August 1, 2024 • 10 mins
Brian Bogusevic, former Astros outfielder and Space City Home Network analyst, joins Next Up after the Houston Astros avoided the sweep against the Pittsburgh Pirates with Wednesday's 5-4 victory.
During the series at Minute Maid Park, the Astros traded right-hander Jake Bloss, outfielder Joey Loperfido and infielder Will Wagner to the Toronto Blue Jays for left-handed starter Yusei Kikuchi prior to the MLB trade deadline. With multiple starters on the injured list, the Astros needed depth and did not hold the bargaining position of being able to walk away. "They had to make a move," and the Astros "know that Kikuchi can handle the workload," Bogusevic said.
Kikuchi had a great start to the season, but is now holding a 4.75 ERA and 1.34 WHIP. "He's got good stuff...he's underperforming what his stuff is right now."
While Kikuchi hasn't shown flashes of success as of late, Bogusevic is confident the Astros staff can help increase his efficiency. "Things can change simply by attacking hitters in a different way...we have a guy that has the tools; they're just not being deployed properly."
Bogusevic also previews the Astros hosting the Tampa Bay Rays as the offense attempts to climb out of a recent "lull."
During the series at Minute Maid Park, the Astros traded right-hander Jake Bloss, outfielder Joey Loperfido and infielder Will Wagner to the Toronto Blue Jays for left-handed starter Yusei Kikuchi prior to the MLB trade deadline. With multiple starters on the injured list, the Astros needed depth and did not hold the bargaining position of being able to walk away. "They had to make a move," and the Astros "know that Kikuchi can handle the workload," Bogusevic said.
Kikuchi had a great start to the season, but is now holding a 4.75 ERA and 1.34 WHIP. "He's got good stuff...he's underperforming what his stuff is right now."
While Kikuchi hasn't shown flashes of success as of late, Bogusevic is confident the Astros staff can help increase his efficiency. "Things can change simply by attacking hitters in a different way...we have a guy that has the tools; they're just not being deployed properly."
Bogusevic also previews the Astros hosting the Tampa Bay Rays as the offense attempts to climb out of a recent "lull."
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
For more intel on where we are with Astros baseball.
No one else does it better than one. Brian bogus Sevic,
former first round selection in his own right to the
Houston Astros. We see him on Space City Home Network,
very debon there doing his analysis.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Boge, Good morning, sir, Good morning. How are you guys
doing all right?
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Always good? Gordy out today? Ben Dubo's in for him, Uh, Bogey.
I'll leave it up to you. I normally don't do this.
Where you want to go. You wanna go deadline or
you want to go to game last night and not
getting swept by the pirates. You tell me where you
want to start.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
No, I mean the story around the team right now
is deadline. It's fire away, Okay.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
I understand they had to do something. Dana was back
into a corner. I get it. I understand that you
can't go back in time. In February, when me and
Chandler Rome and a few other baseball people were trying
to tell the team, you got six dudes on the
IL and a ford one your own ace, you might
want to get some hashtag arm insurance. They elected to
(01:05):
roll the dice. They paid the price in the deal.
Kakuchi gonna do some good, but I can't ignore a
four to seventy five er this season for the Astros
fans that are still scratching their head and the Astros
fans that are trying to be positive. Where do you
land on Kokuchi now being an Astro and taking the
(01:27):
mound tomorrow night.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Yeah? So, so, first of all, what you get with
Kakuchi is a guy who you know can handle the workload.
Right You're at the point of that season where the
innings start piling up and you're already going to be
pushing Arroghetti to a place he's never been. Renelle Blanco
is going to go to a place he's never been,
(01:49):
and to have a third guy in another rookie who
would have been in that position is just too many
questions marks. So you know that Kikuchi can handle the workload,
and you have kind of a known quantity, uh with
that in terms of what you're going to be getting
on a start to start basis. He's got good stuff.
