THE PALLILOG
How the Houston Astros can punch their postseason ticket right now
Aug 18, 2023, 12:21 pm
The Astros open a three-game series with the Mariners on Friday night. Composite image by Jack Brame.
Let's discuss the top 5 reasons for the Astros recent success
The Astros can essentially wrap up a playoff spot over the next week. The big goal is still to shoot past the Texas Rangers and win another American League West championship, but job one is making sure that at bare minimum a Wild Card entry into the postseason tournament is a certainty. The Astros start the weekend trailing the Rangers by two and a half games. They are also two and a half games behind the Tampa Bay Rays for the top Wild Card.
They are three games up on the Toronto Blue Jays for the second Wild Card, three and a half games ahead of Seattle for the final Wild Card, with the Red Sox three games behind the Mariners. Well lookee here. The Astros play host to the Mariners for three games this weekend before the Red Sox are in town for four. The Astros winning both series would just about deal death blows to the M’s or BoSox making the playoffs at the Astros’ expense. Conversely, a losing homestand would make things uncomfortable for the Astros, especially with series in Boston and Seattle still remaining.
Three starts in to his second time around with the Astros Justin Verlander has been rather average, with mini-trending going in the wrong direction. He’s made one excellent start (seven innings two earned runs at the Yankees), one okay start (six innings three earned runs vs. the Angels), one poor start (five innings, four earned runs at the Marlins). It is evident that his stuff has fallen off a half notch, generating swings and misses and strikeouts at a much lower rate than pre-2023 JV. The Astros tweaked their rotation so that Verlander could make his Miami start on his preferred four days rest. That should not be the norm. He’s 40!
Verlander and others might argue that last season he was awesome on four days rest with a 0.90 earned run average over five starts. Well guess what, he was even better on six or more days rest with a 0.63 ERA over seven starts. After the All-Star break last season Verlander’s only start on four days rest was the start when he strained a calf and went on the injured list. Verlander’s meticulousness and competitiveness have been part of his greatness. Those traits shouldn’t be allowed to become stubbornness to a fault. Extra days rest for him make sense. After next week the Astros are off the final five Thursdays of the regular season. Building around Verlander going on four days rest would be foolhardy.
Jeremy Pena is having a good August but overall his second big league season clearly remains disappointing to this point. Pena’s 2023 salary is $754,900. Carlos Correa is having a massively disappointing season for Minnesota and has been no better than Pena. Correa is in the first year of his six year 200 million dollar with the Twins. That’s 33.333 million dollars per season. Pena turns 26 September 22, the same day Correa turns 29.
Chas McCormick’s salary is $752,500. In late May Chas endured a one for 20 slump that dropped his batting average to .211 and OPS to .663. Those numbers could have warranted a demotion to Sugar Land if the Astros had quality alternatives. They did not, and since then Chas has been spectacular. In a stretch of 57 games covering 54 starts the 28 years old McCormick is batting .315 with a whopping 1.015 OPS. Last season Yordan Alvarez finished with a 1.019 OPS. George Springer has 2024-2026 left after on the six year 150 million dollar contract he signed with Toronto. Springer has been absolutely mediocre this year. He turns 34 next month.
Moral of these stories? Regardless of what Dana Brown says publicly, keeping guys as “Astros for life” is generally empty chatter. Unless Jim Crane has a bizarre change of heart, Alex Bregman can forget any long term huge dollar extension. Bregman is merely a good player at this point, from 2020 forward just a .257 hitter with a .792 OPS. That’s not remotely elite, and is clearly inferior to where Springer and Correa were when they left via free agency. When Bregman can hit the market after next season, he will be 30.
Jose Altuve is also free agent-eligible after next season. He’ll be 34 and the risk factors of more injuries and performance fade are real, but a healthy Altuve remains a remarkable player. If there is one guy who “Astro for life” should apply to, it’s Altuve. But business is business. The discipline that has served Crane so well will be tested.
Then there’s Kyle Tucker. He ended May with a rather meh .267 average and .775 OPS. Since then, a phenomenal performance with a .320 batting average and 1.001 OPS that probably has vaulted Tucker into the top five for AL Most Valuable Player. Tucker is the guy with whom Crane needs to show some intelligent contractual flexibility. Tucker turns 27 in January. There is very little chance that Jacob Melton, Colin Barber, Joey Loperfido, or any other outfielder in the Astros’ minor league system becomes as good as Tucker is now and should remain for the next three to five seasons. “Overpaying” Tucker on the back end of a seven or eight year deal that takes him through his age 33 or 34 season to secure the entirety of his prime would not be bad business. Damn sure not in comparison to signing a declining 36-year-old “slugger” to a three-year deal. Not mentioning any names (Cough. Jose Abreu. Cough.)
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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.
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