WEEKEND WRAPUP
Fred Faour: On actual odds of Lebron to the Rockets, Tiger Woods, Blake Bortles and the world is flat. Really.
Feb 26, 2018, 8:01 am
Lebron to the Rockets? Some gambling sites think so. NBA.com
One of the things that has become popular is the practice of gambling web sites releasing prop odds for things that will spark people’s interest. Such things as Odds to win the Heisman, which coach will be fired first, which coach will get a certain job. There are even odds on who sits on the Iron Throne at the end of Game of Thrones.
They are designed to be fun, create talking points and get the web sites’ names out there more than anything else. So I found it interesting this morning to see that The Big Lead fell hook, line and sinker into a topic that will be of interest to Houston fans: Where will Lebron James wind up next season?
It’s interesting because the Rockets are first favorite on one site, second favorite on the other. The reality is James will probably stay in Cleveland, but at least national news outlets are noticing the Rockets and how well they are playing and do not consider the possibility to be a joke. That sites have them so low is also a show of respect.
Odds are just speculation based on potential outcomes. And there is still a lot of time left before the season ends. After all, the Rockets appear to be title contenders now. But it’s always fun to speculate, right?
Tiger’s back?
Main headline on the front page of USA TODAY sports this morning:
TIGER IMPRESSES
Woods finishes 12th while Thomas wins Honda Classic
The golf world is so desperate for Woods to be good again, it’s almost pathetic. (The media is the same way. You are much more likely to click on a story that says Tiger Woods than Luke Thomas. Wait for it...Gotcha. You probably didn’t even notice that his name is Justin -- not Luke -- Thomas and he is on fire on the Tour). But hey, Woods finished 12th! Tiger being good benefits everyone, so expect more of the same moving forward. “Tiger finishes 10th; Speith wins tournament.” “Tiger shows promise with a ninth-place effort; that Thomas guy wins again.”
Rock solid
The U.S. men won gold for the first time in Olympic curling. It might be the first time I have watched an entire curling match. There is a hell of a lot going on in that game. It seems like it would be a fun beer league thing. But now it will go back into oblivion for four years.
Shame bell to NBC for the awful karaoke rendition by the team of Don’t Stop Believin’. I stopped believing four bars in.
Blake superior
The Jaguars locked up Blake Bortles for three years. He is signed through 2020 and the numbers look big -- $54 million -- but the Jags can essentially bail after one year without much penalty, and if he plays well they have him at a fair price. If you think you can win with Bortles, and the Jags clearly think they can, it is a good deal. I think there were better options out there for a team that is a QB away. Maybe Bortles can take a key step forward, but as we see with a lot of franchises, their window is now. There is no guarantee that a great defense will carry over from one year to the next. For now, Bortles is the man. If the Jags are wrong, they will miss out on a golden opportunity.
Flat out stupid
I would like to assume Geno Smith was trolling when he started buying in to the flat earth argument only to back off later when he was destroyed on Twitter.
One of the positives to social media is it has given people a way to share their views without filter. And that, too, is the negative. No filter means no one to say, “hey, you are going to look dumb if you tweet this.”
His last tweet was this: “I find it funny how you all assume I believe Earth is flat lol I just think you guys should have an open mind because as we know a lot of the “truths” that we thought were true actually aren’t.”
First off, slapping an LOL on it does not make it OK. Secondly, I’m all for questioning things that need to be questioned, but someone thinking the earth is flat is not a “truth.” It’s dumb.
What’s next Geno?
Truth: The moon is made of cheese. And there is a man in it.
Truth: The stars are just God’s night lights.
Truth: I can jump off a building because gravity does not exist and I will float like a leaf on the wind.
Truth: Scarlett Johannson has a secret crush on me and going to leave her attractive husband for an old, disgusting radio host.
Yeah, feel free not to believe any of those "truths."
I think it’s time we focus our energy on some real truths, like Geno Smith sucks at football. But Don’t Stop Believin’ buddy.
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After finishing up with the Guardians the Astros have a rather important series for early May with the Seattle Mariners heading to town for the weekend. While it’s still too early to be an absolute must-win series for the Astros, losing the series to drop seven or eight games off the division lead would make successfully defending their American League West title that much more unlikely.
