BRIAN T. SMITH: TIME TO MAKE IT HAPPEN. JENNY DIAL CREECH: DON’T FORGET THE VETS.
Seemingly better than the club that made the playoffs two years ago, 2017 Astros need to live up to their potential
This has to be the year. Or at least it should be. Jim Crane finally stopped being so stingy. We’re a season removed from the Astros’ being crowned magazine World Series champs, yapping about it all spring, then failing to deliver when the real games began. A.J. Hinch’s daily lineup runs nine-deep — heck, 11. The bullpen has stabilized, a core four has arrived, the minors are stocked, and the Astros have one of the strongest starting staffs in Major League Baseball.
OK. That last part is a stretch and could end up ruining this whole thing.
But hey, it’s early April, summer’s soaking humidity hasn’t arrived, and we’re all eagerly waiting on the big 162.
Optimism reigns. Hope is contagious.
This really is the best team Jeff Luhnow has put together on paper, and I truly can envision a 2017 future in which the Astros win 90-plus games, capture the American League West for the first time, return to the postseason for just the second time since their lone World Series appearance in 2005, and are actually better than those annoying Rangers.
Yes, long-deprived Houstonians — you who originally fell for the Colt .45s in 1962 and for the first time have been waiting longer for a ring than the Cubs’ faithful — this really could be the year. And 2017 should definitely be the season when the painful rebuilding of 2011-13 and all those woeful 100-plus-loss seasons start to pay off in annual playoff berths.
Optimism merited
“This is the most optimistic I’ve been heading into a season,” said Luhnow, on a gorgeous open-roof day this week at Minute Maid Park with the sun beaming overhead. “There’s very few pieces that I really can think of that I’d like to add right now. And that’s a good spot to be for a GM.”
Did I mention Carlos Beltran is an Astro again? That Alex Bregman, 23, is entering Year Two? That Carlos Correa is now a whopping 22, Jose Altuve (26) is coming off the best year of his career, George Springer (27) is just entering his prime, Lance McCullers (23) is healthy, and Dallas Keuchel (29) just might be back to his 2015 Cy Young self ?
Enough with this waiting thing. Let’s play ball.
“It’s very exciting. From the day I got the phone call to come over here, it was something I felt like I could be a part of,” said veteran outfielder Josh Reddick, who never would have signed a four-year, $52 million deal with the Lastros a few years ago.
“I’ve seen the transition of what they went through from (2012) and ’13 to now.
“A team that you ran to the bat racks early about four years ago. Now, you’re scared to come into town with them because of the guys that they do have.”
I don’t want to create too-high expectations for the 2017 Stros — this isn’t Boston, Chicago, New York or Cleveland; we never win anything here — and part of the problem with last year’s team was an initial 7-17 nose dive, which followed a spring of hollow World Series chatter in Florida.
Technically, these Astros are still “on schedule” with Luhnow’s grand rebuild plan, and the foundation of this team will be around for years to come.
But you know what? The heck with that. Times have changed, we’re past all that take-it-slow stuff, and everyone from Crane and Luhnow to Hinch and that guy at the bar proudly wearing a new Astros cap knows it.
Luhnow is entering his sixth season calling all the shots and is on his third manager. Hinch is 170-154 in two years and has understood the pulse of his team since day one. But all the Astros really have to show for Crane’s ownership is three playoff victories and one postseason — they haven’t even won their division since Bud Selig tricked them into giving up the National League for the AL. So finishing third in the West truly won’t cut it in 2017.
This roster should be playing ball in mid-October. If not, it’ll be time to start asking the big questions.
Like, can this staff really last for six grueling months and not become the thread that pulls the whole promising vision apart?
Can add if necessary
“We have enough depth to get started and get off to a good start this season,” Luhnow said. “We’re going to be tested; there’s no question. … If we have to go out and grab somebody, we certainly have the resources to pull that off but don’t necessarily feel like we have to do that right now.”
The days of waiting for Chris Carter and Carlos Gomez to strike out have faded away. When Hinch wrote a lineup for a meaningless exhibition against the Cubs on Thursday, he could have been picking a video game 1-9: Springer, Bregman, Altuve, Correa, Beltran, Brian McCann, Yuli Gurriel, Reddick, Evan Gattis.
If the long balls are balanced with line drives and the starting arms consistently set up the pen, this should be the best club Houston’s seen since 2005. They’re still the young, silly Club Astros from the unexpected thrill of ’15. They also have the wisdom, experience and playoffproven track record Hinch’s first two teams clearly lacked.
“Our personality is pretty strong,” Hinch said. “It’s because we kind of know who we are and what we can do. We know our roles, and the players are all buying into what it’s going to take to potentially win the West and get into the playoffs.”
This should be the year, the beginning of everything that follows. It better be. If not, we’re going to spend the next six months figuring out what wrong.