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Jeff Luhnow Reflects On Decision To Pass On Kris Bryant

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The Astros have more than their share of highly talented young players, but one player they don’t have in their system is Cubs masher Kris Bryant. Houston had the chance to take Bryant with the first pick in the 2013 draft, but they decided on righty Mark Appel instead, and the Cubs snagged Bryant with the next selection. Appel, now 25, has yet to make his big-league debut, and was traded to the Phillies in the Ken Giles deal last offseason. Bryant, meanwhile, leads the NL in home runs, runs scored and OPS+ while anchoring an intimidating Cubs lineup.

The Cubs and Astros are currently playing a series, so Astros GM Jeff Luhnow fielded questions about the Bryant-Appel decision. Here’s some of what he had to say, courtesy of Gordon Wittenmyer of the Chicago Sun-Times.

“There’s a history lesson to be learned about the risk with pitchers vs. position players,” says Luhnow, referring to the tendency of position players to be better bets in the early stages of the draft. “[T]hat’s a history lesson that’s been laid out over a long period of time. Having said that, if you want an impact pitcher, you have to gamble.”

The Astros have had plenty of experience selecting both position players and pitchers with top picks in recent years. Of their ten first-round picks from 2011 to 2016, six were position players, and three of those (George Springer, Carlos Correa and Alex Bregman) clearly look to be significant parts of their future. Another, outfielder Derek Fisher, was a later selection who doesn’t look like an impact player, but who has consistently hit well in the minors. The others, Kyle Tucker and Daz Cameron, were drafted last year and are still teenagers. Cameron has struggled so far in his pro career, but Tucker’s is off to a fast start, as he’s already advanced all the way to Class A+ Lancaster.

Meanwhile, two of four pitchers the Astros have selected in the first round, Appel and Brady Aiken, have suffered significant speed bumps even though they were both first overall picks, and the Astros famously didn’t even sign Aiken due to a disagreement regarding the Astros’ concerns about his health. One of their other first-round pitching picks was this year’s 17th overall selection, Forrest Whitley, about whom it’s way too early to pass judgment. Even granting the Astros’ success with 2012 supplemental pick Lance McCullers, their experience does seem to bear out the maxim that there are considerable risks to selecting pitchers at the top of the draft.

Nonetheless, Luhnow says the Appel/Bryant decision doesn’t keep him up nights. “We’ve got Carlos Correa. We’ve got Alex Bregman. We’ve got Lance McCullers. Our scouting department has done a nice job with the draft,” he says. “You can always look back and say I should have taken this player instead of that player, but there’s no reason to really dwell on it.”

Dallas Keuchel Cleared Of Structural Issues In Shoulder, But Timeline Uncertain

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Astros lefty Dallas Keuchel is shut down at the moment with shoulder issues, but he said today that he has been cleared of structural concerns, as Mark Berman of FOX 26 reports (Twitter links). Tests showed inflammation, but he says the club’s training staff is confident that “a little bit of time” is all that’s needed to heal the joint.

If the issued had arisen earlier in the season, the ’Stros would surely have less immediate concern, as Keuchel could take his time getting back to full strength and embark upon a rehab stint. Plus, it would be easier to fill innings with an outside addition.

As it stands, though, there’s less than a month to go in the regular season and Keuchel’s absence will tell for a club that’s fighting to stay in the Wild Card hunt. Whether he can make it back by season’s end, or for a hopeful postseason run, is “hard to say at this point,” GM Jeff Luhnow tells MLB.com’s Alyson Footer (via Twitter). It doesn’t help that the southpaw won’t have an opportunity to pitch in the minor league system on a rehab assignment.

At this stage of the season, the organization is likely limited to the arms it already has on hand (see the Houston depth chart here) to fill the void in the rotation. Youngster David Paulino received his first major league start recently, but lasted only three innings and coughed up four earned runs with two walks, two wild pitches, and no strikeouts. The Astros received somewhat more promising results from just-activated righty Brad Peacock in his outing, as he allowed one earned in 3 2/3 frames, but he did permit five base knocks and managed only a pair of Ks.

