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Astros 2024: 5 reasons to be concerned …. or not

I’ve told this story before. My wife was a bit of a combative teen and would get into verbal battles with her parents. She once told her dad not to worry about her, and he said he was not worried…. he was concerned.

And I think we are in that area with the Astros as they toddle along in a win some / lose some attitude here lately. So, let’s cover five reasons to be concerned about them making the playoffs and 5 reasons to not be concerned about them.

Concerns

Health – The team has successfully powered through the many injuries on the pitching staff this season (Lance McCullers, Luis Garcia, Jose Urquidy, Cristian Javier, JP France and Justin Verlander who has returned).  But their offense has been a lot more wobbly and their best players are part of the recent concern. Kyle Tucker has only played DH and has not done that everyday and has not yet showed his normal “in the groove” hitting. We’ve been told Alex Bregman is day to day on when his elbow allows him to play and has intermittently missed time lately. Jose Altuve has “something” wrong with his side (and we know how soft tissue injuries can linger). Chas McCormick looked like 2023 Chas and then broke a finger. YAAARRGGHH!!

Inconsistency – As we said here Astros 2024: A bipolar year for the fans – ALL THINGS ASTROS (chipalatta.com)  this team has been a ship swaying to the extremes in a building storm. Since August 20th they have Lost 2 / Won 1 / Lost 2 / Won 1/ Lost 2 / Won 5 / Lost 3 / Won 2 / Lost 3. This has neither allowed an even more inconsistent Mariners club to catch them, nor allowed them to shake the M’s.

Head to Head – They have those three games in the penultimate series before the end of the season against the Mariners and right now the Astros don’t look like they will be able to extend their lead to make those games meaningless. I am scarred from the Astros first playoff effort in 1980 where they held a three-game lead against the Dodgers with three games to go and lost three head to head, but blessedly won a 163rd game to move on to the NLCS against the Phillies.

Tight and Close – As we’ve discussed before, the 2024 Astros are not good in tight and late situations. Wednesday’s 5-4 loss to the A’s dropped them to 15-26 in one-run games, which when paired with their 5-10 record in extra-inning games does not give the fans a warm fuzzy when the team is fighting for their playoff lives down the stretch.

Wearing Out – Ronel Blanco has thrown 150.1 innings in 2024. His most innings in a season – 94.1 IPs last season with major league, minor league and Dominican Winter League combined. Spencer Arrighetti has thrown 131.2 innings this year. His most was last season at 124.2 IPs.   Hunter Brown’s effort Wednesday night put him at 158 innings. His most was last season at 155.2 IPs. Bryan Abreu (1st), Josh Hader (15th) and Tayler Scott (19th) are all in the top 20 in appearances in the AL this year with Abreu the biggest concern at #1. Abreu’s next appearance will match his most in a career. Hader already has one more appearance than his most ever. Scott already has 7 more appearances than any previous season.

What Me Worry? (Or Be Concerned?)

History – The Astros have made the playoffs the last seven seasons and eight of the last nine. And while previous performance is not a guarantee of future performance, they are a solid bet until they prove otherwise.

Veteran Leadership – These guys have been here before. Players like Jose Altuve, Yordan Alvarez, Alex Bregman, Kyle Tucker, Ryan Pressly, Bryan Abreu, Justin Verlander, Framber Valdez, and others have been there before many times and succeeded. Even younger guys like Yainer Diaz and ALCS/WS MVP Jeremy Pena have performed when the oven was the hottest.

Pitching Depth – Even with the loss of the five pitchers listed under health, the Astros have six starting pitchers to utilize as needed down the stretch, who have performed well this season, especially the last 3 months (except for one giant elephant in the room). Framber Valdez, Hunter Brown, Ronel Blanco, Spencer Arrighetti, and Yusei Kikuchi have all been good to very good for this team during their comeback from a poor start to the season. Verlander is still struggling, but with his history, there is hope he will figure it out in his next handful of starts.

Bullpen Depth – Josh Hader, Bryan Abreu, Ryan Pressly, Tayler Scott, Hector Neris, and even the K(C)aleb brothers Ort and Ferguson give the pen a solid lineup. They have the second-best bullpen ERA in the AL this season.

The Lead – Yes, it is tighter than the Astros and their fans would like right now at 3-1/2 games, but it is a lot better to be up 3-1/2 games right now than down that many with 16/17 games to go. If the Astros go a mediocre 8-9, the Mariners must go 11-5 to catch them. The Ms had these types of runs twice early in the season but have been lucky to go .500 over that long stretch in the last three months. The Mariners hold the tiebreaker unless the Astros sweep them, and if the Astros sweep them – this thing would likely be over.

So, it’s your turn….what concerns you about the Astros in the race to the playoffs, and what comforts you?

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42 responses to “Astros 2024: 5 reasons to be concerned …. or not”

  2. “As we’ve discussed before, the 2024 Astros are not good in tight and late situations.”

    No, sir. They are not. Haven’t been since DFB came to Houston.

    Anybody with enough money can put together a group of young men (how long before Manfred changes that as well?) who can play baseball well. Been done many, many times.

    But these are the situations where intelligence and imagination make a huge difference between winning and losing. And intelligence and imagination are two interrelated areas where the Astros fall far short of the mark. No surprise at all to me they lose more than they win in these situations.

    I am not, however, concerned in the least about it. Far too busy the next 53 days, 9 hours, and 45 minutes. And after that, things are quite likely (I expect) to get very hairy in the big cities until 1/20/25 when everything will change for the rental thugs.

    Though I don’t expect it here in small town America (thank you Jason Aldean) I’m still going to be ready and alert. Locked and loaded here!

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    • 1oldpro, I’m with you, but I was long asleep at 11:50 PM Central Time. Another 6 shutout innings from Framber and then a struggle with the pen, but the bats were able to open it up in the 8th and give Hader a cushion for the 9th.

      I’ve said over and over that I don’t have any expectations. I still think this group has overachieved. And every time we pick up a game on the M’s it’s easier to envision post season play once again.

      My concern? Injuries of course. I don’t want to lose an overly taxed pitcher to a late season injury that might impact his health in 2025.

      On the flip side, I think the M’s are rather gassed too at this point. Their pen gave up 4 late runs last night with the help of some sloppy defense. Sound familiar?

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  4. My concerns –

    Can they hit good pitching? Their overall offensive numbers are really good considering with what they have dealt with – but they don’t seem able to generate runs, too many guys that can’t take an extra base, they aren’t hitting the best pitchers for the other team. They are not getting it done with RISP. We sometimes have to wait on the right bullpen guy to beat up on. Or sometimes teams use their best BP guys on us and we can’t hit them. And those are the guys we are going to see in the playoffs.

    If a pitcher can navigate our 1-5 twice, we may end up in a hole early. I’m glad Jon Singleton could beat up the A’s pitching yesterday, but let’s be real about Jon’s chances against the Guardindians and Orioles and Yankees bullpens.

    Concern 2 – Yes, it’s all hands on deck, but Tayler Scott and Caleb Ort are other organizations depth throwaways that we are going to be expecting to get big outs in the 5th or 6th inning. Do you trust Ryan Pressly to be throwing to Aaron Judge or Juan Soto in the 8th inning of a tied game in Yankee stadium?

    Concern 3 – JV makes the decision easy if he pitches 21 innings of 3 run ball down the stretch. He also makes it easy if he pitches 14 innings of 8 run ball in these last 3 starts. But what if he strings together some 5 inning, 2 runs starts? Think about this – 2 starts ago Espada marched out to the mound with runners on 1st and 2nd with 2 outs in the 5th inning of a 2-2 game. JV was at 97 pitches but one pitch away from what we might call a decent start. He refused to let Espada pull him from the game. Espada went back to the dugout and watched JV get torched. What if he had gotten that out? One batter, and everyone could feel differently, and they shouldn’t. He is extremely hittable. Even extremely hittable guys can string some outs together – after all the most famous non-perfect perfect game of all time was a by a guy that, for all of his career, was very hittable. If JV wants a spot in this rotation, he needs to be sitting 94 while climbing to 96 in critical moments and giving Espada the feel that he has command of all his pitches. 92 down the pipe and offspeed pitches that aren’t fooling anyone because they are a foot off the plate isn’t going to cut it.

