Astros manager AJ Hinch: "When you set a franchise record for wins and people ask you 'what happened?' at the end of the year, that's a unique question."— Brian McTaggart (@brianmctaggart) February 13, 2019
*Check out McTaggart's Notebook, in which we learn about how the Astros plan to adjust without Marwin, how Brad Peacock learned a changeup from Twitter, and some Meat Wagon updates.
*Gerrit Cole won his arbitration case and will make a laughably-low $13.5m in 2019.
*Jake Kaplan has the biggest questions facing the Astros going into Spring Training.
*Brian T. Smith: Great expectations are normal now.
*Jose Altuve and Robinson Chirinos spoke about the unrest in Venezuela.
*FanGraphs: Top 100 Prospects list feature Forrest Whitley (#4), Kyle Tucker (#10), Corbin Martin (#50), J.B. Bukauskas (#88), Josh James (#98), and Cionel Perez (#100). Yordan Alvarez came in at #125.
*Here's Chandler Rome's story on Forrest Whitley and Corbin Martin throwing 110mph.
*Frankie Tuesday could return from Tommy John surgery in Agosto o Septiembre.
*Lance Berkman and Jeff Bagwell will be in the booth for some games this year. Berkman was surprised to only get 1.2% of the HOF vote in his first year.
*Former Astros Great Bob Grossman signed a 1yr deal with Oakland.
*And now that Grossman and Former Astros Great Xavier Cedeno have signed, the market is now set for Harper, Machado, Marwin, and Keuchel to sign.
*Czech out this NYT story on the 11-full time employee, church-headquartered Sports-Reference (which I visit daily).
*Ryan Adams dangled success, multiple women say they paid the price.
*A Musical Selection:
Note: 1:03 into this video is one of my favorite musical moments of all time.
