Farmer1906 said:

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I am going to play hitting coach today.

I reviewed a little how Max Fried attacked us. He threw more curves, more sliders, and significantly fewer fastballs than usual. I don't know if that was his gameplan or he made the adjustment. Most of the early hits and hard contact were on fastballs. Most of the Ks were on breaking stuff. We only had 1 whiff on a four seamer & sinker (34% of the pitches seen) yet 13 on his slider and curve (61% of the pitches seen).

If you look at what he threw, he wastes a decent # of pitches.


I'd sit fastball first pitch and jump all over it until he shows he can throw the breaking stuff for a strike constantly.

He absolutely loves the lower left edge. Lefties should look to go oppo. Both Alvarez and Tucker have shown the ability and willingness to do so this postseason. The heater, slider, and curve are all usually lower away (to lefties) and low and in (to righties). The sinker is the only pitch he consistently gets on the other side of the plate.

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With how the Astros roughed up his fastball he'll lean more heavily on breaking stuff I imagine. He really settled down in his game 2 start and pitched well after a rough beginning. The bats will have to see the breaking balls better than last time. They did a very good job last night being more patient.

Farmer1906 said:

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I am going to play hitting coach today.

I reviewed a little how Max Fried attacked us. He threw more curves, more sliders, and significantly fewer fastballs than usual. I don't know if that was his gameplan or he made the adjustment. Most of the early hits and hard contact were on fastballs. Most of the Ks were on breaking stuff. We only had 1 whiff on a four seamer & sinker (34% of the pitches seen) yet 13 on his slider and curve (61% of the pitches seen).

If you look at what he threw, he wastes a decent # of pitches.


I'd sit fastball first pitch and jump all over it until he shows he can throw the breaking stuff for a strike constantly.

He absolutely loves the lower left edge. Lefties should look to go oppo. Both Alvarez and Tucker have shown the ability and willingness to do so this postseason. The heater, slider, and curve are all usually lower away (to lefties) and low and in (to righties). The sinker is the only pitch he consistently gets on the other side of the plate.

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Feels like this has been their strategy with all their pitchers. Lots of offspeed and balls out of the zone.

Teddy Perkins said:

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Farmer1906 said:

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I am going to play hitting coach today.

I reviewed a little how Max Fried attacked us. He threw more curves, more sliders, and significantly fewer fastballs than usual. I don't know if that was his gameplan or he made the adjustment. Most of the early hits and hard contact were on fastballs. Most of the Ks were on breaking stuff. We only had 1 whiff on a four seamer & sinker (34% of the pitches seen) yet 13 on his slider and curve (61% of the pitches seen).

If you look at what he threw, he wastes a decent # of pitches.


I'd sit fastball first pitch and jump all over it until he shows he can throw the breaking stuff for a strike constantly.

He absolutely loves the lower left edge. Lefties should look to go oppo. Both Alvarez and Tucker have shown the ability and willingness to do so this postseason. The heater, slider, and curve are all usually lower away (to lefties) and low and in (to righties). The sinker is the only pitch he consistently gets on the other side of the plate.

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It's easy to say lay off the breaking stuff but that's not always an easy determination to make in less than a second.

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It's always easier said than done. But he's not a big K guy even if he went off vs the Brewers. He's more of a soft contact type. He's only in the zone about half the time, normally. But he tries to get ahead on the first pitch (in the zone 64% of the time). That most likely going to be the 4 seamer with some sliders mixed in.

for what it's worth last world series wife and I ate at Ninfas and walked to the field. It wasn't bad because it was a steady group leaving the restaurant doing the same thing. easy walk, didnt mind...rode the shuttle back though

I paid $20 to park in the parking lot of some bank about a third of a mile from the stadium. Corner of Preston and Emancipation.

I was planning on doing this, but had forgotten.

Thank you.

So Bregman interviewed last night about his slow series and being moved down. He said the top end (of his swing?) is all out of sorts. What does he mean and if he knows what it is, has he fixed it - thus the good swings last night?

Big Al 1992 said:

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So Bregman interviewed last night about his slow series and being moved down. He said the top end (of his swing?) is all out of sorts. What does he mean and if he knows what it is, has he fixed it - thus the good swings last night?

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Not a direct answer to your question but in the documentary he did on his comeback from the leg injury it gets deep into his swing mechanics starting about 14:50

Big Al 1992 said:

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So Bregman interviewed last night about his slow series and being moved down. He said the top end (of his swing?) is all out of sorts. What does he mean and if he knows what it is, has he fixed it - thus the good swings last night?

