2017 Houston Astros Season

The Astros are money on opening day. Since MLB coerced new Astros owner Jim Crane into agreeing to jump from the National League to the American League as a condition of his purchase of the Astros the good guys have not lost on opening day. Three of those wins were behind Dallas Keuchel who was masterful last night. It was almost like being in a time warp and being swept back to 2015, Keuchel’s Cy Young award winning season. He went 7 innings allowing zero runs on 2 hits, 2 BB’s and 4 K’s. Keuchel got himself into a bit of a jam in the 4th loading the bases but it was just a case of Keuchel dangling a carrot in front of the Mariners and just before they grab it Keuchel jerked it away by getting former Ranger Leonys Martin to hit an inning ending ground out. Keuchel also flashed leather showing why he’s a 3 time Gold Glove winner. He robbed Jean Segura of a bunt single by making a wonderful play bare handing the ball and throwing his hardest pitch of the night to first base to just beat Segura to the bag. Keuchel put two runners down in the 7th. After a leadoff walk to Kyle Seagar Keuchel began a double play on a grounder from the bat of Danny Valencia for the classic 1-4-3 DP. Martin came back up with two out and he hit a soft ground ball down the 3B line which Keuchel fielded and gunned Martin down at 1B. This ended Keuchel’s night and just as I thought AJ Hinch was conservative with Keuchel after he got Keuchel hurt last year on opening day by letting Keuchel throw over 100 pitches on a freezing cold day at Yankee Stadium. Keuchel was a dog that day but he hurt his shoulder in the game and 1) he didn’t tell anyone about it and 2) he was never right again all season. Rested and healthy again Hinch wasn’t going to push his ace too far this time around. Keuchel threw 85 pitches on the night and it was up to the bullpen to do their job to complete the win. Luke Gregerson scoreless 8th allowing a hit and a walk to make everyone a little nervous but he got the job done. My behind puckered a little when Ken Giles entered the game to close out the 9th knowing he has been less than dependable since coming to Houston last year. Giles converted 15 of 20 saves last year and, in case you don’t know it, .750 isn’t good for a closer. Depending on a killer slider rather than his 100 mph fastball Giles struck out 3 of the 4 batters he faced to give Keuchel and the Astros the win by a score of 3-0.

The Astros offense scored enough to give the home team the win and all 3 runs came off the bats of George Springer and Carlos Correa. Springer led off the game with a home run to left that gave the Astros a super early lead. Correa backed up Springer’s round tripper with a monster mash over the train tracks in left to give Houston a 2 zip lead. In the 6th after Alex Bregman went from 1st to 3rd on a Jose Altuve single to center Correa hit a fly ball to center deep enough to easily score Bregman. 3 runs were all Houston needed on the night as a capacity crowd at the Juice Box went home happy.

 

Lance McCullers is on the bump for Houston tonight while Seattle counters with RHP Hisashi Iwakuma. Here’s a preview from Astros.com.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/mariners-vs-astros/2017/04/04/490119?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490119

 

How cool was the opening ceremonies before the game? HOF Craig Biggio tossed out the first pitch to the newest HOF’er Jeff Bagwell. It’s never a disappointment to see those two on the field together. Talk about a time warp!

Mark it down on your calendar, April 4th, 2017 the Houston Astros are alone atop the AL West. So far in 2017 Houston has shared or owned the outright lead in the division all season. That sounds pretty impressive doesn’t it? It would mean a lot more if it was August 4th or September 4th but still. Okay, I know, it’s only been two games but let me live, won’t ya? The Astros have a one game lead on the Los Angeles Angels and Oakland A’s and they are 2 games up on the Mariners and the Rangers. On Monday night we found out that Dallas Keuchel is alive and well as he looked the Cy Young Award winner from 2015. Last night Lance McCullers laid to rest questions about his health issues by going 6 complete innings allowing 5 hits, 2 BB’s and notching 7 K’s throwing 88 pitches on the way to getting his first ever win in April in his first ever start in April since he’s been in the bigs. Between Keuchel and McCullers they have combined to allow just one run in 13 innings of work. Credit a rock solid bullpen too. On Monday Luke Gregerson and Ken Giles didn’t allow a run in 2 innings combined of work and last night you just need to add Will Harris to that duo and you got 3 innings work with zilch runs given up. Ken Giles has two saves in two chances. Consider this as well, of McCullers’ 5 hits allowed 3 were infield hits!

 

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/222329646/mccann-gonzalez-hrs-lead-astros-over-mariners/

 

Charlie (Jimmy Fallon) Morton tries to keep the train rolling tonight as he makes his first ever start for the Astros after being signed to a two year deal this offseason. The Mariners will send LHP James Paxton against the Astros. It’s not like either team has been flashing some sexy offense with Seattle scoring but one run in the first two games but Houston isn’t lighting up the scoreboard either. They have scored just 5 total runs in the first games. Mariners skipper Scott Servais credits the Astros pitching as being the reason the M’s have struggled and he’s right. The Astros head man AJ Hinch doesn’t have to answer questions about what’s wrong with the Astros offense because they won both games but if he did get asked I’m sure he would say the same thing Servais said. The Astros have had to contend with “King” Felix Hernandez and Hisashi Iwakuma who are no slouches either. Here’s a preview of tonight’s game.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/mariners-vs-astros/2017/04/05/490133?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490133

 

Ask anyone who know anything about baseball and they will acknowledge that the synergy between the catcher and the pitching staff is important for that staff to be successful. Having Brian McCann behind the plate could be the difference in whether or not the Astros staff is successful this season. Astros.com agrees and says so in this article about McCann from the website. BTW I spoke about Charlie Morton being a doppelganger for Jimmy Fallon but you stand McCann next to his backup Evan Gattis and you’d swear you were seeing double. Twin son’s from different mothers is surely the case with those two!

 

Brian McCann in sync with Astros' pitchers

 

Brian McCann in sync with Astros' pitchers

HOUSTON -- Veteran catcher Brian McCann's presence behind the plate could have a bigger an impact than anyth...

Three and Oh, Baby!!! It took 13 innings and almost 4 and half hours but Houston managed to win on a walk off 3 run home run to steal a victory away from Seattle who took the lead in the top of the 13th when Brad Peacock walked a run home to give Seattle a 3-2 lead. It looked like Houston was going to suffer their first defeat of the season. Then came the bottom of the inning. Mariners manager Scott Servais had depleted his bullpen using 7 relievers in the game and all Servais had left was rookie Chase De Jong who had never thrown a pitch in an MLB game until last night. It was an up and down inning for De Jong as he retired Yuli Gurriel on a comebacker to him to begin the inning. Then De Jong walked Evan Gattis. Josh Reddick followed Gattis by popping out in foul territory for the 2nd out of the inning. Nori Aoki singled down the left field line to give Houston runners on 1st and 2nd with two outs in the inning. Then it was George Springer at the plate. Springer had a truly excellent at-bat working the count full and that’s when De Jong made his only real mistake of the inning when he hung a curveball out over the plate and Springer jacked it into the Crawford boxes in the left field. Bam, game over! If you’re a fan of baseball in general you kind of feel bad for De Jong who was one strike away from locking down his first MLB save in his MLB debut. It wasn’t to be and as an Astros fan I appreciate how De Jong must feel but, I the end, I don’t care because MY guys won the damn ballgame! Final score was 5-3 and it guarantees Houston wins the opening series of the season. If you are a ridiculous, unrealistic homer then you say, “Great, 3 down and 159 more games to our perfect season!” knowing of course THAT is NEVER going to happen. Right now though, it isn’t impossible that it could happen because we are still undefeated!

 

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/16285926/v1258270483/seahou-springer-discusses-his-walk/?game_pk=490133

 

Houston will try to pull out the broom tonight to try and complete the sweep of this opening series against Seattle. Joe Musgrove will make his first start of the season and his first start in April after making his MLB debut last fall when he was called up from AAA Fresno to replace Lance McCullers who was placed on the DL. Here’s a preview of tonight’s game from Astros.com

 

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/20170405222509382/musgrove-prepared-as-astros-take-on-mariners/?game_pk=490146

 

Last night the relief staff of both teams got some extensive use. Seattle used 9 relievers while Houston used 6. The saving grace for the Astros bullpen was the 4 innings of no-hit relief from last year’s long relief ace Chris Devenski. Charlie Morton gave Houston six innings as the starter allowing 2 runs on 5 hits as he gave Houston its third straight quality start. Tony Sipp and Michael Feliz combined to pitch a scoreless 7th which set the stage for Devenski’s heroics. Devenski had his changeup working to devastating effect. No hits, no runs and just one walk with 7 K’s. The Mariners had no chance at all against him. Will Harris pitched a scoreless 12th which left the 13th for Jandel Gustave. He is the only pitcher on the night for Houston to disappoint. He faced 3 batters in the inning and he walked all three when AJ Hinch pulled him in favor of Brad Peacock. That’s just the situation a guy wants to come into a game, bases loaded and nobody out, but that was the situation Peacock found himself in. It didn’t look good for Houston as Peacock promptly walked in a run to give the M’s a 1 run edge but Peacock settled down from there and retired the next three batters. The next batter up after the walk was Danny Valencia and Peacock got him to weakly fly out to shallow center field, not deep enough for Robinson Cano to score from 3B. Peacock then struck out Mike Zunino and Jared Dyson to end the inning. You have to give props to Peacock to escape a horrible situation and only allowing one run. So far both the starting pitching and, with the exception of Gustave’s appearance, the relievers have been rock solid.