Since their own stumble out of the gate to a 6-10 record the Mariners have been racking up series wins, including one this week over the Atlanta Braves. The M’s offense is largely Mmm Mmm Bad, but their pitching is sensational. In 18 games after the 6-10 start, the Mariners gave up five runs in a game once. In the other 17 games they only gave up four runs once. Over the 18 games their starting pitchers gave up 18 earned runs total with a 1.44 earned run average. That’s absurd. Coming into the season Seattle’s starting rotation was clearly better on paper than those of the Astros and Texas Rangers, and it has crystal clearly played out as such into the second month of the schedule.
While it’s natural to focus on and fret over one’s own team's woes when they are plentiful as they have been for the Astros, a reminder that not all grass is greener elsewhere. Alex Bregman has been awful so far. So has young Mariners’ superstar Julio Rodriguez. A meager four extra base hits over his first 30 games were all Julio produced down at the ballyard. That the Mariners are well ahead of the Astros with J-Rod significantly underperforming is good news for Seattle.
Caratini comes through!
So it turns out the Astros are allowed to have a Puerto Rican-born catcher who can hit a little bit. Victor Caratini’s pedigree is not that of a quality offensive player, but he has swung the bat well thus far in his limited playing time and provided the most exciting moment of the Astros’ season with his two-out two-run 10th inning game winning home run Tuesday night. I grant that one could certainly say “Hey! Ronel Blanco finishing off his no-hitter has been the most exciting moment.” I opt for the suddenness of Caratini’s blow turning near defeat into instant victory for a team that has been lousy overall to this point. Frittering away a game the Astros had led 8-3 would have been another blow. Instead, to the Victor belong the spoils.
Pudge Rodriguez is the greatest native Puerto Rican catcher, but he was no longer a good hitter when with the Astros for the majority of the 2009 season. Then there’s Martin Maldonado.
Maldonado’s hitting stats with the Astros look Mike Piazza-ian compared to what Jose Abreu was doing this season. Finally, mercifully for all, Abreu is off the roster as he accepts a stint at rookie-level ball in Florida to see if he can perform baseball-CPR on his swing and career. Until or unless he proves otherwise, Abreu is washed up and at some point the Astros will have to accept it and swallow whatever is left on his contract that runs through next season. For now Abreu makes over $120,000 per game to not be on the roster. At his level of performance, that’s a better deal than paying him that money to be on the roster.
Abreu’s seven hits in 71 at bats for an .099 batting average with a .269 OPS is a humiliating stat line. In 2018 George Springer went to sleep the night of June 13 batting .293 after going hitless in his last four at bats in a 13-5 Astros’ win over Oakland. At the time no one could have ever envisioned that Springer had started a deep, deep funk which would have him endure a nightmarish six for 78 stretch at the plate (.077 batting average). Springer then hit .293 the rest of the season.
Abreu’s exile opened the door for Joey Loperfido to begin his Major League career. Very cool for Loperfido to smack a two-run single in his first game. He also struck out twice. Loperfido will amass whiffs by the bushel, he had 37 strikeouts in 101 at bats at AAA Sugar Land. Still, if he can hit .225 with some walks mixed in (he drew 16 with the Space Cowboys) and deliver some of his obvious power (13 homers in 25 games for the ex-Skeeters) that’s an upgrade over Abreu/Jon Singleton, as well as over Jake Meyers and the awful showing Chas McCormick has posted so far. Frankly, it seems unwise that the Astros only had Loperfido play seven games at first base in the minors this year. If McCormick doesn’t pick it up soon and with Meyers displaying limited offensive upside, the next guy worth a call-up is outfielder Pedro Leon. In January 2021 the Astros gave Leon four million dollars to sign out of Cuba and called him a “rapid mover to the Major Leagues.” Well…
Over his first three minor league seasons Leon flashed tools but definitely underwhelmed. He has been substantially better so far this year. He turns 26 May 28. Just maybe the Astros offense could be the cause of fewer Ls with Loperfido at first and Leon in center field.
Catch our weekly Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast. Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and I discuss varied Astros topics. The first post for the week generally goes up Monday afternoon (second part released Tuesday) via YouTube: stone cold stros - YouTube with the complete audio available via Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.