Astros DO-OR-DIE stretch is HERE!

Astros DO-OR-DIE stretch is HERE!

[Music] Welcome to the Stone Cold Stros. I’m Brandon Strange with Charlie Polo and Josh Ford. Fordon. Josh Fordon. You’re Josh Fordon. Go follow them on XPLO and Josh Jordan 975. Josh Ford is another guy. Uh on today’s episode for two glorious nights, Houston put the hot in hot Atlanta, but that was before snapping back to reality in the finale. An ugly part of that reality has been injuries to which you can now add Altuve to the list of the hobbled. While Pedes is trying desperately to get himself off that list, the Astros opened the door and Seattle has come charging through as Houston now trails in the division for the first time since June 1st. We’ll preview what could likely be a make or break home stand for the Wild Wild West. Before all that, hit like on the video now. Subscribe to the channel to see more of our episodes in your timeline. Ring that bell to be notified ever so politely when new episodes drop. And we’re on all your favorite podcast apps where you can listen to us, hear our soothing voices while you’re on the elliptical at the gym or driving to go get lunch. Just search Stone Cold Stros. Charlie Josh, welcome in. The road trip is over. results were underwhelming and the Brave series uh Houston’s offense put up 17 runs over two games. Hunter Brown looked excellent, but in the finale, all the old problems came home to roost as Frober and the Astros got shellacked. There are a plethora of things to dig into in the macro, but let’s start with the micro. Charlie, we start with you. What were your thoughts on the series in Atlanta? Well, the series and the road trip on its face, okay, the Toronto Blue Jays are just flat out a better team than the Astros. So, they lose two out of three in Toronto. The Atlanta Braves stink. Their long run of playoff appearances is dying this season under an avalanche of injuries among other factors. So, the Astros taking two out of three there is right to expect or demand a sweep. It’s not like the Astros are very good for over two months now. Uh but Meatloaf’s old uh old song, two out of three ain’t bad. Two out of three wasn’t really good either with the Seattle Mariners flat out refusing to lose games. The Texas Rangers winning two out of three over a still current National League playoff team uh at the Mets. So this isn’t due week setting up for the Astros. It could be die week. If they have a bad home stand, it’s over. Uh, but it is a home stand where they’ve been much better than they have been on the road for the season. Not a great home team, but a good home team. And wouldn’t it be something? This Astros club, which has yet to win more than five in a row all season, was to peel off a 6 and0 home stand. Three over the Rangers, three over the Mariners. I get it. A boy can dream, can’t he? Uh, but we go back a week. The Seattle Mariners were coming off a bad trip. kind of revived themselves winning two out of three in Atlanta and they ran a table at home in Seattle. Now they swept the best team in baseball in the Milwaukee Brewers. So much more impressive than whatever the Astros might do with the Rangers. And then they took out the trash four straight over the Angels. So the Astros a game behind. If they don’t take the series from the Mariners, they lose the season series in the tiebreaker. If the Astros don’t sweep the Texas Rangers, they lose that tiebreaker. The Astros have already lost the season series to the Boston Red Sox. They’re not very far ahead of the Cleveland Guardians. Oh, the Astros lost that season series, too. So, they absolutely need to have a winning home stand. Do they have the components to do it? Sure. But it’s prove it, right? They’re a losing baseball team for over two months, 12- 11 over the last 23 games. They haven’t swept any series since Arizona in late July. No time like the present. Better late than never, right guys? This is the time, you know, if we do put a little silver lining on it. They finally won a series. Remember in our last video, they hadn’t won a series since against the Rockies. Think how long ago that was. And it was the Rockies. So, you’ll take the series win when you can get it because you haven’t had them for a while. Offense just got to be more consistent. and then the pitching killed you again and it’s going to be it’s going to be a slippery slope as we go along here especially with the bullpen and then I know we’ll get into to fr more but I have serious concerns about him just he’s just not the same pitcher he was a few months ago so without him to have to put that much on Jason Alexander and Hunter Brown and and who knows what you’re going to get from Christian Javier the rest of the way Ball’s at least shown you