 

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/10025790/v1258253383/seahou-devenski-strikes-out-seven-in-hitless-relief/?game_pk=490133

Man, I don't know why the Gods of Sport seem to be so offended by me but just I'm joking about the Astros going undefeated for the whole season they have to bring me down to earth by making them lose two straight. Lighten up people! You can't take a friggin' joke? Sheesh. So, Joe Musgrove pitched the finale against Seattle and he gave Houston yet another quality start going 5 innings allowing 2 runs on 5 hits, 3 BB's and 2 K's. Okay, it wasn't technically a quality start since you need to go six innings but you know what I mean, right? Young pitcher in his first ever April start you gotta feel good about his performance don't you? So, the score was tied at 2 heading into the 9th with Ken Giles on the mound so, given his previous appearances, you have to feel good about the Astros holding them scoreless, right? Annnnnhhhh. Wrong! I still have trouble wrapping my head around how he gave up 2 runs on just 2 hits and a walk with no homers allowed. Especially since he led off the inning with a K on Kyle Seager. That's when things started going sideways for Giles. A walk to Danny Valencia, then he hit Carlos Ruiz who was followed by an RBI single by Jared Dyson. Giles then struck out Leonys Martin but the damage wasn't fully done yet. Jean Segura got an RBI single to center field that made the score 4-2 and Dyson moved all the way to 3rd on the play. With Mitch Haniger batting Segura stole 2B giving the M's men on 2nd and 3rd. Fortunately for the Astros Giles got Haniger looking for his 3rd K of the inning but that, my friends in how an inning can go to the dogs in a hurry. Houston's offense hasn't exactly been a thing of beauty as they only managed 2 runs in the series finale and just 12 in the series. That's 2 runs a game for the math challenged.

Kansas City came to town to begin 3 games with Houston and the offense even took a step backward from where they were. They only managed 1 run in last night's 5-1 loss to the Royals. Don't blame the pitching, okay you can blame them a little, but not really Mike Fiers who DID have a quality start going 6 innings giving up 2 runs, 1 unearned on 5 hits including a solo HR to C Salvador Perez in the 2nd inning, 3 walks and 3 K's. The Royals got an unearned run because of an error by Evan Gattis who was catching last night to give Brian McCann a day off. That sixth inning was so close to being over after Fiers had loaded the bases on a walk, a single and another walk. That brought Paulo Orlando up and with a 1-2 count Orlando swung at a ball fouling it off but his bat hit Gattis' glove for the interference call which allowed Orlando to go to first forcing a run home. It was a tough break for Fiers who was in line for a win had the 2-1 score he had at the time held up. Jandel Gustave came on with 2 out in the 7th to bail Tony Sipp out of a jam but Gustave got into hot water of his own in the 8th. Gustave loaded the bases on a single, a walk and single. With the bases loaded and Raul Mondesi batting Gustave threw a fastball when Gattis was expecting a slider and that resulted in a passed ball for Gattis and another run for the Royals. One batter later Alex Gordon doubled down the left field line scoring two runs giving the Royals a 5-1 lead which became the final score. Maybe Altuve, Correa, Beltran and Bregman are suffering a post World Baseball Classic hangover but they and the rest of the Astros bats except for George Springer's has been limp as a wet biscuit. Hopefully, they will break out of the funk and start showing some of that preseason promise everyone expects out of this lineup.

The Royals came in last night and got their first win of the season after dropping their season opening series against Minnesota 3 games to zip. So, Gods of Sport, it's too early in the season for y'all to act like a bunch of dicks so lighten up on the irony, okay? Keuchel pitches tonight so let's see you just sit back and allow the team to play up to its potential okay? Okay. Sheesh!

 

Thank goodness the starting pitching has been good this week as the Astros made it through is first time through the rotation and every one of the starters did a good job highlighted by Dallas Keuchel's 3-0 shutout over Seattle to lead off the season. It's a good thing too because Collin McHugh suffered a big setback in his minor league rehab assignment in Fresno Thursday night. McHugh had a 27 pitch first inning which was bad enough in and of itself but when he came out to warm up for the 2nd inning he know something was wrong. McHugh ended up back in Houston on Friday to get evaluated for elbow and bicep tightness. McHugh had already been having arm issues during the spring which is why he was in Fresno doing some catchup on spring training time he missed because of "dead arm". Hopefully, the guys who are in the starting rotation continue pitching well in McHugh's absence. McHugh is currently on the 10 day disabled list but there is no timetable for his return to action.

The week of April 3rd sure had its ups and downs didn’t it? We began the 2017 season winning 3 straight behind good starting pitching, even better relief pitching and a couple of timely home runs, mostly by George Springer. Springer’s walk-off 3 run dinger to win the Astros 3rd game of the season in the bottom of the 13th inning was one for the books. Dropping the series finale to Seattle on Thursday didn’t seem like that big of a deal until Houston’s lack of offense started costing them games. They wasted a nice effort by Joe Musgrove on Thursday as well as a nice outing by Mike Fiers on Friday in the opening game of a series with Kansas City but Saturday’s game had to be a punch in the gut for the Astros.

Dallas Keuchel made his second start and he went 7 innings again allowing just 2 hits and a single run on a home run by Royals 3B Cheslor Cuthbert in the 5th inning but he was in line for the win as he left the game with a 2-1 lead. The tag line on the Astros website read, “Bullpen can’t finish Keuchel’s strong outing”, but it wasn’t the bullpen it was Luke Gregerson who had maybe the worst outing for a reliever ever. In just 1/3 of an inning of work he gave up 6 runs on 5 hits including 2 home runs and a walk zero K’s. It was ugly and it reminded me of 2015 when Keuchel could have had more than the AL leading 20 wins were it not for a leaky bullpen. He could easily have had 25 wins or more were it not for that. Also another bad memory of 2015 was Luke Gregerson having the occasional meltdown, mainly when Keuchel pitched. All the Astros needed for an unpleasant episode of déjà vu was Pat Neshak to complete the flashback to the 2015 ALDS game against the Royals when the Astros blew a 4 run lead in the 8th inning and the Royals tacked on 2 more runs in the 9th inning to beat the Astros 9-6. To be fair on that day it was Will Harris and Tony Sipp who blew that game for Lance McCullers but the feeling was just the same Saturday. Total frustration.

McCullers got the ball yesterday afternoon for his 2nd start of the season and he pitched pretty well though not as good as he did last Tuesday. He allowed 3 runs on 6 hits with no BB’s and 10 K’s. McCullers’ downfall came on two pitches, one to Royals cleanup hitter Salvatore Perez in the 1st inning with nobody on and another solo shot to Mike Mustakas in the 5th. McCullers went 7 innings giving up 3 runs which qualifies as a quality start but I’ll bet he didn’t think so. Will Harris pitched a scoreless 8th and Chris Devenski came on in the 9th with the score tied 3-3. Devo got the first batters out but Royals DH Brandon Moss was up next when Devenski made a mistake on a 2-2 2-out pitch that Moss sent to the right-center field seats to give the Royals a 4-3 lead. To call KC a pain in the ass to the Astros is an understatement. The Astros tied the score in the bottom of the 9th on a Jake Marisnick dinger and it was all Devenski the rest of the way. As he had done on Wednesday night he went 4 innings of stellar relief pitching giving up just the one run to Moss. In the bottom of the 12th Houston finally got something going offensively. Springer led off the inning with a single. Alex Bregman laid down a sac bunt to get Springer to 2nd for the first out. Jose Altuve was walked intentionally and Carlos Correa hit into a fielder’s choice that nailed Altuve at second. Houston had 1st and 3rd with 2 out and Brian McCann came up. McCann put together a nice at-bat working the count to 3-2 before finally getting a walk to load the bases. Up next was McCann’s doppelganger Evan Gattis. Gattis was uncharacteristically patient at the plate but he had had a nice day at the plate on Sunday going 2-3 with 2 walks up to the AB in the 12th. Gattis admitted a pitch up in the zone that was probably ball four on a 3-1 count was a mistake and the grimace on his face at the time showed he knew he had helped KC pitcher Matt Strahm with that swing. It didn’t matter however as the next pitch was high and tight for ball four giving Gattis a walk off walk to score Springer from 3rd and win the game. 5-4.

Houston finished its first week of the season 4-3 splitting their opening home stand beating Seattle 3-1 and losing to KC 1-2. They are in second place behind the LA Angels who began the season 5-2 and the Astros are a game ahead of Oakland followed by Texas and Seattle brings up the rear. Houston travels to Seattle for their home opening series beginning today at 3:30 PM. It will be a rematch between Game 3 starters with Charlie Morton going for Houston and LHP James Paxton going for Seattle.

 

Thank God for George Springer because without him the Astros may have gone 0-7 this past week. As the Astros offense struggles Springer put the team on his back and carried them this first week of the season. He became the first player ever in MLB history to hit 3 leadoff homers to begin a game in the first 7 games of the season. Springer homered in the very first AB of the season last Monday and he did it again yesterday to end the week. He also homered to lead off the game Thursday in the series finale against Seattle. In all Springer had 4 home runs last week including the walk-off 3 run shot to end Wednesday’s 13 inning game. Springer is hitting .250 so far with 7 hits in 28 AB’s which include 4 HR’s with 7 runs scored, 8 RBI’s and 7 K’s. Houston’s offense has been stagnant to begin the season as they are 22nd in runs scored so far on the season. The Astros have scored a total of 21 runs and Springer has either scored or driven in 15 of them. It seemed like the offense was starting to come alive over the weekend at they started hitting the ball better they just can’t seem to get one when it counts all except for George.

 

The Astros got some bad news on Sunday. P Collin McHugh will miss over 6 weeks with a sore elbow, officially called a posterior impingement on his right elbow, McHugh will not even throw for 6 six weeks as the Astros are hoping the inflammation will calm down and go away. McHugh has never had any elbow issues before so the Astros are hoping this is just an anomaly that complete rest and rehab will take care of. McHugh was penciled in as the Astros No. 3 starter until the arm issues crept up during spring training.

The week of April 3rd sure had its ups and downs didn’t it? We began the 2017 season winning 3 straight behind good starting pitching, even better relief pitching and a couple of timely home runs, mostly by George Springer. Springer’s walk-off 3 run dinger to win the Astros 3rd game of the season in the bottom of the 13th inning was one for the books. Dropping the series finale to Seattle on Thursday didn’t seem like that big of a deal until Houston’s lack of offense started costing them games. They wasted a nice effort by Joe Musgrove on Thursday as well as a nice outing by Mike Fiers on Friday in the opening game of a series with Kansas City but Saturday’s game had to be a punch in the gut for the Astros.

