10:59pm: Altuve’s IL placement is official, Kaplan reports. His roster spot will indeed go to Martin.
5:53pm: The Astros are likely to send second baseman Jose Altuve to the 10-day injured list with a left hamstring strain, manager A.J. Hinch announced Saturday (via Jake Kaplan of The Athletic and Mark Berman of Fox 26). The promotion of right-hander Corbin Martin will be the corresponding 25-man roster move, per Kaplan.
Altuve exited Friday’s game with the strain, and even though Hinch noted the Astros don’t think it’s serious, they’re erring on the side of caution with one of their cornerstones. For now, they’ll turn to Aledmys Diaz at the keystone and have Yuli Gurriel back him up, according to Kaplan.
This will be only the second IL placement in Altuve’s career since he made his major league debut in 2011. The six-time All-Star missed three weeks last summer with a right knee injury, but that didn’t stop him from producing at an elite level for the fifth straight season.
Altuve, 29, hasn’t been his usual great self thus far in 2019, thanks in part to a sure-to-rise .234 batting average on balls in play, though he has still hit a respectable .243/.329/.472 (119 wRC+) with nine home runs and a 25:18 K:BB ratio in 164 plate appearances. Altuve’s replacement, Diaz, has also done well avoiding strikeouts, having fanned in just 13.8 percent of plate trips. However, Diaz has still only mustered a .217/.246/.383 line (66 wRC+) with two HRs in 65 attempts.
How nice it is not have X the first person to comment each time.
Wonder what’s going on with Altuves bat?
That .234 BABIP is a big indicator. Something like 100 points below his career average.
If altuve is actually on the decline I’ll admit I didn’t see this becoming a bad contract
I believe I mentioned it was a mistake when that contract was announced.
I still think so. Too high an AAV, to long on years. These are the kind of deals that hamstring a franchise.
And I like the dude!
What a joke of a comment. Altuve is in the midst of a long slump and he still has a 119 wRC… just last month the national media was declaring him an MVP candidate.
Well, he’s getting to the age where players begin to decline, so it is conceivable.
Have a hard time believing him playing like an mvp one month and then the next month he’s an overpaid, bad contract player.
So do I.
Some of y’all obviously only started to follow the Astros now that they are good….. but what y’all don’t realize is that when the stros were bad altuve was playing for a bargain price so his new contract in a way was making up for his bad contract if that makes sense
Thanks, we had no idea how it worked.
IMO he’s pulling off trying to hit HRs after a hot HR streak earlier. Granted I don’t crunch numbers and just watch but haven’t seen the hits to all fields like in the past. Hoping he’ll get back to that because they really don’t need him to hit HRs, just be a good hitter and keep the line moving.
Poor little puckwudgie lol