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Houston, We’ve Had Some Problems: Astros Series Preview

Toronto Blue Jays @ Houston Astros

August 1st – August 4th

Written by Mike Passador and Matt Gwin

The Toronto Blue Jays head down to Texas for a four game set with one of the AL Wild Card contenders. The Astros, currently 55-49, sit second in the AL West at 6 games behind the Rangers and are 2.5 games back of the Red Sox in the wild card chase.

Houston has struggled as of late, losing five of their last six to the Yankees and Tigers. They were absolutely battered by Detroit, getting outscored 28-8 in a three game sweep that was capped off by an 11-0 drubbing. That poor stretch has seen them slip in the playoff picture, as the Tigers are now between Houston and the Red Sox.

The Blue Jays took two of three from division rival Baltimore and are just a half game behind the AL East leaders. The Jays, of course, were in first place from Saturday night into Sunday afternoon but slipped back into second after dropping the series finale on Sunday. After welcoming back Jose Bautista last Monday against San Diego the Blue Jays will hope he can get back into rhythm atop a potent lineup. Toronto has made up a lot of ground this month and will look to continue their strong play against the Astros.

Pitching Matchups:

August 1st – 8:07 PM ET

Marcus Stroman vs. Doug Fister

Over his last seven starts, Marcus Stroman has posted game scores of 19, 34, 71, 74, 14, 75, and 53. For reference, a game score of 50 is considered an average start. To say he’s been enigmatic would be quite the understatement. With that said, his issues now seem to be different than they have been at other points this season. Over May and June, Marcus Stroman averaged 12 hits against per nine innings. In July, that number is a more respectable 8.5 hits against per nine innings. Instead, it’s the long ball that he can’t quite figure out. One would then infer that his stuff is no longer the issue, as it may have been earlier in the season. Rather, Stroman has just missed his spots at times; that’s hurt him. In fact, on July 15th against the Athletics, he gave up three home runs, which is a career high. That’s not what you want to see from your ‘ground ball’ pitcher. The Astros, who have hit the eighth most home runs in baseball, aren’t going to ease those issues.

Doug Fister has been tentatively scheduled to make Monday’s start; the first that he’s eligible to pitch after going on the paternity leave list on Friday. Fister, whom the Astros signed to a one year $7 million contract this offseason, has had a fairly typical season for him. At one point, as a member of the Tigers rotation, Doug Fister was one of the better starters in the American League. However, for a guy like him who can’t blow hitters away, it’s all about the margins. Since leaving the Tigers, he’s had marginally fewer strikeouts, marginally more walks, and marginally more home runs. The three of those marginal things together have put his production level closer to replacement level. His 4.90 DRA is 15th worst among all starters with at least 100 innings pitched.

August 2nd – 8:07 PM ET

R.A. Dickey vs. Lance McCullers

With a 4.66 ERA and a 4.99 DRA, R.A. Dickey has not had a great season for the Jays. However, it’s almost nice that he can be somewhat forgotten. In years past, where he has been the starter with the highest or second highest expectations, he’s gotten more criticism when the knuckleball hasn’t rolled his way. This season, as he’s become the Jays de-facto fifth starter, there’s been far fewer contrasts with a certain viking-like starter in the Big Apple. Versus the Astros, and there homer happy lineup, Dickey is likely to have issues yet again. However, he will very shortly become an appreciated commodity as the Jays other starters begin to run out of innings down the stretch.

With a walk rate of 13.3%, Lance McCullers walks more batters than anyone else in the majors…but he makes it work. Without looking, I would have guessed that he and his strikeout heavy style would have taken advantage of lesser offences, and had trouble with better ones. However, oddly enough, his three of his four worst starts this year have come against lesser offences (TBR, OAK, ARI). Meanwhile, he’s dominated teams like the Yankees, Rangers, and Orioles. I’d like to guess that the Jays ability to draw walks often would hurt McCullers, but he’s a tough one to predict. Either way, he makes things interesting.

August 3rd– 8:07 PM ET

Marco Estrada vs. Collin McHugh

By ERA, July was Marco Estrada’s worst month since May of last season. In fact, he hasn’t had a single month with an ERA above 4.00 over that time. However, by FIP, it was his third best month over the last two seasons. In fact, not only were Estrada’s traditional peripherals (walk rate, strikeout rate, home run rate) better, but so too were his popups. This happened all the while he was dealing with a back injury. At some point, we may have to wonder if he’ll be able to hold up beyond the 200 IP mark , but we need not worry yet. Expect popups galore versus the Astros.

Collin McHugh, man of one of baseball’s spinningest curveballs, is another one of baseball’s recent sabrmetric darlings. This season, he’s had his fair share of issues with run prevention, but at present it appears to be a BABIP issue. The majority of his recent starts would appear to affirm that; he’s had a sub 3.50 ERA in six of his last eight starts. McHugh’s last start is not among those as he managed to give up eight earned runs off of ten hits in just 1.2 innings pitched. His pitches were all over the place. Unfortunately for the Jays, that would appear to be an anomaly. Toronto will have to be patient and lay off the breaking balls, which they don’t always fair so well against.

