Not every prospect is the same. Not every player is the same. That's why making comparisons is so much a fool's errand and why every young pitcher with bad velocity and good control gets hung with a Greg Maddux comp (even though that's patently ridiculous).
↵Developing players runs in the same way. Players respond in different ways and teams can spend lots of time on guys who never actually get better than their small sample sizes. Take Chris Johnson on the one hand. We all knew he wasn't going to do as well as that marvelous run his rookie season. The Astros quickly cut bait with him and moved onto the next big thing, Jimmy Paredes.
↵With Matt Wieters, the Orioles stuck with him despite offensive struggles for most of his first three seasons. He didn't perform atrociously, but he was slightly below league average in a lot of ways. And yet, his defense and prospect status kept him on the field, allowing him to make a breakthrough.
↵You can make the same comparison to Jordan Lyles and Paredes this season, I think . Lyles did not have a good season, but will be given plenty of chances for the next few seasons to prove he can be a top-flight pitcher. He may not get there, but the Astros have time.
↵With Paredes, all the numbers point at him fallling just as much as CJ did this year. However, he brings one thing to the table that Johnson does not: defensive value. Paredes is good enough defensively to warrant playing time even when he's not hitting .300. It may take some time for Paredes, Jose Altuve and J.D. Martinez to become the players Houston wants, but they've certainly got the time to develop them.
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