Carlos Correa To Have Shoulder Examined

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The Astros will be without shortstop Carlos Correa for at least two games as he travels back to Houston to get his ailing shoulder examined, manager A.J. Hinch told reporters, including Jake Kaplan of the Houston Chronicle. Correa is believed to be troubled by some inflammation in his shoulder, and despite his leaving the team, the injury doesn’t appear to be serious in nature just yet, as Hinch said the team’s expectation is that Correa will play at some point this weekend. If that’s the case, it’s a minor hiccup for the Astros, but a more prolonged absence is something the Astros can ill afford as they sit two games back in the American League Wild Card hunt. With Correa absent, Alex Bregman saw his first Major League action at shortstop last night.

Astros Among Teams That Pursued Vladimir Gutierrez

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  • Just-signed righty Vladimir Gutierrez was also pursued by several other clubs before agreeing with the Reds, Zach Buchanan of the Cincinnati Enquirer reports (Twitter links). The Rangers and Astros were the two primary pursuers who were willing to strike a deal right now, but three other organizations tried to convince the Cuban youngster to wait until the following July 2 signing period to put pen to paper. Meanwhile, Cinci GM Dick Williams says that the club likely won’t be making any other big-dollar signings in the near term.

Astros To Promote David Paulino

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The Astros have decided to call up right-handed pitching prospect David Paulino, according to Jake Kaplan of the Houston Chronicle (via Twitter). Because he already held a 40-man roster spot, no corresponding move will be required.

Paulino, a towering 22-year-old righty, drew top-100 prospect consideration entering the year from Baseball America. And he has largely continued that momentum, improving to 47th on BA’s midseason top 100 and rating as MLB.com’s 76th-best prospect in the game on their own midseason rankings.

The appeal here is obvious: Paulino has a huge frame and a mid-nineties heater to go with a quality curve. His third pitch, a change, is somewhat less developed but seems to hold the promise of being a useful major league offering. Paulino comes with a big ceiling, scouts say, but it remains to be seen how the entire package will translate at the major league level.

Paulino has impressed thus far in 2016, at least when he has been on the mound. He served a suspension for a violation of team rules in the middle of the year — the situation remains murky — meaning that he has only accumulated 90 total frames on the season. That still rates as a career-high for a hurler who had undergone Tommy John surgery before he was sent from the Tigers to the Astros as the player to be named later in the Jose Veras trade.

Despite that hiccup, Paulino obvious did enough to convince the Astros brass that he was worthy of a shot at the majors. He burned through Double-A, posting a 1.83 ERA with 10.1 K/9 and 1.5 BB/9 over 64 frames, earning a bump to the highest level of the minors. Though Paulino has allowed 16 hits and six earned runs over his 14 frames (spread over three starts) at Triple-A, he has managed to compile an appealing 20:6 K/BB ratio.

For the ’Stros, it’s hard not to wonder whether there’s at least some connection between the move and the recent loss of staff ace Dallas Keuchel. While Paulino’s precise role remains unclear, the injury to Keuchel may have made the organization more willing to roll the dice on an unproven arm — whether in the rotation or some kind of relief role. Even if it is somewhat sub-optimal to rely on Paulino at this stage, he certainly delivers some upside and didn’t require any roster maneuvering.

As for service-time considerations, the move will obviously get Paulino’s ticker started. If he opens the 2017 season in the majors, then the extra days of action will have no impact. If, however, the Astros decide they’d like to further delay his free agency, then time spent in the bigs this season will extend the number of days he’d need to stay down next year.

Dallas Keuchel Sidelined With Shoulder Inflammation

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Astros lefty Dallas Keuchel will miss at least two starts due to shoulder inflammation, Houston GM Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch both said today. Mark Berman of FOX 26 reported Luhnow’s comments (Twitter links), while MLB.com’s Brian McTaggart spoke with Hinch.