Dallas Keuchel made his second start and he went 7 innings again allowing just 2 hits and a single run on a home run by Royals 3B Cheslor Cuthbert in the 5th inning but he was in line for the win as he left the game with a 2-1 lead. The tag line on the Astros website read, “Bullpen can’t finish Keuchel’s strong outing”, but it wasn’t the bullpen it was Luke Gregerson who had maybe the worst outing for a reliever ever. In just 1/3 of an inning of work he gave up 6 runs on 5 hits including 2 home runs and a walk zero K’s. It was ugly and it reminded me of 2015 when Keuchel could have had more than the AL leading 20 wins were it not for a leaky bullpen. He could easily have had 25 wins or more were it not for that. Also another bad memory of 2015 was Luke Gregerson having the occasional meltdown, mainly when Keuchel pitched. All the Astros needed for an unpleasant episode of déjà vu was Pat Neshak to complete the flashback to the 2015 ALDS game against the Royals when the Astros blew a 4 run lead in the 8th inning and the Royals tacked on 2 more runs in the 9th inning to beat the Astros 9-6. To be fair on that day it was Will Harris and Tony Sipp who blew that game for Lance McCullers but the feeling was just the same Saturday. Total frustration.

McCullers got the ball yesterday afternoon for his 2nd start of the season and he pitched pretty well though not as good as he did last Tuesday. He allowed 3 runs on 6 hits with no BB’s and 10 K’s. McCullers’ downfall came on two pitches, one to Royals cleanup hitter Salvatore Perez in the 1st inning with nobody on and another solo shot to Mike Mustakas in the 5th. McCullers went 7 innings giving up 3 runs which qualifies as a quality start but I’ll bet he didn’t think so. Will Harris pitched a scoreless 8th and Chris Devenski came on in the 9th with the score tied 3-3. Devo got the first batters out but Royals DH Brandon Moss was up next when Devenski made a mistake on a 2-2 2-out pitch that Moss sent to the right-center field seats to give the Royals a 4-3 lead. To call KC a pain in the ass to the Astros is an understatement. The Astros tied the score in the bottom of the 9th on a Jake Marisnick dinger and it was all Devenski the rest of the way. As he had done on Wednesday night he went 4 innings of stellar relief pitching giving up just the one run to Moss. In the bottom of the 12th Houston finally got something going offensively. Springer led off the inning with a single. Alex Bregman laid down a sac bunt to get Springer to 2nd for the first out. Jose Altuve was walked intentionally and Carlos Correa hit into a fielder’s choice that nailed Altuve at second. Houston had 1st and 3rd with 2 out and Brian McCann came up. McCann put together a nice at-bat working the count to 3-2 before finally getting a walk to load the bases. Up next was McCann’s doppelganger Evan Gattis. Gattis was uncharacteristically patient at the plate but he had had a nice day at the plate on Sunday going 2-3 with 2 walks up to the AB in the 12th. Gattis admitted a pitch up in the zone that was probably ball four on a 3-1 count was a mistake and the grimace on his face at the time showed he knew he had helped KC pitcher Matt Strahm with that swing. It didn’t matter however as the next pitch was high and tight for ball four giving Gattis a walk off walk to score Springer from 3rd and win the game. 5-4.

Houston finished its first week of the season 4-3 splitting their opening home stand beating Seattle 3-1 and losing to KC 1-2. They are in second place behind the LA Angels who began the season 5-2 and the Astros are a game ahead of Oakland followed by Texas and Seattle brings up the rear. Houston travels to Seattle for their home opening series beginning today at 3:30 PM. It will be a rematch between Game 3 starters with Charlie Morton going for Houston and LHP James Paxton going for Seattle.

 

Thank God for George Springer because without him the Astros may have gone 0-7 this past week. As the Astros offense struggles Springer put the team on his back and carried them this first week of the season. He became the first player ever in MLB history to hit 3 leadoff homers to begin a game in the first 7 games of the season. Springer homered in the very first AB of the season last Monday and he did it again yesterday to end the week. He also homered to lead off the game Thursday in the series finale against Seattle. In all Springer had 4 home runs last week including the walk-off 3 run shot to end Wednesday’s 13 inning game. Springer is hitting .250 so far with 7 hits in 28 AB’s which include 4 HR’s with 7 runs scored, 8 RBI’s and 7 K’s. Houston’s offense has been stagnant to begin the season as they are 22nd in runs scored so far on the season. The Astros have scored a total of 21 runs and Springer has either scored or driven in 15 of them. It seemed like the offense was starting to come alive over the weekend at they started hitting the ball better they just can’t seem to get one when it counts all except for George.

 

The Astros got some bad news on Sunday. P Collin McHugh will miss over 6 weeks with a sore elbow, officially called a posterior impingement on his right elbow, McHugh will not even throw for 6 six weeks as the Astros are hoping the inflammation will calm down and go away. McHugh has never had any elbow issues before so the Astros are hoping this is just an anomaly that complete rest and rehab will take care of. McHugh was penciled in as the Astros No. 3 starter until the arm issues crept up during spring training.

 

they should give free beer if bregman or gurriel gets a hit

With all the crap in the world, specifically in Syria and North Korea, worrying about the Astros lousy hitting to begin the season seems pretty lame. It’s only the second week of the season for goodness sake so to get bent out of shape because they are in a team-wide slum. I looked at the box score from yesterday Houston is actually hitting lights out compared to the Mariners and a lot of those anemic batting averages of the M’s actually got better after banging out 11 hits against Houston pitching yesterday. Take it easy. Climb down off that ledge. Don’t panic because it will be okay. Really it will, I promise. What Houston has traditionally done is have a lousier than lousy April and then come storming back. The problem is April has been such a miserable month for the Astros but April isn’t the month Astros fans need to worry about, it’s September. The Astros cost themselves home field advantage and a division championship in 2015 with a September meltdown going 11-16 after logging a plus .500 record the other 5 months of the season except July when they were exactly .500. Last year another September swoon cost Houston a shot at one of the AL wild cards. Now, Houston’s worst month of the season was a painful 7-17 record which took Houston 2 months to climb back into contention but the 12-15 September is what derailed them in the end. Right now Houston is 4-4 and .500 ball isn’t terrible. Consider this, if Houston goes .500 on the season they will have a record of 81-81 but what if they win just 12 more games? Doesn’t 93 wins look pretty good? Damn right it does and 93 wins is almost a lock to win a wild card spot if not the division. I’ll take that all day every day. I don’t care if I predicted Houston will win 95 games, I’ll take my 93 and go home.

All that said there isn’t much to take away from yesterday’s 6-0 shutout loss in Seattle. Joe Morton went 5 innings allowing 3 runs, a couple of walks with a six K’s. He gave up 7 hits and he held the damage down by not allowing a home run but he did allow 3 doubles to the Mariner’s hitters. Not a quality start but not terrible either. I think it’s safe to say Morton was just okay yesterday but “okay” doesn’t cut it when your offense doesn’t score. The only Houston hitter to get more than one hit was Carlos Correa who went 3-4 on the day but the trouble with that is nobody was on base ahead of him and none of his hits went for extra bases. Carlos Beltran went 1-4 behind Correa and it probably came after the only time Correa didn’t get a hit. (I looked and that’s not true. Correa had men on 1st and 3rd with 1 out in the 8th when he struck out and Beltran followed with a weak pop out to 3B Kyle Seager in foul territory. This goes to a disturbing trend of Houston being unable to get a meaningful hit with men on base.) It’s just frustrating to wait for 5 month for baseball to crank back up again only to see your favorite team sit around spanking their monkeys instead of hitting the baseball.

Houston has two more games in Seattle before getting Thursday off before heading into Oakland for 3 over the weekend. It’s crazy, 10 of Houston’s first 13 games are division games. Certainly a chance to get some early separation but right now I’ll settle for keeping pace.

 

Joe Musgrove gets the nod for Houston tonight while Seattle will send Ariel Miranda to the bump. It will be the 2nd start for both and both starts come against each other. Houston lost Musgrove’s last start but it wasn’t Musgrove’s fault. He gave up 2 runs in the 5 innings he worked as did Miranda. That 2-2 tie lasted until the 9th when Ken Giles gave up 2 runs to give the Mariners a 4-2 win. Here’s a preview of tonight’s game from Astros.com.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/astros-vs-mariners/2017/04/11/490208?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490208

First off, very cool and funny and accurate reply to my post of Monday. Thank you!

 

Btw, Bregman got a hit and his first RBI on the season last night. He actually got 2 hits last night as Houston beat Seattle 7-5 in a game that shouldn't have been that close. Ken Giles allowed 2 runs in the bottom of the 9th that likely made AJ Hinch's butt cheeks tighten up becore closing the door on the Mariners. Joe Musgrove got the win, his first of 2017, as Houston evened the series at one game apiece. Jose Altuve got his first RBI of the season last night as well. The Astros exploded in their half of the 6th inning with four runs to give Houston a 6-3 lead after beginning the inning on the wrong side of a 3-2 Mariners lead. Unlike Monday's game when Carlos Correa was the only bright spot in Houston's batting order he was the only one who didn't get a hit. That includes a 3 for 4 night from Yuli Gurriel. Hopefully, the bats coming alive is a sign the Astros offense is breaking out of its slump. The final game of the series is tonight at 9:10 PM.

Is it just me, or does Bregman look a little soft? I don't know if he has put on some weight or his lack of AB's in ST due to the WBC has caused him to come into the season a little out of shape. Either way, they guy will hit and in fact had two hits last night. Gurriel just needs to learn that they don't throw 85% fastballs in MLB. Once he adjusts to hitting more off speed his bat will come around and his defense has been awesome at times. Dallas, Lance, and Joe have looked pretty amazing so far. The elements are there for the Astros, but due to the WBC they are still getting to know each other and the roles each player is going to play. Hinch is not helping matters by rolling out a different line-up every night.

