Who played it better: ’98 or current Astros?

Team with Johnson and Killer B’s still franchise standard-bearer, but this year’s squad could surpass it

T he Astros are on pace to win 109 games, which would shatter the franchise’s record for the best regular season.

The standard-bearer is the 1998 Astros of the Killer B’s and Randy Johnson. That team won a franchise-best 102 games before running into a red-hot San Diego Padres team and being eliminated in the National League Division Series.

That was Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio at the peak of their careers, plus a powerful outfield

of Moises Alou, Derek Bell and Carl Everett. Then, the addition of Johnson at the trade deadline made the Astros look like World Series favorites.

Nineteen years later, the Astros again have the smell of a World Series contender.

So, how does this current crop of Astros compare to the best team in franchise history?

Pretty even.

The current offense packs way more punch — on pace to hit 258 home runs, as compared to 166 long balls in 1998. Still, the difference in run production isn’t that great. The 1998 Astros scored 874 total runs, while the current batch is on pace to score 893.

Where the older Astros have the biggest advantage is the starting rotation. Facing a staff of Johnson, Shane Reynolds, Jose Lima and Mike Hampton is much scarier than the current version of Dallas Keuchel, Lance McCullers, Charlie Morton and Mike Fiers.

Ideally, we would jump in the wayback machine and see what it would be like for Jose Altuve or Carlos Correa to try to hit off Johnson or how a matchup between Keuchel and Biggio would look, but instead all we have our numbers.

Here’s a breakdown by position of the Astros then and now.