THE PALLILOG
It's not just the Rockets with something at stake this weekend
Aug 28, 2020, 10:46 am
Composite photo by Brandon Strange
Quite a week as it pertains to sports. The Milwaukee Bucks opting to not play their scheduled playoff game Wednesday created an unprecedented domino effect of others choosing to do the same across multiple sports. The hope is that the one game pause will be means to a long game end of fixing some of America's ills such as police brutality against black people. Those who don't see nobility in the objective are largely beyond hope. The players pulling the plug on the season would have been foolhardy and financially catastrophic for them. Hence, plug unpulled. Principles should always matter. Principal usually does.
It is an American disgrace that so many on each side of the political aisle so often adhere to a "we're 100 percent right and they're 100 percent wrong" attitude. The casualization of lying is its own epidemic.
Rockets relaunch
And now back to the games. The additional time off between games four and five of their first round playoff series certainly isn't a bad thing for the Rockets. Despite Russell Westbrook's absence they seemed in control with a two games to none lead over Oklahoma City. That edge disappeared as the Rockets squandered leads in games three and four. Westbrook had been upgraded to questionable for game five had it been played Wednesday. An extra 48 hours or more of rehab time for Westbrook's injured quad could well make the difference on the will he or won't he play front, and if he will then his of level of explosiveness should benefit. The Rockets could get through this series without Westbrook. Against the Lakers they'd have little chance without him. That is unless LeBron James or Anthony Davis went down injured.
If two weeks ago I told you that Westbrook won't have played through four games of the series and that James Harden thus far would be maybe the fourth best guard in the Western Conference this postseason, you'd probably think the Rockets were in dire straits. It's not as if Harden is having a bad series. Utah's Donovan Mitchell and Denver's Jamal Murray have been spectacular and then some. Dallas's Luke Doncic may have produced the single best all-around game anyone will put up in the bubble.
Astros get another shot at the A's
The Astros and A's open a three game series Friday night at Minute Maid Park that is both huge and of little significance, and that is within a purely baseball context. If the Astros hope to win the American League West for a fourth year in a row, it's just about a must that they take at least two out of three this weekend. The A's lead is four and a half game with only a month to play. If they increase that lead here, it's close to curtains for the Astros AL West hopes. That's the huge part of the series. The insignificance comes in that the Astros are probably better than 95 percent to make the expanded playoff field by finishing at least second in their division. The Rangers, Angels, and Mariners are all terrible. It's extremely unlikely the Astros drop below any of them in the standings. About the only way it could happen is if the Rangers whip up on the Astros over the 10 head-to-head matchups they have in September.
The A's have been a lot better than the Astros in this short season to date, most notably sweeping them out of Oakland a couple of weeks ago. The Rockies swept three from Arizona this week to creep a game over .500. That means the Astros in their 31 games to date have four wins over teams presently with a winning record, their four over the Rockies last week. The only good teams the Astros have faced are the A's, Dodgers, and Padres. Against those three teams the Astros are 0-8. But none of that matters when the playoffs start.
With the Astros' schedule disrupted by the Hurricane Laura scare and the A's skipping their scheduled finale in Arlington as part of the social injustice protest, the pitching matchups for Astros-A's get tweaked. Chris Bassitt isn't Jacob DeGrom or Gerrit Cole but he has been the A's best starter so far. Bassitt was to have pitched against the Rangers Thursday. Instead he'll open vs. the Astros and Lance McCullers. Mike Fiers will not pitch in the series for the A's.
Out of tune
Anyone else wonder how much Elton John freaked out (not in a happy way) at Ivanka Trump using "I'm Still Standing" as her intro music before speaking Thursday night?
Buzzer Beaters:
1. Inside two weeks now to the Texans at Chiefs regular season opener. The Chiefs are favored by 10. Taking the points. Lukewarmly.