He's always had good stuff, but he's underperforming what his
(02:14):
stuff is right now. And when you look at a
pitcher who you know you can look at the fastball traits,
and you can look at spin and extension and all
these things and say that he should be better than
he is. Usually something missing. So the question is is
do the astros have a good idea of what it
is that is missing that that's not allowing his individual
(02:37):
pitches to perform as a whole the way they should.
And they've been very good at that, And the perfect
example of that this year is Renelle Blanco. Right, you
add a change up, you get hitters thinking about a
change of speed, and all of a sudden, the results
are better and the and the fastball plays better and
the slider plays better. I think that's going to be
the case with Kakuchi. I think they're going to change
(02:59):
up the pitch mix a little bit, get him a
little more off speed heavy immediately, get some people off
of his fastball a little bit, and then as the
season goes on and you start winding down, then he
can go back to pitching the way he's been pitching,
but with that kind of thought in the back of
everybody's mind that he will go heavy on off speed
because right now his fastball isn't playing the way it
(03:20):
should be, So you know, you have to think that
you go and trade for a guy, you have a
plan for him immediately, and the astros usually do you.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Guys had an interesting graphic on the Space City broadcast
last night showing some of the advanced metrics the pip
X fip X e er all top fifteen, top twenty
among starting pitchers, and it's an interesting juxtaposition with his
top line statistics because I think a lot of fans
when the trade was made, they pull up his MLB
(03:51):
dot com page and they see four nine four to
seven five ERA one thirty four whip and all those
numbers are underwhelming. Yet when you look on under the hood,
there's a lot more that's encouraging analytically. I know that
intrigues the astros. You went into that a little bit
in your last answer in terms of the reasons for
that difference besides pitch mix, is it luck, is it defense?
(04:15):
What are some of the other factors that would lead
to a discrepancy like that to where in some of
the more advanced metrics he grades out top fifteen, top twenty,
Yet when you look at his just basic numbers, he's
four nine with the four seven five RA.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of things that can play.
The two major things are usually luck or just usage
and the batting average on balls and play things like that.
The exit velocities, things that would speak to luck aren't
really in his favor though. It's more just the profiles
of his pitches, particularly his basketball and you know, you're
(04:51):
looking at the velocity, and he throws hard, he throws
with good angle, he gets great extension. All of these
things say that it should be better than it is.
And you know, if you look at Hunter Brown was
a great example of this too. It and his turnaround
throughout the course of the season. When he was getting
killed early, his off speed pitches were still grading out
(05:12):
as above average pitches. His slider and his cutter, they
were still, you know, metrically plus pitches, but they were
getting killed. And the reason they were getting killed is
because he didn't have anything on his arm side to
keep hitters from diving out. So, you know, things can
change simply by attacking hitters in a different way, you
can get better results from the same pitch. And that's
(05:35):
got to be the thought with Kakuchi is that we've
got a guy who has the tools, they're just not
being deployed. Properly. So if he if they you know,
have run numbers on it, if they have, you know,
run their modeling on it. And also what comes into
play too is the Astros hitters have seen a lot
of Kokuchi. He spent years in Seattle in the division.
(05:56):
They faced them a ton. You get a lot of
feedback on a posing players from your own players, and
there's probably guys in that club up and say, hey, man,
when he was doing this, he was nasty, but when
he would attack us this way, it was much easier.
So there's got to be a lot of thought put
into this and a plan moving forward. And there's a
lot of stories throughout baseball of guys being traded, guys
(06:18):
being brought in next free agent, and on day one
having sit downs where the coaching staff in the front
office comes in and says, hey, you've been doing this,
We think you should do this instead, and it's just
immediately implemented. I think they're they're not just saying, hey,
we've got a guy who you know, he's got a
high four era, but he can eat up a lot
(06:38):
of innings. We think he's a better option. There's more
to it.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
The voice of Brown Bogosfrik is his name. Space City
Home Network former twenty fourth overall selection by the Strolls
and the five MLB draft form a picture in his
own right before logging some innings out in the outfield
as well, Bagi. Let's talk prospects. I believe would agree
that it was expensive, but I find it interesting how
(07:04):
some folks are moving the goal post. Were Local Fito's
making plays in an Astros uniform. It's like, oh my goodness, Yeah,
this guy could be a budding star Astros fan favorite.
