re: Why are the Astros so awful?

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Farm system says otherwise

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Great point.

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And what happens when it's time to pay the ones that actually turn out to be productive major leaguers? Odds are they will trade or not resign them, because that's what owners who sell this kind of bullshite to their fans do.

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Glad you know exactly what Crane / Luhnow are thinking.

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If you want to see what new owners who actually want to win do, check out what Mark Anastasio did with the Brewers. He actually spent money and guess what, the team became a lot more competitive immediately and the farm system wasn't hurt by it.

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I don't even know what to do with this post. First of all, when Attanasio took over as owner, he was blessed with the 3rd ranked farm system in baseball. That was down 2 spots from the #1 ranking in 2004. Rickie Weeks (2005 #8 prospect) was a starter and RoY candidate. The #19 prospect JJ Hardy also joined that team. Later that year, the #15 prospect Prince Fielder joined the team. That's the #8, 15 and 19 ranked prospects on 1 team in 1 season. 2 seasons later the #26 prospect Ryan Bruan joined the Brewers. Attanasio inherited an extremely talented farm system the day he took over.

In 2004, the Brewers were last in payroll at $27MM. In Attanasio's first season 2005, the payroll was upped $13MM. They improved by 13 wins. In 2006, the payroll was upped by another $17MM. The Brewers win total dropped by 6. Fast forwarding, the Brewers upped their payroll each of the next several years and the reward was modest.

2005: 81-81
2006: 75-87
2007: 83-79
2008: 90-72
2009: 80-82
2010: 77-85
2011: 96-66
2012: 83-79

So over an 8 year span, the increased spending netted 4 winning seasons and only 2 seasons that were better than mediocre. An average record of 83-79 is what the Astros should aspire to be?

As for the farm system:

2005: 3 (down from 1)
2006: 5 (down from 3)
2007: 7 (down from 5)
2008: 21 (down from 7)
2009: 10 (up from 21)
2010: 13 (down from 10)
2011: 30 (down from 13)
2012: 26 (up from 30)
2013: 23 (up from 26)

So the farm system wasn't hurt even though it was a top 10 system his first few years and thats dropped to a bottom 10 average his last 6 years?