The Launch Angle

Heading into the last week of the season, I hoped and pulled for the Astros to pull out the division title. A division title is a tangible accomplishment, no matter how you get there. It gets written down in ink in the record books. Whether it comes on a 100 win season or an 81-81 season, they both end with the Astros with triumphant and the Rangers and Mariners empty-handed.

“A division title is a win for this team,” I thought, “We’ve seen all season long that these are not your 2019 Astros. Everything after is just gravy.”

The Astros wrapped up the division on two blowout wins over the A’s to end the season, though. Suddenly, delusions of competence started flooding in. I asked the other Launch Angle writers for their predictions on how this series would go. I was thinking White Sox in 3.. maybe even 2. But the overwhelming majority responded, “Astros in 3.” I admit, I got caught up in the excitement. “Wait… yeah…. YEAH. Okay.. Astros in 3. LFG!!!!”

These two teams are pretty close. They’re very similar: the low innings the rotations provide, the heavy dependency on the bullpens, the offenses that rank towards the top of the AL in wRC+ and home runs. If they’re close and the Astros have the experience, then why not a Houston series win?

Midway through yesterday’s game, MCN texted me. “Feeling a bit disappointed in myself for being a little excited for today.” Same.

I guess after a 2025 season where there was no postseason for the Astros, I was just happy to see October baseball again.

Except that might not even happen. The Astros head into Game 2 of the AL Wild Card series facing elimination… and it’s still September.

How ridiculous do these shirts seem now?

When two teams are close, when the games are close, it frequently comes down to the small things, wins and losses along the margins, and those small things can often be traced to the manager.

Blaming the manager is a tired and overdone practice. The manager is such an easy target. The players are the ones playing, not the manager, but it’s a lot easier for fans to criticize the manager. They can imagine themselves doing what the manager needs to do, but they can’t see themselves doing what a player needs to do. “If I were the manager, I would have pulled Javier after the three innings,” is a lot easier to say than “If I were the left fielder, I would have hit a two run double into the gap.”

That doesn’t mean it’s never warranted. Bilbos touched on that in his recap of yesterday’s loss.

“They say you can’t blame the manager when the pitchers don’t pitch, and the batters don’t hit.

True enough, but the manager can put his best players in position to achieve the best odds for positive results.

Joe Espada did not do that.

Today is probably Joe Espada’s last chance to get a postseason win. I don’t mean “last chance this year”, I mean ever… at least for the Astros. If he doesn’t get the win tonight, he’s not coming back. He’s 0-3 now over 2 postseasons, with all losses coming at home.

We’ve now had three seasons of Espada under our belt, and it’s tough to identify exactly what he is bringing to table. Too frequently, his lineup decisions haven’t made sense, his management of when to push and when to pull pitching is questionable. His in-game strategy oftentimes is non-existent.

This season has been littered with examples, whether it’s having Hunter Brown throw over 100 pitches on the first day of the season, to routinely leaving pitchers in for longer than the data shows is advisable, to using his closer Josh Hader in 9th inning tie games on the road.

You don’t have to rewind all season though, there were numerous examples just in yesterday’s game. The White Sox started a lefty pitcher, and Espada started Taylor Trammell in left field. If you made a list of all 13 position players on the Wild Card rosters, Trammell would probably be LAST of who you would want to face a lefty. Tramell is a .429 OPS hitter against lefties, almost 250 points less than his .676 OPS against righties.

You cannot have Trammell take important at-bats against lefties. Espada did it in game 162 too, with the division title on the line and the bases loaded with 2 outs in the second inning. The A’s brought in a lefty to face Trammell, Espada didn’t counter-substitute and left Trammell in. Just because it’s the second inning, doesn’t mean it’s not high leverage. Bases loaded in a tie game in a game that might mean elimination, that’s high leverage, even in the second inning.

So what was Espada’s plan with starting Trammell against the lefty? Did he assume that Hagen Smith was just an opener so he would be lifted before the 9 spot came around? Well what if he wasn’t (and he wasn’t)? Or what if they did lift Smith, but put in another lefty pitcher? Then Espada has to either let Trammell bat against a lefty, which again should never happen, or he has to pinch for him with a righty and burn Trammell who no longer can even be used as a pinch hitter against RHP, a situation where he would have been useful! And unlike Game 162, this no-win situation could have been completely avoided because we knew that the White Sox were starting with a lefty pitcher.

If there’s any matchup on the Astros as criminal to allow than Trammell against a lefty, then it’s allowing Nelson Velazquez to hit against a righty, which also should never happen. Velazquez hit a great pinch hit 2 run home run yesterday, I know. That’s specifically what he was acquired to do: hit against lefties, and he crushed lefty Sean Newcomb. There’s no reason for him to hit against a righty though, especially when you’ve brought up lefty bat Joey Loperfido specifically for this series, and Velazquez did it twice both in spots of significant consequence. First, leading off the 8th inning, putting the Astros in the hole by 1 out in an inning they would go on to bring the tying run to the plate. Second, with 2 outs in the 9th with a runner on, and reaching meant bringing Pena and Alvarez up as the tying and go ahead runs. It was literally their last chance, and Espada still elected to have Velazquez bat against a righty.

These are not things AJ Hinch or Dusty Baker would have done. Hinch followed the data and the numbers would have steered him away. Dusty followed his gut, but his gut is grounded in years of experience and common sense, and he wouldn’t have allowed platoon players to stay in hitting against their advantage. Hinch and Dusty were very different managers, but everything they did could back up with reasons why.

Hinch sat down with Jake Kaplan after the 2019 World Series Game 7 loss and explained his decision making with his use of Zack Greinke and Will Harris, and his lack of use of Gerrit Cole. You might not agree, but there was still a logic to the thought process, so you can see how he got there.

Dusty didn’t always follow the data, but he knew players and he knew people and he knew baseball. So sometimes you’d get situations where he had Robel Garcia batting leadoff in a game, which the numbers don’t support, but Dusty would do because Garcia was replacing an injured Pena and it preserved everyone else’s batting order position that they were used to. You might not agree, but there was still a logic to the thought process, so you can see how he got there.

Espada’s managing is too frequently baffling. He makes desperate moves when he doesn’t need to, and he lacks urgency when it’s required. It feels like he doesn’t follow the data like Hinch because he’s going with his gut, but he doesn’t have the experience that Dusty did to justify that. His gut is grounded in nothing.

This season, I’ve written most of the Game Previews for the Launch Angle. I’ve tried to write pieces that are focused on today and tomorrow and less on yesterday, I leave that for the recaps that Cody and Bill and the others do so well. I’ve spent most of this piece talking about yesterday. I couldn’t help myself.

But yesterday is what bring us to today, Joe Espada’s last chance to get a postseason managerial win. If it doesn’t come, the Astros season ends, and so will the Espada era. Frankly it’s going to require at least 9 postseason wins to convince anyone the Espada era should continue, maybe even 13 wins.

Hunter Brown takes the ball for the Astros, Sean Burke starts for the White Sox. Win if you want to see October.

This post will be updated with starting lineups as they are made available.

The TV broadcast will be on Peacock, while 790 KBME provides radio coverage. Game time is a gain 4:05 p.m. CT.

Please join us on the TLA Discord Server, to join the gamethread channel to discuss and experience the game in real time with your fellow Astros fans and TLA community members. Instructions are available at the Launch Angle Guide.

Feature photo from @astros on X, Source Link.