some things so I feel okay as we sit here Sometimes you don’t want to have your finishing quick too soon in a season, right? To where you get on a roll too soon and then maybe you drop the last couple series of the season, then you fall out of the playoffs. So, I I I think I’d kind of rather be where the Astros are right now and and not the Mariners because I I I get it. Winning baseball games is great, but sometimes you you go a little too soon, a little too early, and then you don’t have a good finish to your season. And so I’d kind of I’d rather not be waiting for the other shoe to drop like ripping off seven, eight, nine wins cuz it’s going to happen. They’re not going to win 16 games in a row. Baseball teams aren’t going to do that. Knock on wood. So I think the Astros are poised here to to be at home to get back on track. And these are the biggest games of the season. These next few games, let’s do it right now. We’ll see how healthy Altuve really is. All this stuff. It’s going to it’s at least interesting and intriguing, but it’s going to be such a disappointment if we do get to the end of this season and we we see that the Astros let it slip through their hands and they went out and got and and did all these things to to try and push it over the top. So, this is it guys. This is why what Bill Parcels used to say, this is why you lift all those weights. This is why you do all those exercises all year. These are the games. This is what all those practices are for. So, hopefully they come together and they have a couple great series here. Josh, I’m not going to beg because begging is unbecoming, but I will differ. I You have to rather be the Mariners right now. First, they’re in first place going into the week, while the Astros are playing a Rangers team, which has been winning a bunch of games. Yeah, the Mariners do go on the road, but it’s to Kansas City, which is now dead. Obviously, the Astros have to win the series over the Mariners here this weekend to have any viable shot to win the division because after that series, while the Astros go to Sacramento and face an A’s team, which has much more potency offensively than the Astros have shown for months now, the Mariners have a three-game series at home against the Colorado Rockies before the Dodgers go there. The last series of the regular season, a series that might mean nothing to the Dodgers if they’ve clinched the number three seed. and and and that’s where they are. In the end though, we can analyze it and schedule strength it. The Astros are going to have to play two weeks of very good baseball and they have not put together two good weeks of very good baseball in a very long time. The Sands are draining through the hourglass. But I do want to point out that while obviously the Mariners seize the upper hand in the division, there’s the two-front race. And I know for many Astros fans, uh, not the die hards who are, hey, if I’m going to go down with the ship and this is the end of the era, so be it. And man, it’s been magnificent. Uh, but for those looking to pull the rip cord, if you get in as the wild card, what are you going to do in the playoffs? Well, if you get in the playoffs, you give yourself a shot starting with that two out of three where anything can happen in a short series. If you don’t get in, if you’d rather not get in, losers mentality. The point is to get in. And on that wild card front, I mentioned they’re in big problems with tiebreers if they don’t sweep the Rangers. But if they take two out of three from the Rangers, well, they then nudge themselves three games ahead of the Rangers with only nine games to play. And then you just hope that Cleveland doesn’t have a big finishing kick. The Guardians have two series left with the Detroit Tigers. Uh, but with 12 games to go, if the Astros can’t go, let’s say, minimum of seven and five, on one hand, they won’t deserve to make the playoffs, right? If you sucked for two and a half months, you don’t deserve to make the playoffs. The other hand, if at the end of 162 games, your record qualifies, then you deserve to make the playoffs. So, it’s on the table for the Astros, will they carpay enough DMs? I can’t I can’t relate to the thought of I’d rather miss the playoffs than not win the division. That’s a that’s a weird uh line in the sand to draw because uh Houston won the division last year and then got quickly exited. So there it doesn’t really bring any more value to it. Um you know, look, you know, we brought up um the pitching and and kind of the realities of where they’re at. In Friday’s Laugher, Colton Gordon came in to eat four innings, surrendered three earned runs, and as unimpressive or whatever is that was, he gave up less hits, walks, and runs, and had one more strikeout than Frober did in his start on Sunday. Um, over the same amount of innings, four. Um, I say that to underscore that Frober is not pitching like an ace and for the better part of two months just been a guy. Um, and we talk about, you know, Josh talked about putting so much on Alexander. Well, let’s talk about Alexander. Over his last seven starts, 3-0, 220 erra, 41 innings pitched, nine walks, 25 strikeouts, a whip of under one. Whereas Fromper’s last seven, one and five, 625 RA, 40 innings pitched, 17 walks compared to nine for Alexander. 