Further regarding Pressly, he pitched in today’s B game versus the Marlins and K’d one over one inning. From that McTaggart article linked elsewhere:
After appearing in only two Grapefruit League games this spring – the most recent on March 11 – [Pressley] has been doing all of his pitching on the back fields at the Ballpark of the Palm Beaches, away from the fans and television cameras. Pressly said the nature of the Astros’ 2021 Spring Training schedule, which included several off-days, just meant he wound up pitching the “B” games the Astros scheduled to make up for the extra off-days. “I’ve been getting my work done back there,” he said. “I’ve been facing good hitters, facing our hitters. It’s been beneficial. You can kind of control your pitching back there.”
By all accounts this will be the opening day roster. As I said before, including Verlander and Whitley 10 pitchers will start the season either on the injured list or the restricted list. One of those pitchers is Pedro Baez who is on the COVID IL and doesn’t count towards the 40-man roster limit. Once he’s ready to come off the IL a corresponding roster move will be needed (unless one of the other injured pitchers are moved to the 60-day IL but there’s no indication as of now of that happening). Kent Emanuel’s suspension will end in late April and he’ll need to be added to the 40-man roster at that point which will necessitate another corresponding move (alternatively Emanuel himself would have to be DFA’d).
No, but part of me thinks that’s why they kept him instead of Toro, who would be available to get sent up and down as needed when Diaz inevitably got hurt.
Garcia has some power and is also a switch hitter. He is a little more versatile than Toro defensively. Garcia can play second, short, third and left field if needed. Toro had better spring numbers but I believe the thinking is Toro, who is younger, will benefit more by getting everyday at bats in Sugarland rather than coming off the bench on infrequent occasions with the Astros.
There’s an exhibition game at Round Rock on April 8 which would be his next day to pitch (or he could stay behind at Corpus and pitch a sim game on that day). Followed by him being activated by the Astros and making his season debut on the 13th vs the Tigers.
