After a well-timed All-Star break for them, the Astros get back to work with what is merely their biggest series of the season to date, three games at the Seattle Mariners. The Astros staggered into the break with a 1-5 homestand, while the Mariners pasted the best team in the American League (Detroit Tigers) scoring 35 runs in a three-game sweep. Net result, the Astros AL West lead stands at five games entering play Friday night. That is down from the season best seven-game cushion they enjoyed going into last weekend, but still a fine spot in which to be. Last season the Astros came out of the break one game out of first place, also resuming play in Seattle. They beat the Mariners in the first two games to leapfrog into the division lead. The Astros didn’t stay in first the rest of the way, last waking up in second place on August 7 one game into an eight-game August winning streak that gave them control of the race which they would not relinquish. The Mariners shoot for role reversal this year. Their starting pitching has rounded into near-full health and makes them a potential danger. The Astros’ starting rotation presently is Framber Valdez, Hunter Brown, and a bunch of question marks. Even Brown showed some vulnerability by getting hit hard in his last two starts, a minor taint to his brilliant pre-All Star Game season.

It’s not a must for the Mariners that they take at least two out of these three at T-Mobile Park, but it would be a huge body blow to them if the Astros take the series, especially given the Astros are still without Yordan Alvarez, Jeremy Pena, and Jake Meyers. The trade deadline is two weeks away. Astros general manager Dana Brown is on the hunt for a left-handed hitter. They certainly can’t believe their best option is to promote Jon Singleton from the minors, though taking some playing time away from Christian Walker at first base is warranted if he doesn’t step it up. Still, it’s an outfield or second base bat that is a more pressing need. Counting on production from Jacob Melton once healthy would also be a dubious plan, but it would be the cheapest way to go. The Astros are presently just a couple of million dollars below the first Collective Bargaining Agreement tax threshold, which Jim Crane definitely prefers to stay under since the Astros would pay a repeater-tax penalty tax rate of 30 percent. Adding five million in salary would incur about a million and a half in tax. That is chump change, though going over the first tax threshold again this year would mean doing so again next season would result in a 50 percent tax rate. Still, unless going well over the threshold, that is pennies and nickels for a franchise Jim Crane and his partners bought for 610 million dollars and could now likely sell for between two and a half and three billion. However, willingness to pay tax doesn’t mean the Astros can just snap their fingers and make any preferred acquisitions.

What the Mariners try to accomplish before the deadline is a big question. Their payroll sits about 60 million dollars below the Astros’. In the offseason the Mariners “big” additions were laughable. Rowdy Tellez was big only as in overweight. He was last good in 2022, was lousy for the Mariners, and was released late last month. Seattle enthused exactly none of its fans by adding 37-year-old Donovan Solano. He has an OPS worse than Christian Walker’s. The Mariners have one of the best farm systems among the 30 big league franchises, the Astros have one of the worst. Any player the Astros seek, the Mariners could make a better offer. That is true of most teams relative to the Astros, but it’s the Mariners the Astros have tormented in recent years. Seattle has finished second to Houston in the AL West in three of the last four seasons, and the one season in which the Mariners made the playoffs as a Wild Card, the Astros began their run to 2022 World Series glory by sweeping the M’s in three games. Mariners’ fans should be steaming if the franchise doesn’t take a good-sized swing at an upgrade or two to at minimum strengthen their pursuit of a Wild Card.

The Astros won four of the first seven meeting with the Mariners this year, so splitting the remaining six would give the Astros the tiebreaker should it come into play at season’s end. After this weekend, the remaining series between the two arises at Daikin Park, September 19-21.

Through a different lens

Nobody knows when the Astros get back Alvarez, and at what level of performance. Yordan’s career-high for home runs in a season is the 37 he smashed in 2022. That is one way of placing in perspective the ridiculous season Mariners’ catcher Cal Raleigh has going. Raleigh has 38 homers as play resumes. That’s on pace for 64 which would break Aaron Judge’s American League record of 62. The single season mark by a player who caught the majority of his games played is the 48 posted by Salvador Perez in 2021.

For Astro-centric conversation, join Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and me for the Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast which drops each Monday afternoon, with an additional episode now on Thursday. Click here to catch!

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