I like Stafford. He’s just a goofball, which is out of place for this interview, but good for their normal episodes.
Highlights for me:
In the 2012 draft, Luhnow and Elias knew they were taking Correa 1-1 but basically nobody else even in the scouting department knew it before they called his name. They were getting him at such a discount they didn’t want word leaking out to other teams who might have offered him more.
The original plan wasn’t to use the savings from Correa on McCullers and Ruiz, it was to get Appel down to the comp round and take him where they took McCullers. Left unsaid in the interview is that the Pirates fucked everything up by taking Appel at 1-8 without a deal in place, thinking they could call Boras’s bluff.
If Correa hadn’t agreed to his discount (which was only finalized minutes before the draft), they’d have taken Byron Buxton.
The Gomez trade that cost them Hader and brought Fiers into the organization is number one on the list of moves Luhnow wishes he hadn’t made (the look on everyone’s face as he says that is priceless, but they refrain from saying the obvious thing).
Luhnow regrets the Osuna trade, says he didn’t anticipate the message it would send to the fans, women fans in particular.
Luhnow did informally offer Altuve to the Royals back in 2013 when trying to trade for Eric Hosmer, as Dayton Moore recently said. It was the kind of conversation where he was trying to figure out if the Royals would entertain any package at all for Hosmer, or if he was just totally off the table, so he threw the Astros’ best name at Moore and he still wouldn’t bite, confirming Hosmer was unavailable.
Luhnow says he isn’t being blackballed and has talked to a couple of owners about coming back but isn’t interested for the moment.
Surprisingly newsy for a beat writer podcast. Good on Rome for asking some of the questions he did. Got a lot of interesting answers.
Today is All Star Game workout day (sounds like a big photo op to me) and the Home Run Derby.
Being 2 1/2 hours from ATL, I checked the get in the door price for 2 tickets HRD - $183 each and ASG - $274 each. Not worth it to me. I checked a few weeks ago and I could have gone to the futures game for $10 each. I had a conflict and my son is choosing to study the bar and spend his free time with a girl than hang with me. I like his priorities.
He’s been called that since the minor leagues, and yes, because his ass is really big. He seems to embrace the nickname. Not quite as heroic as “Big Unit”, but hey, it could be worse…it could be “Clown Penis”.
Me neither. And if Manfred gets any more cute ideas before being inducted into the Hall of Fame, I fear that I’ll end up feeling the same way about the whole gotdang season.
