Astros' damage control for Framber Valdez incident is becoming pretty sad

As Framber Valdez's meltdown makes news throughout baseball circles, the Houston Astros seem desperate to quell any controversy and get back to the business of winning baseball games and staving off the Seattle Mariners and surging Texas Rangers for the AL West crown.

Valdez made waves for drilling catcher César Salazar in the chest after a sequence where the two clearly disagreed about how to attack New York Yankees center fielder Trent Grisham, who took the All-Star southpaw deep for a grand slam. The act left some around baseball appalled, with Boston Red Sox announcer Will Middlebrooks calling it an "all-time scumbag move by a teammate".

This isn't the first time that Valdez has lost his cool, with fans becoming increasingly frustrated with his antics, with past examples such as criticizing outfielder Taylor Trammell for his defensive positioning and questioning the implementation of baseball common sense.

The firestorm created by Valdez's latest temper tantrum has the club doing damage control, and the explanations they have come up with are not believable in the slightest.

Astros aren't fooling anyone with their feeble Framber Valdez defense

The story that came out immediately after the game was that Valdez had simply crossed up Salazar. While that might be a likely story, it was clear to anyone watching that that wasn't the case.

In the aftermath, the club, as well as Valdez's agent, has doubled down on that story. Manager Joe Espada called a meeting with the pitcher-catcher battery to get to the bottom of the issue, coming up with the same excuse.

Valdez's agent, Ulises Cabrera, told the Houston Chronicle, "The idea that he's intentionally trying to injure one of his teammates is preposterous. It's a complete lack of respect for who he is as a person and who he is as a player. And his body of work demonstrates that. Anything to the contrary is just completely misguided and it's not right." That would be more believable if not for Valdez's documented penchant for getting frustrated with his teammates.

General manager Dana Brown kept the party line going, speaking with 790 AM in Houston, offering the same weak defense.

"I believe that he was absolutely frustrated, as anybody who ever played any sport ... you get frustrated, you get rattled, you're angry. And these things happen. Sometimes you get so angry you can't see straight. And he crossed him up. They had a conversation after the game, and they squashed it."

Other excuses given were Joe Espada's claim that mix-ups happen all the time and the idea that perhaps Salazar pressed the wrong button on the PitchCom transmitter. All of this sounds as if the lady doth protest too much.

Valdez has been a front-line starter throughout his Houston tenure, but tensions have existed as the club and the 31-year-old star have been unable to come to terms on a long-term extension. A free-agent-to-be, speculation has run rampant that Valdez will price himself out of the Astros' budget, and this latest incident might shine some light on why the club has not been more proactive in making a deal with their homegrown ace.

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