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2008 Before getting too crazy about Towles' season, remember that he was getting owned by the Carolina League in May when a suspension opened up a job at Double-A Corpus Christi. He tore up the Texas League and eventually made it all the way to Houston for a few weeks. Towles' buzz is the result of spending his age-21 and -22 seasons in the Sally League and two good months in Double-A. As much as the Astros need to replace Ausmus, they also need to be realistic about their in-house alternatives. 2007 Towles has had an injury-plagued career so far--a broken finger here, a sore knee there. None of the injuries have been serious, but they`ve limited him to 165 games since being drafted in 2004. That`s a shame, because when Towles is healthy, he`s pretty damn good, with a career average of .311, 60 extra-base hits and very good defensive skills to boot. The only issue is that he turns 23 before spring training and has yet to get out of A-ball. He`s an unproven commodity to be sure, but an interesting one.
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