A couple of things for you this morning...
*The County Mountie wrote up options at 1B and SP options in free agency.
*Chris Devenski, who did not get selected in last year's Rule 5 draft, finished 4th in AL Rookie of the Year voting.
With Correa winning the award in 2015 and Devenski receiving votes in 2016, it's the first time since Mitch Meluskey/Lance Berkman (2000) and Roy Oswalt (2001) that the Astros have had players receive votes for ROY in consecutive seasons.
Just as an aside, and I'm sure that I'll get my dander up about it soon enough, but how in the actual hell did Lance Berkman - who hit .297/.388/.561 with 21 homers in 114 games - finish 6th! Behind Meluskey! - and Rafael Furcal, who hit .295/.394/.382 in 131 games, win the damn thing?
*Jayson Stark's MLB Awards Week piece says that Mike Trout should win the AL MVP award, but Mookie Betts will win it.
*The Astros are Anthony Castrovince's Most Interesting Team in the AL West. Castrovince:
The Astros are loaded with young talent, but they are also loaded with needs, and the flexibility they've "bought" themselves by, you know, not spending much money in recent years means they can address those needs...in meaningful, eye-catching ways.
*Former Astros prospect Matt Duffy (who ended 2016 in the Rangers' organization) has signed with Chiba Lotte Marines of the Japanese League.
*Joe Thatcher, who ended his nine-year MLB career in 2015 with the Astros (22.2IP) has retired.
*Former Astros reliever Anthony Bass, who played in Japan last season, is now a free agent and looking for an MLB team.
*In honor of Buck O'Neil's birthday on Sunday, Joe Posnanski reposted Buck's Best Day.
*Houston celebrity chef Bryan Caswell - who was responsible for some of the nicer dining options at Minute Maid Park - will no longer be associated with Jim Crane's new downtown establishments to focus on his own ventures. CultureMap has a press release from Crane indicating that Caswell's other ventures prevented him from devoting the time Crane wanted him to devote.
This post has been updated to show that Rafael Furcal hit .295 in 2000, not .395 as I put at 5:25am.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
