Dusty Baker’s leaving Chas McCormick on bench frustrates some within Astros organization
September 7, 2023
Dusty Baker’s leaving Chas McCormick on bench frustrates some within Astros organization
24 comments
you could say the same for Yainer Diaz
I used him a bit in MLB the show, that card fucks. Based on that he should be starting.
Some WILD quotes in this. Anyone who says Dusty deserves immunity because *he* won us a WS and not the other way around is kidding themselves
Unfortunately we see the downsides of having a “players manager” who plays favorites based on emotions and not performance. The same Dusty who says Chas is not a “big boy” will hand the ball to Maton when the game is on the line instead of Abreu. Or pinch hit Singleton over Chas.
Dusty, by his own admission here, doesn’t particularly care about young stars and feels veterans should get priority. Hard to see how that could jive well with Dana Brown, who came from a highly successful team practicing the antitheses of that approach.
every single quote from dusty in this article is literally just antiquated hunch based decision making that harbors almost zero logic, we wouldn’t be having this problem if we had a manager that was younger. this is entirely an age based issue. dude’s gotta go.
This is what happens when the owner decides he’d rather let the manager run the team instead of the GM. And before you say well they won the title last year, remember that if you look at last year’s team it literally didn’t matter how he managed. The pitching staff was so loaded you can pick pitchers randomly and still be awesome. Last postseason the Astros had 2 pitchers with an ERA above 2 (Verlander and McCullers). Yeah, they had 5 pitchers with 0 ERA and 5 more under 2 ERA.
Fucking delusional. Also, to be referred to as “big boys” or “not a big boy” is the most demeaning childish shit ever.
fUSTY need to go.
Chas has the 10th highest OPS and wRC+ in the ENTIRE FUCKING LEAGUE and Mr. Magoo is over here benching him 4 of the last 8 games in the last month of the season with our playoff fate on the line, meanwhile playing a guy with a career OPS in the mid-600s 7 of 8 games, most at the position Chas plays better than him defensively. Gives Chas 3 whole ABs in a series we get swept by the inept Yankees and only score 7 fucking runs the entire series. Before last night, in the last 10 games the Astros were 6-1 when Chas plays and averaged 11 runs per game, and 1-2 when he doesn’t play averaging 3 runs.
I could go on and on about how stupid you’d have to be to not play Chas every single day, much less at the expense of fucking Mauricio Dubon, but everyone who is going to be swayed already is, and the braindead Dusty Defenders on this site and Twitter have their heads way too far up Dusty’s ass to be swayed by literally every single statistic available.
Since all star break Chas has started 42 of 50 games…
>“It’s easy if you got a Julio Rodríguez, you just put him out in center field,” Baker told reporters.
Yeesh, brutal thing to tell your CF having a career year that he has to be a 22 year old phenom to get every day reps.
That’s the Dusty I remember. He’d get weirdly attached to terrible players because he knew them or they had “more experience”. Shouldn’t be a surprise, this is how he always does things
This is the same Dusty Baker that said Trey Mancini couldn’t play the outfield last year.
(Trey has more career games in the outfield then at 1st)
I’m happy Dusty got his ring and he was the right hire to take the pressure off of players in the wake of the cheating scandal, but you knew he was not going to be the long-term option for the Astros.
I hope Dusty decides to retire because seeing him ousted from the Nats was wrong when he was a clear upgrade over Matt Williams. Also, he’s about to make the postseason for the 9th time in his last 10 seasons managed.
Yeah, you can say he stumbled into the right situations after being canned from the Reds, but it’s unfair to keep upholding the narrative that he was a liability because of his stubborn, traditional approach to managing. I’d like to see Dusty hang it up with this rosy outlook on his prestigious career. I really hope we don’t go back to jumping through hoops to delegitimize what is a surefire HOF managerial career.
Yeah but how many high fives did you guys invent? Zero! Yall are losers
Dusty Baker’s gonna do weird Dusty Baker shit. That’s what you get when you hire Dusty Baker. He always manages to win games.
