Tuesday, July 11, 2017

Tuesday Morning Hot Links

My life changed five years ago today. My wife and I have had our fair share (and some other people's fair shares) of pregnancy complications. Six miscarriages - three of which were ectopic, two of those almost killed her - led, in part, to the creation of Astros County. I needed a project where I could channel some attention that didn't have anything to do with how awful life was at times. But on July 10, 2012 I got to drive on the shoulder of Interstate 40 through the middle of Nashville to get to the hospital because my wife's water had broken.

As a noted idiot I thought that, when your water broke, it meant that a baby would coming falling out within minutes, so I wasn't prepared for the 21-hour wait until we got to meet our daughter. That night, as we waited for, um, conditions to get right, I tried to keep friends and family updated. My wife was laying there, focusing on her breathing. I brought a book. About 7:00 that evening, five hours after her water broke, I looked over at my wife and told her she was beautiful. Starting in a matter of minutes was the 2012 All-Star Game, and Jose Altuve would be playing. I asked her, "Hey, here's a tv, can I watch the All-Star Game?" The look that she gave me indicated, "No, it is not acceptable for you to watch a baseball game while I'm in labor." Her only audible response was "And I don't care that Altuve is playing." I chalked that up to the labor pains and don't hold that betrayal against her. Altuve went 0x1.

I don't stay up late. If I see 2am, I've already been asleep and - for whatever reason - have awakened. So as the clock crept closer to midnight, I started getting sleepy. I knew that, if I couldn't watch the All-Star Game, I sure as hell couldn't take a nap, so I drank coffee, took walks around the floor of the hospital, checked Twitter, answered texts. 2am turned into 3am, which turned into 4am. At that point I was delirious. I had been awake since 4:30am the previous day and I don't do well in that situation. So as I went to get my 85th cup of coffee and stretch my legs. 

A personal character flaw is how I try to use humor as a defense mechanism. I also have a very hard time understanding when it's okay to make a joke, and when I should just let the moment pass. Factor that character flaw into being awake for 24 hours and I get dumb. So when I walked into our room (right next to the nurse's station) at 4:30am and yelled "I SEE A LADY TONIGHT WHO SHOULD BE HAVING MY BABY...BABY." Well, you can imagine - or maybe you can't - the fury that erupted from my wife who, eight hours later would deliver our only child, a perfect little girl, who turns five years old today. 


*Richard Justice writes of the paths each of the Astros All-Stars took.

*2013 still weighs on the minds of Jose Altuve and Dallas Keuchel:
It's a motivating factor. Just the other day I was talking with Dallas about that. For all the players on the team, what we're going through now is special, but for me and him there's a little something extra because we were on that team that lost more than 100 games. 

*Washington Post: The Astros are a playoff team, but not yet a World Series contender

*Jeff Bagwell jumped on Jerome Solomon's podcast.

*Jonah Keri talked to Chris Devenski.

*Collin McHugh made another rehab start for Corpus last night, throwing 4.1IP, 4H/3R (0ER), 4K:2BB. He threw 47 of his 74 pitches for strikes in a 6-5 Corpus win. Garrett Stubbs was 4x5 with 3RBI

*Franklin Perez was promoted from Buies Creek to Corpus after last night's game in which he threw 4IP, 3H/0ER, 5K:2BB. In 54.1IP for BCA, he allowed 38H/18ER, 53K:16BB. Last week Baseball America named Perez as their #32 prospect.

*Quad Cities are working faster and smarter in the heat.

*The White Sox still want Francis Martes and Kyle Tucker for Jose Quintana. Heyman:
The price for Quintana is high enough that the Astros are looking elsewhere, having known to have called on Teheran and even Mets star Jacob deGrom...And word is, the Astros don't actually see Quintana as an ace at this point.

*Here's a cool story on Astros scout Hank Allen.

*Chris Carter is looking for a job.

*FanGraphs: The recent history of free-agent pricing.

*The Art and Science of Throwing Batting Practice

*Come get your boy: