THE PALLILOG
Eye-popping Astros projections with two thirds of the season in the books
Aug 6, 2021, 10:45 am
Thursday marked the start of the final third of the regular season. Composite image by Jack Brame.
Sad news with the death Wednesday night of former Astro J.R. Richard at 71 years old. Before the career ending stroke he suffered at just 30 years old in 1980, James Rodney Richard was one of the most intimidating pitchers ever to take the mound for the Astros or any other team. Six feet eight inches tall with a 100-mile per hour fastball, Richard at the end of his long pitching stride must have made batters feel like he was about handing the ball to the catcher at 100 MPH. He had a wipeout slider to go with it. In each of his final two full seasons, Richard topped 300 strikeouts and led the National League. Those same two seasons Nolan Ryan led the American League while with the Angels. Over those two seasons Ryan struck out 483. J.R. struck out 616. Nolan faced designated hitters instead of pitchers but that is still a huge gap. Since J.R. did it, the only pitchers to reach 300 Ks in consecutive seasons are Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson (not when they were teammates with the Diamondbacks). "The Big Unit" topped 330 four years in a row.
Three times Richard led the NL in walks, three times he led in wild pitches. In 1980 Richard had harnessed his wildness and was absolutely dominating. His earned run average was 1.90 and he'd given up just 65 hits in 113 2/3 innings. The league was batting .166 against him with a laughable .462 OPS. J.R. was making opposing lineups look like they were comprised of all guys significantly worse than Martin Maldonado (OPS this season .595). Richard started the All-Star Game July 8. He made one more start July 14 before being shut down feeling a "dead" arm. Barely two weeks later, the stroke on July 30.
In what has been disappointing to some and angering to some others, the Astros never retired J.R. Richard's number 50. The most recent Astro to wear number 50 was Charlie Morton, who certainly wore it with great distinction. J.R. is in the Astros' Hall of Fame. With COVID having messed up last year's planned celebration of Astros' Hall of Fame Class of 2020, the class will be honored Saturday night. The honorees are: Lance Berkman, Cesar Cedeno, Roy Hofheinz, Roy Oswalt, Billy Wagner, and Bob Watson.
Big opportunity for Astros
Off a 4-4 road trip to Seattle, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, the Astros should now resume racking up the wins. They started with a weak showing in losing to Minnesota Thursday night at Minute Maid Park so their American League West lead over Oakland is four games. While the A's play host to the abysmal Texas Rangers this weekend, the Astros get three more games against the lousy Twins. Those are followed by two at MMP vs the roadkill Rockies, three In Anaheim against the mediocre Angels, then four at crummy Kansas City. Winning fewer than nine of the next twelve would be at least mildly disappointing.
Astros projections
Thursday marked the start of the final third of the regular season schedule. Extrapolating some numbers from the two-thirds mark over the rest of the way…
Jose Altuve is on pace to top his career highs in home runs (career high is 31, on pace for 37), runs scored (112, 118), walks (60, 71), and strikeouts (84, 104).
Between injuries and a couple of down seasons Carlos Correa has never scored more than 82 runs in a season. He's on pace for 104. Correa's first full big league season (2016) is the only normal length season he's been healthy all the way. So far so good this year.
Kyle Tucker woke up May 9 batting .175. Since then he's hit .322 and is on pace for 31 homers and 99 runs batted in.
Historic Astros offense?
The Astros have never had four guys reach 100 RBI in the same season. Altuve, Tucker, Yuli Gurriel, and Yordan Alvarez are all on pace for from 96 to 105.
Buzzer Beaters:
1. Astros' starting pitchers may not combine for 19 complete games this decade. J.R. threw 19 complete games in 1979.
2. Lionel Messi may be the greatest soccer player ever. Messi is 34 years old so his leaving F.C. Barcelona isn't as big a deal as when the Edmonton Oilers traded Wayne Gretzky in his prime. It's probably a bigger deal than Michael Jordan unretiring to join the Washington Wizards. Jordan turned 40 during his second and final season with the Wizards. He played all 82 games and averaged 37 minutes per game. Load management of today's NBA must make Jordan laugh, if not make him nauseous.
3. Greatest real wizards, meaning not movie or book characters: Bronze-Gus Williams Silver-John Wooden Gold-Ozzie Smith
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How 3 major x-factors could tip the scales in Texans-Colts: Week 1
Sep 5, 2024, 7:27 pm
Each football game of a season carries much more weight than one game in a 162 Major League Baseball schedule. That reality, combined with the National Football League campaign opening and with it the most anticipated season in Texans’ history, the Astros are relegated to second banana this weekend. Just the way it goes despite the Astros’ phenomenal extended run from 10 games out of first place in mid-June to now having control of the American League West race and a likely (though definitely not yet certain) eighth consecutive year of postseason play.
