A Big Win Streak; Conquering New York; National Guys Take Notice; A Third Sixth Report
It ended with a whimper, and not a bang from an Astros standpoint. Cristian Javier finally had a bad start, giving up 3 home runs in the first two innings, and a Royals rally in the top of the 9th against Hector Neris ended another Astros comeback attempt. It was a reminder that even the best teams tend to lose 50 to 60 games each season.
But it was an end. Last night’s 7-4 loss to the Royals ended the first half of the Astros season, and—importantly for this blog—the third sixth of the season.
Last night notwithstanding, it was an excellent sixth for the Astros, punctuated by winning 7 of 9 games against the two teams from New York. Those wins, and the Astros moving the odds of catching them in the AL West from highly to vanishingly unlikely moved the team more into the national conversation among baseball pundits, setting up expectations for October and dread among those tired of seeing the Orange and Blue every October that “the Astros are inevitable.”
Last night was unpleasant (and way too long a game, I might add), but the end of an eight game winning streak should be celebrated for the winning streak and not the loss. We cheer for an excellent baseball team this year. Again.
As a reminder, here at the Orange Fire Substack, we divide the baseball season up into sixths. Each sixth is 27 games, which is very close to a month. I use sixths because it is easier to compare equal sections of the season--all sixths are 27 games. And the math is easier. With three sixths complete, the season is half over. So you can simply double Kyle Tucker’s numbers—16 home runs and 57 RBI—and figure out what his pace is for the season—32 home runs and 114 RBI. And then you can go, “Hey, Tucker is having a great season.”
Overall Record: 53-28 (.654)
Record This Sixth: 18-9 (.667)
On Pace for a Record of: 106-56
The sixth started off with five losses in seven games against the Mariners, Marlins, and the Rangers. I called it “The Bad Week,” and wrote that the “losing streak will certainly not be something we remember fondly when we look back at the Astros 2022 season. But odds are we will not remember it at all when we do remember the season.”
That take held up. The Astros followed up the Bad Week by winning 16 of their next 19. That included winning 7 of 9 straight games against the two teams from New York—both of whom lead their league in wins.
They they came home to Minute Maid Park to sweep the Angels, punctuated by Jeremy Pena’s walk-off homer on Sunday. They then won a pair of come-from-behind victories against the Royals. It’s been an excellent stretch of baseball by the Astros, demonstrating what we have long known—this is a really good baseball team; one of the best in baseball, and one that is, once again, headed for October.
Team Offense & MLB Rank.
R/G: 4.48 (12th). OBP: .320 (11th). SLG: .429 (5th). OPS: .749 (5th). OPS+: 113 (4th).
The offense has been the biggest source of frustration for Astros fans this season. This is particularly notable in the number of runs that the team has scored this season—they are 12th best in the majors at plating runners.
But despite that mediocre number, other numbers are more encouraging for us Astro fans. The first is that the Astros are doing much better in just about any other offensive categories across the entire season. In particular, they are 5th in majors in slugging percentage and On base Plus Slugging (OPS), and 4th in the majors in OPS+. They “should” be scoring more runs than they are, and their luck should come closer to evening out over the course of the season.
And that has proven true in the third sixth of the season. The Astros have scored 5.2 runs per game over the last 27 games, better than their 4.5 runs in the second sixth and the 3.8 runs they scored in the first sixth of the season. The run scoring is getting better.
And it is getting better because the team is hitting better. Across the entire offense, the Astros slashed .259/.338/.483 since June 6th. That puts them 2nd in the majors in on base percentage, slugging percentage and weighted on base percentage (wOBA) over that period.
The improved offense has been spread across different hitters. Of the eight regulars who played throughout the sixth, seven of them had a wRC+ of over 100, which means they were above the average for a major league hitter. Six were over 35% better than league average; five were over 45% better; and four were over 55% better.
The slow start in the first sixth of the season seems to be a slump. Every team goes through one during the season, and the Astros could certainly go through another one over the final 81 games. But offensive talent level of this team is very good, and they should score a lot of runs in the second half of the season.
Team Pitching and MLB Rank
RA/G: 3.37 (3rd). FIP: 3.60 (5th). WHIP: 1.11 (3rd). K/9: 8/9 (9th). BB/9: 3.0 (9th)
The offense improved over the third sixth, and the pitching remained the same—very good. They gave up 3.5 runs per game, so a little worse than they had in the first third of the season, but the overall run prevention has been outstanding.
