The Astros play the devil they know in the ALDS

While the Astros were waiting for the Oakland A’s and the Chicago White Sox to play their third game of the Wild Card round, some interesting storylines were being tossed out there.

On the White Sox side, Astro fans were hoping for revenge from their team’s 2005 loss in the World Series. That is, of course, the only World Series loss for a team that has only been to the WS in 2 of their 59 seasons. Another side story might have been facing their former ace, Dallas Keuchel, who had over-priced himself in the off-season after the 2018 season and ended up signing a one-year make-good contract with the Atlanta Braves. He rolled that opportunity into a 4 year / $72 million signing with the White Sox and was their best 2020 starting pitcher (6-2, 1.99 ERA) in the first season of that contract.

But the White Sox were derailed by the A’s, and now other side stories jump to the forefront. There is, of course, the divisional rivalry between the two teams where they play 19 times in a normal year and 10 times in a COVID year. There is the flip around of fortunes as the A’s went from going 8-11 against the Astros last year to 7-3 this season. There is the result of the 2020 season where the A’s finished with the second-best record in the AL (36-24), while the Astros backed into the playoffs with the worst record of the 8 AL playoff teams at 29-31.

But actually, THE story of the clubs is “IT”. And the biggest part of “IT” is the fact that Mike Fiers, who is either the noblest player to walk the earth or the Judas of baseball, plays for the A’s. Fiers is the inside source who turned the Astros in on their 2017 cheating scandal. The fact that there has not been a Mike Fiers coming forward for any other team (Red Sox? Yankees?) means other teams have not gone through the shame the Astros have faced. It may be true that the other teams did not cheat to the extent of the Astros, but it may also be true that without an inside source, the other teams and players stonewalled the issue.

The A’s and the Astros have played a very eventful 10 games in 2020. The Astros were swept in three games fairly forcefully by the A’s in Oakland in the second week of the season. Former Astro farmhand, Ramon Laureano was hit by a pitch three times in the series including twice in the finale. This led to a confrontation for which Laureano was suspended six games (reduced to four) and Astros (non) hitting coach Alex Cintron was suspended for 20.

When they met next in Houston, Friday night was the game where both teams walked off the field in support of social justice issues. The Astros gained some momentum, winning both ends of a doubleheader on Saturday, but that mo’ seemed to evaporate when the Sunday game was postponed and moved to Oakland due to a positive COVID test with the A’s. This forced the Astros to play five games in four days in their next trip to Oakland, and the A’s took four of the five with the Astros scoring 3 runs total in those four losses.

So the Astros played Oakland twice at home (2-0) and eight times (1-7) on the road. But now the road games are in Los Angeles at the home of the Astros 2017 WS rival, the Dodgers. The league has the teams playing up to five days in a row in the ALDS as they held back the start of the series until after Sunday (can you say “we can’t compete head to head with the NFL”?). Playing five games in a row takes away the terrific weapon Dusty Baker had in the AL Wild Card series against the Twins, where he had his #4 and #5 pitchers, Framber Valdez and Cristian Javier pitch very effectively in relief of starters Zack Greinke and Jose Urquidy. An interesting question is – will Mike Fiers, who did not pitch against the Astros in the regular season dare show his face in the ALDS? You would think he would have to, but in this uncertain season, who knows?

So, how does this matchup work out?

The lineups

Both teams are basically average offensive teams in this down year for offenses. The Astros slash (.240 BA/ .312 OBP/ .720 OPS) is slightly better than the A’s (.225/ .322/ .718) and they score slightly better at 4.65 runs/gm vs. 4.57. The A’s are without the injured Astro killer 3B Matt Chapman (replaced by weaker hitting Chad Pinder and Jake Lamb) and are led by the Kingman-esque 1B Matt Olson, who pairs up a .195 BA with 14 HR and 42 RBIs. Former Astros OF Robbie Grossman is one of their better hitters (.241/.344/.826 with 8 HRs/23 RBIs), OF Mark Canha and his 33 RBIs has been a top run producer, and C Sean Murphy has been a pleasant surprise (.821 OPS). 2B Tommy LaStella (.289 BA/.369 OBP) has been a sparkplug since being traded from the Angels.

The Astros have more guys who have performed well in past playoffs though not many who have performed well in this regular season. Michael Brantley, Kyle Tucker and Carlos Correa led the team through the first playoff round against the Twins. Will George Springer, Jose Altuve, Alex Bregman and Yuli Gurriel step up in the next round as they have in the past? That well could be the difference in the offenses.