    Concern 4 – You saw the graphic. You heard Blummer talk about the fact that we were the only contender on that list. We cannot play defense this way, not in the tight nature of the playoffs. Second most errors since July, the infield has to tighten this up particularly Pena and whoever is on 1st. Altuve is already a liability at 2nd due to range and arm issues, we can’t have the other guys giving free passes.

    So there you go, return of the glass half empty guy. But you only asked the doom and gloom side. Ask me what am I excited about.

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    • I wish you didn’t make valid points up above. At this point, I think the plan has to be to limp into the postseason if we can hold off a Mariners team that is also not playing well. We did just play well against Baltimore, KC, and Arizona who are all leading candidates to secure Wild Cards. I want to say it’s unlikely Espada will make the same bullpen decisions that didn’t work in those series again…but I’m not confident there. Regardless, the only way this team is going to advance in the postseason and win is if the TV schedule allows us to rest certain relievers at the right time. I do have confidence in putting Pressly, Abreu, or Hader out there in the ninth inning…which is something I don’t think any other team has the ability to do. The problem will be getting to the ninth with a lead and one of their arms being fresh enough to finish it.

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      • Devin, heck if we get to the post season, even without a bye, anything can happen. To me, just getting to the post season will have been a heck of an effort. But I would not count our guys out at that point, at hone, on the road, regardless of injuries, it would be bonus time for the Astros!

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    • I need to stop visiting them. So tired of the continued negative, nasty commentary by some of that whining clan; bleep Espada, bleep this team, this bleeping team is underperforming, bleep this player, bleep that player. Sorry Dan, no support. You’re likely too busy, but one day during a game, especially when the Astros are having a bad day, you should go read a bit of their game thread.

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      • Dave – I say go to that particular link because I like how they post all those Astros or AL West or MLB links, which often includes the Chipalatta links. Negative comments I ignore (unless they say something about one of my Chipalatta posts). No, I don’t have time to get into one of their live game posts. I can just imagine.

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  6. My concern: Their aggressiveness on offense. As I listened to Ford, on the radio yesterday during the late innings, he mentioned the club had received 1, ONE, walk in the previous 22, yes TWENTY TWO, innings!! After the game, I researched this and that streak reached 23 TWENTY THREE innings before Heyward was walked in the ninth inning of last night’s game.

    My worry: Their aggressiveness on offense. Espada’s strategy of being aggressive at the plate has led to the opposing pitcher being comfortable in the thought that the club will swing at noncompetitive pitches, allow him to pitch far into the game, and get themselves out at the plate.

    I do hope the upper management sit with him, at the conclusion of the season, and tells him to tone that down. Become a patient hitting team as they were in the past.

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  8. Just so its not all doom and gloom – a message from the glass half full guy –

    Well, I’m excited by the fact that Framber/Hunter/Yusei give us a chance in any series, because games shouldn’t get away. When you can keep a game close, even if the offense has problems moving runners or taking extra bases or getting big hits, they got a chance.

    At different times the big 3 has each hurt us, including Pressly giving up a game tying HR (and costing Framber a much needed W if he is actually gonna be a threat to Skubel), but you still have to think having 3 guys that could close for half the teams in the big leagues is a luxury that other teams may not be able to match. They all have made our hearts flutter, but none of the other contenders are really that kind of 3 deep.

    When you put Altuve-Alvarez-Diaz-Tucker-Bregman all in the same order, all we need is something from Pena and then one of the other 3 to have a big moment, you can lean on that pitching staff to win games. Last night Singleton and Diaz both had to be held up on third with 2 outs and neither ended up scoring, but in a playoff scenario neither may be running those bases in the 8th of a close game. There are athletes that will likely be over there on the bench including Gamel, McCormick, Dubon, that pinch run in the 8th if one of them single in a close game. That’s something you may not manage for in the regular season, but in a playoff every opportunity matters.

    The glass half full guy says, there is still plenty of reasons to be optimistic about another playoff run by this team. I never doubt a team that has Yordan Alvarez hitting in tight games. One game or even a series can sway on the bat of that guy.

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    • I’m with you. Once in post season play, a short series is a crap shoot. Win the first game, get a couple of breaks, an offense wakes up, someone throws 6 or 7 shut out innings, anything can happen.

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  9. I tried to post this morning with my phone waiting for my car at the dealership. And my comment did a daveb disappearing act.

    Anyways – here is kind of what I was thinking about.