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Exactly like a pga golfer, can look at video and see there is a hitch or kink in his swing that he needs to correct. However sometimes it's hard to work your way through it, especially if your not 100% which no one is this time of year because you need tons of cage work to correct and ingrain the correction.

Just because you know what you're doing wrong doesn't mean it's easy to fix.

And I'm no hitting coach but I'm guessing that by top end he is referring to the start of his swing. My guess is he's doing something that's not letting his swing get on the correct plane and he's popping everything up.

He mentioned some stuff on Instagram about his launch angle being so high.

Again this is all just amateur hour speculation.

AustinCountyAg said:

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for what it's worth last world series wife and I ate at Ninfas and walked to the field. It wasn't bad because it was a steady group leaving the restaurant doing the same thing. easy walk, didnt mind...rode the shuttle back though

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It's only about a mile walk, but there aren't sidewalks the whole way is there? Hopefully you had a couple of drinks for the walk.

Dusty Baker said the Astros could pitch José Urquidy in some capacity tomorrow, but he'd "rather not." Cristian Javier and Jake Odorizzi are both "well rested," according to Baker, and will be needed tomorrow behind Luis Garcia.

— Chandler Rome (@Chandler_Rome) November 1, 2021

Dusty Baker said "probably not" when asked if Jason Castro could be activated for the final two games.

— Brian McTaggart (@brianmctaggart) November 1, 2021

I'm seeing some decent spots on park whiz on the other side of the soccer stadium.

Crazy to me that he still has a rooting interest for the team. I know he basically built it and what is on the field is the fruits of his labor, but it is wild to see him cheer the organization on.

I would think he would never wish Crane success again. Hopefully the 30 for 30 will give insight none of us could imagine haha

979ag said:

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Crazy to me that he still has a rooting interest for the team. I know he basically built it and what is on the field is the fruits of his labor, but it is wild to see him cheer the organization on.

I would think he would never wish Crane success again. Hopefully the 30 for 30 will give insight none of us could imagine haha

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I think it is more of rooting for himself. If the Astros win another, he gets the lion's share of the credit as far as team construction goes. That will continue to be true as long as we have guys like Altuve, Bregman, Alvarez, Tucker, Framber, Urquidy, McCullers, Garcia, etc leading the way.

Yeah, I totally agree. I guess I am more surprised he is public with it.

MAROON said:

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Podcasts - ApolloHOU

On this off day I highly encourage you to take 40 minutes and listen to Apollo Media's podcast with Brent Strom.

What an amazing coach.

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Phenomenal listen. Thanks for the rec

979ag said:

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Crazy to me that he still has a rooting interest for the team. I know he basically built it and what is on the field is the fruits of his labor, but it is wild to see him cheer the organization on.

I would think he would never wish Crane success again. Hopefully the 30 for 30 will give insight none of us could imagine haha

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he still lives in Houston and probably watches a lot of the games since built the team. Still drives a blue Audi with Orange rims as well

n_touch said:

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Teddy Perkins said:

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MAROON said:

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Podcasts - ApolloHOU

On this off day I highly encourage you to take 40 minutes and listen to Apollo Media's podcast with Brent Strom.

What an amazing coach.

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Forget Correa, pay the Strom-man. What a wizard.

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He gets paid well, but he is done. I think this is his last year. He wants to just relax and enjoy the rest of his life. Can't say that I blame him.

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That's one of the bigger questions I have for our future - Strom has been pretty integral to our success since he joined in 2014. I wonder if a replacement has been groomed in-house or who our target is to replace him with when he retires.

979ag said:

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Crazy to me that he still has a rooting interest for the team. I know he basically built it and what is on the field is the fruits of his labor, but it is wild to see him cheer the organization on.

I would think he would never wish Crane success again. Hopefully the 30 for 30 will give insight none of us could imagine haha

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I assume that going through those 3 100-loss seasons that watching his draft picks rise through the minors to the majors Luhnow thinks of them like his children.

It's no secret most of MLB did not like the Luhnow-led Astros front office as they had a reputation for being very arrogant. Add to that the tanking seasons and the Astros very aggressive use of the infield shift and baseball did not like them. I always thought of it as sour grapes. Luhnow, Sig, and the rest of that staff were smarter than everyone else with the possible exception of the Rays, the Red Sox, and whoever Billy Beane had at the time.

What I've wondered is if Crane was put off by his own front office and used the "cheating scandal" to clean house when the front office had nothing to do with it. He then parted ways with Reid Ryan and brought in his son to be groomed to run the team, though I assume they will always have a baseball guy as GM.

The Luhnow-led Astros changed baseball and have had a pretty long run of success now. If no team offers Luhnow a GM job this offseason, I have to think there is something more that went on than we know about that likely involves the weasel Manfred.