Putting the last week in perspective

Even analytical fans can be overcome with emotions. The last ten days have been brutal. If we remove the opener of the Mariners series, we saw the Astros got a combined 2-6 in the span of eight days. That was against a collection of teams where they probably were hoping for a 6-2 run. They blew late leads, the offense sputtered at times, and the starting pitching continued to struggle to get through the fifth inning. Even the normally reliable Yordan Alvarez seemed to hit a snag throughout much of the run.

I hate to boil things down to simple math, but this is usually where my brain goes. There are essentially six months in a baseball season. It’s obviously grossly simplified to assume four weeks in a month, but we could probably add one week in there to account for the extra days. That means there are 25 weeks in a season. The last homestand accounts for slightly more than a week’s worth of games. 162 divided by nine equals 18. 18 is a nice round number.

To put this in perspective for most Houston fans, 18 essentially corresponds to the number of weeks in an NFL season. So, imagine if the Texans’ offense failed to show up for a particular game. I know that’s not hard to imagine. Imagine if they had held a lead into the fourth quarter and squandered it. Imagine if their defense simply got torched on a particular Sunday. What would the conversation be like?

Obviously, the conversation would likely depend on when that particular loss occurred. If it occurred in a random regular season game in October it would likely be a cause for concern, but no one would be quitting on the season quite yet. If it were the opening week of the season there would be some doom and gloom, but most people would realize it was just one game in a long schedule. If it occurred in January then obviously the season would be over.

This is where we find ourselves as Astros fans. We have experienced one terrible week of baseball. They have had worse this season. It doesn’t seem like it but the first road trip was an unmitigated disaster. There have been stretches at home that have looked just as awful. So, the key to sound analysis is to take a step back and keep a level head about these things.

The question we should ask is whether there is anything from these nine games that we can extrapolate to the much larger whole. I think there are a few through lines we can look at and pencil them in as areas of concern moving forward. These are things the next general manager and manager need to consider when the 2027 season opens (yes, I am assuming they are both gone).

Let’s do the math. We know Yordan Alvarez is great. We know Jeremy Pena is an all-star level player. We know Christian Walker overall has had a nice bounce back season. Isaac Paredes is also approaching career highs in OPS. That’s it. This lineup has four average to above average hitters when compared to the league average (as defined by 100 OPS+). That simply ain’t going to get it done.

Certainly, others have shown flashes of brilliance. Jose Altuve is a Hall of Famer in waiting, so he will have stretches where he looks like one. Cam Smith is obviously a physically gifted player and he will have stretches where he looks like a future all-star. Yainer Diaz even had a stretch earlier where he looked like his former self. That is why this offense can look great at times. Yet, on a nightly basis you are counting on the same four guys to hit. What happens when one or more of them aren’t hitting?

Moreover, if you have four guys that are clearly head and shoulders above everyone else then shouldn’t those four guys be the top four in your lineup? There are too many games when random people like Daulton Varsho are batting cleanup. Again, this is simple math. Who are your best hitters? Where they can hit in the lineup to get more opportunities?

Everyone here remembers the Jake Odorizzi days. Most fans would not remember them fondly, but they likely are misremembering things. Odorizzi was famously very effective two times through the order. The third time through things all went to crap. When Dusty Baker finally realized what he had then Odorizzi became a lot more effective. The Astros have a couple of those guys in their current rotation. Cristian Javier looks like one of those guys. Kai-Wei Teng was one of those guys when he was a starter. You could say Hayden Wesneski looks like one of those guys too.

Tatsuya Imai is also one of those guys as a starter. When more than half of your potential rotation are guys that are only effective two times through the order you are going to tax your bullpen. In my last lab, I suggested leaning into that. Obviously, that is a short-term solution to a long-term problem. You can’t go through a 162 game schedule without that blowing up in your face. You could credibly claim that it did on the last homestand.

Javier’s overall effectiveness has actually surprised me. I thought he was cooked earlier in the season. However, you are setting yourself up for problems if most of your starters are not capable of going beyond five innings. Heck, just getting to the fifth lately has been a struggle. In terms of short-term fixes, the answer is only Mike Burrows and hoping Ethan Pecko can go deeper than he did last time out. Neither of those are appetizing solutions. Still, when you do nothing at the deadline, your options are going to be limited.

If we have learned anything as Astros fans it is never to write them off in any situation. They taught us that in 2005 and throughout the current dynastic run. They are going up against the New York teams this week and that seems like a recipe for disaster. Still, this is when they usually have played their best baseball in the past. We can hope for it again. 3-6 is a horrible nine game stretch at home, but it is essentially one game’s worth of action in NFL terms. We wouldn’t write the Texans off after one week and we shouldn’t do that with the Astros even if the last nine games really makes us want to.