Houston’s troubles boil over with bad pitching, hitting
Seattle pounces on bullpen that has few solid options
SEATTLE — There is one reliable reliever and maybe four everyday names a casual baseball fan can recognize.
Life and energy appear only briefly in their dugout. Baserunners reach but never advance. Starting pitchers can finish four innings before beginning a combustion. The bullpen enters to pour gasoline on the fire their teammates started.
The Astros are in a bad way,
wondering when reinforcements may arrive and, more dispiritingly, if they may even help.
The Astros’ problems are far greater than the four missing everyday members of their lineup. They mustered one hit in a lifeless 7-2 loss against the Mariners on Sunday, but the minor-league level bottom of their order suggested such anemia is possible.
The return of Houston’s missing position players may mask some deficiencies, but do not be fooled. One glimpse at this grueling stretch of April baseball illustrated the ways this season can careen into ignominy. Position player depth is almost nonexistent. Starters don’t get deep into games, leaving a mess. The bullpen is beset by injury and more so by ineffectiveness. Dusty Baker’s decision-making can confound, but in reality, any choice he makes may lead to the same result.
Baker has only one good option in his bullpen. Ryan Pressly cannot pitch every pressurized spot. Houston’s starting pitchers refuse to go deep into games, forcing Baker into four or five innings of picking which reliever may not blow up upon entry. He left the dugout on Sunday to remove Jake
Odorizzi after 4⅔ innings of inefficiency. That’s now seven starts in 15 games to last fewer than five innings.
Odorizzi offered flashes of brilliance on Sunday. At one point, he retired 10 Mariners in a row. Six of them struck out. A 37-pitch first frame clouded all of it. Odorizzi walked two of the first four hitters he faced. Home plate umpire Brian O’nora deployed a small strike zone and squeezed the starter on at least a few pitches. An inability to adjust left Odorizzi’s day doomed from the start.
He escaped the first with only one run across. Success started in the second and fizzled in the fifth. Odorizzi’s fastball showed tremendous life. Command came around. He required 39 pitches to finish the next three innings, offering at least some hope on this abysmal afternoon. Taylor Trammell struck a sharp single to start the fifth, ending Odorizzi’s rhythm and any control the Astros appeared to have.
Odorizzi walked nine-hole hitter J.P. Crawford as his pitch count neared 90. Baker had activated his bullpen with lefthander Brooks Raley, but allowed Odorizzi to face dangerous leadoff man Mitch Haniger for a third time. Hainger hammered a baseball high into the Seattle sky and Myles Straw sprinted backward to save the game.
Straw is here for his defense and an occasional stolen base, two things his predecessor almost made an afterthought. His task in 2021 is tall. Few expect Straw to replace the presence or power George Springer supplied. The Astros need Straw to succeed at his two areas of expertise and hope the cast around him can handle everything else.
Straw’s assignment is understandable when the Astros are at full strength. The skeleton crew currently in place for so much more. Straw is suddenly a veteran. For at least the next four days, the 26-year-old must play like it.
He turned around in pursuit of the fly ball, leaving his back to the infield and sun in his eyes. Straw stuck out his glove for an over-theshoulder catch. The baseball bounced off of him and rolled around the warning track. Haniger headed to third base. Both men aboard scored runs, affording Seattle a lead and ending Odorizzi’s afternoon.
Baker opted for Raley out of the bullpen. Two lefthanded hitters loomed — Kyle Seager and Jose Marmolejos — but before them was righthanded slugger Ty France. Righthanders have a career .915 OPS against Raley. Baker obviously wanted the southpaw to neutralize Seager and Marmolejos, but having him face a righty invites doubt. Ryne Stanek, a righthanded reliever with reverse platoon splits, warmed in the Astros bullpen as it happened.
France fouled off a cutter to fall behind Raley 0-1. Raley returned with the same pitch. France deposited it over the left field fence, widening the gap Houston never had a chance to make closer.