You are so right Big T! Good to see you back!

 

After looking like absolute crap on Monday night offensively the Astros bats have come alive the past two nights in chilly Seattle. The Astros banged out 16 hits last night on the way to a 10-5 (good buddy) win over Seattle to take the series 2 games to 1. It didn’t look like it through 3 innings though as Mike Fiers looked more like he was pitching batting practice to the Mariners as he got the Astros down 5-0 after 3 innings. It all changed in the 4th as Houston sent 7 men to the plate scoring their first two runs of the night. It could have been more but Carlos Correa wasn’t paying attention to 3B coach Gary Pettis as he ran past his stop sign and was caught in no-man’s land between 3rd and home and tagged out to end the inning. BTW, a co-worker of mine made an observation that the Astros have made several base running errors in the early going which needs to be corrected pronto. Good teams don’t beat themselves and bad base running is not a sign of a good team. That said, Houston put up two more in the 5th to make the score 5-4. Houston came back in the 7th and 8th innings scoring 3 runs in each inning to take the lead and extend it to the final 10-5 result. Fiers was pulled after just 4 innings but he had thrown 89 pitches and this early in the season that about what Hinch has been doing with his starters--they’ve averaged around 90 pitches as this is the 2nd time through the starting rotation. Tony Sipp replaced Fiers and I was holding my breath waiting for Sipp to suck again but he didn’t as he pitched a scoreless 5th. Brad Peacock took care of the 6th and 7th innings in good shape and Luke Gregerson has recovered from that monumental meltdown in Dallas Keuchel’s last start this past Saturday when he allowed 6 runs in 1/3 of an inning. He has pitched several times since then including last night and been fine. Jandel Gustave closed the game, it wasn’t a save situation, but had I been awake when the game was on I would have again held my breath waiting for him to suck again. Like Sipp he didn’t suck and he allowed a hit to lead off the 9th but he retired the next 3 batters on a groundout, a pop out and another groundout to end the game.

Talk about wake up a sleeping giant, in the last two games Houston has left Seattle with the Mariners having to be feeling quite a bit shell shocked. Houston has definitely broken out of the slump at the have gotten 30 hits and scored 17 runs in the past two games. In the games prior to Tuesday night it seemed the only way Houston could score a run was if they homered. Houston couldn’t string enough hits together to get a runner past 1B much less score a run. However, in the past two games Houston has hit just one home run the rest coming from Houston stringing together hits and working walks to get runners on base. It’s been good to seen. I know this sort of run production isn’t going to happen all the time but after the first 8 games it’s nice to see.

How about George Springer? The guy hit his 4 HR to lead off a game on Tuesday night and pair that with the walk-off 3 run shot to win a 13 inning game against these same Mariners last week in Houston and you’re looking at a guy who has 5 home runs in his first 10 games! Not bad for a guy hitting just .233 so far. Houston is ½ game out of 1st in the AL West behind the Angels and they lead Oakland but a full game as they will get today off and begin a weekend series in Oakland Friday night.

Dallas Keuchel (1-0, 0.64 ERA) will face Kendall Graveman (2-0, 2.08 ERA) on Friday night. Here’s a preview from Astros.com.

http://m.mlb.com/gameday/astros-vs-athletics/2017/04/14/490245?bullpen_friendly=true#game_state=preview,lock_state=preview,game=490245,game_tab=

What a fun game to watch last night! Looks like the Astros are starting to put all the pieces of the puzzle together and figuring out their roles. How about Altuve?! 11 straight plate plate appearances ending in him getting on base by either a walk or a hit. Three games in, Dallas looks like he is trying to reclaim his Cy Young award. So far the Stros are 3-1 on this road trip and the bats have finally came alive to match the pitching that has been solid all year. Good performance boys!

I agree completely Big T except for the part about solid pitching. Oh, the starters have been pretty good with only one shaky performance by Mike Fiers in his last start but there have been some crazy meltdowns by the bullpen. By and large the team just needed the offense to start performing and they have done that. The win last night, a 7-2 score in the series opener against the A's, was the 3rd win in a row for Houston. Their record is now 7-4 and they have reclaimed the AL West lead. The Angels are in 2nd followed by Oakland, Texas with a surprisingly struggling Seattle bringing up the rear. The standings don't mean too much right now as there is still a long, long way to go.

 

Today is Jackie Robinson Day across the MLB landscape and to honor the first black baseball player in MLB history every player on every team will be wearing Robinson's number 42. It should be a great day honoring a great man.

 

Lance McCullers (1-0, 2.77 ERA) takes the hill for Houston in a 3:30 CDT start time. Oakland will counter with Sean Manaea (0-1, 7.15 ERA).

 

http://m.astros.mlb.com/news/article/224357210/astros-as-set-to-honor-jackie-robinson/?topicId=26688836

 

As Big T mentioned in his post Dallas Keuchel has been money in his first 3 starts in 2017. He's gone 7 innings in each of those starts and if not for an inexplicable meltdown by Luke Gregerson in Keuchel's 2nd start against Kansas City Keuchel would be 3-0 instead of 2-0 as he is giving up less than a run per start so far. His ERA stands at 0.86. It's nice to see that all the issues that plagued him seem to all be in the rearview mirror.

 

To say that two of the newest Astros have perplexing walk up music is an understatement. Last night in Josh Reddick's return to Oakland and his first as a Astro the A's played his walk up song when he was with them. If I gave you a year you would never guess his walk up tune is 'Careless Whisper' by George Michael. What, really? Most guys have a walk up song that is usually a rocker, generally from the heavy metal genre not a slow torch song. What was Reddick thinking when he decided on that song? Was his plan to lull the defense to sleep so he could sneak in an extra hit or two? I would love it if somebody asked him WTF he was thinking. Only slightly less disturbing is Norichika Aoki's song of 'Johnny B Goode'. At least that is an up tempo rocker for goodness sake. Aoki must like the song or else Norichka is Japanese for "Johnny".

 

Okay, now for the legend of the Astros bats suddenly awakening after beginning the season with barely a pulse. It was this past Tuesday night in Seattle with the Astros trailing the Mariners 3-2 going into the top of the 6th inning. Starting pitcher Ariel Miranda retired the first two batters in the inning but he then walked Brian McCann and Marwin Gonzalez back to back. Miranda was pulled in favor of James Pazos. While Pazos was warming up Root Sports went to their sideline reporter Julia Morales who was about to eat a big soft taco but there was something else on Morales plate a lot less appetizing. Apparently Seattle's concession stands offer toasted grasshoppers as a side dish. This is not a cute name for something else it is real, honest to goodness toasted grasshoppers. Somebody, I think it was Seattle fans in the boxes above Morales position near the Astros dugout, must have goaded Morales into trying the not-so-delectable treat. She put a whole grasshopper in her mouth and bit down and that was it, she turned around and spit it out and did her best not to hurl on the spot. She got rid of the plate with the taco and grasshoppers and said she needed a drink of water as she embarrassingly laughed as the TV guys, Todd Callas and Geoff Blum, teased her about her situation. In the mean time Yulieski Gurriel was the next Astros batter and he had a 1-2 count when Pazos threw a 95 mph sinker that Gurriel swung at catching the ball with the bottom part of his bat. He drove the ball straight into the ground in front of home plate and it bounced so high that by the time it came down Pazos had no chance to get Gurriel at 1B. Next up was Evan Gattis with the bases loaded and he hit a sinking line drive to right field that Mariners right fielder Mitch Haniger tried to make a sliding catch on. He got to the ball okay but instead of hitting in the pocket of his glove it hit on the thumb and caromed away. By the time Haniger got the ball in 3 runs had scored and Gattis was standing on 2B with a double. I was a little surprised the official scorer gave Gattis a hit instead of an E9 but that didn't matter as Houston captured the lead and went on to win 7-5. To add insult to injury the Astros got base hits by George Springer and Alex Bregman who drove in Jake Marisnick who pinch ran for Gattis for a 4th run in the inning. That was enough to win the game and give Joe Musgrove his first win of the season. It was pretty funny how disgusted Julia Morales was and Geoff Blum called Gurriel's hit a 'grasshopper chopper' that began the rally and thawed out the Astros bats. It was the first time all season Houston had sent as many as 7 men to the plate and the 4 runs scored was the most in any inning so far in the Astros season. I doubt very seriously if Julia Morales can be talked into putting a grasshopper in her mouth the next time the Astros go into a team wide slump but it sure worked on Tuesday night. As an aside, as disgusted as Morales was Todd Callas and guys in the Astros tv truck were munching grasshoppers like they were popcorn. The only guy not to try them was Geoff Blum who wanted no part of eating insects at all. Of course Blummer was roasted on twitter for being a wuss but he didn't care, he wasn't about to eat a friggin bug! And that is why Houston's bats have suddenly come alive in the past week.

The Astros were rained out yesterday in Oakland which is a bit of an unusual situation for Oakland to be rained out but it happened. The game will be made up in September as one of the games in that fall series will become a doubleheader. It’s a shame because Houston is on a bit of a roll and you hate to see anything stall their current momentum.

The Astros won the series on Saturday afternoon beating the A’s 10-5 in a game that saw the Astros down 5-0 through 5 innings. On top of that, the Astros didn’t even get a hit until the 6th inning. A sixth inning in which Houston began chipping away at that 5-0 lead scoring 2 runs in the 6th and 7th before ramping it up with 3 runs in each of the final two innings.

