Winning the Series in Seattle in Quite Nice. But Winning the Division is a Long-Term Proposition.
The Astros--led by the bullpen--have been great the last two games in Seattle to take the division lead. But winning the division requires the Astros to outplay the Mariners over the long run.
The win on Friday night in Seattle was nice, as the Astros scored 3 in the second inning and kept the Mariners off the scoreboard the rest of the way.
The win on Saturday night was even nicer. Julio Rodriguez got real excited when he hit a two-run homer in the 6th but that energy was short-lived as Jake Meyers hit his own go-ahead two-run homer a half an inning later as the Astros won 4-2.
The bullpen were the stars of the two games, in my opinion. Astros relievers have thrown 6.1 innings across the two games and have allowed no runs, no hits and only two walks while striking out eight Mariners. Astros relievers have a collective 0.29 Win Probability Added over those two games.
The two wins moved the Astros into sole possession of first place in the American League West. And even if the Astros lose the series wrap-up game later today, they will leave Seattle percentage points ahead of the Mariners in the AL West standings.
With the two wins over their most direct competitor for the AL West title, the Astros have increased their Fangraphs playoff odds to 69%, their highest since Tax Day (April 15). You can see the Astros and
It’s been a nice series for the Astros.
I write today not to yuck any Astros fan’s yum. But I think it’s important to point something out. This series win against the Mariners isn’t all that big of a deal. To win the American League West, the Astros need to outplay the Mariners not just over a weekend in Seattle, but over the season’s final 64 games.
The Astros have earned a 1 game margin over the Mariners, so they have the tinies of cushions. But in reality, they don’t have one. For the Astros to win the AL West, they need to have a better record than the Mariners over the next two months and change.
It’s easy enough to win one big series and then to go into a slump. We see it happen all the time in baseball, and this would be a bad time for the Astros to do it. Fortunately, they play Oakland in their next series, so they should be in good shape.
Despite that negativity (or reality, I would argue), there are some real positive notes from not only this series, but from the team’s recent winning stretch, where they have won 19 of 25 games since losing the series opener to the White Sox on June 18.
The first is that the team has met the challenge created by their godawful start to the season. Earlier this season, I wrote that “because of the big hole the Astros have dug in the first 26 games of the season, they do not have the comfort of relying on the long run. They need to start winning now.” My headline for that article quoted on of Yogi Berra’s most famous and perceptive aphorisms: It’s getting late early out there.
I also wrote that “to make up the ground they have lost already…they will need to play as well as they did in some of the best seasons in franchise history.” Since the 7-19 start to the season, the Astros have a .625 winning percentage, which is a 101 win pace. And that was the win total of the 2017 Astros. So yes, they have met the need to play as well as some of the best teams in Astros history.
The second note I have is that thanks to the big winning streak, it is no longer getting late for the Astros. And that means that we Astros fans can return to focusing on the long-term picture in analyzing the team’s chances in the AL West race. It was odd to write that the Astros “need to start winning now” in April because my usual attitude is that Astros fans should take each loss in stride and focus on the long term. It’s good to get back to normal.
My third note is to check in on Mariners fans and their perception of this series. And it is, not surprisingly, negative.
The best demonstration of this comes from Mariners vlogger Chris Crawford, who does a daily recap of each Mariners game. He began last night by staring forlornly into the camera for 20 seconds, taking a big swig of something more than 12 ounces of booze, and then say “Yep.” After recapping the Mariner’s record and the game’s scoring plays (and taking two more large swigs from his bottle, Crawford says “Do you ever wish you didn’t care about something?”
Of course, part of Crawford’s despair as a Mariners fan is not that his team is now down in the division, but that his team has missed its best opportunity to parry back the Astros and gain ground in the division.
Because Crawford feels—as do most Mariners fans—that the Astros will outplay the Mariners over the last two months of the season. There is good reason for this belief. The Astros have a much better offense than the Mariners and a better back end of the bullpen (Ryne Stanek is a pretty average reliever).
That is why Fangraphs projects the Astros to win the division—and thus outplay the Mariners. Fangraphs projects the Astros to have a better record than the Mariners over the rest of the season. In fact, Fangraphs projects the Astros to have the second best record in the AL over the season’s final two plus months, only percentage points behind the Yankees.
The Astros are a good baseball team with lots of good players. It is why they have come back to take the division lead after getting down so far early. And it’s why we can now focus on the long term in assessing the 2024 AL West race.