Verlander: Good as old
(c) Associated Press
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From an overall perspective, a winning road trip is always a good thing. It's been said that a successful team wins 2/3rds of their games at home and half of their games on the road. In that sense, a 5-4 road trip to open the season is somewhat of a success. However, most Astros fans will feel disappointed, particularly at dropping three of the last five after winning three of the first four in Anaheim.
The Astros dropped to second place in the AL West, a half-game back of the Angels, after Sunday's 7-2 defeat in Seattle where weak hitting continued for the team that used to be known for running up the score on opponents. The Mariners outscored Houston, 18-7, in the three game series. The Astros compiled just 17 hits.
Friday's opener became an 11-1 massacre as Jake Odorizzi has his second disappointing start of the season, allowing four runs on eight hits and three walks in 4-1/3rd innings. The relief crew of Bryan Abreu (two runs), Pedro Baez (three runs) and Ronel "Bandera" Blanco (two runs) were rocked as well. Saturday was a different story thanks to Justin Verlander, who tossed eight shutout innings en route to a 4-0 whitewash. Martin Maldonado hit the big blow, a two-run shot to left to give JV the cushion he needed.
Sunday's 7-2 loss was mostly at the expense of Jose Urquidy who received a five-run knockout in the fourth inning. Michael Brantley's two-run homer in the sixth was just one of four Houston hits on the afternoon.
It's been an especially rough road trip for Jose Altuve (.156 batting average) and Kyle Tucker (.121). New papa Yuli Gurriel is down to .167 and Aledmys Diaz is at .182. In Saturday's win, Maldonado, Jeremy Pena and Jose Siri did most of the damage. Pena had three hits to push his average back up to .375 (10-for-29), and he seems to understand situational hitting and productive outs, two things that seem to escape today's batters for the most part who just swing for the fences. The only non-hit for Jeremy on Saturday night was a sacrifice fly that plated Houston's first run.
Pena's OPS is .996 which you can compare to last year's shortstop, $35 mil/yr Carlos Correa who currently is batting .154 with a .587 OPS. Yeah, I know it's early.
Two players wound up on the 10-day IL this week. Slugger Yordan Alvarez has missed the last two series with an illness. He was placed on the Health and Safety protocol list, which is normally a code word for COVID infection, but manager Dusty Baker says Alvarez tested negative for COVID. Maybe the Cuban star should get on an immunotherapy regimen - some vitamin C, maybe some Flintstones chewables and some zinc. Infielder Joe Perez was called up for the second time to take his spot on the roster.
Closing reliever Ryan Pressly was also placed on the 10-day list. His issue is with inflammation in his right knee, one he has battled before. To take his place on the roster, Houston promoted lefthander Parker Mushinski from Sugar Land. That will probably require a move on the 40-man roster.
The wandering Spacemen (5-4) finally come home to Houston Monday to open a six-game homestand beginning with a three-game series against first-place Anaheim (6-4). Angels superstar Mike Trout may miss some time after he was hit by a pitch on his left hand Sunday. X-rays were negative but he may need a couple of days to heal.
Luis Garcia (0-0) will pitch the home opener, a 7:10 p.m. Central contest against righthander Michael Lorenzen (1-0). A pair of lefties duel on Tuesday when Framber Valdez (1-0) challenges Patrick Sandoval (0-0). This will also be a 7:10 p.m. Central start. Both games will feature Yordan Alvarez giveaways.
Monday will also be the debut of the "City Connect" or "Space City" uniforms which will be on display for every Monday home game this season. For more about this, see the new column in the sidebar of this page.
Wednesday's 5:40 p.m. finale will feature the O's Bros - Odorizzi (0-1) for Houston and Shohei Ohtani (0-2) for Anaheim. Thursday will be an off-day before the Astros host the Toronto Blue Jays for a three-game weekend set.
Incidentally, the Astros will end the month playing in Toronto which has a national policy that unvaccinated people may not enter the country. What MLB is doing is that teams may temporarily suspend, with pay, any unvaxxed players with teams able to replace them on the roster just for that series. Think of it as paternity leave without the baby.
- Bob Hulsey
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