He goes out the door, his bat and average is
going down every month. He was a bomb overrated all
the things from a minor league stand out minor league standpoint,
(07:24):
from a prospect standpoint, was it expensive? Should they have retained?
And some people are saying Bloss was more valuable than
Local Fito. Again, you've been in these situations. Your thoughts
on the package that went out the door versus what
they got back?
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, I think it was expensive. I mean three high
I mean three organizationally high end prospects for a rental
picture is a steep price. But the Astros were in
a situation where they had to make a movie. Right
the most effective bargaining tool is being able to get
up and walk away, and they didn't have that as
(08:03):
an option. They had to make a deal. So, you know,
I think it speaks more to what the league sees
their farm system as being where where one or two
of their quote unquote high end prospects isn't going to
be enough where you need to do it more by
volume because people are more unsure of what these guys
(08:23):
will be. And yeah, I mean, you saw good things
from low per Feedo, but there are holes that you
can poke in his game. And you saw some good
things from Bloss and I mean very limited sample size,
but you can poke holes in his game. And Will
Wagner has you know, good stats at TRIPAA, but never
set foot in the Big League. So there's a lot
(08:44):
of unknown And when it comes to projections and seeing
what guys are going to be in the future, I
always tend to side with the team that knows them best,
which is the organization that had all these guys in house.
And if if the Astros were comfortable trading guys away,
(09:04):
there had to be internal questions about their ability to
be everyday impact players. So you know, obviously, only time
will tell on it. But you know you gotta do
what you got to do to make a move, because
that was getting getting an established starting pitcher that can
handle the workload for the rest of the season was
(09:26):
an absolute monk.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
We're going to run over here, just a little bit bolgie.
So I'm going to ask you two questions in one
real quick brother, if you would like thirty seconds, get
me out of here.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Yes, some some up.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
The Pirates series for me and tell me what you
think about the Rais and our chances of getting back
Astros what just percentage points they hit a seattle back
in first place. But continuing to ask some distance there, Pirates,
raise what you got?
Speaker 2 (09:49):
You know? The number one, the Pirates are better than
we think they are because we think of them as
just being the Pirates. But they don't stink anymore. And
the Astros offense has hit a lull. You know, you
can look over a large sample size and say, oh,
they're scoring five and a half six runs a game,
but it's been a struggle to score runs. They need
to get heated up again with the bats and moving
(10:10):
into the Race series. The race sold like like they Yes,
they are still in the race. Statistically, and not that
far out of the wild card. But they told you
everything you need to know about their team last week
at the deadline, So hopefully you're catching a team that's
going through a little bit of a mini rebuild and
(10:30):
you can catch them at the right time.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Brian Boga Savic Space City Home Network dropping by next
up for his weekly every Thursday at ten thirty here
with Gordion and I again Gordi out tonight to excuse
me today and Ben do bos is in follow him,
won't you at Brian b O g U s V
I see Bogey know we appreciate it. Brother. Let's do
it again next week.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
God willing, thanks guys, all right be will
For more intel on where we are with Astros baseball.
No one else does it better than one. Brian bogus Sevic,
former first round selection in his own right to the
Houston Astros. We see him on Space City Home Network,
very debon there doing his analysis.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Boge, Good morning, sir, Good morning. How are you guys
doing all right?
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Always good? Gordy out today? Ben Dubo's in for him, Uh, Bogey.
I'll leave it up to you. I normally don't do this.
Where you want to go. You wanna go deadline or
you want to go to game last night and not
getting swept by the pirates. You tell me where you
want to start.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
No, I mean the story around the team right now
is deadline. It's fire away, Okay.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
I understand they had to do something. Dana was back
into a corner. I get it. I understand that you
can't go back in time. In February, when me and
Chandler Rome and a few other baseball people were trying
to tell the team, you got six dudes on the
IL and a ford one your own ace, you might
want to get some hashtag arm insurance. They elected to
(01:05):
roll the dice. They paid the price in the deal.