It’s frustrating the fan base as well. The only people okay with it are the casual fans that say “Dusty won us a world series. We won a WS with Maldy” Even last year we were clamoring for Castro or Vasquez to take over. At least last year Maldy was playing defense. This year he has been terrible in all assets of the game. He is even having trouble catching pitches. He lead the league in passed balls last year and he’s going to crush it again this year. But that is not enough to convince JV, Framber, Javier, and Dusty that keeping him behind the plate. He has a sub .600 OPS and is 3rd worst at catching runners stealing. He has caught 16% of runners stealing and Yainer is at 33%, albiet with less play time. He states that Yainer is like a young QB that the fan base wants to rush out there if they are not ready. Meanwhile football and baseball could not be any different. Dusty said he doesn’t believe in analytics as it is “fan made up stuff” But he does not consider that our winning % is nearly 100 points higher with Yainer. Yainer who also does not catch our top 3 starters. So there is no reason Maldy should be an everyday starter outside of favoritism.
Dusty has kept Yainer on the bench to play guys like Bligh Madris (because he likes having a lefty), Grae Kessinger, Mauricio Dubon all at 1B. No explanation. He just doesnt like Yainer. His biggest rationale is that Yainer struggles vs lefties. Well, Maldy struggles vs everyone. So why not let Yainer go up there and figure it out.
Now the Chas situation. Dusty refused to start Chas opening day. A shock to many considering how heroic he played in the playoffs last year. He didnt even get in game 2. This year he has kept Chas out of the regular lineup consistently and now it looks like is starting to favor Dubon in CF. Dubon is hitting well but he can be a liability at the plate. He tends to swing first pitch and routinely is an easy putout. Meanwhile Chas is hitting at a .898 OPS which puts him in elite category. Dusty stated that “we don’t have a Julio that we can play every day in CF” Julio is an absolute stud and nothing should be said about that. However, Chas slugs at a higher % then him. Chas is also on pace for a 20/20 season. Against the Yankees Dusty decided to pinch hit Chas for Jon Singleton who is hitting a whopping .171 and a .565 OPS against Holmes with 2 outs in the 9th. Why? Because according to Dusty his internal projections had Singleton at a higher batting average than Chas. The only thing Dubon has over Chas is arm strength. So why does Dubon start to become our everyday CF? Because Dubon is friends with Dustys son and JV likes Dubons arm.
The biggest difference between Hinch and Dusty has been Hinch always was open to learning about data that was provided from the likes of Lunhow, Stearns, Taubman, Mejdal, etc. (even though Hinch biggest mistake was leaving Cole in the bullpen for Harris in game 7) Dusty just seems to ignore all the information and goes with what he believes is best.
I do believe we are one of the strongest teams in the league. However, our goal is to win a world series. Dustys choices based on nepotism is what I fear is our biggest threat to repeating as champions.
Why couldn’t he have left McCormick on the bench in game 5 of the World Series
I wanted the Nats to move on from Dusty after 2017 as much as anybody. In hindsight, however: in 2017 the Nats won 97 games and the division. They had a bunch of injury issues (partial seasons from Harper & Eaton), but they were managed around. In 2018, Davey’s first season, the team was effectively the same. Again, we had some injury issues, but OF injuries actually led to us calling up Juan Soto, who was immediately a monster. We had a full season from Bryce. The Nats won 82 games and missed the playoffs. I can’t help but think Dusty was a big part of the difference.
Its nice that he got this ring but its time for the old man to retire.
My Frank Costanza is kicking in:
“He’s got a .898 OPS with an OPS+ of 144!!! YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT THE HELL YOU’RE DOIN’!!!”
Dusty Baker doing ___________________ frustrates some within the Giants, Cubs, Reds, Nationals, Astros organizations.
It’s no secret dusty hates Chas and most of us are sick of it
He’s a top 10 CF in the league for fucks sake
“It’s easy if you got a Julio Rodríguez, you just put him out in center field,” Baker told reporters.
“He ain’t a big boy yet,” Baker said before Wednesday’s 12-3 bludgeoning of the Rangers. “It’s hard to be a big boy right out the gate. What is this, Chas’ third or fourth year? The big boys are Altuve, Bregman, Tucker, those are the big boys. The other boys are approaching big boys.”