    TOF – yeah I know you have something more important than baseball on your mind

    daveb – I know you don’t have a lot of expectations for this team even if it makes the playoffs and are looking forward to 2025, but we’ve seen teams like the 2019 Nationals and the 2023 Rangers enter the playoffs with a so-so record and win it all.

    Oldpro – sorry I did not comment yesterday on the game – sometimes I am a little tired from writing the posts and don’t have a lot to say. But it was a good win even after erping up the lead.

    Devin – I feel like the playoffs with normally two games and a day off – favors us and out bullpen.

    Sarge – I share your pain. I wish the team would take more walks or even go deeper in the count to get these opposing pitchers out of the games sooner. If we were murdering early pitches and scoring a bunch of runs every game I might change my mind – but we aren’t.

    Negative Steve – Concern 1 – they do struggle against good pitching – but especially pitching they have not seen. Hopefully there will be less they have not seen in the playoffs (before the WS). Concern 2 – I worry about Pressly throwing to the other team’s back-up catcher with a tight game in the 8th. Concern 3 – I am going to Polyana it and believe that JV will figure it out. Concern 4 – Maybe they just need more concentration in the field? This is a new problem – this team has been good in the field during this run and especially with Pena – very unusual.

    Positive Steve – Yes – I like the Astros chances with those three on top of the rotation. The top 3 in the bullpen – well I trust a rejuvenated Abreu and Hader in a save situation. Pressly not so much. If…..we can get the top 5 in the order healthy at the same time, I think they can inflict enough damage to give them a shot.

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  10. Dan, sorry about the never never land post. It sure is frustrating though! I really have this belief that sometimes the clock runs out and discards our posts indiscriminately before we have a chance to hit the comment button.

    If this club makes it into the post season, I’ll be happy as a clam. And as I noted above in my short reponse to Steven, once in, anything can and has happened. I’m far more concerned about getting there than how we’ll perform once there.

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    • HAHA I just checked the final score and misread it myself. How can Kikuchi get the win and Spaghetti get the loss? What’s going on here?

      Then I put my bifocals on. 😉

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  12. As a reward for their bullpen blowing a 4-0 lead against the Mariners the Rangers drop 8.5 games behind the Stros. Seattle’s 5-4 win keeps them 4.5 games behind Houston.

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  13. As we inch closer towards September 23 and the three game set against the Mariners, it’s looking more like it will be a pivotal series. In the meantime, we have to keep scratching out wins. Getting some good innings out of Justin Verlander tonight would be a good start. The option is more hand wringing.

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    • 9 games against LAA, SD, and LAA before we see Seattle for 3. We close out with 3 against CLE. I’m fearful those 3 Seattle games will be pivotal, as you say. The Mariners close with TEX, NYY, TEX, HOU, and OAK. It could be a toss up.

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  14. The Astros just have to work hard on taking care of their business. They would have to be up by 7 when they play Seattle for that series to mean nothing. If they went 7-2 while the M’s went 4-4 – that would do it. But yes, they are likely to need to clinch in those last 6 games. They need to play well against the M’s and Guardindians anyway – they need to be playing well headed into the playoffs.

    Thoughts on last night

    • Kikuchi gives up 3 runs in those 7 innings – I know we would have taken that right after the trade.
    • Hunter and Framber must be wondering why Kikuchi gets enough support and holds by the bullpen to get the win – while they are getting no run support and no bullpen support
    • Bryan Abreu looks like his dominant self again – good
    • Nice to see the top 5 in the lineup and getting those big dingers out of Bregman and Yordan
    • You stick Hader in a save situation and suddenly it is good Hader
    • 14 hits and 6 walks should garner more than 5 runs for the good guys
    • Not happy that the guy coming back off the side strain is trying to lag out a double and is gunned down by 4 feet to lead off the game
    • I’m almost looking at Tucker like he’s supposed to be on the field now.

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  15. The Gerrit Cole/Raphael Devers story has to be the “it” story of the month in baseball. What a joke! With a well-deserved ending.