Kakuchi gonna do some good, but I can't ignore a
four to seventy five er this season for the Astros
fans that are still scratching their head and the Astros
fans that are trying to be positive. Where do you
land on Kokuchi now being an Astro and taking the
(01:27):
mound tomorrow night.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Yeah? So, so, first of all, what you get with
Kakuchi is a guy who you know can handle the workload.
Right You're at the point of that season where the
innings start piling up and you're already going to be
pushing Arroghetti to a place he's never been. Renelle Blanco
is going to go to a place he's never been,
(01:49):
and to have a third guy in another rookie who
would have been in that position is just too many
questions marks. So you know that Kikuchi can handle the workload,
and you have kind of a known quantity, uh with
that in terms of what you're going to be getting
on a start to start basis. He's got good stuff.
He's always had good stuff, but he's underperforming what his
(02:14):
stuff is right now. And when you look at a
pitcher who you know you can look at the fastball traits,
and you can look at spin and extension and all
these things and say that he should be better than
he is. Usually something missing. So the question is is
do the astros have a good idea of what it
is that is missing that that's not allowing his individual
(02:37):
pitches to perform as a whole the way they should.
And they've been very good at that, And the perfect
example of that this year is Renelle Blanco. Right, you
add a change up, you get hitters thinking about a
change of speed, and all of a sudden, the results
are better and the and the fastball plays better and
the slider plays better. I think that's going to be
the case with Kakuchi. I think they're going to change
(02:59):
up the pitch mix a little bit, get him a
little more off speed heavy immediately, get some people off
of his fastball a little bit, and then as the
season goes on and you start winding down, then he
can go back to pitching the way he's been pitching,
but with that kind of thought in the back of
everybody's mind that he will go heavy on off speed
because right now his fastball isn't playing the way it
(03:20):
should be, So you know, you have to think that
you go and trade for a guy, you have a
plan for him immediately, and the astros usually do you.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Guys had an interesting graphic on the Space City broadcast
last night showing some of the advanced metrics the pip
X fip X e er all top fifteen, top twenty
among starting pitchers, and it's an interesting juxtaposition with his
top line statistics because I think a lot of fans
when the trade was made, they pull up his MLB
(03:51):
dot com page and they see four nine four to
seven five ERA one thirty four whip and all those
numbers are underwhelming. Yet when you look on under the hood,
there's a lot more that's encouraging analytically. I know that
intrigues the astros. You went into that a little bit
in your last answer in terms of the reasons for
that difference besides pitch mix, is it luck, is it defense?
(04:15):
What are some of the other factors that would lead
to a discrepancy like that to where in some of
the more advanced metrics he grades out top fifteen, top twenty,
Yet when you look at his just basic numbers, he's
four nine with the four seven five RA.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of things that can play.
The two major things are usually luck or just usage
and the batting average on balls and play things like that.
The exit velocities, things that would speak to luck aren't
really in his favor though. It's more just the profiles
of his pitches, particularly his basketball and you know, you're
(04:51):
looking at the velocity, and he throws hard, he throws
with good angle, he gets great extension. All of these
things say that it should be better than it is.
And you know, if you look at Hunter Brown was
a great example of this too. It and his turnaround
throughout the course of the season. When he was getting
killed early, his off speed pitches were still grading out
(05:12):
as above average pitches. His slider and his cutter, they
were still, you know, metrically plus pitches, but they were
getting killed. And the reason they were getting killed is
because he didn't have anything on his arm side to
keep hitters from diving out. So, you know, things can
change simply by attacking hitters in a different way, you
can get better results from the same pitch. And that's
(05:35):
got to be the thought with Kakuchi is that we've
got a guy who has the tools, they're just not
being deployed. Properly. So if he if they you know,
have run numbers on it, if they have, you know,
run their modeling on it. And also what comes into
play too is the Astros hitters have seen a lot
of Kokuchi. He spent years in Seattle in the division.
(05:56):
They faced them a ton. You get a lot of
feedback on a posing players from your own players, and
there's probably guys in that club up and say, hey, man,
when he was doing this, he was nasty, but when
he would attack us this way, it was much easier.
