Over the past two seasons, the Astros were 11-11 in their first 22 games. Remind us if we are wrong, but they did pretty well in both of those seasons. This year, the Astros have begun 3-4 after splitting a four-game series with the White Sox and losing two of three to the Tigers. Now, as they head out on their first road trip of the season, some fans are worried.
It’s true that the offense has struggled a bit and the first pass through the five man starting pitching rotation wasn’t perfect. But, they have gotten quality starts in the last two games from Framber Valdez and Christian Javier, and there are players (some surprising) who are hitting the ball well to start this year.
In short, this team will be fine, especially when they start getting some of their players back from injury. Oh, and the new rules are pretty great (more on that later). Let’s take a look at how it’s going.
The Good: Pitching will be a strength and the guys who will hit are hitting.
Despite the early hiccups, when this team gets the rotation stretched to six or seven innings and the bullpen settles down after early taxing, this pitching staff will be as good as advertised. We saw what the Astros want on Wednesday with six innings from Javier followed by Bryan Abreu, Rafael Montero and Ryan Pressly. Keep that up, and it will be as good as advertised.
And at the plate, guys like Kyle Tucker, Yordan Alvarez and Jose Abreu are in midseason form. Tucker is hitting .333 with three homers. Alvarez is at .348 with two homers and 11 RBIs. Abreu is hitting .345. Imagine how good this team will be when they get back Michael Brantley and Jose Altuve.
The Surprising: The outfield appears to be rounding into form.
Chas McCormick had his first homer of the season on Wednesday and is hitting a very respectable .286. He is clearly the best center fielder on the roster. But the bigger surprise is rookie Corey Julks, who is hitting .250 in four appearances. He’s not on fire exactly, but he’s hit safely in every appearance. It bodes well for the future.
The Bad: The guys who are struggling…are really struggling.
Jeremy Peña finally broke an 0-18 streak and got his first home run of the season Wednesday. Alex Bregman, who always seems to struggle early in the year, is hitting .138. Others like Yanier Diaz have yet to find their groove and it is being made more difficult by the fact that the team has 51 strikeouts to only 26 walks. That is definitely not typical Astros baseball. It’s early with a small sample size, but those numbers will need to turn around sooner rather than later.
The Ugly: Somebody come get Jake Meyers.
Honestly, we feel bad for the guy who seemed to be a breakout young player in 2021. Since his shoulder injury doing that postseason, he is simply not the same player at the plate or in the field. Whether it is mechanical or mental, he should not be playing for this team right now.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
