Get in on this before your annoying officemate...
*Odd story in the Chron about Mike Elias and the draft, which Drellich describes as Elias' sole job. "If it is necessary," Drellich adds later, "Luhnow has the final call on whom the Astros draft. He also handles the negotiations of the highest profile pick in the draft."
*The Astros are one of nine MLB teams to which Cliff Lee could be traded without his consent.
*The St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Jeff Gordon sums up former Cardinal exec Jeff Luhnow.
*Scott Boras describes the difference between the Cubs and the Astros.
I deal with (Luhnow), so I don't know about other aspects of the Astros system, but Jeff has a very empirical formula and he has a very defined plan and he is, at this point in his career, he has a very...tight track of what he wants to do. It's a narrow track as far as his intentions. The Cubs have a plan that I think very much includes kind of what Theo's positioning is after his experiences in Boston.
*Mac Marshall on Friday's draft deadline:
We had to wait until 4pm, but once we found out I was just excited (about staying at LSU).
See! It all worked out for everybody (*sobs*)
*Mark Appel had his next scheduled start - originally tonight - pushed back in order to get extra bullpen work. Mike Elias:
As crazy as his numbers look, we're really not that worried about it internally because of what we know about him and what we expect of him.
*Dexter Fowler isn't very close to returning from his intercostal strain.
*"It's kind of weird to know that this is my third year, but I'm just now getting the hang of it."
-Collin McHugh
*"In addition to revealing the Astros as shitty jerks, the Brady Aiken saga has also reminded the world of the existence of one of the NCAA's silliest and most farcical rules..."
-Deadspin
*They're pretty much what we all thought the Astros would be, only we had the wrong team in Texas pegged as the biggest mess in the sport.
-New York Daily News, on the Rangers
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