29 strikeouts. So, he has four more and a whip of 156. Um, it it’s crazy. I I I guess. So, my question is is, you know, we talk about the the frer uh the duality of frer this season because his erra for the season is still sub four, but it’s climbing quick. Um, if the season came down to uh well, no, let’s let’s let’s start here. Exactly how cooked is Houston if Frober continues to pitch at this level production? Uh in terms of the division cooked to a burnt crisp in terms of making the playoffs. The Rangers are no given even if they take two out of three here to go on and have a fabulous final three series. The Astros enter the week still a couple games ahead of the Guardians. Uh but flowers to Alexander who’s in the midst of a fabulous fluky run. I mean, I really hope the Astros, just because he’s dirt cheap, aren’t thinking, “Oh, yeah, just ink him in to be a stud in the 2026 rotation. Uh, the whip’s not great. The stuff isn’t great, but he’s been crafty and outstanding and largely kept them afloat.” And, you know, Jason Alexander is the only Astros starter who’s going to pitch in both the Rangers and Mariners series. Uh, I’m sure it’s just outrage and fury for so many Astros fans. You wonder within the clubhouse um you know how much thought is there? Yeah$und00 million arm 10 cent head uh too often and the the Dr. Jackekal and Mr. Hyde of his season. I mean there is eb and flow but uh this is like the stock market going through the roof and then a complete crash when the Astros won 13 consecutive Valdez starts. He wasn’t just along for the ride with them scoring 11 runs per game. His ERA over those 13 starts was 186. Now, when that streak snapped, it was actually a 2 to1 loss in which Frober pitched very well against the Nationals. Well, in the eight games since this is the stock market crash of 1929. You said that he’s been just a guy, Brandon, that guy’s Lance McCullers. I mean, look, over his last eight starts, it’s eight out of nine they’ve lost. But I’m giving Framber a deserved pass for the first one where he gave up, you know, one run in six innings. Uh, but of his last eight starts, 6.41 earned run average. You talk about the command, especially of the bread and butter, the curveball having disappeared. I mean, the Sunday start against the Braves in the fifth inning when he walked the first three batters, not one of the 12 balls was anywhere close to the strike zone. I mean so whether command release point mental breakdown in the end it doesn’t matter the results were disastrous and it was comprehensive because over those 12 nowhere close balls multiple curve balls fast balls or what they call the sinker his two seam fast ball uh a couple of change ups in there couple sliders they even log not one of them anywhere close and then he gives up a rocket up the middle for one hit and then another and and the game’s out of out at hand. Uh so I mean talk about from feast to famine start to start or in a shorter stretch that’s going to happen standard deviation in all this but to be largely untouchable over a 13 start window during which the Astros were literally unbeaten to now this trash turnin turn out because Frober has flat out sucked in five of these eight starts. In two of them he was okay. Quality starts. Six innings, three earned runs. Six and two/3 innings, four runs, three of them earned. Yeah, he’s killing them. He has been pitching which individually the days you pitch are the most important player on the team to what Jos Alt has been offensively over the last 30 games batting 175 with a 552 OPS. Yeah, your best players, a lot of them are in a freef fall right now and it doesn’t look like it’s getting better anytime soon. We know with Altuve, he’s just one of the streakiest ball players. It could just be totally awful or totally awesome. With Frober, it’s it’s each month tells you a whole lot. His RA in June 174, RA in July 216. Then you get to August 564. Then you get to September 675. I don’t like the way these numbers are trending, guys. and and the eye test tells you the same thing. He’s he’s having trouble getting guys out. It’s not like it was early in the season. And I I do think that the some of the