Houston Astros : News : Houston Astros News
The key line is GM Tim Purpura’s, saying that Pettitte has twice this spring fallen on the stairs in his house and sprained his ankle. Well, that and the one where Purpura says they’d let him play in the regular season with the ankle injury, but “being Spring Training, where he was going to have to cover his position, cover bunts, cover first, whatever, it doesn’t make any sense for him to [pitch].” Huh?
Pettitte has always worked very closely to the line between fantasy plus and fantasy placeholder, and while this news surely isn’t a reason to back off completely, you have to consider it a warning and a good reason to keep a close eye on him as spring training proceeds.