Astros planning to take championship trophy on a tour
ORLANDO, Fla. — In the twoweeks since the Astros won their first World Series championship, requests to see the trophy have been “off the charts,” team president of business operations Reid Ryan said Wednesday.
Anyone from the Astros’ corporate partners to local churches and rotary clubs to radio and TV stations has sought the company of the Commissioner’s Trophy. So like other recent winners of the Fall Classic have done, the Astros are planning a trophy tour, commencing during this offseason and extending into the regular season when the team is on the road.
More details about the tour will likely be announced next month, according to Ryan.
“Fans want to see it. The outlying communities want to see it — San Antonio, Austin, Corpus Christi, Beaumont, places like that,” Ryan said. “We want to make sure we get out and get to take it to those communities as well, because they’re all part of our fan base.”
The Astros are still gathering information about best practices for the tour and other various matters pertaining to their first offseason and season as reigning champions. While at the quarterly owners’ meetings that began Wednesday and will end Thursday at Orlando’s Waldorf Astoria, Ryan is gleaning insight from other recent winners.
Ryan spoke Wednesday with Chicago Cubs chairman Tom Ricketts and president of business operations Crane Kenney as well as Boston Red Sox president and CEO Sam Kennedy and chairman Tom Werner to learn from their experiences. He said he planned to talk Wednesday night with San Francisco Giants CEO Larry Baer.
40-man roster decisions loom
Astros outfield prospect Ramon Laureano’s stock rose considerably in 2016 but dropped off significantly last season at Class AA Corpus Christi. And in the coming days, the team must decide whether to add Laureano to its 40-man roster or risk losing him in next month’s Rule 5 draft.
The decision on Laureano is probably the most difficult one the Astros must make before Monday’s 7 p.m. deadline to set 40-man rosters ahead of the Rule 5 draft. Their brass will meet Friday to discuss the players under consideration.
Cionel Perez, the 21-year-old Cuban lefthander eligible for Rule 5 only because he signed last year with the same team that first voided his contract, is certain to be protected. Other Astros minor leaguers eligible to be picked in Rule 5 if not added to the 40-man roster include outfielder Jon Kemmer and righthander Dean Deetz.
The righthanded-hitting Laureano, 23, batted just .227 and had an OPS of only .668 in 513 plate appearances in the Texas League last season. It represented a big dropoff from his 2016, when he batted .319 with a .955 OPS across two levels.
“The tools are there,” Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow said of Laureano. “I think it was just an off year for him. But (I see) no reason to think he can’t bounce back to the form he was in ’16.”
Otani awaits posting system
Major League Base- ball hopes to reach a new agreement on a posting system with Japan by early December, a deal that would allow star pitcheroutfielder Shohei Otani to start negotiations with big league teams.
MLB Chief Legal Officer Dan Halem said Wednesday a new framework has been agreed to with Nippon Professional Baseball and that a deal with the Major League Baseball Players Association could happen “maybe within a week.”
Otani, a 23-year-old with the Pacific League’s Nippon Ham Fighters, would be restricted to a minor league contract with a maximum signing bonus of $3,535,000.