Astros GM's reasoning for Jose Abreu call-up ought to be a fireable offense

Jose Abreu had a season to forget in his first year with the Houston Astros, posting career lows in average, OPS, and OPS+. A strong postseason performance gave Astros fans hope that Abreu would look like his former All-Star self in his second year with the team, but they couldn't have been more wrong.

Abreu recorded seven hits in his first 71 at-bats of the season (.099 BA) and struggled so mightily to the point where the Astros had no choice but to send him down to the minors. The thinking was Abreu would spend a while away from the pressure of trying to help the team win and rediscover his swing.

The 37-year-old was sent down on May 1 and didn't appear in a game until May 17. Despite that, Astros GM Dana Brown said on the team's radio show that Abreu will be brought back up to the majors and activated for Monday's series opener against the Seattle Mariners. There's a non-zero chance that Abreu will be in the lineup at first base against the team that they're chasing in the AL West.

The only thing worse than the decision to bring Abreu back so soon is Brown's reasoning for it.

Dana Brown might have just put himself on the hot seat with nonsensical reasoning for Jose Abreu call-up

Abreu played a total of seven minor league games. Five of those came with the FCL Astros, Houston's Rookie Ball affiliate. Abreu performed admirably, recording seven hits in 22 at-bats including a home run. The Astros then moved him up to AAA Sugar Land where he'd play two games and fail to record a single hit.

Abreu went hitless in seven at-bats at the AAA level. He did draw a walk, but he also struck out three times and grounded into a double play. Despite a microscopic sample and no results, the Astros decided they've seen enough and that Abreu was ready to return with reasoning that just makes no sense.

"It's not really about the hits. We want to make sure he's getting quality at-bats. Sounds like he had a few quality at-bats"

To Brown's credit, he did have some quality at-bats. He was able to work some deep counts. However, is this not a results-based business? If Abreu works six or seven-pitch at-bats but gets out every single time is that worth it for them? He did work deep counts, but also put the ball in the air just once. He struck out three times and grounded out three times, which is not what Houston wants. It's not as if he was hitting bullets right at people.

With Abreu out of the picture, Houston had been starting Jon Singleton at first base most of the time. While Singleton didn't light the world on fire, his 110 OPS+ is actually ten points above the league average. On the flip side, Abreu had a -20 OPS+ in the majors when given the chance to play earlier this season, which doesn't feel possible.

Will Abreu play better than he did before? Almost certainly. I mean, can it get any worse? However, the Astros are likely set to remove a guy who has hit at a slightly above-league-average clip in a relatively decent sample size and replace him with a player who did nothing in AAA. All it took for the Astros to make that switch was just a couple of at-bats that appeared to be better than they were before? What has Abreu shown that suggests he'll hit close to as well as Singleton has?

The Astros don't have much room for failure due to their brutal start to the season. Rushing Abreu back when they simply didn't have to doesn't help, and Brown's reasoning could give Houston cause to fire him if things trend in the wrong direction again.