friction in the clubhouse is part of this. And and we’re seeing reports that he’s been tweeting some things reportedly. We think it’s him. I don’t know for sure, but he doesn’t seem to be super happy. And look, all good things come to an end. We didn’t expect From to to be back after this season, but it would be nice if we could just finish this thing strong and in a good place and try and win another championship together and then and and then part ways. But it it’s just not feeling like that right now, guys. Something’s just off with From It’s just the walks, they haven’t been a consistent issue from him from start to start, but when they pop up, they really snowball. I mean, if you look what he did in that finale, he only pitched four innings. He gave up six hits and walked four guys. I mean, it doesn’t get much worse than that. He’s got to turn this thing around. But I don’t have super like a confidence that it’s going to happen. He’s just so volatile and the way that things have been trending. I just haven’t seen anything to jump out at me like, oh, we can turn this around, flip it 180 and improve here. So maybe if they actually get into the postseason that sparks something with Frober, but I think you just kind of got to hope the best with him. And you know, I hate to tell you, but I don’t like where this is headed. I I I just don’t he can’t get anybody out right now. And I don’t I don’t think his teammates are getting along with him very well either. And it’s not like he’s going to settle wherever he winds up for one year, $12 million. But Framber is costing himself a freaking fortune. And we don’t have to stay on this too long, but I did want to ask the question. I almost asked it instead of that one, but I thought that was probably the more important question, but just real quick, season came down to a oneame playoff to get into the postseason and you got uh and let’s say Hunter Brown is not available, but you have From available on four days rest and Jason Alexander available on five. Who are you starting? I don’t I guess it really doesn’t matter who I’m starting. It’s who is Joe Aspatada going to start and we know that answer. Yeah, I think with the season on the line, he’s going to go with From. Uh for me, I might go back to the Frober. Well, but I wouldn’t feel good about to me it’s just a 50 flip 50-50 kind of coin toss here. I I don’t feel great about Alexander just based on his pedigree. He doesn’t really have much of one at least. From you’ve seen that when he is right, he can be dominant. Yeah, you’d probably play the matchup game, you lefty hitting lineup, uh, fly ball friendly ballpark, but that we would even for two seconds have something to consider of Valdez or Jason Alexander sums up each man’s fortunes over the last many weeks. Yeah, I thought that was that’s why I asked because like you have to really think about it and Josh, you’re right. I know who a spot is rolling with because you’re going to get fired if you roll out Jason Alexander in a do or die situation given both of their pedigrees and experience. You’re going to get fired if you roll out Jason Alexander and he gets shellacked. Um either guy though, you’d probably have the bullpen warming up before the national anthem. Yeah. Yeah. No doubt. Um, well, we know who’s not in the bullpen. Uh, we’ll get to that in a second. But, uh, uh, look, we we touched on Altuve’s foot issues and, uh, we’ll have to see how lingering this is, but the reports regarding Esoch Pretti almost seem too good to be true, you know, if or that Houston’s possibly rushing back another player from injury, which has been uh, has had devastating effects to this team over the past several seasons. But the timing is interesting considering Altuve has been floundering with the bat in his hand. Although, you do have to wonder if there’s some if those are related, if the soreness in his foot and his productivity at the plate could be related. It’s something maybe they hadn’t disclosed prior. But that’s just us, you know, speculating because that’s what you do with this team because they don’t ever give you any real information. You just have to take your best guess as to what’s really going on behind the scenes. But uh the reg regardless Alu’s production for whatever reason has been floundering and now he’s got this injury and then here’s Eso Parades which we were already wondering like what this team was going to do with Esoch when he returned what we thought would be next season but now there’s the potential that he’s going to be returning by the end of the season. So I I wondered, you know, could Pedes end up being the Astros second baseman by the end of the season and how much does he improve the potency of a lineup that is desperately in