Lance McCullers did not have it on Saturday, he just didn’t. He gave up all five A’s runs in just 4.1 innings of work and I mean it was work. The day started out like it was going to be a dominating performance by McCullers as he shut down the A’s 1-2-3 in the 1st inning. That was just camouflage for what was to come. In the 2nd he gave up 3 runs as McCullers faced 7 A’s hitters throwing 35 pitches. In the 3rd McCullers faced six batters as he loaded the bases with a walk and a pair of singles to the first 3 hitters in the inning. He buckled down and retired the last 3 on a K, a groundout and another K. It was an awesome job not allowing a run when he was facing a bases loaded, no out situation. In the 4th McCullers looked like he found something in the 3rd as he retired the side in order with a thankfully quick inning but in the 5th whatever McCullers found he must’ve lost it in the dugout between innings. The A’s Trevor Plouffe led off the inning with a first pitch HR to center field extending the A’s lead to 4-0. Plouffe was followed by former Astro Jed Lowrie who hit a hard line drive to center field but it was caught by Jake Marisnick who got a nice jump on the ball to make the catch. McCullers then gave up a 1-0 HR to Khris Davis again to center field. Just like that the score was 5 zip and the A’s were tattooing McCullers’ pitches right back up the middle of the field which means he wasn’t fooling anyone. AJ Hinch had seen enough and just like that McCullers’ day was done.

Houston pitching beginning with Tony Sipp and ending with Luke Gregerson shut the door on the A’s offense with only Ken Giles giving up a run in the 8th. It’s interesting to see that it only took 2 weeks for Giles to pitch his way out of the closers role.

The Astros had no solution for A’s starter Sean Manaea who went 5 inning throwing a no-hitter. Unfortunately for the A’s Manaea should have quit after 5 because he got into trouble in the 6th allowing the first 3 batters in the inning to reach base on walks. Carlos Correa reached 1st with the bases loaded on a fielding error by SS Adam Rosales when he threw away his throw to 2nd base with the ball ending up in center field. The bad throw allowed 2 runs to score and the flood gates opened after that. Manaea was relieved after Correa’s at-bat and the A’s shaky bullpen did the rest. Manaea was tagged for 2 runs but the bullpen surrendered the other 8 over the next 3 innings. Houston has won 4 in a row and they won the series with the win on Saturday.

Next up is a trip to LA-LA Land to play the Angels. Charlie (Jimmy Fallon) Morton (1-0, 4.63 ERA) will face off against the Angels’ Jesse Chavez (1-1, 5.40 ERA).

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/angels-vs-astros/2017/04/17/490288?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490288

The Astros lost for the first time in 5 games on Tuesday when Joe Musgrove had a couple of rough innings in his 3rd start of the season and the offense took a brief vacation except for a HR by Springer and another by Yuli Gurriel which gave the Astros a brief 2-1 lead in the game before Albert Pujols went all Brad Lidge on Musgrove when he jacked a 3-run HR over the train tracks in left field.

The Astros got back on track on Wedneday night when Dallas Keuchel on the mound for Houston. The Astros starting rotation was jacked up a little because of the rainout in Oakland on Sunday. Charlie Morton was scheduled to pitch Sunday made his start on Monday getting his first Astros win. Musgrove made his start on Wednesday but Mike Fiers was skipped in favor of keeping Dallas Keuchel on his regular schedule. It looks like a really good move as Keuchel made it 4 times in 4 starts that Keuchel has pitched 7 seven innings and he led the Astros to a 5-1 win over the Angels. He got all the help he needed from Josh Reddick who went 3-4 on the night falling a single short of hitting for the cycle. Reddick tripled in the first inning and he scored when Jose Altuve singled him home giving Houston an early 1-0 lead. In the 6th inning Reddick led off the inning with a double and 3 batters later with 2 outs in the inning Evan Gattis singled Reddick home. In the seventh Reddick hit a 2 out, 2 strike 2 run homer to right that just did get over the wall. Houston is 10-5 on the season and they have opened a 3 game lead over the 2nd place A’s in the AL West. Only the Yankees have won 10 games in the AL while only the Diamondbacks and Rockies have won 10 games in the NL. I know it’s still way too early to worry about records and who has won what but it’s way better than the situation last season when the Astros had won just 5 games by this point on their way to a 7-17 April record.

 

The Astros play an afternoon game today at 1:10 PM as Lance McCullers tries to put a real sticker of a start behind him. Last Friday McCullers only lasted 4.1 innings as he gave up 5 runs to spot the A’s a 5 zip lead. Fortunately Houston came roaring back scoring 10 runs in four innings to beat the A’s 10-5 which was great for McCullers because the offense saving McCullers from suffering his first loss of the season. As it is McCullers did not factor in the decision and he comes into today’s finale in the four game series against the Angels. If Houston gets the job done today that would give them 4 series wins in 5 tries which is not too shabby.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/angels-vs-astros/2017/04/20/490331?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490331

The Astros inserted Mike Fiers as the starting pitcher last night and it didn't look good early as he allowed one run in each of the first 3 innings giving the Tampa Bay Rays an early lead. Carlos Beltran got a solo HR in the 2nd inning but after 3 TB led 3-1. Houston came back in the 4th with 2 runs to tie the game. In the 7th Rays starter Alex Cobb loaded the bases with nobody out before being pulled in favor of Jumbo Diaz a huge guy with a so-so ERA but he had his split finger working last night. The first batter he faced was George Springer who promptly grounded sharply to 3B Evan Longoria. Longoria briefly bobbled the ball and it must have messed up his mind because instead of going home with the ball to get Brian McCann, which he had plenty of time to do, he ran to third base for the force out there. Longoria got the out but he also allowed the go-ahead run to score when he didn't have to. Jumbo Diaz got Josh Reddick to pop out in foul territory to Longoria and he got Altuve on a comebacker to the mound to end the inning. Diaz did a great job coming in with bases loaded and one out escaping with just one run scoring but if Longoria hadn't had a brain fart he would have escaped without any damage at all. Longoria could have been the goat of the game if the final score had ended up 4-3 but Houston tacked on 2 more runs in the 9th for insurance and the bullpen was amazing again going 4 innings allowing no runs on just one hit with no walks and 3 K's. Michael Feliz pitched a perfect 6th and ended up getting the win. Will Harris allowed a lead off hit in the 7th but he retired the next 3 in order. Luke Gregerson pitched a perfect 8th and Ken Giles picked up his 4th save of the season with a perfect 9th giving Houston a 6-3 win.

 

Last night on the TV broadcast Kalas and Blum talked about the futility the Astros have had in Tampa. The Astros had not won a single game in Tampa since joining the American League 5 years ago and they have averaged, prior to last night, just 1.76 runs per game in Tampa. In fact Houston had not scored more than 5 runs in any game until last night's 6 runs. Maybe this will open the flood gates to more wins!

 

Charlie Morton (1-1, 2.81 ERA) will start tonight's game while Tampa will counter with LHP Blake Snell (0-2, 2.76 ERA).

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/astros-vs-rays/2017/04/22/490356?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490356

Charlie Morton pitched really well for 5 innings. He got a little shaky in the 5th when he allowed 2 Tampa Bay runs to tie the game at 2. Houston came right back in the top of the 6th with a go ahead run that was all Jose Altuve. Altuve led off the 6th with a 4 pitch walk. Carlos Correa flew out to right field for the first out of the inning. Next up was Evan Gattis and during his AB Altuve stole 2nd base. Later in the same AB Gattis grounded out to 1B Logan Morrison. Morrison took the ball to the bag himself but he didn't count on Altuve's heads up base running. As Morrison sort of lollygagged his way to the 1B bag to get Gattis Altuve turned on the jets as he rounded 3rd and he easily scored to give Houston the 3-2 lead. It was just a beautiful thing to see as Altuve took advantage of the Rays' lethargy to score a very unlikely run.

 

http://m.mlb.com/hou/video/v1312339483/houtb-altuve-scores-on-smart-baserunning

 

The Astros offense was all Altuve and Gattis yesterday with both players getting their first home runs of the season. It was Gattis' groundout to 1st that enabled Altuve to score the, at the time, go ahead run. Houston only managed 3 runs as they fell back into their old pattern of not being able to score runs against Tampa in Tampa. The D-Rays looked like they were in the same funk until the bottom of the 6th. Charlie Morton allowed the first 3 batters to reach base before getting the hook by AJ Hinch after throwing 89 pitches. The bullpen still could have saved the game for Morton but it just didn't happen. The normally reliable Will Harris came on and he allowed 2 consecutive base hits to give the Rays a 4-3 lead. Harris got the next hitter, Corey Dickerson, to ground out to Altuve who gunned down Derek Norris at home to save a run. Harris was so grateful for Altuve's play he promptly gave up a 2 RBI single to Peter Bourjos, who will henceforth be named Peter Blowjob, that gave the Rays a comfortable 6-3 lead which they took to the house along with the victory tying the series at 1 game apiece.

 

Some other bad news hit the Astros as George Springer came out of the game in the sixth inning after pulling a hamstring trying to leg out a ground ball to short. Springer was the 2nd half of a Rays twin killing and Springer came up limping as he got near the 1B bag. He will listed as day-to-day and he isn't in the Astros lineup this afternoon.

 

The Astros have already begun their rubber game against the Rays. They have Joe Musgrove going this afternoon while the Rays have Matt Adriese. So far it's all Andriese as Tampa leads Houston 4-0 after just 2 innings! The hell of it is Musgrove shouldn't have given up squat. The Rays had Corey Dickerson leading of the game and he struck out but Musgrove had thrown a wild pitch on strike 3 allowing Dickerson to get to first base. Dickerson was followed by Logan Morrison who flew out to Jake Marisnick in center. Hitting third was Evan Longoria who grounded to Carlos Correa who took the force out at 2nd. Two outs that really should have been 3. That's when everything went south for Musgrove. Next up for Tampa was Brad Miller who tripled into the right field corner scoring Longoria. Stephen Souza connected on a 2 run homer to put the Rays up 3-0. Remember all this is taking place with 2 outs. Shane Peterson, Ricky Weeks Jr and Jesus Sucre hit back-to-back-to-back singles that also scored 1 more run to put the Rays ahead 4 zip. Joe Musgrove's bludgeoning finally ended when he got Tim Beckham to fly out for the final out.

While I was writing this Carlos Beltran hit a 2-run homer to right field to edge the Astros close with the score now 4-2 with the Rays coming up in the bottom of the 3rd.

