Hey, Ed. Del needs you to lose again this week. Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images
Has Texas finally found an identity on offense?
Questions about the Longhorn’s return to the elite of college football seem to be never ending and really miss the point. The only time Texas was great in my lifetime they had a clear identity. It was a somewhat fortunate and not likely to be sustainable identity, but it worked. Build your program around two legends at QB and watch the program flourish. That is somewhat tongue in cheek as Texas had great players everywhere when Mack Brown had it going. It really is remarkable though that Vince Young and Colt McCoy both were the starting quarterbacks at Texas in such a short amount of time. Texas has been looking for their next quarterback heir ever since. The inability to find the next great one got Mack Brown fired and is partly why Charlie Strong got fired too. Beating Oklahoma doesn’t mean Sam Ehlinger is the next in line. His play in a single game against a bad defense shouldn’t be the focus. How Texas won that game should be.
Texas was the bully in that game. They beat up Oklahoma for three-plus quarters on both sides of the ball. The Longhorn defense under Todd Orlando has that reputation. The Longhorns offense does not. That beat up another blue blood program when they dominated USC earlier in the year as well. It isn’t just the Texas offensive line that are bullies on offense. They have big strong wide receivers that outmuscled and ran through smaller Sooner defensive backs on the perimeter all game long. If Texas is actually “back” it will be about establishing a consistent identity on both sides of the ball that permeates throughout the program. This past Saturday against the Sooners was a great start.
Hate Watch Record 3-3: Miami beats FSU 28-27
The game was ugly for almost three quarters if you were a Miami fan. Losing to your hated rivals is one thing. Losing to them at home when you’re a two touchdown favorite could ruin a season. Florida State’s season-long issues along the offensive line bore themselves out in the second half as the Seminoles were shut out and amassed a total of 45 yards of total offense in after halftime. Two turnovers by Florida State inside their own 30-yard line gave the crowd in Miami and the team life. After being down 27-7 late in the third Miami stormed back to win 28-27. The victory is Miami’s second straight in the series after losing seven in a row to their in-state rivals.
Hate Watch Game of the Week: Georgia vs LSU
I can’t even pretend like this is based on anything other than a LSU loss helps my team’s chances. If Miami’s slim hopes of making the college football playoff are to get better, LSU losing more than one game this season has to happen. The Tigers lost to Florida on the road last week but their resounding win over Miami in Week 1 would make them an obvious choice if it came down to picking between the Tigers and the Canes for a playoff spot. LSU also has a schedule the rest of the way where winning out would assuredly put them in the playoffs. Rooting for Georgia is simply pragmatic.
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Through 20 games, the Houston Astros have managed just six wins and are in last place in the AL West.
Their pitching staff trails only Colorado with a 5.24 ERA and big-money new closer Josh Hader has given up the same number of earned runs in 10 games as he did in 61 last year.
Despite this, these veteran Astros, who have reached the AL Championship Series seven consecutive times, have no doubt they’ll turn things around.
“If there’s a team that can do it, it’s this team,” shortstop Jeremy Peña said.
First-year manager Joe Espada, who was hired in January to replace the retired Dusty Baker, discussed his team’s early struggles.
“It’s not ideal,” he said. “It’s not what we expected, to come out of the shoot playing this type of baseball. But you know what, this is where we’re at and we’ve got to pick it up and play better. That’s just the bottom line.”
Many of Houston’s problems have stemmed from a poor performance by a rotation that has been decimated by injuries. Ace Justin Verlander and fellow starter José Urquidy haven’t pitched this season because of injuries and lefty Framber Valdez made just two starts before landing on the injured list with a sore elbow.
Ronel Blanco, who threw a no-hitter in his season debut April 1, has pitched well and is 2-0 with a 0.86 ERA in three starts this season. Cristian Javier is also off to a good start, going 2-0 with a 1.54 ERA in four starts, but the team has won just two games not started by those two pitchers.
However, Espada wouldn’t blame the rotation for Houston’s current position.
“It’s been a little bit of a roller coaster how we've played overall,” he said. “One day we get good starting pitching, some days we don’t. The middle relief has been better and sometimes it hasn’t been. So, we’ve just got to put it all together and then play more as a team. And once we start doing that, we’ll be in good shape.”
The good news for the Astros is that Verlander will make his season debut Friday night when they open a series at Washington and Valdez should return soon after him.
“Framber and Justin have been a great part of our success in the last few years,” second baseman Jose Altuve said. “So, it’s always good to have those two guys back helping the team. We trust them and I think it’s going to be good.”
Hader signed a five-year, $95 million contract this offseason to give the Astros a shutdown 7-8-9 combination at the back end of their bullpen with Bryan Abreu and Ryan Pressly. But the five-time All-Star is off to a bumpy start.
He allowed four runs in the ninth inning of a 6-1 loss to the Braves on Monday night and has yielded eight earned runs this season after giving up the same number in 56 1/3 innings for San Diego last year.
He was much better Wednesday when he struck out the side in the ninth before the Astros fell to Atlanta in 10 innings for their third straight loss.
Houston’s offense, led by Altuve, Yordan Alvarez and Kyle Tucker, ranks third in the majors with a .268 batting average and is tied for third with 24 homers this season. But the Astros have struggled with runners in scoring position and often failed to get a big hit in close games.
While many of Houston’s hitters have thrived this season, one notable exception is first baseman José Abreu. The 37-year-old, who is in the second year of a three-year, $58.5 million contract, is hitting 0.78 with just one extra-base hit in 16 games, raising questions about why he remains in the lineup every day.
To make matters worse, his error on a routine ground ball in the eighth inning Wednesday helped the Braves tie the game before they won in extra innings.
Espada brushed off criticism of Abreu and said he knows the 2020 AL MVP can break out of his early slump.
“Because (of) history,” Espada said. “The back of his baseball card. He can do it.”
Though things haven’t gone well for the Astros so far, everyone insists there’s no panic in this team which won its second World Series in 2022.
Altuve added that he doesn’t have to say anything to his teammates during this tough time.
“I think they’ve played enough baseball to know how to control themselves and how to come back to the plan we have, which is winning games,” he said.
The clubhouse was quiet and somber Wednesday after the Astros suffered their third series sweep of the season and second at home. While not panicking about the slow start, this team, which has won at least 90 games in each of the last three seasons, is certainly not happy with its record.
“We need to do everything better,” third baseman Alex Bregman said. “I feel like we’re in a lot of games, but we just haven’t found a way to win them. And good teams find a way to win games. So we need to find a way to win games.”