Advantage – Slight advantage Astros

The Starting Pitching

The Astros starting staff in the regular season, despite the loss of Justin Verlander and the late return of Jose Urquidy from COVID, were a half step ahead of the A’s. They put up a 19-15/ 4.26 ERA/ 1.17 WHIP vs. the A’s 22-19/ 4.49 ERA/ 1.30 WHIP in 2020. The matchups for the first two games have been announced with Lance McCullers Jr. (3-3/ 3.93 ERA/1.164 WHIP) against A’s ace Chris Bassitt (5-2/ 2.29 ERA/ 1.159 WHIP) on Monday and Framber Valdez (5-3/ 3.57 ERA/ 1.118 WHIP) vs. Sean Manaea (4-3/ 4.50 ERA/ 1.204 WHIP) on Tuesday. McCullers has not pitched in 9 days and has not given up an earned run in his last 3 starts (though he gave up 4 unearned runs in one of those). The next three starters for the Astros would likely be Zack Greinke (3-3/ 4.03 ERA/ 1.134 WHIP), Jose Urquidy (1-1/ 2.73 ERA/ 1.011 WHIP) and Cristian Javier (5-2/ 3.48 ERA/ .994 WHIP). This looks a heck of a lot better than the next three on the A’s slate, Mike Fiers (6-3/ 4.58 ERA/ 1.373 WHIP), Jesus Luzardo (3-2/ 4.12 ERA/ 1.271 WHIP) and Frankie Montas (3-5/ 5.60 ERA/ 1.509 WHIP) or Mike Minor (1-1/ 5.48 ERA/ 1.031 WHIP). Of course, this is all on paper, the Astro often struggle with lefties and the A’s could be throwing Luzardo, Manaea and Minor all from the portside at them.

Advantage – Astros, but barely

Bullpen

If the series comes down to the bullpen as so many playoff series do, the Astros would seem to be dead meat. The A’s have the best bullpen in all of baseball (14-5/ 2.72 ERA/ 1.13 WHIP), while the Astros are middle of the road (10-16/ 4.39 ERA/ 1.52 WHIP) with a propensity to walk the opposition. The A’s can roll out closer Liam Hendriks (3-1/ 14 SV/ 1.78 ERA), Jake Diekman (2-0/ 0.42 ERA – that is not a misprint), Yusmeiro Petit (2-1/ 1.66 ERA), and J.B. Wendelken (1-1/ 1.80 ERA) and still have solid relievers behind them in Lou Trivino, Joakim Soria and Burch Smith. Behind closer Ryan Pressly (1-3/ 12 SV/ 3.43 ERA), the Astros bullpen is young and shallow featuring Blake Taylor (2-1/ 1 SV/ 2.18 ERA), Enoli Paredes (3-3/ 3.05 ERA) , and Andre Scrubb (1-0/ 1 SV/ 1.90 ERA). Veterans Brooks Raley (0-1/ 3.94 ERA) and Josh James (1-0/ 7.27 ERA) will also be in the mix. But there will not likely be starters helping out in this series as they did against the Twins.

Advantage – A’s

The A’s are feeling pretty good about themselves right now as they just won their first playoff series since beating the Twins in the 2006 ALDS when Barry Zito ????? was their best player. Will this good feeling, plus a superior regular-season and better head to head stats carry them to the ALCS? Will the Astros get fired up by the sight of Mike Fiers and ride their deep recent playoff experience to their fourth straight ALCS appearance?

Tune in to find out.

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57 responses to “The Astros play the devil they know in the ALDS”

  1. Well, this business of not hitting lefties has to stop.
    The Astros have Springer, Altuve, Bregman, Gurriel, Correa and Maldonado. That is six RH regulars in their lineup. They need to hit. If they hit, the Astros will win. If they don’t, they won’t advance.. The A’s are daring the Astros core to hit against pitchers they should feast on.
    The Astros should hit those pitchers. If they can’t, they go home and miss a great chance. The A’s have all those LH pitchers and the Astros have all those powerful RH hitters. Forget about Fiers. The Astros should see the A’s starting lefties as a big slap in the face and go out and make the A’s pay for it.

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  3. Just a reminder about Grossman. His offense came against RH pitchers. He almost never played against lefties and when he did he was bad.

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  5. Oh, and Chas McCormick.

    Just a reminder of the tiny backfields the Astros found this young man..

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      • I’m a Broncos fan but my wife is a Texans fan…if she’d not recently had surgery she’d be jumping for joy right now. About time that arrogant jerk got shown the door.

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      • Billy C
        I saw this hilarious meme of Bill O’Brien smiling and the caption said “Bill O’Brien receiving the Executive Of the Year award for firing head coach Bill O’Brien.”

        Liked by 1 person

  10. Astros back up 6-5. They are hitting like they took a time machine back to 2017. I told my kids its because they left the trash cans there from 2017…..
    Too soon?

