EVERY-THING SPORTS
Unorthodox or not, Astros keep finding ways to produce on their own terms
Sep 8, 2021, 5:01 pm
Would a true "ace" be nice? Of course! Composite image by Jack Brame.
Ever since the likes of Dallas Keuchel and Gerrit Cole left via free agency, and Justin Verlander got hurt, the Astros haven't had a true ace on their pitching staff. Yes, I'm aware Zack Greinke is on this team. I'm also very aware of Lance McCullers Jr, and Framber Valdez's respective presences in the rotation. I tend to look at a true "ace" of a pitching staff as a top of the line starter who'll give you at least six to seven innings and/or about 100 pitches per start. ESPN Houston's The Killer B's spoke about this on their show Tuesday. He's always a threat to win 20 games, approach 200 plus strikeouts or more, post a sub three ERA, and always finishes near the top three to five in the Cy Young voting. Keuchel won a Cy Young with the Astros in 2015. Cole finished second to Verlander in the 2019 Cy Young race, narrowly missing out by a 171 to 159 point edge.
None of the current pitchers in the starting rotation are a threat to put up those kinds of numbers. At least not as of this season. Greinke is a solid vet, but he isn't the threat he once was. Valdez has good to great stuff, but he has to prove he can do this on a more consistent basis. McCullers has all the tools to be an ace, but he hasn't been able to stay healthy. If he and Valdez can stay healthy, improve/fine tune their pitching repertoire, and be more consistent, they both have "ace" written all over them. So if the Astros don't have a true "ace", how are they one of the contenders in the American League to make it to and/or win a World Series?
Most top-notch starting rotations have an ace, a dependable number two, and the rest is a crap shoot. The Astros have three number twos (Greinke, Valdez, McCullers Jr), and a host of number threes and fours. The reason why not having an "ace" is a problem for this team is because their rotation is filled with guys who are secondary starters. A team is lucky to have an "ace", and even more lucky to have a pitcher or two behind that "ace" in order to command control with their rotation. The Astros have managed to do so without an "ace." They've been able to maintain control of first place in their division and stay in relative striking distance of the AL's best record with a rotation by committee. At certain points, they've gone to a six-man rotation whereas most teams utilize a five-man rotation. Having a surplus of starting caliber pitchers has afforded them that luxury.
What it has also afforded the Astros is the ability to interchange parts in their rotation as needed. Whether they've utilized the six-man rotation, or various versions of the traditional five-man rotation, they've navigated the waters to an AL West division lead, while almost guaranteeing a return to the postseason, and positioning themselves for another playoff run. With the moves they made at the trade deadline, they shored up the bullpen, which was once a weakness, and have made themselves into true contenders in the AL.
Would a true "ace" be nice? Of course! Is it an absolute necessity? Maybe not. Only time will tell whether this approach will work or not. I'd deem it a success if this team made it to another ALCS and/or World Series. Anything short of that isn't a failure, but it does speak to the lack of having a true "ace" and what that means to your rotation. This team will still go down as a dynasty for what they've done since 2015. Anything they do now will only add to that legacy. However, winning a ring now would force-feed the haters a big serving of STFU about the cheating scandal, and I'm here for it!
They’ll be watching in Canada, not just because of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, though the NBA’s scoring champion and MVP favorite who plays for Oklahoma City surely helps lure in fans who are north of the border.
They’ll be watching from Serbia and Greece, the homelands of Denver star Nikola Jokic and Milwaukee star Giannis Antetokounmpo. Alperen Sengun will have them watching Houston games in the middle of the night in Turkey, too. Slovenian fans will be watching Luka Doncic and the Lakers play their playoff opener at 2:30 a.m. Sunday, 5:30 p.m. Saturday in Los Angeles. Fans in Cameroon will be tuned in to see Pascal Siakam and the Indiana Pacers. Defending champion Boston features, among others, Kristaps Porzingis of Latvia and Al Horford of the Dominican Republic.
Once again, the NBA playoffs are setting up to be a showcase for international stars.
In a season where the five statistical champions were from five different countries, an NBA first — Gilgeous-Alexander is Canadian, rebounding champion Domantas Sabonis of Sacramento is from Lithuania, blocked shots champion Victor Wembanyama of San Antonio is from France, steals champion Dyson Daniels of Atlanta is from Australia, and assists champion Trae Young of the Hawks is from the U.S. — the postseason will have plenty of international feel as well. Gilgeous-Alexander is in, while Sabonis and Daniels (along with Young, obviously) could join him if their teams get through the play-in tournament.
“We have a tremendous number of international players in this league,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this season. “It’s roughly 30% of our players representing, at least on opening day, 43 different countries, so there’s much more of a global sense around our teams.”
By the end of the season, it wound up being 44 different countries — at least in terms of countries where players who scored in the NBA this season were born. For the first time in NBA history, players from one country other than the U.S. combined to score more than 15,000 points; Canadian players scored 15,588 this season, led by Gilgeous-Alexander, the first scoring champion from that country.
Gilgeous-Alexander is favored to be MVP this season. It'll be either him or Jokic, which means it'll be a seventh consecutive year with an international MVP for the NBA. Antetokounmpo won twice, then Jokic won three of the next four, with Cameroon-born Joel Embiid of the Philadelphia 76ers winning two seasons ago.
“Shai is in the category of you do not stop him,” Toronto coach Darko Rajakovic said after a game between the Raptors and Thunder this season.
In other words, he's like a lot of other international guys now. Nobody truly stops Jokic, Antetokounmpo and Doncic either.
And this season brought another international first: Doncic finished atop the NBA's most popular jersey list, meaning NBAStore.com sold more of his jerseys than they did anyone else's. Sure, that was bolstered by Doncic changing jerseys midseason when he was traded by Dallas to the Los Angeles Lakers, but it still is significant.
The Slovenian star is the first international player to finish atop the most popular jerseys list — and the first player other than Stephen Curry or LeBron James to hold that spot in more than a decade, since soon-to-be-enshrined Basketball Hall of Famer Carmelo Anthony did it when he was with New York in 2012-13.
“We’re so small, we have 2 million people. But really, our sport is amazing,” fellow Slovene Ajsa Sivka said when she was drafted by the WNBA's Chicago Sky on Monday night and asked about Doncic and other top Slovenian athletes. “No matter what sport, we have at least someone that’s great in it. I’m just really proud to be Slovenian.”
All this comes at a time where the NBA is more serious than perhaps ever before about growing its international footprint. Last month, FIBA — the sport's international governing body — and the NBA announced a plan to partner on a new European basketball league that has been taking shape for many years. The initial target calls for a 16-team league and it potentially could involve many of the biggest franchise names in Europe, such as Real Madrid, Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester City.
It was a season where four players topped 2,000 points in the NBA and three of them were international with Gilgeous-Alexander, Jokic and Antetokounmpo. Globally, time spent watching NBA League Pass was up 6% over last season. More people watched NBA games in France this season than ever before, even with Wembanyama missing the final two months. NBA-related social media views in Canada this season set records, and league metrics show more fans than ever were watching in the Asia-Pacific region — already a basketball hotbed — as well.
FIBA secretary general Andreas Zagklis said the numbers — which are clearly being fueled by the continued international growth — suggest the game is very strong right now.
“Looking around the world, and of course here in North America," Zagklis said, "the NBA is most popular and more commercially successful than ever.”