You can’t talk about the 2026 Astros without mentioning the disaster of a pitching staff. Starting rotation? A mess. The bullpen? Mostly horrendous. Only the Nationals have a staff that has cost them value (-2.4 wins) in addition to Houston (-0.5 wins). Walks, in particular, have proven incredibly detrimental. No other team in baseball has allowed a higher walk rate than the Astros and it shows.
This club’s pitching fortunes won’t begin to improve until walks decline. Whether that occurs through better health, self-improvement, or an influx of better pitchers remains to be seen. Once that rate starts to drop, we might see some modest improvement. While it won’t solve all of this staff’s problems, it would be a step in the right direction. But the timing matters. If this team continues to issue an alarming number of free passes unabated for the next couple of months, the results we’re seeing now won’t change. If anything else, the situation could grow even worse.
Cardinals @ Astros Game Information and Gamethread Details
If Lance McCullers Jr. makes his start today against the Cardinals, he’ll join Mike Burrows as the only pitchers on the team to make at least four starts this season. It’ll be at least a couple of weeks before anyone else joins them in that distinction. Or, you know, May at the earliest. What a depressing tidbit.
Saturday’s game will, again, largely be dependent on how well McCullers throws. Even five decent enough innings could prove beneficial. Of course, Peter Lambert did that on Friday, but the bullpen still couldn’t keep the score close. The lineup will likely need another strong game to give this team the best chance to win. The infield is set and likely won’t change much between now and whenever Jeremy Peña returns. Carlos Correa gets the start at third base with Isaac Paredes as the DH. Yordan Alvarez is in left field. Nick Allen will handle shortstop. Christian Vázquez will catch McCullers. In fact, for the first time this season, Vázquez will catch on back-to-back games.
On a side note, I am curious to see if the playing time distribution between Yainer Diaz and Vázquez changes. It is only April 18, so I highly doubt we will see anything too drastic. The Astros are likely motivated to see if Diaz’s bat can rebound soon. But the situation does bear further monitoring. After all, if Diaz struggles to hit, then his value as a catcher is basically non-existent.
The game will be broadcast at 6:10 p.m. CT on SCHN with radio coverage on KBME 790 AM.
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Feature photo from @astros on X, Source Link
This is the worst season of all time
Keep searching lol. Oh Dana, your so freaking cooked
If Dynamic Hispanic is right, and Katz is to blame for the pitching performance. The question is, who hired Katz?
I am sorry. The Texian Army, not Dynamic Hispanic. 🤭
Is Yainer such a bad defensive catcher? My eye test says no.
By the way, in the last two seasons with the Astros, Maldy was a bad defensive catcher according to my eye test. He was riding on his reputation