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  15. Kookie things do indeed happen. Astros pen throws a 5 inning no-no and the A’s pen gives up a 7 spot.

    I have no expectations. I can only be pleasantly surprised.

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  18. I watched the game and had a hot dog and a Coke instead of my usual Bud light, but I’m not all giddy about winning all the marbles this week. The A’S aren’t going to roll over and let our guys bulldozer over them. You can bet your blue booties they will come out swinging tomorrow. I really hope Framber is rested and sharp those dudes on the other side want revenge! What I learned this afternoon is homeruns are FLYING out of Dodgers park!

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    • Enoli Paredes is an amazing young man. His coaches rave.
      I had him in the #8-#12 range before any other prospect list.
      Far from anonymous, looking back at my old notes, unfortunately I’m not able to paste the photo here.

      It was Enoli Paredes, Erasmo Pinales, Bryan Abreu, Yohan Ramirez, Carlos Sanabria, Willy Collado, and Cristian Javier.

      On a team that lost 41 Holds and led the Texas League by far, Omar Lopez managed, they could care less about some stats. One secret I’ve picked up is how teams will let a pitcher perform poorly to stay under the Rule 5 radar. An example is to leave him in to work things out during blowouts, a la Brandon Bielak in AAA. That sums up the incredible crop that went through Fayettville and Corpus in 2019. So many of my comments back then asking, ‘when will we call these pitchers up to the next level?!’

      In retrospect, the Astros had a plan for each, and while some fell off with injury, there were lots in the stable kicking at the door & bucking for their turn.

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  20. It has been an enjoyable and unexpected start to the playoffs so far. Can they keep it up? I do not know, but they were like Austin Powers missing his mojo and suddenly it has returned. Pretty amazing that Correa had 5 home runs in 58 regular season games, but now has 4 home runs in his last 4 games played (including the last regular season game of the year. Putting his money where his mouth is. I know the ball was flying out of Dodger Stadium, but he put both HRs out to the deepest part of the park. Nice to see.

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      • Garcia is one I’d have rated higher in the Top 10 for example (Keith Law calls him our #3), but there is still considerable debate over whether he’s long-limbed enough for startery roles.

        Frankly, our minors are stuffed full of these Torres, jairo Lopez, Bellozo, Dubin types who can throw 100 but are smaller in stature!

        I’ve been advocating a true tandem approach where you stick to your guns and only allow each guy 4 innings. But when you get to this level of the playoffs, there will be huge decisions with Framber (if all goes as planned), if he’s 5 innings deep with few runs but has 90 pitches. Astros have been a step ahead, and I like the step on the neck theory once you have the lead — throw your best at them and seal the deal!

        I really believe with exapanded rosters and shorter stints (working within 3 batter rule), teams are going to employ different looks. Where the Astros have been brilliant is each of these “relievers” will have plenty in the tank, which defeats the old argument, “you’ll tax the pen if your starter doesnt finish 6.”

        Either way, it’s a highwire act and the one place a manager earns his pay. The players themselves seem to be doing a lot of the managing though, have you noticed that? During the mound meetings. Seems to help these young pitchers.

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  22. With No Expectations and all: how are we feeling about this game today?

    Fairly confident we will get to Manea, that Framber will hold up his end, and we will take a decisive lead?

    Now wouldn’t it be something that nobody considered? That this team galvanized so well, they have an “internal meter” to extract on opponenets at will. Think of each player and the very special incentive and motive they possess to either lengthen their careers (Reddick), prove the critics wrong (Correa Altuve), to put a stamp on it with their name as a ‘rookie’ (Tucker Javier), to be the warrior that’s expected of them (Lance, Michael, George), and so on.

    At least the commentators seemed to be fair, and talk about this season’s players more often.

    What if …. we just ran the table? One can dream.

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  24. Framber absolutely HAS to throw strikes today. Ground balls bailed him out in the first inning. I’m sure he has butterflies..but kid you gotta throw strikes!

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  25. The announcers state that Springer has the most at bats against Manaea without a home run than any pitcher he has faced and bang!!!!! he goes deep with Reddick on. 2-1 Astros!

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  27. I very rarely say this, but the guy behind the plate is calling two different games. Framber is being forced to throw the ball over the plate. I better watch it because I’m starting to get pissed off and I’m supposed to have no expectations.

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  35. -The A’s go with a LHP to start Game 3.
    -Interesting to see Reddick as the DH in Game 2.
    -Baker said Paredes was not going to pitch in Game 2.
    -The young pitchers we are watching in the playoffs will be veterans in 2021.
    -What if Altuve, Gurriel and Reddick were to actually start hitting?
    – Correa is the Captain of this team. He is the leader and it is obvious.
    -The Astros have a bunch of rested pitchers in their bullpen.

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