I'll be glad when Houston gets the hell out Tampa. You've heard of the Black Hole of Calcutta? Well, Tampa is the Black Hole of Houston. I thought maybe the Astros had broken the Tampa jinx but it appears to have been just an anomaly.

Edited April 23, 2017 by eagle eye

I wasn’t too hopeful that the Astros were going to win yesterday after the Tampa Bay Rays went up 4-0 after the first inning especially given the Astros history in Tampa. But danged it Houston didn’t do it! They came back from 4 runs down to end up beating the Rays by a score of 6-4. It took Houston 10 innings to do it but they got it done. Maybe this team is different. Maybe this team, here in April, is showing signs of being special. So far after just three weeks of play in the 2017 season the Astros have come back from two 5-0 deficits and now a 4-0 hole. In one of the 5-0 games the A’s no-hit the Astros for 6 innings before losing 10-5 when Houston’s offense exploded in the final 3 innings. Yesterday, Houston began chipping away at the Rays lead beginning in the third inning when Carlos Correa hit a two out 2 run HR to make the score 4-2 in favor of the Rays. In the 5th inning Jose Altuve got his second homer in as many days when he hit a two out solo shot to inch even closer to the Rays making the score 4-3. In the Astros last AB they had providence shine on them. Yuri Gurriel led off the inning with a single and he advanced to 2B on a ground ball to 1B Ricky Weeks by Nori Aoki. Evan Gattis came in to pinch hit for Marwin Gonzalez. During Gattis AB Rays closer Alex Colome threw a pitch that wasn’t played by catcher Jesus Sucre and it was ruled a passed ball. The passed ball allowed Gurriel to advance to 3B and he was driven home when Gattis hit a sac fly to right field. Gurriel’s run tied the game at 4 and after Luke Gregerson retired the Rays in the bottom of the inning the game went to extra innings.

In the 10th Brian McCann singled home Carlos Beltran who had walked to lead off the inning and he advanced to 2B on a single by Jose Altuve. That put the Astros up 5-4 and Yuri Gurriel came up with two outs in the inning and singled home Altuve to give Houston it’s final 6-4 lead. Ken Giles came in and he got his 5th save on the season. This is the first series Houston has won in Tampa since 2008.

 

The past week was a good week for the Astros. They went 5-2 this past week beating The Angels in 3 of 4 games at home and Tampa Bay in 2 of 3 games on the road. They are the first team with 11 wins in the majors and they are one of just 3 teams that have 13 wins and they are the only AL team with 13 wins. The Astros are currently in 1st place in the AL West 3 games ahead of 2nd place Oakland. Their starting rotation has been solid with Dallas Keuchel and Lance McCullers leading the way. Keuchel especially, with his 3-0 record in 4 starts. Keuchel has also gone 7 innings in each of his 4 starts which is phenomenal. McCullers had one shaky start last week but he rebounded with a strong start against the Angels last week going 6.2 dominant innings allowing no runs on 3 hits, 3 BB’s and 8 K’s. The Astros offense is coming to life as well after a slow start to the season. The Astros have a team batting average of .266 which is the 3rd best in the majors. The biggest revelation is that Houston has the 3rd FEWEST strike outs in baseball. Only Boston (117) and Pittsburgh (127) have less than Houston’s 132 K’s. This a HUGE change from recent years when Houston was at, or near, the top in the MLB with most K’s. This ability to avoid striking out and putting the ball in play surely has a lot to do with Houston’s ability to overcome deficits and win games they would have lost in the past.

 

Carlos Correa got hit in the hand by a pitch last Sunday and he missed several games last week. He returned for the Tampa series and he got a big HR in yesterday’s finale. George Springer pulled a hamstring on Saturday night and he missed yesterday’s game and he could miss a couple more as he is listed as day-to-day. There will be this last week in April but even if Houston goes oh-fer this week they would still have a nice 1st month of the season. I don’t think they will go oh-fer but they have 3 games against Cleveland in Cleveland and 3 at home against Oakland.

Houston begins the series against Cleveland with Dallas Keuchel (3-0, 0.96 ERA) making his 5th start of the season as Cleveland counters with RHP Josh Tomlinson (1-2, 11.68 ERA).

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/astros-vs-indians/2017/04/25/490393?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490393

Is it really all that simple? Does baseball come down to pitching in final analysis? If you look at the Astros in their first two games with Cleveland it sure seems that way.

On Tuesday Dallas Keuchel got his fifth start of the season and he again pitched at least 7 innings. Had he stopped after seven he would have only given up one run on 4 hits. The one run came on a solo HR by Austin Jackson with one out in the 3rd inning. Keuchel didn't stop at 7 inning of work, no, he went the distance allowing 6 hits and 2 runs, the 2nd run coming off a solo HR by Michael Brantley to lead off the 9th. It was Keuchel's 10th career complete game and his first of 2017 and it runs his record to 4-0 on the season. If not for Keuchel's 117 pitch gem all the accolades would go to Josh Reddick who was the position player star of the game. Reddick drove in 3 of the Astros 4 runs on the night he also made the defensive play of the game robbing the Indians Jason Kipnis drove a ball to deep center field. Reddick, playing center field because of injuries to George Springer and Jake Marisnick tracked the ball to the wall and he timed his jump perfectly snatching the ball just as it was about to clear the wall. Nice start to a series with the AL representative to last season's World Series.

Game 2 featured Lance McCullers and he didn't fare as well against the Tribe. He gave up 3 runs in the first and another 2 in the 5th as he gave up 5 runs on 7 hits, 3 BB's and just five K's. McCullers just wasn't very good last night. Despite it all he did only give up the five runs and Houston has come back from big leads before. It wasn't going to happen last night because in the sixth Tony Sipp came in for McCullers who threw 90 pitches in his 5 innings of work. Sipp immediately got into trouble allowing a leadoff single and he advanced the runner 90 feet when he uncorked a wild pitch followed by a sac bunt to get the runner to 3rd with one out. Sipp then walked the next batter on 4 pitches. AJ Hinch had seen enough and he gave the hook to Sipp and brought in Michael Feliz to bail Sipp out. Trouble was Feliz didn't follow the script Hinch had in mind. During the AB of his first batter Feliz threw a wild pitch that advanced the runner from 1st to 2nd. The runner on 3rd was forced to stay so Feliz had men on 2nd and 3rd with just one out. It looked like Feliz might escape after he struck out that first batter to get to 2 outs but he gave up a 2 run double to Carlos Santana who Oye Como Va'd into 2B. Feliz retired the next batter but the extra 2 runs tacked on to the 5 McCullers gave up was just too much to overcome. Houston had pulled to within one run on a 2 run HR by Evan Gattis in the 4th and another 2 run dinger by Brian McCann in the top of the sixth. Houston got 2 more runs in the 8th on a 2 run double by Marwin Gonzalez but that's as close as Houston could come the Indians on the night as they lost 7-6. Houston squandered a golden opportunity in the 7th inning to score some runs when the Astros had the bases loaded with just one out but Carlos Correa struck out at the end of an 8 pitch AB and Brian McCann struck out right behind Correa to end the Astros threat. A base hit would have likely resulted in 2 runs and could have led to a big inning. It's quite disappointing that Correa and McCann failed to even make contact.

 

The Astros are at a big disadvantage right now as they have several key position players out of action. George Springer pulled a hamstring in Tampa over the weekend and he's been out of action except for a brief appearance on Tuesday night which I will detail in a sec. Jake Marisnick is on the 7 day concussion DL because he ran head first into the wall in center field in Tampa on Sunday making a catch in that series finale. Teoscar Hernendez was called up to replace Marisnick and he came into the game as a defensive replacement for Carlos Beltran on Tuesday night and with one out in the 8th inning he and Jose Altuve were tracking a fly ball down in shallow right field when they collided. The collision resulted in both players coming out of the game and even worse caused Hernandez to go the DL with a bad contusion on his leg and Jose Altuve missed Wednesday's game as a precaution after he received a blow to the head in his collision with Hernandez. It is not known for sure but Altuve could be back in the Astros lineup tonight after being cleared for a concussion. He does have a stiff shoulder as a result of the collision. Tony Kemp was called up from AAA to replace Hernandez and he played last night. With the injuries to Springer and Marisnick Josh Reddick was tabbed to play center field and hit lead off for Houston the past two games in Cleveland. Reddick will likely get the call to do it again in the series finale tonight.

 

Mike Fiers (0-1, 5.40 ERA) will go for Houston tonight while Cleveland counters with Kory Kluber (2-1, 4.28 ERA). Fiers wasn't terrible in his last start in the opening game in the series with Tampa last Friday. He gave up 7 hits and 3 runs in 5 innings of work in a game that Houston came back to win late but he needs to be better against a free swinging and potent Cleveland offense.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/astros-vs-indians/2017/04/27/490421?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=,game=490421

Houston's pitching let them down again last night. Mike Fiers only lasted 4.1 innings and 74 pitches as he gave up 5 hits and 3 walks to along with just 3 K's. Despite constantly being in trouble last night Fiers still only gave up 2 runs on 2 solo HR's. Edwin Encarnacion spanked a homer to left in the 2nd inning and he gave up another HR to Abraham Almonte in the 5th that made the score 3-2 in Houston's favor at the time. After giving up the HR to Almonte and a double to Yan Gomes followed by a groundout by Carlos Santana that advanced Gomes to 3rd base when AJ Hinch brought in Chris Devenski. Devenski got out of the 5th without any problem and he also breezed through the 6th and it looked like he would lock down the 7th until Francisco Lindor golfed a low breaking ball to straight away center field with a man on that gave the Indians a lead they never relinquished as they beat the Astros 4-3 to win the series. This was the first road series the Astros has lost this season so it's been a pretty good run to begin the season. The HR by Lindor wasn't a mistake by Devenski. The pitch was down nearly out of the strike zone on the inner half of the plate. The pitch was probably just about where Devenski wanted it but sometimes the batter just wins and that is what I believe happened there. It just seems like left handed hitters just thrive on inside and down pitches. Lindor reminded me of Ken Griffey Jr when he made that swing and I'm not saying Lindor has Griffey-like power but on that particular pitch he got it all.