At present, it seems, the team doesn’t yet know the cause or full extent of the problem. As such, it’s not yet clear whether Keuchel will be able to return to help drive a push for the postseason, or appear if the team qualifies. Houston is all but buried in the AL West, but entered play today two games off of the Wild Card pace.

The 28-year-old Keuchel hasn’t been at his best thus far in 2016, as he carries a 4.55 ERA over 168 frames — well off of the sub-3.00 rate he maintained over the last two campaigns. Still, he has rated as a solid performer in the eyes of ERA estimators while maintaining quite useful peripherals (7.7 K/9, 2.6 BB/9, 56.7% groundball rate). With his average fastball lagging by over a mile per hour as against recent campaigns, though, Keuchel has been hurt by the long ball (16.4% HR/FB rate) — the same issue that plagued him before his 2014 breakout.

Despite the struggles, Keuchel remains a largely irreplaceable piece for the ’Stros, with the absence of Lance McCullers Jr. further amplifying the problem. At this stage of the season, especially, the club needs every quality inning it can get.

Both Luhnow and Hinch acknowledged that the timing of the injury raises the possibility that Keuchel won’t return in 2016. “I don’t know the answer to that,” the GM said when asked if the southpaw would make it back. “I don’t think anybody really knows the answer to that.” As the skipper put it, “where we’re at on the calendar, it’s going to bring the obvious questions, but we just don’t know right now.”

Efforts to address the inflammation have not yet proven successful, Hinch explained. Keuchel first had pain in his last start, on August 27, and experienced discomfort when he tried to throw on Sunday. And attempts “to give him some gaps in time in giving him some rest periods … hasn’t solved it,” said Hinch. Ultimately, the manager noted, Keuchel will not be allowed to resume throwing “until he’s pain-free.”

The biggest question, perhaps, is whether a deeper structural problem is at play. That’s completely unknown at this point, though more information may become available once Keuchel undergoes a full examination by medical professionals.

Even if he can dodge a broader issue, the injury is likely to cost Keuchel some arbitration earnings. He won’t reach 200 innings for the third-straight season, only has nine wins on his record, and will be weighed down by the sub-par earned run average. Of course, he is working from a monster first-year arb award of $7.25MM, which obliterated prior high-points for first-year arb-eligible starters, so Keuchel will remain a major arbitration earner in his second season of eligibility.

Luis Valbuena To Undergo Season-Ending Hamstring Surgery

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Astros infielder Luis Valbuena will undergo season-ending surgery on his hamstring, manager A.J. Hinch announced to reporters, including MLB.com’s Brian McTaggart (Twitter link with video footage of Hinch’s comments included).

“Valbuena … got some bad news,” said Hinch. “He’s going to have surgery in the next couple days, and his season is over. His hamstring tendon needs to be worked on. He tried to play through it and see if he could rehab it, turns out he couldn’t. Surgery is the next consideration, and he’ll miss the remainder of the season.”

Valbuena went on the disabled list with a hamstring injury back in late July due to a hamstring injury but underwent a setback recently (as MLB.com’s Todd Karpovich wrote over the weekend). His absence will deprive the Astros of what has been a quietly strong left-handed bat, as Valbuena was in the midst of a career year at the plate. In 90 games and 342 plate appearances this season, Valbuena was batting .260/.357/.459 with 13 home runs, 17 doubles and a triple.

While the loss of Valbuena removes a well-above-average bat from the equation for Houston and depletes some of the their depth at both corner infield positions, the Astros are well-equipped to sustain the blow. The recent promotions of Alex Bregman and Yulieski Gurriel gives Hinch a pair of potentially high quality options at third base, while A.J. Reed brings plenty of upside across the diamond at first base. And while both Bregman and Reed got off to rocky starts as Major Leaguers, Bregman is hitting .312/.365/.558 in his past 18 games and Reed is hitting .282/.404/.436 in his past 13 contests.

From Valbuena’s standpoint, the injury is quite poorly timed, as he’s slated to hit free agency this winter and could have done so on the heels of that career-best production. While his overall numbers look plenty appealing, he’ll now need to convince teams of his health and that the hamstring injury he sustained won’t come with any lingering effects that will detract from his performance in 2017 and beyond.

