Crossed-Up MLB

All that was missing was the trash can, and the Astros have plenty of experience with trash cans.

The trash, though, was exhibited on the field Tuesday night at Daikin Park when fuming left-handed pitcher Framber Valdez, who had just surrendered a grand slam to the Yankees’ Trent Grisham in the fifth inning, nailed his young catcher Cesar Salazar in the chest protector with a 93-mph pitch – a simple cross-up Valdez would say later. Salazar, a good teammate, went along with the cross-up story as well.

After hitting his own catcher, Valdez coldly turned his back on his teammate, not even “Sorry, are you okay? My bad.’’ That tells you all you need to know.

Clearly this was not a cross-up, this was a pitch of frustration – and with PitchCom those cross-up excuses are out the window. Valdez was pissed because on the grand slam, Salazar tried to get Valdez to step back on the mound – and not throw the grand slam pitch – but Valdez did not listen and let fly with a hit-me sinker; Grisham obliged.

Then, with wide-eyed Anthony Volpe at the plate, on the second pitch, the cross-up fastball arrived to Salazar’s chest.

Valdez will be a free agent after this season and he was pitching against the Yankees’ big free agent acquisition Max Fried, who was signed to a $218 million, eight-year contract, the largest contract ever given to a left-handed pitcher.

The Astros still lead the AL West but that’s because no team can get its act together in the division, and their .547 winning percentage is the lowest of any division leading team.

The free agent heat is on Valdez.

Always follow the money – and Valdez’ ERA shot up to 3.40 after surrendering six earned runs in five innings in the 7-1 loss. Valdez has been known to show up teammates in the past, but this is a red flag show-up and certainly the Astros clubhouse is not happy with Valdez.

The Astros still lead the AL West but that’s because no team can get its act together in the division, and their .547 winning percentage is the lowest of any division leading team. Perhaps the Mariners will catch them.

Either way, Valdez felt the pressure and appeared to act like a child.

I’ve been saying for a while now these Astros are incredibly vulnerable. There are holes in the lineup and clearly in the makeup of the clubhouse. They miss Alex Bregman.

The entire episode is another example of this generation of player. I have maintained this is the lowest baseball IQ of players to ever come down the major league pike and every week there is a new example of their inept and selfish behavior.

Valdez fits right in with the 2025 crew. First, he does not step off the mound under the catcher’s instructions and then suddenly two pitches later there is a fastball cross-up in the PitchCom era.

Today’s players are running around the bases not knowing the infield fly rule, they are blaming others for their mistakes. Valdez threw the grand slam pitch. Grisham has been hammering that pitch all season. Valdez threw a cookie, another one on this night, Jazz Chisholm homered against him earlier on a middle-middle pitch, and Grisham made him pay hitting the ball the opposite way into the Crawford Boxes for his 29th home run of the season. Grisham is a smart player and is taking full advantage of pitchers.

Excuse me while I step onto my lawn with a couple of other old baseball men.

Old men who love the game.

I checked in with several former major league players, who went on to become coaches, a pitcher and a catcher, to get their response.

They did not disappoint, and this shows the significant difference in today’s Show Game vs. Real Baseball.

The former pitching coach could not believe what Valdez did and flat-out told BallNine: “That wouldn’t have played in my day. (Valdez) would have been laid out in the dugout or the clubhouse.’’

The catcher showing the creative ways to get back at such an action by a pitcher, said: “Hey Framber, maybe I won’t be so good now blocking your shit in the dirt.’’

He added, just to make his point clear: “Earned run when it’s a wild pitch.’’

The former catcher then made a point about the power of managers in the past to the I want to be your friend managers of today.

“Wonder if the manager straightened that shit out. What would Leyland have done?’’

Great thought. What would Jim Leyland, a former catcher, have done?

Never forget that Hall of Fame manager ripped his best player Barry Bonds a new one in that classic caught on camera explosion by Leyland in Pirates spring training of 1991.