Another thing about the series, Houston didn't have their All Star 2nd baseman for one game and they didn't have their star right fielder and it didn't help that their All Star SS is in the middle of a huge slump. That isn't all because their next best center fielder is on the DL with a concussion and the guy the Astros brought up to replace Jake Marisnick went on the DL after colliding with Jose Altuve in the 8th inning in Tuesday's game. The Astros were not even close to full strength and they lost 2 of 3 games to Cleveland, a World Series participant just a few month ago, by one run in both games. Also they lost on the road. IMO the Astros lost the game in the 1st inning when they loaded the bases with just one out and failed to score a run. Josh Riddick led off the game with a double and Nori Aoki singled to give Houston runners on the corners. Carlos Correa had a horrible AB striking out on 3 pitches and he was followed by Evan Gattis who worked a walk to load the bases. Yuli Gurriel flared a pop fly to right field that was ruled a catch by the umpire but AJ Hinch felt Almonte trapped the ball and didn't really catch it. The challenge was upheld by review and Gurriel was the final out of the inning.

The Indians Corey Kluber went 7 innings despite giving up 8 hits and 4 walks to the Astros. What bailed Kluber out were the 10 K's he also recorded. All in all a disappointing series loss to a good team but nothing to be ashamed of either given how many starters and primary backups were out of the lineup last night.

 

Houston returns home for the final series of April beginning tonight against the Oakland A's. Right now Houston owns a 4 game lead over the 2nd place A's heading into tonight's game. Charlie Morton (1-2, 4.29 ERA) goes for Houston while the A's counter with Jharel Cotton (2-2, 4.76 ERA) in a 7:10 start at the Juice Box.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/athletics-vs-astros/2017/04/28/490439?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=box,game=490439

It was a big night for the Astros as they returned home after and 6 game road trip in which the went 3-3. It didn't look good early as Astros starter Charlie Morton got tagged for 3 runs in the first inning on a Kris Davis 3 run homer. Davis came up again in the 3rd inning and he went deep again smacking a solo shot into the seats. Houston came back in the bottom of the third in a rally that included a balk by A's starter Jharel Cotton and a catcher's interference by Stephen Vogt on Josh Reddick helped the Astros score 3 runs of their own to tie the game at 3 after just one inning of play. Vogt was again guilty of catcher's interference and again it was with Josh Reddick at the plate. It was the first time in 2 seasons that has happen. Ironically, it was Vogt who was guilty of catcher's interference against Jacoby Ellsbury in a game in 2015. It's a wonder that Vogt didn't end up with a couple of broken fingers especially after the 2nd time it happened when Reddick knocked Vogt's mitt completely off his hand. In spite of Charlie Morton's troubles with Kris Davis he actually picked really well. As AJ Hinch remarked after the game it was an evolution for Morton during the game and by the end of the 7th, and final inning that Morton pitched, he had become a much better pitcher going from a guy who didn't seem to know where the ball was going as it came out of his hand to a focused and deadly pitcher who was spotting his pitches well. Hinch even noted that Morton's velocity actually increased and his breaking balls had more bit as he piled up innings. Last night was only Morton's 5th start in 2017 and he missed almost all of 2016 with a bad hamstring. He made only 4 starts with the Phillies when he pulled his hamstring legging out an infield hit. He pulled it bad enough it caused him to miss the rest of the season. So, maybe we can forgive Morton for his early struggles as this is his first action in over a year. He is learning to pitch again and if last night was any indication we are in for some good things going forward. Morton recorded a career high 12 K's last night as he went 7 complete innings shutting down the A's after Davis' 3rd inning homer.

Of course Morton was the beneficiary of some good offense by the Astros that was sparked by a George Springer hustle play in the 4th inning that enabled Evan Gattis to score from 3rd base with 2 out. Springer hit the ball in the hole between SS and 3B but A's SS Adam Rosales made a really good jump-throw that Springer barely beat to the bag. Any worries about Springer's hamstring had to laid to rest with his all out hustle to 1B.

Yuli Gurriel and Evan Gattis both went 3-4 on the night. Houston beat the A's without depending on the home run as the only round tripper was hit by Gurriel in the 7th inning. Gurriel hit a solo shot that extended the Astros lead to 7-4 at the time. Carlos Correa showed signs that he is coming out of his slump as he went 2-5 with 2 RBI's. It was a nice win for Houston who scored 9 runs in their 9-4 victory. It was a season high runs scored for 2017 at home as the Astros were averaging just 3 runs a game at home this season.

 

Next up the Astros will send Joe Musgrove (1-1, 5.79 ERA) to face the A's who will have RHP Andrew Triggs (3-1, 2.42 ERA) against an Astros lineup that is killing right hand pitching so far this season.

 

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/athletics-vs-astros/2017/04/29/490454?#=undefined,game_state=preview,game_tab=box,game=490454

Saturday night The Astros offense took the night off with the help of a journeyman pitcher for the A's Andrew Triggs. Did I say journeyman? Well, Triggs is 28 but he only has only pitched in 29 games in the big leagues with just 11 starts. The thing is he is having a nice year so far as he's sporting a healthy 4-1 record including the win on Saturday night. The entire Astros lineup was totally befuddled by Triggs constantly taking fastballs for strikes and whiffing at his slider that most of the time wasn't even close to a strike was frustrating to watch. Maybe not as frustrating as if was for the Astros hitters but I'll bet it was pretty close. The shame of it all was the offense wasted a really nice job by Astros starter Joe Musgrove. After a disastrous 1st inning in Tampa last weekend where he gave up 4 runs he settled down and pitched 6 innings for Houston in a game they eventually came back and won. On Saturday night Musgrove went 6.1 innings and why AJ Hinch pulled him after one out in the seventh and just 86 pitches I couldn't say but he could have finished 7 easily.

Musgrove seemed to have a light go on in Tampa and he showed resiliency and toughness coming back after a rough start. Musgrove is going to be okay and it doesn't matter that he lost the game Saturday night he is learning to be a major league pitcher and he's having success in the process.

Dallas Keuchel pitched in a beautiful sunshiny day with the Juicy Box rook open. Keuchel made it 6 straight starts where he has gone at least 7 innings and he and Roger Clemens are the only pitchers in Astros history to win 5 games in April. That you very much Luke Gregerson, if not for a huge meltdown where you blew a save chance in Keuchel's 2nd start, Keuchel would have gone 6-0 in April and own the franchise record for wins in April. Fast forward to this afternoon and Gregerson came in with two outs in the 8th inning and he promptly fucked up Keuchel's shutout and he allowed a baserunner Keuchel allowed when Adam Rosales singled to left after Keuchel recorded the first two outs in the inning. Gregerson could not find the strike zone to save his life as it took him 3 batters to record one out. He walked Yonder Alonzo on 4 pitches which also allowed Adam Rosales to steal 2nd and a wild pitch later in the AB got Rosales to 3rd. Alonzo was followed by Ryon Healy who singled to center field scoring Rosales who was Keuchel's responsibility. Kids, tell Luke Gregerson he's a douche. Luke Gregerson you a douche. Great, now you kids go play chicken in traffic. Gregerson did get Khris Davis to ground out to 2B to end the inning but the damage to Keuchel's line score had been done. The Astros were leading 7-1 heading into the 9th and Brad Peacock went out to shut the door on the A's. Peacock has pitched well up until togay when he could not find the strike zone with a road map or a seeing eye dog. Peacock faced six batters in the inning and only got 2 out and he allowed his first run of the season and had the bases loaded when Hinch gave him the hook. Ken Giles came in and got Yonder Alonzo to fly out to right field to end the game.

Houston won the series 2 games to 1 and they finish April winning all but 2 of the series they played during the month. Houston ends the month of April in 1st place in the AL West with a very healthy 16-9 record, the best in the AL. The have a 3 game lead over 2nd place LA Angels and 5 games ahead of 3rd place Oakland and Texas. It's a nice start to the season and when the some of the Astros slump the other guys in the lineup are picking them up with just a couple of exceptions. This is a good team and with the emergence of Charlie Morton and Joe Musgrove even the back end of the starting rotation looks like it could be really formidable.

The only negative for Houston is absence of Collin McHugh who is on rehab for a nerve issue in his right elbow. Hopefully, he will be able to start throwing soon but the rotation is holding up fairly without him. It makes the failure of obtaining Chris Sale in free agency even more painful especially since Sale is kicking ass and taking names for the Red Sox. How can you say he is kicking ass for Boston when his record shows anything but? He is currently 1-2 in five starts which is hardly kick-ass but when you look at his 1.19 ERA you can see he just hasn't gotten any run support from his offense. Sale has allowed just six runs, 5 earned in 5 starts and he's allowed just one HR in those 5 starts. So, yes, I'd say Sale is kicking ass for Boston it's just that Boston is not kicking ass for him.

Oh well. I am happy with this Astros team and I don't foresee any prolonged slumps because of the lineup being so strong. If the pitching continues to hold up all I have to hope is that the September swoon that has hit this team the past two seasons keeps the hell away from Houston.

Here we go! This four game series versus the Rangers is extremely important. I keep hearing "it's just another series" and "it's not that important in the long run," but given the recent history against the Rangers and the Astros inability to beat them this series is huge. This will set the tone for the fan base as to whether or not this is truly a different Astros team or if it's going to be more of the same. Buy not only that, it sets the tone for the players in the clubhouse. It is completely demoralizing for these players to get beat over and over by the Rangers. A series win or at least a 2-2 split will allow the Astros players and fan base take a deep breath and say, "this year can be different." A series lose or sweep would be utterly demoralizing.