J-Rod is in his 2nd year and has worse stats than Chas this season.
24 comments
you could say the same for Yainer Diaz
I used him a bit in MLB the show, that card fucks. Based on that he should be starting.
Some WILD quotes in this. Anyone who says Dusty deserves immunity because *he* won us a WS and not the other way around is kidding themselves
Unfortunately we see the downsides of having a “players manager” who plays favorites based on emotions and not performance. The same Dusty who says Chas is not a “big boy” will hand the ball to Maton when the game is on the line instead of Abreu. Or pinch hit Singleton over Chas.
Dusty, by his own admission here, doesn’t particularly care about young stars and feels veterans should get priority. Hard to see how that could jive well with Dana Brown, who came from a highly successful team practicing the antitheses of that approach.
every single quote from dusty in this article is literally just antiquated hunch based decision making that harbors almost zero logic, we wouldn’t be having this problem if we had a manager that was younger. this is entirely an age based issue. dude’s gotta go.
This is what happens when the owner decides he’d rather let the manager run the team instead of the GM. And before you say well they won the title last year, remember that if you look at last year’s team it literally didn’t matter how he managed. The pitching staff was so loaded you can pick pitchers randomly and still be awesome. Last postseason the Astros had 2 pitchers with an ERA above 2 (Verlander and McCullers). Yeah, they had 5 pitchers with 0 ERA and 5 more under 2 ERA.
Fucking delusional. Also, to be referred to as “big boys” or “not a big boy” is the most demeaning childish shit ever.
fUSTY need to go.
Chas has the 10th highest OPS and wRC+ in the ENTIRE FUCKING LEAGUE and Mr. Magoo is over here benching him 4 of the last 8 games in the last month of the season with our playoff fate on the line, meanwhile playing a guy with a career OPS in the mid-600s 7 of 8 games, most at the position Chas plays better than him defensively. Gives Chas 3 whole ABs in a series we get swept by the inept Yankees and only score 7 fucking runs the entire series. Before last night, in the last 10 games the Astros were 6-1 when Chas plays and averaged 11 runs per game, and 1-2 when he doesn’t play averaging 3 runs.
I could go on and on about how stupid you’d have to be to not play Chas every single day, much less at the expense of fucking Mauricio Dubon, but everyone who is going to be swayed already is, and the braindead Dusty Defenders on this site and Twitter have their heads way too far up Dusty’s ass to be swayed by literally every single statistic available.
Since all star break Chas has started 42 of 50 games…
>“It’s easy if you got a Julio Rodríguez, you just put him out in center field,” Baker told reporters.
Yeesh, brutal thing to tell your CF having a career year that he has to be a 22 year old phenom to get every day reps.
That’s the Dusty I remember. He’d get weirdly attached to terrible players because he knew them or they had “more experience”. Shouldn’t be a surprise, this is how he always does things
This is the same Dusty Baker that said Trey Mancini couldn’t play the outfield last year.
(Trey has more career games in the outfield then at 1st)
I’m happy Dusty got his ring and he was the right hire to take the pressure off of players in the wake of the cheating scandal, but you knew he was not going to be the long-term option for the Astros.
I hope Dusty decides to retire because seeing him ousted from the Nats was wrong when he was a clear upgrade over Matt Williams. Also, he’s about to make the postseason for the 9th time in his last 10 seasons managed.
Yeah, you can say he stumbled into the right situations after being canned from the Reds, but it’s unfair to keep upholding the narrative that he was a liability because of his stubborn, traditional approach to managing. I’d like to see Dusty hang it up with this rosy outlook on his prestigious career. I really hope we don’t go back to jumping through hoops to delegitimize what is a surefire HOF managerial career.
Yeah but how many high fives did you guys invent? Zero! Yall are losers
Dusty Baker’s gonna do weird Dusty Baker shit. That’s what you get when you hire Dusty Baker. He always manages to win games.
