so than any other team in the league. The corollary is that its more fun for fans to watch a crappy team out-perform projections than a projected middle of the pack team under-perform.

 

Tell us something we don't know. The reason to watch the Astros this year will be the up and coming guys or signing Albert Pujols in the offseason.

 

Good god, he basically just described a worst case scenario. Projections work both ways, so Bourn may bomb but could also turn into Kenny Lofton and Wallace into a power hitting 1st baseman. Baseball is the hardest sport to project sooooooo I stopped trying.

 

Mindless drivel. I mean the things he says are fair enough, as the Astros' offense really *is* that bad. But can we get past the smack-talk-water-cooler journalism BS now? Is there *anybody* who can actually *write* anymore? "Disastros". Really?

 

LOL

 

this guy is prlly a Rangers fan.


what a loser

 

Out of curiosity, who do you expect to have an OBP over .350?

 

Hunter Pence is a right-fielder, not left.

Half a season doesn't confirm anything on Wallace.

That stat line for Chris Johnson is what I envision, but I wouldn't be disappointed by it. Thats not bad for a guy we never expected anything beyond average from to begin with.

 

**** you, Jay Jaffe.

 

I wouldn't call our record last year and the year before "out-performing expectations". Maybe the pitching was better than it was supposed to be last year, but the results were the same as we all predicted. Except for a few loopy fans that think that 'anything can happen' each year and that maybe this next year might be our turn to be the San Diego Padres! Or whatever nonsense they might want to spew to rationalize rooting for an organization with such piss poor management and ownership.

 

Bourn. In 3 of his 4 full seasons his OBP has been .341 or over. He was at .354 two seasons ago and .341 last season so I think it's a reasonable (but optimistic) projection that he could be in the .350 range this season.

Not subjective expectations, the pre-season projections people come up with by formula's or programs. Like PECOTA. The computers have been projecting us to finish dead last almost every year lately with high 60's/low 70's wins. We usually outperform by a couple of wins.

Is it a big reason to celebrate? Hardly. But its still a minor point to be happy about.

 

Bourn/Lee/Pence/Keppinger have all done it before.

Wallace is capable.

Across the last two years, Bourn's OBP is around .350. No reason to think he would have that dramatic of a drop off from last year.

 

I would love to see a wright up of the 2010 SD Padres and Cincinnati Reds, I wonder how those projections turned out?

 

Unless a player's coming off of a career-worst type of year that looks like an anomaly, projection systems like PECOTA are almost always conservative.

 

The details may be off on individual players, but it's hard to disagree with the general premise. This is an absolutely horrendous offense. Outside of Pence and maybe Lee if he rebounds, every other player is below average at their position. And it's not like Pence or Lee are superstars.

Projections are just that - projections. So of course they may be wrong, but they are based on sound rationale and statistical analysis.

 

http://www.crawfishboxes.com/2010/2/1/1287380/updated-pecota-has-astros-at-76

PECOTA last year projected the Astros to win 76 games. They won ... 76 games.

 

And that after a really nice 2nd half run. They were on a pace to fall woefully short of that there for a while.

 

One thing that surprised me last year was the fan attendance.

I mainly attended Sunday games and there was always a crowd.

That said, I really like Chris Johnson.

I think he's going to have another solid year.

Last season (94 games)

BA .308 OBP .337 SLG . 481

Go Dis-Astros!

 

With Pence coming off of a decent finish to the season, Johnson hitting the way he did last year, Wallace having a strong spring (I know, not worth too much), and Lee most likely having a bounce back year, I just can't see this team doing as poorly as they think. Not to mention that we have Bourn in center to start off the lineup and an improved middle infield offensively, especially when Kepp comes back.

The Astro rotation had four pitchers last season (Myers, Happ, Rodriguez, and Figueroa) with ERAs below 3.60 on the year. With Wilton Lopez setting up for Lyon, our bullpen is more than decent. I'm curious to see where it goes.