The Astros announced the addition of minor league hitting coordinator Jason Kanzler to the big league staff in an unspecified coaching role. The 31-year-old, who spent three seasons in the Twins system as a player, has spent the past three years coaching Astros minor leaguers.
Otherwise, the bulk of Dusty Baker’s staff remains the same. Houston announced the returns of bench coach Joe Espada, hitting coaches Alex Cintrón and Troy Snitker, base coaches Omar Lopez and Gary Pettis, and quality assurance coach Dan Firova in the same positions. Espada, who has spent the past four seasons on the Astros coaching staff, interviewed with the Mets and A’s for their managerial vacancies this offseason but will return to Houston after those respective jobs went to Buck Showalter and Mark Kotsay.
It seems the role of pitching coach will be filled jointly by Josh Miller and Bill Murphy, last season’s bullpen coach and assistant pitching coach, respectively. Longtime Houston pitching coach Brent Strom stepped down at the end of the season, eventually taking on the same role with the Diamondbacks. At the time, Strom suggested the club should turn to Miller and Murphy as his replacements, and that’s the course of action the team will take. It’s theoretically possible Houston adds some additional help for the pitching staff — the team’s announcement didn’t explicitly state that the staff had been finalized — but it seems more likely Miller and Murphy will just take on the responsibilities Strom left behind.
In addition to the tinkering on the coaching staff, Houston announced a few front office hires. The Astros confirmed the previously-reported hiring of Sara Goodrum as director of player development. They also hired a pair of new assistant general managers. Former Angels director of baseball operations Andrew Ball — who had once worked alongside Astros general manager James Click in the Rays front office — and former Dodgers director of quantitative analysis Scott Powers will both join Pete Putila as AGM’s in Houston. The club also announced a handful of promotions within the scouting and player development departments.
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Trash can jokes in 3…2…
Beating a dead horse in 3.. 2…
Nah, better resonance from a trash can than a dead horse. Smells about the same though I’ll give you that.
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Wonder if the pitching staff takes a step back after the Strom departure.
Hope not; but Strom should be HOF, along with Leo Mazzone.
Leo Mazzone was a bust when he went from Atlanta to Baltimore. It’ll be interesting to see how Strom does in Arizona.
Strom and Mazzone over Dave Duncan huh?
He’s a guy that jeff luhnow brought over from st. Louis. Brent strom was revolutionary in his belief of ditching the 2 seamer and throwing 4 seamers up in the zone and breaking stuff low. Also seeking pitchers with elite rpm/spin rates on all their offerings. Every organization in baseball has adapted this approach.
Great question. You can argue that 2021 was Strom’s best year as a pitching coach. The Astros started the season with 10 legitimate MLB pitchers on their injured list. Given the craziness with injuries following 2020’s short schedule, I don’t think you can blame Strom (or Baker) for any of that. However, Strom deserves some credit for guys who stepped up and helped the Astros make the post-season. When I saw their opening day IL, I figured no way they make the playoffs.
Here’s a complete list of Astros pitchers who spent time on the IL. There were 20 guys, some of whom missed significant time or the entire season.
Bryan Abreu, Pedro Baez, Kent Emanuel, Zack Greinke, Tyler Ivey, Josh James, Lance McCullers Jr., Rafael Montero, Jake Odorizzi, Enoli Paredes, Austin Pruitt, JBrooks Raley, Andre Scrubb, Joe Smith, Jairo Solis, Blake Taylor, Jose Urquidy, Framber Valdez, Justin Verlander, Forrest Whitley.
Cey hey. Arent you a dodgers fan? Thats an impressive knowledge of my team. In answer to your question. Yes i believe the 2021 Astros is all about Brent Strom. No Keuchel, No Morton, No Cole, No Verlander. Thats a testament to scouting and talent obviously. But Brent Strom imo was instrumental in maximizing this organization’s pitching success.
Astros2017Champs, I’m a Dodgers fan, but also a baseball fan. I remembered the Astros’ IL situation, so I looked it up before posting. At the start of the season, my feeling was that it would be the Year of the Pitcher Injury, which is how it turned out. In my opinion, the last thing we need in 2022 is any type of abbreviated season that further messes with pitchers’ routines. CBA negotiations be damned, both sides should be looking at what went wrong, health-wise, in 2021.
By the way, I never thought the Astros cheated the Dodgers out of a championship in 2017. One reason is something I saw in a televised Dodgers-Diamondbacks game that August. In the eighth inning, the Dodgers trailed, 6-2, with rookie stud Cody Bellinger due up third. Since the first two hitters batted right-handed, the Diamondbacks had lefty Andrew Chafin warming, obviously to face Bellinger. During the telecast, they showed Bellinger “scouting” in the dugout by watching some footage of Chafin on a laptop. The Dodgers’ broadcasters were marveling at Bellinger’s dedication and preparation. I thought it was technology run amok and could lead to future problems.