It’s frustrating the fan base as well. The only people okay with it are the casual fans that say “Dusty won us a world series. We won a WS with Maldy” Even last year we were clamoring for Castro or Vasquez to take over. At least last year Maldy was playing defense. This year he has been terrible in all assets of the game. He is even having trouble catching pitches. He lead the league in passed balls last year and he’s going to crush it again this year. But that is not enough to convince JV, Framber, Javier, and Dusty that keeping him behind the plate. He has a sub .600 OPS and is 3rd worst at catching runners stealing. He has caught 16% of runners stealing and Yainer is at 33%, albiet with less play time. He states that Yainer is like a young QB that the fan base wants to rush out there if they are not ready. Meanwhile football and baseball could not be any different. Dusty said he doesn’t believe in analytics as it is “fan made up stuff” But he does not consider that our winning % is nearly 100 points higher with Yainer. Yainer who also does not catch our top 3 starters. So there is no reason Maldy should be an everyday starter outside of favoritism.
Dusty has kept Yainer on the bench to play guys like Bligh Madris (because he likes having a lefty), Grae Kessinger, Mauricio Dubon all at 1B. No explanation. He just doesnt like Yainer. His biggest rationale is that Yainer struggles vs lefties. Well, Maldy struggles vs everyone. So why not let Yainer go up there and figure it out.
Now the Chas situation. Dusty refused to start Chas opening day. A shock to many considering how heroic he played in the playoffs last year. He didnt even get in game 2. This year he has kept Chas out of the regular lineup consistently and now it looks like is starting to favor Dubon in CF. Dubon is hitting well but he can be a liability at the plate. He tends to swing first pitch and routinely is an easy putout. Meanwhile Chas is hitting at a .898 OPS which puts him in elite category. Dusty stated that “we don’t have a Julio that we can play every day in CF” Julio is an absolute stud and nothing should be said about that. However, Chas slugs at a higher % then him. Chas is also on pace for a 20/20 season. Against the Yankees Dusty decided to pinch hit Chas for Jon Singleton who is hitting a whopping .171 and a .565 OPS against Holmes with 2 outs in the 9th. Why? Because according to Dusty his internal projections had Singleton at a higher batting average than Chas. The only thing Dubon has over Chas is arm strength. So why does Dubon start to become our everyday CF? Because Dubon is friends with Dustys son and JV likes Dubons arm.
The biggest difference between Hinch and Dusty has been Hinch always was open to learning about data that was provided from the likes of Lunhow, Stearns, Taubman, Mejdal, etc. (even though Hinch biggest mistake was leaving Cole in the bullpen for Harris in game 7) Dusty just seems to ignore all the information and goes with what he believes is best.
I do believe we are one of the strongest teams in the league. However, our goal is to win a world series. Dustys choices based on nepotism is what I fear is our biggest threat to repeating as champions.
Why couldn’t he have left McCormick on the bench in game 5 of the World Series
I wanted the Nats to move on from Dusty after 2017 as much as anybody. In hindsight, however: in 2017 the Nats won 97 games and the division. They had a bunch of injury issues (partial seasons from Harper & Eaton), but they were managed around. In 2018, Davey’s first season, the team was effectively the same. Again, we had some injury issues, but OF injuries actually led to us calling up Juan Soto, who was immediately a monster. We had a full season from Bryce. The Nats won 82 games and missed the playoffs. I can’t help but think Dusty was a big part of the difference.
Its nice that he got this ring but its time for the old man to retire.
My Frank Costanza is kicking in:
“He’s got a .898 OPS with an OPS+ of 144!!! YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT THE HELL YOU’RE DOIN’!!!”
Dusty Baker doing ___________________ frustrates some within the Giants, Cubs, Reds, Nationals, Astros organizations.
It’s no secret dusty hates Chas and most of us are sick of it
He’s a top 10 CF in the league for fucks sake
“It’s easy if you got a Julio Rodríguez, you just put him out in center field,” Baker told reporters.
“He ain’t a big boy yet,” Baker said before Wednesday’s 12-3 bludgeoning of the Rangers. “It’s hard to be a big boy right out the gate. What is this, Chas’ third or fourth year? The big boys are Altuve, Bregman, Tucker, those are the big boys. The other boys are approaching big boys.”
J-Rod is in his 2nd year and has worse stats than Chas this season.