Not in Hall of Fame

Published in Top 50 Toronto Blue Jays
February 15, 2023

49. Jose Cruz

Jose Cruz came from a baseball pedigree as the son of the Astros star of the same name. Also playing in the Outfield, the younger Cruz went to the Jays from Seattle as a rookie, and though there were high hopes for Cruz, the Mariners dealt him for pitching help in their playoff run. He finished the year as the American League runner-up for the Rookie of the Year with a 26 HR year.

Cruz looked poised for greatness after his rookie year, but the next two seasons, it did not come to fruition, with Cruz missing Games due to injury with diminished power numbers (25 HR in 211 Games) with a Batting Average barely scraping .250. His next two years were much better, belting 31 and 34 Home Runs, respectively, but with the exception of 2001, his OPS never breached .800, though he was a 30-30 player that year. He regressed again in 2002 and left for the Giants after as a Free Agent.

Cruz might have disappointed, but he did manage to belt 122 Home Runs with 640 Hits as a Blue Jay, which is more than many can claim.

Published in Baseball
June 12, 2021

148. Jose Cruz

In the late 1970s, and early 1980s, the Houston Astros had put together a good team, but they did not see a lot of National attention, as they had never won anything of note before. Those who were paying attention to Houston couldn’t take their eyes off their Puerto Rican Outfielder, Jose Cruz.

Published in Not in Hall of Fame News
August 16, 2019

Our Top 50 All-Time Houston Astros has been revised

Yes, we know that this is taking a while!

As many of you know, we here at Notinhalloffame.com are slowly generating the 50 of each major North American sports team. That being said, we have existing Top 50 lists out and we always consistently look to update them when we can and based on necessity. As such, we are very happy to present the first revision of our top 50 Houston Astros of all-time.

As for all of our top 50 players in baseball we look at the following:

Advanced Statistics.

Traditional statistics and how they finished in the American League.

Playoff accomplishments.

Their overall impact on the team and other intangibles not reflected in a stat sheet.

Remember, this is ONLY based on what a player does on that particular team and not what he accomplished elsewhere and also note that we have placed an increased importance on the first two categories, which has altered the rankings considerably.

This list is updated up until the end of the 2018 Season.

The complete list can be found here, but as always we announce our top five in this article. They are:

Jeff Bagwell

Craig Biggio

Lance Berkman

Cesar Cedeno

Jose Altuve

There is a significant shift in many of the players and a few new ones based on shuffling of the metrics we have used for our Top 50s.

The biggest change based on recent play is Altuve’s rise to number 5.

As always we thank you for your support.

Published in Top 50 Houston Astros
April 14, 2016

6. Jose Cruz

A great hitter who hit .300 or above for the Astros six times, Jose Cruz finished in the top ten in MVP voting three times. Cruz, a two-time All-Star, would lead the NL in Hits in 1983 and was close to the 2,000 Hit mark with the Astros. Cruz would also exceed the 30 Stolen Base mark five times.