Some will say what the Astros did is not the same thing. To me, it was just another team stealing signs to gain an edge. The Astros just took it to another level by modernizing the tradition. Cheating? Old-timers worshipped Eddie Stanky for his sign-stealing ability.
The Dodgers-Diamondbacks game took place on August 30, 2017, with the inning in question being the top of the 8th. MLB.tv subscribers can find it in the archive if interested. Unfortunately, I can’t currently look at it because I canceled my automatic renewal due to the lockout. So I guess that means I am on baseball pause.
As for the Bellinger-Chafin matchup, a funny thing about that. After all the video preparation by Bellinger, Chafin wound up hitting him with his first pitch.
I appreciate your take. Im not here to defend the Astros. They got caught and have to live with their transgressions. My one thought: we found out last year that pretty much the entire league was suspected of using spider tac/ glue/ pine tar mixes. Basically illegal mixtures to help pitchers get more spin on their pitches right? Well MLB pretty much exonerated everybody until the point they said no more. I find it very interesting that hitters knowing their counterparts were getting a leg up on them apparently did nothing to counter this unfair advantage? Riiiiight. I cant prove it but if illegal pitching stuff went on. Im pretty sure illegal hitting stuff did to. Either way the Astros didnt need to do it and it makes me sad this era of Astros baseball wont be appreciated historically.
Baseball punishing the team that won and going hush-hush on everyone else is troubling. And now we have a journalist in Ken Rosenthal getting fired by the MLB Network for daring to be critical of the commissioner. MLB now leads all sports in bad looks.
I appreciate your take on the Astros and their transgressions. As fans, loving our team shouldn’t mean casting a blind eye when they do something wrong. Eric Gagne saving eight straight games on the schedule was the moment of truth for me. It immediately seemed fishy. Signing Bauer, too, and not because of the character stuff. When the Dodgers signed him, pitchers on the team lauded his unique perspective and methods. We know Bauer was doing some funny stuff, which is hysterical since he was lead finger-pointer at the Astros.
As for this off-season, I was looking forward to finding out more about injury-plagued 2021. If 2020’s short season was a reason, why is that? On a Mets game I watched, Keith Hernandez and Ron Darling theorized that players working out at home isn’t the same as real baseball training and can be detrimental. Yet here we are again, with a probability of players training on their own to stay in shape. So many questions to be asked. I would love to hear player and coach insight on what went wrong in 2021. Maybe some recently retired players who experienced it first-hand.
2017Astros & CeyHey– My friends, this is the kind of baseball dialogue this site used to be about 10-12 years ago. Thank you for some awesome contributions to this article!
Well written!
Doubtful, they still have some quality young arms and got Verlander back, my concern is with Strome gone there’s no longer a check on Dusty’s worst pitching move inclinations.
Soler says hello.
Astros fans are buzzing with excitement over this news.
Gerrit Cole is on record saying the Astros completely shocked him with this approach that they wanted for him. The pirates and ray searage had cole throwing his 2 seamer down in the zone to induce groundballs. That was why the pirates failed. Ray searage was a terrific pitching coach but the game had passed him by. MLB is so hard because the sport changes at a rapid pace
Everyone said that the Yankees were going to win multiple championships the second they signed Cole. They haven’t even been to the ALCS in his first two years there…and he got torched against the Red Sox in the Wild Card Game.
Im not quite sure what you’re saying. I for one never thought that. Gerrit Cole could never mask the shortcomings of that yankee roster. But you cant deny the first 2 years of that contract have been very very good. Sure Cole had a bad outing. Whoopty doo. He’s clearly their best player and they’re lucky they have him.
He’s a good pitcher….but he hasn’t exactly come through in the postseason and that’s what everyone is going to judge when someone is given an absurd contract like that.
Cole is better than a good pitcher. He’s a true #1 starter who nearly won the Cy Young Award after finishing 5th, 2nd, and 4th the previous three years (and 4th in one of his years in Pittsburgh). As a whole, the Yankees roster isn’t championship caliber. It’s one of the reasons I don’t get all the complaining about Boone, who does an outstanding job with the hand he’s dealt. Then again, Yankees fans used to refer to Joe Torre as Clueless Joe.
Yup.
We can withstand the loss of any player on that team besides Gerrit Cole. He is the one guy we could not replace. & I think he was pitching hurt down the stretch. Doesn’t surprise me he got knocked around in the WC game.
I’m optimistic because Stromie endorsed both of these guys. If you look at the Astros minor-league system they seem to really be good at developing arms as an organization.
So Strom deserves to be in the HOF over Dave Duncan?
Just checking her Cvnts! lol
Coles spin rates improved, upon being traded to Houston, and declined when the substance checks went into effect. Was it Strom, or was it spidertack?
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