Since the sixth began on June 7, Astros pitchers have the 3rd lowest ERA and FIP and the 3rd highest K/9 in the majors. Their weakness continues to be control. They were 16th in the majors in BB/9 over that time period, but their 3.16 number shows they lowered their rate over the sixth, but it is still a performance in the middle third of baseball.
But outside of that, the run prevention is excellent. In particular, the starting pitching improved over the big win streak at the end of the sixth. Since the June 14th win over the Rangers, Astros starters have a 2.89 ERA while averaging over 6 innings per start. They have been good and have soaked up innings.
Team Fielding and MLB Rank
Fielding Runs Above Average 35 (1st). Defensive Runs Saved: 36 (3rd). Ultimate Zone Rating: 9.8 (4th). Outs Above Average 22 (2nd). Errors: 40 (10-T).
Astros pitchers allowed a batting average on balls in play (BABIP) of .242 in the third sixth, which was the best in baseball. Why are Astros pitches better able to get batters to find gloves when they hit the ball than their counterparts on other teams? Well, the biggest reason is that the Astros have one of the best defensive teams in baseball.
Kyle Tucker is usually thought of as a middle-of-the-order slugger, and his power numbers I listed above show that his reputation as a run producer is well deserved. But he is also an outstanding defensive right fielder. He has 11 Defensive Runs Saved in right field, which is the best of any major league outfielder and fourth among all major leaguers, regardless of position. He is ranked 13th in the majors in Ultimate Zone Rating, so his DRS number is not just an artifact of one system’s measurement of defense.
Notable Player Performances
Yordan Alvarez .349/.450/.735. 9 HR. 19 Runs. 24 RBI. .491 wOBA. 231 wRC+
It was every bit as good as you thought it was. Yordan Alvarez won the Player of the Month Award for June for a simple reason: he was the best hitter in baseball during that month. Alvarez is a huge slugger who hits the ball real hard combined with a disciplined hitter who makes a lot of contact. Put them together and this is what you get.
Alex Bregman .283/.407/.467 18 BB. 15 Ks
Bregman’s OPS reached a nadir on June 15 at .694. In the 17 games he’s played since then, he’s batted .345 with 7 extra base hits, 12 walks, 14 runs scored and 14 RBI. While Alvarez, Tucker, and Altuve have carried the offense all season, the improvement this sixth is in large part due to Bregman (and Gurriel to a lesser extent) returning to form.
Framber Valdez 5 GS. 32 IP. 2.81 ERA. 38 SO. 13 BB. 70.5% Ground Ball
The development of Framber Valdez from overage signing to unheralded callup to guy with control issues to circle of trust member has been both gratifying and anxiety producing to follow. Valdez was neither the best pitcher of the sixth (that’s Verlander), nor the pitching star (Javier), but his steady consistency this season has made the shift to a pitching-and-defense team more effective.
Hector Neris. 13 G. 11.2 IP. 6.94 ERA 1 HR. 5 BB. 9 Ks
Neris’s performance declined this sixth, as he was less able to induce swings and misses from opposing batters. His FIP (4.48) was better than his ERA, so some of the decline is bad luck, but his low strikeout rate will not lead to low ERAs. He is worth monitoring over the next few weeks.
Their Place in the Race
Overall Record: 53-28 (.596543)
1st Place. 13 Games Ahead of Seattle
Run Differential: +90
Expected Record: 51-30
Is this section necessary for the rest of the season?
The Astros have a huge lead in the American League West. How big? Let’s suppose they go .500 for the rest of the season. They would win 93 games. To match them, Seattle would have to go 52-27. In short, the Mariners would have to play as well in the second half of the season as the Astros did in the first have and the Astros would have to play significantly worse.
So what are the odds of that happening? Very low. The Pecota projections at Baseball Prospectus give the Mariners a 1.1% chance of overtaking the Astros. Or to put it another way, they give the Astros a 98.9% chance of winning the AL West. And that’s the low projection for our boys. Baseball Reference gives the Astros a 99.8% chance of winning the AL West and Fangraphs says that it’s a 99.9% chance. The AL West race is not over, but it’s as over as it can be after only half of the season has been played.
Now, there is another race that matters in the new playoff format adopted in this year’s Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). There will be 12 teams that make the playoffs, 6 in each league. And most importantly for the Astros, the top two seeds in each league get a bye to the Division Series, while the #3 through #6 seeds must play in a 3 game series in the Wild Card round.
At the moment, the Astros hold an 8 game lead over the AL Central leading Twins for the #2 seed. That’s a significant edge for the Orange and Blue.