Leyland confronted Bonds in front of his teammates and was not shy about it and every time I see and hear the video it brings a smile to my face because this was a manager in charge of his team, come Bonds or high water.

“Don’t f— with me. I’ve had enough of this f— shit … If you don’t want to be here, get your f— ass out of here … Let’s get this f— shit over with right now,’’ Leyland yelled.

The law of the land back then was the manager. And there were leaders in the clubhouse who took care of business, too. I call them Top Step Guys.

That is, if you did not hustle or made your teammates look bad, that clubhouse leader would be on the top step of the dugout waiting for you.

I remember a time during batting practice at Dodger Stadium when I was covering the Padres and Jack Clark was hitting in the cage.

Clark noticed that pitcher Eric Show, who was quite aloof, was not shagging balls in the outfield but was along the low right-field fence talking to some ladies. This was when pregame rituals were important.

Clark at once asked the BP pitcher to put the next set of pitches on the outside corner and Clark the Ripper rifled line drive after line drive at Show, who had to dance around the missiles, and then Clark yelled at him to get back to doing his job, shagging fly balls.

Message delivered. Play the game the right way. Pitchers don’t shag flies anymore before games. That not only kept pitchers engaged in team activities, but it also built up stamina so they could go more than four innings.

You see, for generations baseball had ways to police the game from within. It is a much different game now with Rob Manfred and his Minions running the show. That’s why I call it a Show Game, not the Real Game.

Another former pitching coach and pitcher weighed in with me with this assessment of Valdez’ actions. “Not very cool. Embarrassing to do that to your teammate. He’s a free agent and I hope Nerd management remembers the type of teammate he is and that makeup does matter.’’

Makeup matters. But my guess is that Nerds will only go for the metrics not the makeup. It is the way of the baseball world these days.

The good news for the Yankees is that the Astros do not appear to be the obstacle that they used to be. The electronic sign stealing years are a thing of the past for the Astros.

In 2017 A.J. Hinch’s Astros beat the Yankees in the ALCS in seven games, winning all four games in Houston – funny how that happened. In 2019, Hinch’s Astros beat the Yankees in the ALCS in six games. In 2022 the post-cheating Astros, led by Dusty Baker, a true manager, swept the Yankees in the ALCS.

Houston has been the Yankees problem, but the Yankees have won eight straight in Houston heading into Wednesday’s game. These Astros have trouble scoring runs. The Yankees have been crushing home runs. Going into Wednesday they lead all of baseball with 236 home runs so maybe Framber Valdez should not have been that shocked by Grisham’s grand slam. The Dodgers are next with 204 home runs while the Astros are 18th in home runs. The Yankees have had trouble with athletic teams, but the Astros are low in power and low in speed, they are 23rd in stolen bases with only 71.

The AL is again there for the taking for the Yankees, just like in 2024. Overall, this is the poorest shape I’ve seen the American League in quite some time. There are no scary teams and the Yankees, for all their issues, seem to be the class of the league.

The Red Sox have played well lately but their young spark-plug Roman Anthony injured his left oblique on a swing and is out four to six weeks, knocking him out for the rest of the regular season and into the playoffs. It’s amazing to me how a 21-year-old can suffer such an injury but with all the different types of hitting drills and power styles these days, anything can happen. The Red Sox are so high on Anthony, they gave him an eight-year, $130 million extension last month. He was hitting .292 and is considered a leader so this is a double blow for the Red Sox.

Hitters often use the same power swing on all types of pitches and do not adjust, and one talent evaluator told me that is what happened to Anthony.

The injury epidemic is everywhere in baseball in 2025. It is another part of the game that has changed drastically and taking a step back and looking at the Valdez “cross-up’’ to Salazar, that pitch could have easily injured the thumb on his catching hand if Salazar had gotten mitt to baseball. In a way, he was lucky to have just gotten whacked in the chest.

Either way it is a terrible look for the Astros and from this point forward something like this can either bring them together as a team or tear them apart.

Makeup, and not just metrics, is vitally important in today’s crossed-up MLB game.