search of runs? Desperate times, desperate measures, but I can’t see them asserting him at second base. Coming off a blown out hamstring, a healthy pre-injjury Esso Paredes. I think basically no one in Major League Baseball circles believes that he can play a competent defensive second base. And you want to ask him to be on the field where maybe you’re chasing down popups or you need to try to turn double plays. Uh so that that would shock me because while the offense has been overall a stink bomb this season, it’s not as if most recently it’s been every day you can’t score or it’s just one run. 76 games now with three or fewer, but that parades would be an instant tonic to the offense. Of course, he’s much more potent than Duban or if Urias is in there. Uh would Paradus have timing? I mean, if he comes back against Seattle, you’re going to wedge in a couple of days to give him rehab at bats earlier in the week. And how does he he respond to that? But asking him to play second base, uh I don’t think he could hack it. Yeah, I I don’t see that happening either for all the stuff Charlie kind of laid out there, but also I I think if they do get him back, you could see him at DH a little bit. Now, the only caveat here is what if Al Tuve is not moving around better than Pareetis? Like, now that could that could change some things on who’s playing second base. If Al Tuveet’s foot is causing him to not be as nimble as Pettis, I don’t think that’s going to be the case, but who knows? It’s the Astros and their injuries and and you know, you don’t want to bet on that, but I think you could see him at DH. But then that also means you’re probably putting Yordon in left field and then Al Tuve is going back to second base. Now, it does get the Dub Bons out of your lineup and that that’s all the stuff you need. You need another quality bat in your lineup. Now, if we want to ask what is Pettis, I don’t know what he is right now, but I know when he left the team when he was injured, he had the highest OPS on the team. He was he was the best hitter. I mean, bottom line, he was he was terrific. He still has the highest OPS on the team in the amount of games he’s played. The only one that’s close to him now is Pena, but he’s still ahead. You could arguably get your best hitter back with I know we have Yord on now and things have changed. I I get it. But there have been parts of the season where Pettis has been your best hitter. So if you could get him back in the DH spot, yeah, and get one of those dead weight bats out of the lineup, I think that could make a huge difference. But how’s he going to respond? You know, running out of the batters box, you know, is that hamstring going to hold up? And latest example of baseball, man. Yordon finally gets back. Goes nuts for how many games? 449 batting average through the first 12 or what. And yet the offense too many nights. Still just a you know what show. Then the first two games in Atlanta, especially Friday, right? The Zack Cole sell his soul to the devil entry into the big leagues night. And it’s still six runs on Saturday. Uh Yordon looks like he forgot his bat in the batters box both of those nights. Hey, and the offense produces. So that paradus back would up the floor and the ceiling of the Astros lineup obviously. But how it translates into results, who the heck knows, right? Yordon revives for a couple of hits in the Sunday game. The offense meanwhile goes back into nap mode. So Wen Andar Astros pitcher among other teams way back was actually talking about life. You can sum it up in one word, but it really applies to baseball. One word, you never know. Yeah. Uh it I think it’s a testament to where this team is when you have so many guys that from a health concern and are are bottlenecked at the DH position because you’re trying to fight for them at ABS at DH because you really don’t want to play them anywhere else because of health concerns. And speaking of that, uh we got news Friday that McCollers was returning to, you know, to his home away from home, the IIL. um this time with a sore hand. Uh another uh pitcher’s season is essentially over, but at least I guess this wasn’t someone who they were counting on because the idea of Lance making any more meaningful contributions to this season was was fleeting. Um they’ll shut him down. And I look I I think we’ll probably just see we’ll go through this again next year. We’ll just see if he has any setbacks over the off seasonason. If he does, how long does it take him to ramp back up? And then how long, you know, when do we see him? How many innings can he throw? And then how long is it before the other shoe drops? I don’t want to bismerch Lance or take anything away from Lance as the player, but I think