2. MLB's seven inning doubleheaders are silly.
3. Reginald Dwight's best songs: Bronze-Saturday Night's Alright Silver-Bennie and the Jets Gold-Someone Saved My Life Tonight
It’s been an excellent weeklong stretch of games for the Astros tempered by the news of yet another season-ending injury to a starting pitcher. To get the bad news out of the way, it comes as no surprise that Ronel Blanco needs Tommy John surgery and is done until at least the middle of next season. While Blanco had not been nearly as good through nine 2025 starts as he was last season, he was still taking his regular return and on average getting into the sixth inning. Blanco turns 32 years old at the end of August. He’s not even salary arbitration-eligible until 2027. That last fact may be good news for him. The Astros will likely keep Blanco next year in hopes he can contribute in the second half of the season, since they will pay him barely the Major League minimum salary ($780,000 next year) That’s in contrast to Jose Urquidy, who in the midst of his salary arbitration years would have cost about three and a half million dollars to keep, so the Astros non-tendered him.
With Blanco joining Hayden Wesneski in the “See you next year! Hopefully.” club, it struck me as interesting that the Astros let Lance McCullers throw 102 pitches in his Wednesday outing vs. the Athletics. That’s eleven more than he had thrown in any of his prior four starts. McCullers holding up physically would be a huge boost, but the new essentials in the Astros’ rotation are Framber Valdez and Hunter Brown. Framber has settled in to the tune of a 1.93 earned run average over his last four starts. Brown’s season ERA is 2.00. Brown has had five days of rest before all eleven of his starts this season. This Sunday is Brown’s presently next scheduled outing. He would work on four days of rest if on the mound Sunday against the Rays.
Taking the last two games from the Mariners was huge (for the second half of May anyway). Keeping the good times rolling by sweeping the two-game miniseries from the A’s was less significant but still nice. Maybe not quite nice enough to have Frank “The Tank” from the movie Old School belting out “We’re going streaking!!!” but it did give the Astros their first four game winning streak of the season. They still have not lost more than three straight.
On a heater!
Speaking of streaking, time for annual mention of one of my all-time favorite baseball factoids. The 1916 New York Giants hold the MLB record for the longest win streak with an incredible 26 in a row. Earlier in the season the Giants ripped off 17 in a row. Combine the two streaks and that’s 43-0! The 1916 New York Giants finished in fourth place. In all their other games the Giants went 43-66. The American League’s longest ever winning streak is of fairly recent vintage. The 2007 Cleveland Indians won 22 straight. There have been only two other winning streaks since 1900 of at least 20 games. The 1935 Chicago Cubs won 21 straight. The Art Howe-managed 2002 Oakland A’s won 20 in a row, and were the inspiration for the movie Moneyball. The Astros have three 12 game winning streaks as the longest in their history.
Expect the unexpected
Tuesday’s win over the A’s brought the Astros to the one-third completed point of the regular season. Isaac Paredes was definitely their best offensive player to that milepost. His “on pace for” numbers were the best on the ballclub 33 home runs and 93 runs batted in. Paredes also led in runs scored with 29. The last Astro to lead the team in all three of those categories was Alex Bregman who did it in both 2018 and 2019. That Bregman was clearly a better player than this Paredes, but Isaac healthy and making “only” 6.625 million dollars this season is a heck of a lot better value than Bregman at 40 mil for the Red Sox, especially given that while Bregman was off to a sensational start for Boston, he’s now out for at least a month with a quad injury.
Hunter Brown is on pace to win 20 games. The last Astro to get there was Gerrit Cole on the last day of the 2019 regular season. The day before that Justin Verlander won his 21st game.
The Cleveland Guardians’ bullpen was awesome last season, by far the best in the league with four relievers who each pitched in at least 74 games posting ERAs of 1.92 or lower, headlined by closer Emmanuel Clase’s microscopic 0.61. One-third of the way through this season for the Astros: Bryan Abreu sat at 1.90, Steven Okert 1.82, Josh Hader 1.57, Bryan King 1.52.
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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