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      • Yes that is a crazy story – if folks have not seen it – Cole retired the first 10 hitters of the game and then gave up the first intentional walk with the bases empty since they started tracking them in 1955. Cole then immediately crashed and burned in the loss to the Ref Sox.
      • in other news – a blast from our first WS year retires – hard to believe he was still playing.
      • https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/09/nori-aoki-to-retire-at-npb-seasons-end.html

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      • Dan, I thought the most interesting part of the story was that Cole hit Devers in the middle of the back in the first inning. Cora said after the game was over that the crazy intentional walk in Dever’s 2nd AB told him and his teammates that the HBP was intentional.

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  17. Thoughts

    • It probably comes from the confused karma of an Astro fan cheering for the Rangers – but after blowing a 4 run lead on Friday night – the Rangers blew a 2 run lead on Saturday night and lost in walkoff fashion to the Mariners.
    • Which of course means the Astros need to take care of business themselves as much as possible. If the Astros went 7-7 down the line – the Mariners would have to go 11-2 to catch them. a 9-5 Astro run would force the Mariners to run the table 13-0 which would actually be 15-0 since they have won their last two games. Just keep churning Astros.
    • The only thing more gorgeous than that Yordan laser shot 432 ft into the right field stands to bring the Astros from behind was that inspiring majestic 408 foot homer by Tucker off the bench for his first homer since his return and giving the team a little wiggle room at the end.
    • Verlander was not great, but after settling in – he was better than he had been lately. His velocity is still a bit suspect and his location at times was lacking, but he battled through it.
    • Pressly, thanks to one of the odder plays you will ever see had a 5 out save and looked pretty good doing it, except… The first batter with the bases loaded lined one to center that fell in front of a diving Meyers and caromed off him towards the infield. The runner on 3rd was holding, the runner on 2nd was playing it halfway, the runner on first was running full speed – so pretty soon you had three runners between third base and home. The base coach had to send the 2nd guy and Meyers scrambled for the ball and with one of his better throws gunned him down to preserve the 4-3 lead at that point. Pressly got the last out in the 8th and three in the ninth.
    • The Astros had great outfield play in this game with quite a few terrific plays, but a couple of them were a bit harmful. Gamel had to come out after slamming into the wall in right. Meyers twisted his ankle catching one in right center in the ninth and toughed it out. Both may be sitting out as precautions – but the team is a little lacking in OFs with Chas out with his broken hand.

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  18. The lineup today behind Ronel Blanco

    Altuve 2B

    Alvarez DH

    Diaz C

    Tucker RF

    Caratini 1B

    Pena SS

    Heyward LF

    Meyers CF

    Dubon 3B

    So, Meyers recovered from his ankle twist in the ninth inning last night. Gamel sitting out.

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  19. Just wanted to comment. Arguably, the Astros are supposed to have one of the worst farm systems in baseball. They have also been one of the most injured teams in MLB. They traded away three of their top 10 prospects at the deadline.

    So, how in the world does their AAA Sugarland team have the best record in all of MILB. They have 90 wins and no other minor league team has done that at any level this season.

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  21. Nice to sweep the Angel’s as Seattle doesn’t seem to be letting up any. We need to take at least 2 from the Padres and hope the Yankees can help to put away the M’s in their series. We sure don’t want to come down to the last games of the year hoping to capture the AL West. Time to reach way down and finish the job.

    Good job by Blanco and the bottom of the order, not so much for the bullpen in the latter innings.

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      • Probably have my stomach in knots trying to watch those games. Have to be sure to have a good supply of Tums available. Also lots of Ibuprofen.

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      • And it is probably not good for us multi-sport fans’ tummies to pile on a tight Texans game on top of the Astros game earlier in the day.

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      • That fumble at the 4 did not help. A score there would have put the Bears away. Hopefully next week the Texans will play a full game on both sides of the ball. Plenty of talent.

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      • As an unbiased observer it felt like the refs were making a lot of calls in games this weekend trying to make the games close.

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  22. Thoughts

    • Need to keep the pedal to the metal. The magic number is now single digits – 9. That means the Astros control a lot of this – just keep winning and good things will happen.
    • Doing the – if such and such happens for today – if the Astros go 7-6 to the end of the season, the M’s have to go 11-1 to catch them.
    • Totally unusual game where the Astro had good offense and the top of the lineup did not participate.
    • Too bad they had to bring Hader in – he’s likely not available tonight.
    • If picking up someone like Heyward (for free) leads to one more win – that is a heckuva bargain.

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