It is reality that getting swept out of Cincinnati cost the Astros two games in the standings to Seattle the last two days and trimmed their division lead to four and a half games going into this weekend. There was nothing shameful about getting swept. It’s not as if they choked. They got outplayed and beaten in all three games. Stuff happens within a 162-game season. The 2019 Astros were vastly better than the 2024 Astros. The 2019 ‘Stros posted the best record in franchise history at 107-55. In Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole they had the two best pitchers in the AL. The Reds finished 75-87 in ’19. In the lone Astros-Reds series five years ago, Verlander and Cole started two of the three games. The Reds swept the Astros out of Cincy by scores of 3-2, 4-3, and 3-2. Stuff happens. The following week the Astros called up Yordan Alvarez. There is no Yordan coming to fortify the offense now, but wait! Is that Kyle Tucker's music?
The Astros host the NL champs this weekend
It’s highly unlikely but it’s still a possible World Series preview at Minute Maid Park this weekend with the Astros home for three games versus the Arizona Diamondbacks. The reigning National League Champions woke up under .500 July 11, but since then have been sizzling with 33 wins against just 15 losses. Over the same time frame the Astros are 27-21. The Diamondbacks by a large margin have scored the most runs in MLB this season, and that’s while playing the last nearly three weeks without Ketel Marte because of a high ankle sprain. Marte has been far and away the best second baseman in the game this year. He may return this weekend in a designated hitter role. The Arizona offense overall has been sensational, however it has vulnerability against left-handed pitching, in significant part because it typically takes lefty-hitting platoon beast Joc Pederson out of the lineup. The D’Backs are 55-35 in games facing right-handed starters, just 24-27 in games started by opposing southpaws. The Astros have lefties Framber Valdez and Yusei Kikuchi set to go in the first two games this weekend. While the Astros deal with the Diamondbacks the Mariners are in St. Louis for three against the Cardinals.
Eleven Diamondbacks have had at least 200 plate appearances this season. Only one of them has an OPS below .725. The Astros also have 11 guys with at least 200 PAs. Five of them lug around sub-.715 OPSes: Jeremy Pena (.714), Jake Meyers (.664), Mauricio Dubon (.645), Jon Singleton (.697), and Chas McCormick (.566).
Maximizing Tucker's return
Speaking of returns, Tucker fiiiiiiinally should see action for the first time since his June 3 bone bruise. Oh wait, broken leg. Shame on the Astros for their BSing over this and other injuries. Yeah, Alex Bregman slept funny. Whatever. To boost the lineup Tucker doesn’t have to be the .979 OPS MVP candidate he was when felled. Ben Gamel has done some good work, but over time he’s Ben Gamel. Same for Jason Heyward. If Tucker's legs are under him his power is a B-12 shot and only Yordan is in his league in on-base percentage. Joe Espada has decisions to make as to how slot the batting order. Against a right-handed starter Jose Altuve, Tucker, Alvarez, Yainer Diaz, Bregman one through five makes sense with Tucker dropping down below Yainer against a left-handed starter. No question those are the top five in some order. How much of a workload Tucker is ready for bears watching. Presumably he doesn’t initially play the outfield day in day out. When Tucker DHs obviously Bregman (and Yordan) can’t so Alex’s ailing elbow holding up is key. One might say hopefully the bone chips don’t fall where they may. Tuesday the Astros start a stretch playing 16 days in a row.
Keep hope alive!
If you’re an Astros fan holding out hope of chasing down the second seed to avoid having to play the best-of-three Wild Card series, say it with me, whatever nausea it may induce: “Go Dodgers Go!” Hurt as it might, business is business. The Dodgers play host to the Guardians. The Astros trail Cleveland by five games with just 22 to play, but do finish the regular season with three games at Cleveland. It's pretty much over for the Astros to catch both the Orioles and Yankees.
Season-long trends mean nothing once the playoffs start, and that’s a good thing for the Astros provided they are in the playoffs. They continue to flat out stink in close games. Thursday’s 1-0 loss to the Reds has the Astros record in one-run games at 15-24. In two-run games they are 10-14. Correlatively, the Astros also continue to routinely fail late in close games. The Astros have played 14 games that were tied after seven innings. They have lost 11 of the 14. In games tied after eight innings they are 7-13. Every team loses an extremely high percentage of games when trailing after eight innings, but the Astros haven’t pulled out a single game they’ve trailed going to the ninth. 0-50. Oh and fifty. But hey, the White Sox are 0-92!
*Catch our weekly Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast. Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and I discuss varied Astros topics. The first post for the week generally goes up Monday afternoon (second part released Tuesday) via The SportsMap HOU YouTube channel or listen to episodes in their entirety at Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.