we’re all kind of done, you know, with with this ride, this carousel ride that we’re on. But congrats. I think he may have tied a league record for most officially listed different injuries to be placed on the injured list in one season. Well, there there is that. Uh, but yeah, it’s look, it’s the real question is when he comes back, how many runs will he serve up before the team finally has to make a tough decision on a guy whose passion for the game is evident, but unfortunately surpassed by his body’s inability to stay healthy. Um, final thoughts before we’re out the door. What a week. three with the Rangers, the Astros starting pitchers, Jason Alexander, Christian Javier, and an opener. This is what it’s come to. Uh I think tactical error, Joe Espatada, whoever else factored in holding Hunter Brown until Saturday. He will not face the Rangers. Well, if he’d faced the Rangers, he would not have faced the Mariners. I think the Astros took the view that ah we’re going to put away the Rangers or they’ll put away themselves. It’s all about Seattle. It’s all about SE. It might not be all about Seattle. And on top of that, with Hunter Brown not pitching until Friday against the Mariners, that means his next turn won’t be until the following Wednesday against the Athletics. And then last day of the regular season, if the Astros have to win to be in, the only way Hunter Brown is available is on three days rest for the first time in his career. Had he gone in the Friday game in Atlanta, he could have gone Friday, Wednesday, Tuesday, and then if necessary sun necessary that last Sunday, at least four days rest for all the starts. Uh you hope it’s not one final indignity to their pitching staff. Uh waiting to happen. Um for better and worse, Hunter Brown from Valdez one two for the Mariner series Friday, Saturday. Yeah, it it all comes down to this, right? And that’s why I kind of talked about early streaking too early. Even though you have these games where you get full game advantages by beating the Mariners and the Rangers, if you go lay an egg against the A’s and the Angels, that’s going to be a problem because the Mariners, they’re not just going to not ever win baseball games again. So, I just like to to keep in mind being an Astros fan, we know this, just because you go out and perform well in in these series here, that doesn’t mean you’re going to get to the postseason. We very often have teams like the A’s do damage to us at the end of the year and it gets really dicey. So there’s a lot of baseball to be played even there only like four series left. A lot can happen in this amount of time. And then just as I look ahead to next year, guys, I’m kind of like what is the starting rotation going to look like next year? My lord, Hunter Brown and we think From’s gone and who knows, Jason Alexander turns back into whatever he is. and you got Eric Getty and Garcia and all these elbow issues like they really are going to have to put some some things together building a starting staff next year because as you’ve seen like just everybody’s hurt and a lot of guys that are hurt you can’t expect them to be ready to go at the beginning of next year as the Astros have largely owned the American League West for fairly close to a decade they’ve dominated within the division season in season out not 2025 five going to the Rangers series, trailing them, going to the Mariner series, even with them. Going to the A series, trailing them. And then there are the Angels. So, oh yeah, 12 games to play all within the division. So, at least for that stretch, it’s now or never. And again, the tiebreaker circumstances, if they don’t sweep the Rangers, they lose the tiebreaker to the Rangers. They have to take two out of three of the Mariners or they’re probably dead in the division anyway. But they’d also lose the tiebreaker. By the way, they would lose a three-way tiebreaker if somehow Astros, Rangers, Mariners all wind up knotted together. They’ve lost the tiebreaker to the Red Sox. They’ve lost the tiebreaker to the Guardians. Uh minimum seven wins necessary in these 12 games. Uh anything fewer than four of these six games, I think the division race, they’re pretty much dead. Still alive for the wild card, but then as Josh talked about, they’re going to need a really good road trip. And there’s not a whole lot of cause for optimism about that at this point. One last reminder, if you’re watching on YouTube, be sure to click like on the video. And if you listen on podcast on apps like Apple or Spotify, please give us a fivestar rating while you’re here. For Charlie and Josh, I’m Brandon saying so long. Have a great week. Thanks for listening. And as always, ghosts. 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