GOING OUT OF BUSINESS?
Here's why there's so much at stake for MLB, Astros with lockout in full swing
Dec 2, 2021, 6:51 pm
Get ready to wait. Composite image by Jack Brame.
By locking out their players, Major League Baseball owners may not just kill their golden goose, they risk wiping out the whole gaggle. And, yes, I had to ask Siri, “What do you call a group of geese?”
Baseball’s lockout started precisely at 11:59 p.m. Wednesday. Until team owners and the players’ union knock out a new collective bargaining agreement, there will be no free agent signings, no trades, no workouts or medical treatment at team facilities …
Essentially, America’s national pastime shut down tight. And like so often when multimillionaires get into a spat, it’s the little guy, the poor shnook who buys tickets and T-shirts, who roots roots roots for the home team, who gets screwed.
This is a tough one – whose side are we on? The players who make oil baron money for playing a kids’ game, who stay in 5-star hotels on the road, who get $100-a-day meal money even though stadium clubhouses put out a spread worthy of a Beverly Hills bat mitzvah, (the visitors clubhouse at Yankee Stadium serves steak and lobster), make a fortune scribbling their name at autograph shows and still leave 10-percent tips at Hooters?
If the visitors clubhouse at Yankee Stadium serves steak and lobster, what’s going on in the home clubhouse – wenches in togas feeding grapes by hand? Tough life these players lead.
Or the owners, even the skinflints who field last-place teams, who make millions by selling beer and hot dogs at six times what they pay at wholesale even on Dollar Dog Night. Jim Crane and his buddies bought the Houston Astros for $680 million in 2011. The team is valued at $1.8 billion today.
As usual, it’s all about money. Money can’t buy you love, but it can keep a Cy Young winner in Houston. Major League Baseball is a $10 billion-a-year industry. Players want to make more. Owners want to keep more. There you have it. Meanwhile Francisco Lindor, making $341 million, makes “thumbs down” gestures at his hometown Mets fans?
Poor Carlos Correa now has to wait for the players and owners to reach a new agreement before he can sign with another team … or the Astros. In the meantime, perhaps he should wear a Hazmat suit everywhere he goes and boil himself at night to keep from incurring an injury. And stay off the massage table, we know how dangerous a rubdown can be.
Analysts are saying it could be a long lockout, like the last baseball stoppage in 1994-95, when they canceled the 1994 World Series. Which brings up the question, how stupid is baseball? The game’s popularity is waning, young people don’t seem to care anymore, attendance is dwindling … and the owners and players, the two sides that benefit the most from baseball slap a “Closed for Business” on the locked front door. Keep it up and that sign may read “Going Out of Business.”
It took several years and a home run battle between two steroid freaks to revive baseball after the ’94-’95 players strike. That’s not going to happen next year. They hand out Dixie Cups now.
The hope is a settlement in by Feb. 1 so spring training can start on time, or at least by March 1 so teams can play their completely unnecessary 30-game spring schedule. Funny how NBA teams need only four preseason games, the NFL only three games and college football zero games. And those teams actually require players to be in shape from the get-go.
Baseball players are among the most pampered humans short of Halle Berry getting ready for the Academy Awards. Team owners make millions, in some cases billions, for sitting behind home plate and watching their team flop come crunch time. The New York Yankees haven’t won a World Series since 2009. The Yanks are worth $5.25 billion. The Chicago Cubs have won one World Series in Betty White’s lifetime …$3.36 billion.
It’s time for the players and owners to get this lockout over real fast. At some point fans won’t care when and if it’s time to “Play Ball.”
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It’s May 1, and the Astros are turning heads—but not for the reasons anyone expected. Their resurgence, driven not by stars like Yordan Alvarez or Christian Walker, but by a cast of less-heralded names, is writing a strange and telling early-season story.
Christian Walker, brought in to add middle-of-the-order thump, has yet to resemble the feared hitter he was in Arizona. Forget the narrative of a slow starter—he’s never looked like this in April. Through March and April of 2025, he’s slashing a worrying .196/.277/.355 with a .632 OPS. Compare that to the same stretch in 2024, when he posted a .283 average, .496 slug, and a robust .890 OPS, and it becomes clear: this is something more than rust. Even in 2023, his April numbers (.248/.714 OPS) looked steadier.
What’s more troubling than the overall dip is when it’s happening. Walker is faltering in the biggest moments. With runners in scoring position, he’s hitting just .143 over 33 plate appearances, including 15 strikeouts. The struggles get even more glaring with two outs—.125 average, .188 slugging, and a .451 OPS in 19 such plate appearances. In “late and close” situations, when the pressure’s highest, he’s practically disappeared: 1-for-18 with a .056 average and a .167 OPS.
His patience has waned (only 9 walks so far, compared to 20 by this time last year), and for now, his presence in the lineup feels more like a placeholder than a pillar.
The contrast couldn’t be clearer when you look at José Altuve—long the engine of this franchise—who, in 2024, delivered in the moments Walker is now missing. With two outs and runners in scoring position, Altuve hit .275 with an .888 OPS. In late and close situations, he thrived with a .314 average and .854 OPS. That kind of situational excellence is missing from this 2025 squad—but someone else may yet step into that role.
And yet—the Astros are winning. Not because of Walker, but in spite of him.
Houston’s offense, in general, hasn’t lit up the leaderboard. Their team OPS ranks 23rd (.667), their slugging 25th (.357), and they sit just 22nd in runs scored (117). They’re 26th in doubles, a rare place for a team built on gap-to-gap damage.
But where there’s been light, it hasn’t come from the usual spots. Jeremy Peña, often overshadowed in a lineup full of stars, now boasts the team’s highest OPS at .791 (Isaac Paredes is second in OPS) and is flourishing in his new role as the leadoff hitter. Peña’s balance of speed, contact, aggression, and timely power has given Houston a surprising tone-setter at the top.
Even more surprising: four Astros currently have more home runs than Yordan Alvarez.
And then there’s the pitching—Houston’s anchor. The rotation and bullpen have been elite, ranking 5th in ERA (3.23), 1st in WHIP (1.08), and 4th in batting average against (.212). In a season where offense is lagging and clutch hits are rare, the arms have made all the difference.
For now, it’s the unexpected contributors keeping Houston afloat. Peña’s emergence. A rock-solid pitching staff. Role players stepping up in quiet but crucial ways. They’re not dominating, but they’re grinding—and in a sluggish AL West, that may be enough.
Walker still has time to find his swing. He showed some signs of life against Toronto and Detroit. If he does, the Astros could become dangerous. If he doesn’t, the turnaround we’re witnessing will be credited to a new cast of unlikely faces. And maybe, that’s the story that needed to be written.
We have so much more to discuss. Don't miss the video below as we examine the topics above and much, much more!
The MLB season is finally upon us! Join Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and Charlie Pallilo for the Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast which drops each Monday afternoon, with an additional episode now on Thursday!
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