Never able to match his profuse minor league production with the St. Louis Cardinals, Tyler Greene gets a second chance with the Houston Astros. That’s how both he and his new club see it after the infielder was traded to Houston for a player to be named or cash Thursday before the Astros’ 5-0 loss to the Washington Nationals.
Greene, 28, was selected by current Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow, then in charge of the Cardinals’ draft operations, in the first round in 2005. He has a .218 career batting average with a .295 on-base percentage and a .358 slugging percentage, never able to match his .291/.373/.477 line as a Class AAA player.
“I’m hoping that whatever it is is going to be different here, because he’s certainly an exciting player,” Luhnow said. “I’ve known him since he was at Georgia Tech. He’s got all the talent in the world to be a successful major league player.
“Hopefully he’ll feel like he’s got an opportunity here to do that in a little bit more relaxed atmosphere and show us what he’s capable of doing.”
Greene is aiming for exactly the same with his new club, where he will be used mostly as a shortstop. He also played second base and third base well with the Cardinals in what was fruitful from a team standpoint but disappointing as an individual.
“What’s happened here in the past stays here,” Greene told reporters in St. Louis of his rocky tenure with the Cardinals. “This is a new start for me with Houston.”
He will join the Astros roster on Friday and provide some much-needed backup for shortstop Marwin Gonzalez. Previously, the Astros were in scramble mode when Gonzalez was unavailable given the prior injury to Jed Lowrie.
“When your backup at shortstop is Brett Wallace, you’ve got to think of other options,” Luhnow said.