THE PALLILOG
Changes have already begun for Houston Astros scuffling offense
Jun 10, 2022, 10:50 am
Dusty Baker finally moved Kyle Tucker ahead of Yuli Gurriel in the lineup. Composite image by Jack Brame.
The hiccup of losing two out of three at home to Seattle this week aside, the Astros roll merrily along with a beyond robust nine game lead atop the American League West. That is thanks to their own fine play and the utter implosion of the Los Angeles Angels. The Angels’ franchise record 14 game losing streak cost manager Joe Maddon his job and saw the Halos plunge from 27-17 and just one game behind the Astros, to 27-31 and nine and a half back. Basically, the AL West race looks over with the Astros to win it for the fifth time in six years. Still, the Astros are no unstoppable juggernaut. They’ve been whipping up (to their credit) on an amazingly soft schedule. There are issues that should be addressed. As covered last week, Yuli Gurriel has played so far this season as if washed up. The Maldonado/Castro catching combo continues to be worse than sub-pathetic at the plate. General Manager James Click should be pursuing upgrades at both spots. Then there’s the more perplexing plight of Alex Bregman.
At the end of the 2019 season the then 25-year-old Bregman had booked the early phase of what could viably project as a Hall of Fame career. No Astro has ever been better over his first full three seasons in the Major Leagues. In 2017 he merely helped the Astros win the World Series, highlighted by the game winning hit in the incredible game five against the Dodgers. Bregman’s 2018 was tremendous with him earning a first All-Star spot and finishing fifth in American League Most Valuable Player Award voting. He was the most swaggering Stro. Remember his thing of getting into the dugout after a home run trot and doing a snap head turn and stare into a dugout camera? 2019 was even better with another All-Star spot and a runner-up finish to Mike Trout for AL MVP. Now when Bregman looks into a mirror he could understandably be thinking “I'm only 28. What the heck has happened to me?”
It's not as if this Alex Bregman is an absolutely lousy player, but he is currently closer to one than rating with the elite third basemen of the game (presently Jose Ramirez, Manny Machado, Nolan Arenado, and Rafael Devers, and maybe Austin Riley). This is the third straight season with Bregman’s decline in status a simple fact. He had hamstring problems in both 2020 and 2021, and wrist surgery last November. If there is some ongoing cumulative toll from his injuries, that’s the way it goes. Bregman has been healthy so far this year, missing just two games. He just hasn’t been good. “It’s still early” isn’t true anymore. He’d never been this unproductive for two straight months. A .220 batting average with underwhelming power numbers add up to a soft .377 slugging percentage. About three weeks ago Bregman thought he’d identified a mechanical flaw in his swing. Since then he’s been worse. Bregman’s major offensive positive this year is he draws a lot of walks. So while his .220 batting average stinks, his .339 on base percentage is higher than Jeremy Pena’s (average .277, OBP .330) and fairly close to Jose Altuve’s (average .280, OBP .355).
The way the Astros backloaded the five year 100 million dollar extension Bregman signed before the 2019 season, they owe him 28 and a half million dollars cash on the barrelhead in both 2023 and 2024. Ouch. A dramatic turnaround for the better could happen, but that one is inevitable is silly. No doubt plenty will note that Bregman has not been a big-time player since the cheating scandal came to light. Part of that is you reap what you sow. However, there was no finding of Astros' illegal activity in 2019, which was Bregman's peak season.
Dusty Baker occasionally does some exasperating things with his batting order. EVER batting Niko Goodrum second or third, or Jose Siri at the top of the order leap to mind. A positive this week: he finally moved Kyle Tucker ahead of Gurriel in the lineup. Ideally Bregman would be dropped to sixth or seventh in the order, but with the sinkholes that are Gurriel, the catchers, and on balance the centerfielder production (Chas McCormick not so bad, Siri yuck), Dusty is not blessed with obvious solutions. Pena is having a terrific rookie season but has cooled off the last couple weeks.
Again, James Click should be in the market for improvements. Other than Jake Meyers perhaps boosting output from center field, internal help is almost certainly not there for this year. Top Astros’ catching prospect Korey Lee is batting .207 at Triple-A Sugar Land. Lee can get his shot in 2023. Cubs’ catcher/free agent-to-be Willson Contreras would be a fabulous rental and massive upgrade. Nationals’ switch-hitting first baseman Josh Bell would be an interesting pursuit, also a free agent-to-be but a re-sign candidate with the 38-year-old Gurriel’s contract up after this season and no heir apparent in the organization. The Astros’ farm system is not strong, but has enough that Click can and better competitively bid on at least one significant move.