So there's got to be a lot of thought put
into this and a plan moving forward. And there's a
lot of stories throughout baseball of guys being traded, guys
(06:18):
being brought in next free agent, and on day one
having sit downs where the coaching staff in the front
office comes in and says, hey, you've been doing this,
We think you should do this instead, and it's just
immediately implemented. I think they're they're not just saying, hey,
we've got a guy who you know, he's got a
high four era, but he can eat up a lot
(06:38):
of innings. We think he's a better option. There's more
to it.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
The voice of Brown Bogosfrik is his name. Space City
Home Network former twenty fourth overall selection by the Strolls
and the five MLB draft form a picture in his
own right before logging some innings out in the outfield
as well, Bagi. Let's talk prospects. I believe would agree
that it was expensive, but I find it interesting how
(07:04):
some folks are moving the goal post. Were Local Fito's
making plays in an Astros uniform. It's like, oh my goodness, Yeah,
this guy could be a budding star Astros fan favorite.
He goes out the door, his bat and average is
going down every month. He was a bomb overrated all
the things from a minor league stand out minor league standpoint,
(07:24):
from a prospect standpoint, was it expensive? Should they have retained?
And some people are saying Bloss was more valuable than
Local Fito. Again, you've been in these situations. Your thoughts
on the package that went out the door versus what
they got back?
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, I think it was expensive. I mean three high
I mean three organizationally high end prospects for a rental
picture is a steep price. But the Astros were in
a situation where they had to make a movie. Right
the most effective bargaining tool is being able to get
up and walk away, and they didn't have that as
(08:03):
an option. They had to make a deal. So, you know,
I think it speaks more to what the league sees
their farm system as being where where one or two
of their quote unquote high end prospects isn't going to
be enough where you need to do it more by
volume because people are more unsure of what these guys
(08:23):
will be. And yeah, I mean, you saw good things
from low per Feedo, but there are holes that you
can poke in his game. And you saw some good
things from Bloss and I mean very limited sample size,
but you can poke holes in his game. And Will
Wagner has you know, good stats at TRIPAA, but never
set foot in the Big League. So there's a lot
(08:44):
of unknown And when it comes to projections and seeing
what guys are going to be in the future, I
always tend to side with the team that knows them best,
which is the organization that had all these guys in house.
And if if the Astros were comfortable trading guys away,
(09:04):
there had to be internal questions about their ability to
be everyday impact players. So you know, obviously, only time
will tell on it. But you know you gotta do
what you got to do to make a move, because
that was getting getting an established starting pitcher that can
handle the workload for the rest of the season was
(09:26):
an absolute monk.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
We're going to run over here, just a little bit bolgie.
So I'm going to ask you two questions in one
real quick brother, if you would like thirty seconds, get
me out of here.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Yes, some some up.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
The Pirates series for me and tell me what you
think about the Rais and our chances of getting back
Astros what just percentage points they hit a seattle back
in first place. But continuing to ask some distance there, Pirates,
raise what you got?
Speaker 2 (09:49):
You know? The number one, the Pirates are better than
we think they are because we think of them as
just being the Pirates. But they don't stink anymore. And
the Astros offense has hit a lull. You know, you
can look over a large sample size and say, oh,
they're scoring five and a half six runs a game,
but it's been a struggle to score runs. They need
to get heated up again with the bats and moving
(10:10):
into the Race series. The race sold like like they Yes,
they are still in the race. Statistically, and not that
far out of the wild card. But they told you
everything you need to know about their team last week
at the deadline, So hopefully you're catching a team that's
going through a little bit of a mini rebuild and
(10:30):
you can catch them at the right time.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Brian Boga Savic Space City Home Network dropping by next
up for his weekly every Thursday at ten thirty here
with Gordion and I again Gordi out tonight to excuse
me today and Ben do bos is in follow him,
won't you at Brian b O g U s V
I see Bogey know we appreciate it. Brother. Let's do
it again next week.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
God willing, thanks guys, all right be will
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