Biggio

My friend Cathy, ever the Craig Biggio fan, notes that He Of The Dirty Helmet reached base six times in yesterday's game. But even so, as of tonight his average is only .251 (40 points off his career average), and his on-base percentage .345 (35 points off his career average).

Those numbers are depressing considering the Astros are paying him 8.75 million this season. He Of The Dirty Helmet has the 20th highest salary in the National League this year (highest in the Bigs for Second Basemen), according to USA Today. He's not playing like a top 20 player. His stats this year barely put him in the Top 20 among Major League second basemen -- and probably in the bottom half of that group.

Drayton McLane paid too much for Biggio (and Shane Reynolds, for that matter) given his age and numbers. There's a sentimental case to be made for doing so, of course. Biggio is a fan favorite, and probably could have gotten similar money from some other organization. And I'm sure Drayton didn't want to be compared to John McMullen, who let Nolan Ryan get away only to see Nolan continue to pitch like... well, Nolan. But for a team with a middle-level budget, it's hard to field a winner when your highly paid players underperform or are injured. That's one of the team's problems this year -- and Biggio and Bagwell are surely a big part of that.

On a positive note, they are in a division in which 90 wins might be good enough. On a less positive note, they will have to go 65-30 over their next 95 games to get to 90 (not including tonight's game). Oh well.

[Posted at 21:36 CST on 06/17/02] [Link]