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While holding one’s breath that for a change the Astros aren’t publicly grossly underestimating an injury’s severity with Jose Altuve having missed the last game and a half with “right side discomfort…”
The Astros averting a sweep vs. Oakland Thursday was in no way a must-win, but getting the win allowed a mini sigh of relief. The Astros are NOT in the process of choking. Could they collapse? Sure that’s possible. Also possible is that they’ve just been in one more ebb phase in a season of ebb and flow. They certainly have left the door ajar for the Seattle Mariners to swipe the American League West, but with the M's simply not looking good enough to walk through that door the Astros remain in commanding position. The Astros made a spectacular charge from 10 games behind to grab the division lead. But there was a lot of runway left when the Astros awoke June 19th 10 games in arrears. September 3 the Astros arose with a comfy six game lead over the M’s. With Seattle blowing a 4-1 eighth inning lead in a 5-4 loss to the Texas Rangers Thursday night, heading into Friday night the Astros' advantage is back up to four and a half games despite the Astros having lost six of their last nine games and having gone just 10-12 over their last 22 games. Not a good stretch but nothing freefalling about it.
While the Mariners have the remainder of their four-game series vs. the dead in the water Rangers this weekend, the Astros play three at the lousy Los Angeles Angels. The Astros should take advantage of the Halos, with whom they also have a four-game series at Minute Maid Park next weekend. Since the All-Star break, only the White Sox have a worse record than the Angels 19-31 mark (the White Sox are 6-43 post-break!). Two of the three starting pitchers the Angels will throw this weekend will be making their third big league starts. To begin next week the Astros are in San Diego for a three-game-set against a Padres club which is flat better than the Astros right now. That does not mean the Astros can’t take that series. The Mariners meanwhile will be still at home, for three vs. the Yankees.
There are some brutal Astros’ statistics that largely explain why this is merely a pretty good team and not more. As I have noted before, it is a fallacy that the best teams are usually superior in close games. But the Astros have been pathetic in close games. There used to be a joke made about Sammy Sosa that he could blow you out, but he couldn’t beat you. Meaning being that when the score was 6-1, 8-3 or the like Sammy would pad his stats with home runs and runs batted in galore. But in a tight game, don’t count on Sammy to come through very often. In one-run games the Astros are 15-26, in two-run games they are 10-14. In games that were tied after seven innings they are 3-12. In extra innings they are 5-10. The good news is, all those realities mean nothing when the postseason starts. So long as you’re in the postseason. In games decided by three or more runs the Astros have pummeled the opposition to the tune of 53 wins and 28 losses.
General Manager Dana Brown isn’t an Executive of the Year candidate, but overall he’s been fine this season. Without the Yusei Kikuchi trade deadline acquisition the Astros would likely barely lead the AL West. Brown’s biggest offseason get, Victor Caratini, has done very solid work in his part-time role. Though he has tapered off notably the last month and change, relief pitcher Tayler Scott was a fabulous signing. Scrap heap pickups Ben Gamel, Jason Heyward, and Kaleb Ort have all made contributions. However…
Dana. Dana! You made yourself look very silly with comments this week somewhat scoffing at people being concerned with or dismissive of Justin Verlander’s ability to be a meaningful playoff contributor. Brown re-sang a ridiculous past tune, the “check the back of his baseball card” baloney. Dana, did you mean like the back of Jose Abreu’s baseball card? Perhaps Brown has never seen those brokerage ads in which at the end in fine print and/or in rapidly spoken words “past performance is no guarantee of future results” always must be included. Past (overall career) performance as indicative of future results for a 41-year-old pitcher who has frequently looked terrible and has twice missed chunks of this season to two different injuries is absurd. That Verlander could find it in time is plausible. That of course he’ll find it? Absolutely not. His next two starts are slotted to be against the feeble Angels, so even if the results are better, it won’t mean “JV IS BACK!”
Presuming they hold on to win the division, the Astros’ recent sub-middling play means they have only very faint hope of avoiding having to play the best-of-three Wild Card Series. Barring a dramatic turn over the regular season’s final fortnight, Framber Valdez and Hunter Brown are the obvious choices to start games one and two. If there is a game three, it is one game do or die. Only a fool would think Verlander the right man for that assignment. No one should expect Brown to say “Yeah, JV is likely finished as a frontline starter.” But going to the “back of the baseball card” line was laughable. Father Time gets us all eventually. Verlander has an uphill climb extricating himself from Father Time’s grasp.
*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.