Astros Interested In Mitch Moreland

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  • The Astros have a lot of interest in Rangers first baseman Mitch Moreland, though Cafardo doubts a trade is likely given Texas’ lack of first base depth in the wake of Prince Fielder’s retirement.  (It would also be very unusual to see a trade between two division rivals in a pennant race, even if Houston has fallen well behind Texas in the AL West.)  The Astros already have a left-handed hitting first baseman in rookie A.J. Reed, though Reed is still a work in progress despite some improved hitting over the last couple of weeks.  While it doesn’t seem like Texas would deal Moreland, he has cleared trade waivers, so he can freely moved to any other club.

    [SOURCE LINK]

Astros To Promote Yulieski Gurriel

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Over a month after signing him to a five-year, $47.5MM contract, the Astros will promote infielder Yulieski Gurriel to the majors Sunday, reports Julia Morales of ROOT Sports (Twitter link).

[RELATED: Updated Astros Depth Chart]

Gurriel, one of the most accomplished athletes in the history of Cuba, hasn’t gotten off to an overly productive start in a small sample size of 95 plate appearances in America. In his first game action of the season, the 32-year-old hit .229/.293/.361 with two homers while spending minimal time at four different minor league levels. The Astros will now hope to receive something a bit closer to Gurriel’s output in 2015, when he concluded his career in Cuba by notching a hit in exactly half of his 174 at-bats. In 225 plate appearances, he drew 38 walks against a meager three strikeouts and smashed 15 home runs en route to an .874 slugging percentage.

Given their collection of infield talent, there have been plenty of questions regarding where the Astros will use Gurriel. Initially, he’ll serve as their designated hitter, according to Angel Verdejo Jr. of the Houston Chronicle (Twitter link). That means fellow midseason call-up Alex Bregman will continue at third base, where the highly regarded 22-year-old has spent most of his time since the club promoted him last month.

If the hot corner is where the Astros want Bregman for the long haul, it could push Gurriel to first base or even the corner outfield. First baseman Luis Valbuena suffered a setback with the strained right hamstring that has kept him out all of August, and he could miss the rest of the season, per Todd Karpavich of MLB.com. Gurriel could slot in there in the near term, then, but the Astros have a highly touted prospect who’s currently in the majors in A.J. Reed. In the outfield, Houston hasn’t gotten much production this year from anyone other than George Springer. With Colby Rasmus out until next month with an ear cyst and scheduled for free agency in the offseason, left field seems like a logical landing spot for Gurriel.

Regardless of where he plays, the Astros need the Gurriel signing to pay dividends immediately if they’re going to climb back into the American League playoff race. The Astros were surging when they recalled Bregman on July 24, but they’ve since lost 16 of 25 and are 9 1/2 games behind AL West-leading Texas and 4 1/2 out of a wild-card spot.

Astros Purchase Eury De La Rosa's Contract

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  • The Braves have released righty Andrew Thurman, per Matt Eddy of Baseball America (Twitter link). The Astros took Thurman in the second round of the 2013 draft before ultimately shipping him to Atlanta in a January 2015 trade involving catcher Evan Gattis. Control problems have hampered the 24-year-old Thurman since that year, having failed to post a sub-5.00 BB/9 in stints at the High-A and Double-A levels. With Double-A Mississippi this year, Thurman threw 62 2/3 innings and compiled a 6.89 ERA, 7.47 K/9 and 6.75 BB/9.
  • The Astros have purchased the contract of lefty Eury De La Rosa from the Long Island Ducks, as Newsday’s Jordan Lauterbach seems to have been first to report (on Twitter). De La Rosa pitched yesterday for Triple-A Fresno, allowing seven runs over four innings. The 26-year-old last pitched in the big leagues with the Diamondbacks in 2014, and he has a career 4.21 ERA, 8.4 K/9 and 3.3 BB/9 in 51 1/3 innings over two Major League seasons. He pitched in the minors for three organizations in 2015 before heading to the Atlantic League.

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