The Astros beat Texas last night in a contentious affair that included a bench clearing confrontation in the 6th inning. No punches were thrown, it was just a bunch of macho posturing mainly by the Rangers. It all began when Rangers starter Andrew Cashner hit Jose Altuve in the 1st inning. Cashner also led off the 3rd by hitting Yuli Gurriel. Neither plunking looked like it was on purpose, but the Astros weren’t happy with Cashner nonetheless. In the 4th inning the Ranger’s Mike Napoli hit a towering home run to straight away center field which gave the Rangers a 2-1 lead at the time. The next time Napoli came to the plate Astros starter Lance McCullers threw a pitch behind Napoli. The pitch didn’t hit him but Napoli acted like a little bitch about it and started talking smack to McCullers who talked smack right back at Napoli. The rivalry between the Rangers and Astros has gotten pretty heated since Houston joined the AL and it hasn’t helped that Texas has gotten the better of Houston most of the time. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed and the teams went back to playing baseball. McCullers came back and retired Napoli on a swinging strike to end the Rangers 4th inning. The Astros still trailed the Rangers 2-1 as they came to bat in the bottom of the 7th but when the final out was recorded the Astros had batted around and scored 5 runs to take a 6-2 lead. Among the hits by the Astros were doubles by Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa and Yuli Gurriel that drove in all five runs in the inning.

Lance McCullers did pitch a nice game going 6.1 innings allowing just 2 runs on 6 hits with 2 walks. He also punched out the Rangers 10 times in the game. He came out in the 7th after throwing 105 pitches. Chris Devenski did his magic as he finished off the 7th for McCullers and pitched a scoreless 8th that ended up earning him the win. Michael Feliz came on in the 9th but he had his second straight poor outing logging one out while putting two runners on base before AJ Hinch had seen enough and gave Feliz the hook in favor of Ken Giles. Giles faced Elvis Andrus who put up a good at-bat taking Giles to a 3-2 count and battling through a 9 pitch AB before Giles got Andrus to ground into a game ending double play. Houston won the first of a total of 19 games these teams will play this season. Personally, I would love it if Houston got some payback and go 19-0 against the Rangers this season. I don’t like the Rangers in general but I really don’t like Redneck OH-der and Carlos Gomez. IMO they are twin dicks from different mothers. It won’t be easy to achieve 19-0 when you have a pitching matchup the Astros face tonight. Cole Hamels goes for the Rangers while the Astros send Mike Fiers to the hill. There hasn’t been a pitch thrown and the Rangers have the advantage.

 

Jake Marisnick was active and played in the game last night. After brief absences by Carlos Correa, Jose Altuve, George Springer and Marisnick the team is back to full strength and it comes none-too-soon as the Astros face their nemesis, the Texas Rangers, in a four game series this week. Houston took Game 1 but there are a lot of games left to play and the Rangers have owned Houston since the Astros made the move the American League. Houston would love to turn the tables on the Rangers and Astros fans would love it too.

The Astros won the series against the Rangers but I was sure hoping for a sweep. Game 4 of the series started badly with Astros starter Joe Musgrove giving up 4 runs in the very first inning and another run in the 2nd so Houston was down 5-1 before anyone knew what the heck was going on. After 7 innings the Astros had scratched and clawed their way back into the game to where they were down just two runs with score standing at 6-4. Then came Luke Gregerson. In the past week he has been pretty awful and he did manage to make it through the entire inning but not without giving up 3 more runs effectively slamming the door on his own team. The Rangers took Game 4 in the series yesterday by a score of 10-4 but it wasn’t as if Gregerson was the only problem the Astros had. The offense was hitting the ball but they didn’t do when it counted. Houston was 2-14 with RISP and they stranded 16 base runners in all. Houston had the bases loaded in the 7th with less than 2 outs and only scored one run in the inning. They had two men on with less than 2 outs in the 8th and didn’t score at all. The Astros got their leadoff man in every inning except the 5th and the 9th on base. The pitchers didn’t show up either. Besides Musgrove and Gregerson, Brad Peacock and Michael Feliz gave up a run each. Peacock pitched 2 innings in relief of Musgrove and Feliz pitched the 9th. The only Astros pitcher who didn’t suck was Tony Sipp. In his inning of work Sipp didn’t allow a run, a hit or a walk with one K.

After Wednesday’s game Houston was the only team with 19 wins and they went into Thursday’s game with the chance to be MLB’s first 20 win team. That didn’t happen and the Washington Nationals won their 19th game yesterday. It’s kind of ironic that the two teams with the best record in baseball began spring training sharing their brand new facility at the Park of the Palm Beaches. Could we be looking at the two World Series teams? That would be a heckuva story.

 

Speaking of the Nats, they will get the first shot at being the first team in the bigs to win 20 games when they face the Phillies at 6 o’clock this evening. The fact is, by the time the Astros game in Los Angeles against the Angels begins that game should be over. Right now the Angels are in 2nd place in the AL West so Houston needs to take care of business there beginning tonight through Sunday. The Astros played a 4 game series in April taking 3 of the 4 games. In April Houston played a total of 25 games 16 of which were division games. The Astros played just 3 series outside the AL West and those were with Kansas City, Tampa Bay and Cleveland. After playing the first seven games of May against division foes the Astros will not play another division game until June 2nd when they travel to Arlington for Round 2 with the Rangers.

 

Tonight the Astros will send Dallas Keuchel to the mound for his seventh start of the season. Keuchel was named AL Pitcher of the Month for April this week after going 5-0 in six starts with a 1.21 ERA. Keuchel has also gone at least seven innings in each of his 6 starts. I believe we can declare Keuchel healthy and good to go by now. Keuchel even pitched a complete game throwing 117 pitches in beating the Cleveland for the Astros only win in that series. AJ Hinch has really put a limit on Keuchel’s pitch count, the only other start he let Keuchel’s pitch count get to triple digits was an even 100 pitches against the A’s in Oakland in his third start of the season. I think Hinch learned a lesson as he let Keuchel to throw 106 pitches in freezing weather in the season opener in Yankee Stadium. Keuchel hurt his shoulder in that start and he was never the same pitcher for the rest of 2016 going 9-12 for the season and he never pitched again after August 27th last season until opening day this year. The two biggest worries about the Astros coming into the season was the health of Keuchel and Lance McCullers and both appear to be healthy. So far Keuchel is pitching to the level of his Cy Young award winning season in 2015. McCullers made one small change in his mechanics in the offseason and he’s throwing the ball better than ever. The thing about McCullers is can he maintain his level of play while he continues to learn how to be a major league pitcher. The same can be said of Joe Musgrove in that he has all the tools but he’s just beginning to learn HOW to pitch in the bigs. I would love to see Houston go on a 10 game winning streak but so far the offense isn’t as consistent as you would like and the pitchers except for Keuchel need to stop giving up 4 and 5 runs in the first inning all the time. First up, the Angels. Let’s take care of business in LA this weekend behind Keuchel, McCullers and Fiers.

Game 1 against the Angels was a cake walk for 8 innings. Dallas Keuchel was again magnificent allowing just two runs on two solo home runs in those 8 innings. The Astros were leading heading into the bottom of the 8th 4-2 but they pushed across two insurance runs to take a 6-2 lead into the last inning. At that point Keuchel had thrown 95 pitches and looked unstoppable but after 4 times through the Angels lineup they either figured Keuchel out or Keuchel was just tired and lost his mojo. Either way the first three batters singled loading the bases with nobody out. Keuchel had thrown 103 pitches and the Angels had Mike Trout and Albert Pujols coming to bat. In came Ken Giles who has his worst outing of the season. He allowed all 3 runners Keuchel was responsible for as well as one of his own to allow the Angels to tie the game. Houston came right back in the 10th with a Jose Altuve single and a stolen base followed by a base hit by Carlos Correa to score Altuve giving Houston a 7-6 lead. In the Angels half of the 10th the Astros brought on Chris Devenski and he retired the Angels 1-2-3 to give the Astros the win. Yet again Dallas Keuchel goes 7+ innings for the 7th time in outings. This time a meltdown by the bullpen with a little help from Keuchel himself resulted in a blown chance for Keuchel to become the first pitcher to reach 6 wins for the season. The consolation to this disappointment is that the Astros got the win anyway which, in the grand scheme of things is what is most important.

 

In Game 2 Houston got a really superior effort from Lance McCullers. He went 7 innings allowing just 2 hits, 2 BB's with 4 K's. The one run scored on him was unearned thanks to a passed ball by Brian McCann that allowed former Astro Luis Valbuena, who had singled to lead off the 2nd inning and had stolen 2B, to advance to 3B. He scored on a ground ball to short by Cameron Mayben. That run tied the game at one, Houston had taken an early lead when they scored a run in the top of the first when Carlos Beltran doubled scoring Carlos Correa who had singled just before Beltran's AB. Houston had 9 hits in the game but they stranded 8 base runners in the game with all 8 in scoring position but Houston just couldn't seem to get a hit that would have broken the game open. The game stayed tied at 1 through 8 innings when Chris Devenski came in to pitch the 9th. It was an unfortunate outing for him after he was victimized by a bad call on ball four to lead off hitter Kole Calhoun and that was followed by a doink single by Albert Pujols and some heads up hustle by Calhoun got Calhoun to 3B. Luis Valbuena struck out after Pujols but Andrelton Singleton hit a bouncing ground ball to short that allowed Calhoun to score for a walkoff win to even the series at a game apiece. As with Keuchel, McCullers deserved to get the win last night but sometimes stuff happens and we don't always get the good things we deserve.

 

Today Mike Fiers (0-1, 5.68 ERA) goes for his first win of the season in 7 starts this season. Houston has won some games he started but he has had a propensity to allow a lot of early runs. Fiers leads the majors in home runs allowed with 12, 4 of which came in his last start against the Rangers. A game Houston eventually came back and won. The Angels counter with RHP Matt Shoemaker (1-1, 4.78 ERA) who pitched against Houston on April 20 going 7 innings allowing just two runs but he took the loss anyway as Lance McCullers went 6.2 innings of 3 hit ball allowing no runs. Chris Devenski came on in relief of McCullers. He went the final 2.1 innings allowing 3 hits and one run giving Houston a narrow 2-1 win.