The Astros announced that they’ve placed right-handed reliever Joe Biagini on the 10-day injured list due to shoulder soreness and, in a corresponding move, selected the contract of right-hander Andre Scrubb from their alternate training site.
Biagini, 30, averaged 94.5 mph on his fastball as a reliever from 2018-19 but came out of the gates in 2020 averaging a diminished 92.6 mph on that heater. He allowed a run on two hits with a strikeout in two-thirds of an inning in his lone 2020 outing. Biagini struggled in his time with the ’Stros last year, but he turned in a 3.78 ERA with a strikeout per inning and solid control in 50 frames before being traded from Toronto to Houston.
Scrubb, 25, has yet to advance to Triple-A but will now jump directly to the big leagues. Houston acquired him in the 2019 trade that sent Tyler White to the Dodgers. He split last year between the Double-A affiliates for Houston and L.A., pitching to a combined 2.78 ERA with 10.6 K/9 against 4.6 BB/9. He’s not among the organization’s top-ranked prospects, but his solid showing in Double-A last year landed him in the team’s 60-man player pool (and now on the 40-man roster).
With Scrubb joining the bullpen and Bigaini landing on the injured list, the Houston bullpen now has an incredible seven pitchers who entered the season without so much as a day of MLB experience. In addition to Biagini, the Astros also have Brad Peacock, Austin Pruitt, Rogelio Armenteros, Justin Verlander and Jose Urquidy on the injured list at the moment. Given the mounting number of injuries, it’s not difficult to see why the club is pursuing a depth pickup of Fernando Rodney, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if the ’Stros were to make some similar additions in the near future.
Andre Snrub
I agree with Snrub.
Astros are in trouble if they have to resort to bring up Scrubbs.
Hope he gets in the game tonight or tomorrow against his former club.
How many scrubs are there in the majors? Just you, buddy…
You know a team’s bullpen is depleted when they are calling up someone who’s literally named “Scrubb”
What a scrubb.
All jokes aside, Biagini is the real scrub here.
Ouch, that one hurt!!
Mlbtr needs to scrubb this comment section of all the horrible jokes being made.
I’ll take these over the same, repeated trash can jokes
@jj. Congratulations. You completely changed my attitude. The Scrubb jokes are down right welcome compared to more trash can jokes.
We can always recycle those for later in the season. Gotta strike with the new material now.
Recycle? Do the Astros recycle? That’s the blue can boys. The one WITHOUT any dents.
Houston Astros definition: Scrubbs
And yet they beat the almighty Yankees in 2015, 2017, and 2019.
@goastros123- And how many times did they cheat in 2015, 2017, and 2019? We’ll likely never know. You can say they beat the almighty Yankees because they knew what pitches were coming, right?
That’s rich coming from a team that employed Arod
@Yank4life, I can say the Astros won because Keuchel dominated the Yankees in 2015, Yankees couldn’t score at MMP in 2017, and Chapman threw a hanging slider in 2019.
Bounced your team from the playoffs quite a bit here recently
@DirkDiggler2850- Yes, and cheated the whole time beating my team. Something to definitely take pride in? And receiving only a slap on the wrist. Encouraging all teams to cheat… And only apologizing once their caught? smh. Yes, best winning cheaters ever.
I will take pride in my team beating the Yankees not once, not twice, but three times in the post season. As for the cheating, it was wrong but I got no control over that.
The Astros bullpen is gonna lit up due to having to rely on so many untested rookies.