The offense…..What offense?
After 18 games, the Astros have not once won two games in a row. They have remained one or two games below .500 almost all year.
Today, they failed yet again to create a two-game winning streak or reach .500.
We keep saying, “the season’s young,” or “look how much worse they were last year at this time.” Of course, that team had Alex Bregman and Kyle Tucker. But with each daily display of offensive impotence, these excuses are getting ever more difficult to believe.
Yes, there’s a lot of season left, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that what we’ve seen so far is what we’re going to get.
Here are the OPSs of the Opening Day #3, #4, and #5 hitters:
Yordan Alvarez………..695
Christian Walker……..482
Yainer Diaz…………….397
A team that is to be considered as a serious contender has to hit better than wRC+ 88, 23rd in baseball, or rank 23rd in home runs.
Is it time to start wondering what kind of coaching might have caused the complete collapse of the aforementioned proven MLB hitters?
This year, the Astros are investing $39.5 million on first base and currently are getting -0.2 fWAR out of that position
Yes, every team not called the Yankees or Dodgers goes through periods of mediocrity. The Championship Era Astros couldn’t last forever. Yet, this team still has the talent to compete. It’s not the mediocrity that is so frustrating. It’s the unfulfilled potential and yawn-inducing offensive futility that continues to disappoint.
As Earl Weaver once asked an umpire, “Are you going to get better, or is this it?” Increasingly, we are having to face the reality. For the 2025 Astros, this is it. Lucky to sniff .500 only based on overperforming pitchers.
The Astros did manage a first-inning run thanks to the only consistent Astro this year, Jose Altuve, who led off the game with a single and had two hits today to bring his BA to .311. He scored on an RBI groundout by Isaac Paredes. The Astros finished with only four hits. Diaz had the only extra-base hit, a double.
Ronel Blanco was a bit of a hard-luck pitcher today. But it wouldn’t have mattered if Bob Gibson had been pitching. Going into the fifth inning, he had allowed only an infield hit. In the fifth, Victor Scott led off with a bunt single that rested on the foul line by about a millimeter. Thomas Saggese next hit a bloop single to right. And then Blanco made his only mistake of the game, a hanging curve that Lars Nootbar landed beyond the center field wall to give the Cards a 3-1 lead.
Perhaps a home run was inevitable. Blanco had only one K and seven flyouts to one groundout.
The Cardinals got an unearned run in the sixth on a few cheap hits off Logan Van Wey to complete the scoring.
The low-leverage bullpen did their jobs; Steven Okert, Tay Scott, and Bennett Sousa held the Cardinals after the departure of Van Wey.
If you score only six runs in three games, with a max of three in the Game 1 loss, you’re lucky to leave town with even one win.
Next, the Astros face the red-hot San Diego Padres, a team that competes in a division where they play real baseball, the NL West.
See ya Friday.