Astros Morning Snippets: Celebrating Truck Day

Astros news and notes from February 6th, including photographic evidence of the massive equipment haul to West Palm Beach along with a touching story about Joe Smith and his family’s ongoing battle with Huntington’s disease.

Important Spring Training Dates

In exactly one week (February 13th), the Astros‘ pitchers and catchers will report to West Palm Beach to partake in Spring Training. Five days later, the club will hold its first full squad workout on February 18th, which means that actual baseball is close to a return. Thank, goodness! Honestly, I need a break from football for a while.

Celebrating Truck Day? 

Alyson Footer of MLB.com provided photographic evidence of the Astros moving truck preparing for its annual trip to Florida. And it looks like the club’s mascot, Orbit, is already in mid-season form. I wonder how much bubble gum is on the truck? What wacky situations will Orbit put himself in this year?

Wait, is Truck Day an actual thing now? Sure, why not.

Raising Awareness about Huntington’s disease and IVF

Kirsten Fleming of the New York Post recently published an article detailing how Joe Smith and his wife Allie LaForce, a TNT basketball reporter, are utilizing in vitro fertilization to have a HD-free child of their own. The piece also delves into Smith’s family history with the disease, which has already afflicted the pitcher’s mother and may affect him one day. The couple also has a charity, HelpCureHD, to assist families in need who can’t afford the large cost of the IVF procedure. I’d recommend that you read the article in full as it does provide valuable insight about the disease and how the Smiths’ are raising awareness about the disease. It is really inspirational to see a player we follow closely as fans tackle an important issue like Huntington’s disease.

Are We Having Fun? 

We all know that this year’s offseason hasn’t lived up to the hype quite yet. I’m sure that’ll change once Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Dallas Keuchel, and Craig Kimbrel finally sign somewhere. Jeff Sullivan of FanGraphs does raise the question here whether if the offseason is a fun one. Specifically, would we, as fans, enjoy the “fast and chaotic” free agency of the NBA, or the “drawn-out and suspenseful” of the MLB? Personally, I do prefer the “fast and chaotic” of the NBA’s free agency.

Talking about Harper, again

Oh, look, the Sugar Land Skeeters have “officially” entered the Harper sweepstakes.

Carlos Correa Wins in Arbitration

In other news, the Astros’ star shortstop, Carlos Correa, won his arbitration case against the club. He will now earn $5 million in 2019, which is further elaborated on by our own Brian Murray here. Either way, Correa still represents a heck of a bargain, especially if he can remain healthy for the majority of the 2019 season.