August 4th – 8:07 PM ET

J.A. Happ vs. Mike Fiers

The J.A. Happ from last season’s second half is back: that’s the title of Corinne Landrey’s excellent breakdown of Happ this past week at FanGraphs. If true, that mostly bodes well for the Blue Jays; they’ll be getting a top of the rotation starter. However, the one thing that did plague Happ over his strong streak of starts last season was durability. In the second half of 2015, he averaged just 5 1/3 innings, compared to 6 1/3 innings this season. If Happ has found a way to combine the strikeout success with plenty of innings, great! If not, we may find that we prefer early 2016 J.A. Happ.

Here are Mike Fiers strikeout rates for the last three seasons: 27.7%, 23.7%, and 16.4%. In case you couldn’t tell, that’s not a great trend. In recent months, he’s gained some of the strikeout stroke back, throwing seven starts with 20%+ strikeout rates. But, those starts have also come with very few innings pitched. It seems that the league is adjusting to Fiers’ deceptive stuff, and he now has to adjust. Over the last two months he’s tried to do that, throwing under 40% four seam fastballs for the first time in his career. Fortunately for the Jays, he hasn’t quite figured out how he’s going to adjust; expect quite a few runs.

Additions and Subtractions

The Astros come into this series relatively healthy with just one player on the DL. Luis Valbuena was placed on the DL on July 29th (retroactive to July 27th) with a strained hamstring. While they’ll miss a healthy Valbuena, his injury has opened up third base for top prospect Alex Bregman. Infielder Tyler White was called up to take Valbuena’s roster spot but is unlikely to see much playing time.

Marwin Gonzalez has been out of the lineup for the past two days after being hit on the hand on Friday night against the Tigers. His X-rays were negative but he’s been held out of action since. Carlos Gomez was lifted from last Wednesday’s game against the Yankees with a strained hamstring and hasn’t played since.

The Blue Jays could be without Troy Tulowitzki for the next little while as the shortstop sustained a “little chip fracture” in his right thumb according to manager John Gibbons. His thumb was in a brace yesterday and the length of his time off will depend on when he feels comfortable gripping a bat again. He’s listed as day-to-day at the moment but could wind up on the DL if he doesn’t heal up quickly.

Keep an Eye On

MVP Contenders

If you were to pick three favorites for this year’s AL MVP Award, Josh Donaldson and Jose Altuve would join regular suspect Mike Trout on pretty much everyone’s list. While we’re all well aware of Donaldson’s exploits, Blue Jays fans will finally get to see Altuve in action this year. This four game set will give fans a glimpse of Houston’s talented second baseman who they might not otherwise get a chance to watch.

An All-Star for three years running, Altuve has put up a monster season with a slash line of .358 / .424 / .570 to go with 18 home runs, 62 RBI, 77 runs and 25 steals. He’s currently fourth in the majors in WARP with a 5.40 mark, placing him behind Kris Bryant, Buster Posey and Mike Trout. That’s a good list to be a part of. While the Astros haven’t necessarily built upon their strong 2015 season, nobody can say Jose Altuve isn’t doing his part.

Houston’s Bullpen

Houston’s relievers have combined to post a 3.17 ERA, good for fourth in all of Major League Baseball and second in the American League. They’re led by closer Will Harris who has posted a 1.90 ERA in 42.2 innings. Harris has 11 saves and is backed by a 59.8% ground ball rate and a 9.49 K/9. Harris has also been somewhat victimized by a .308 BABIP which makes his stellar year all the more impressive.

Harris may be the current closer but is actually second on the team in saves. Luke Gregerson leads the Astros in that category with 14 saves. He actually has a better K/9, BB/9 and ground ball rate than Harris and is half of a lockdown duo in the late innings.

While Houston traded for fireballer Ken Giles to presumably take over the closer’s role, he’s settled in as a nice part of Houston’s bullpen after a rocky start. Giles uses his electric stuff to rack up strikeouts; he’s registered 60 K’s in just 41.2 innings, giving him an immaculate 13.0 K/9.

The only current member of Houston’s bullpen to have an ERA above 4.00 is lefty specialist Tony Sipp whose 4.88 ERA is inflated by a few blowups in very short outings. Harris, Gregerson, Giles, Pat Neshek, Chris Devenski, Scott Feldman and Sipp have combined to form one of the league’s best relief corps. If the Jays find themselves behind in the late innings they could be facing a major uphill battle.

Minute Maid Malaise

The Blue Jays and Astros haven’t had much of a history, what with Houston joining the American League in 2013. The Jays are just 11-16 all-time against Houston but have had an especially tough time on the road. Minute Maid Park has emerged as a little shop of horrors for the Jays, who sport just a 2-12 road record against the Astros.

The team’s last win in Houston came on July 31, 2014 when Nolan Reimold hit a go-ahead home run in the top of the 9th inning. Since then, the Jays have lost seven consecutive road games to the Astros and will look to buck the trend and capitalize on a scuffling opponent.

Probable Lineup

Toronto Blue Jays

Houston Astros

1 Jose Bautista – RF 1 George Springer – RF
2 Josh Donaldson – 3B 2 Marwin Gonzalez – 1B
3 Edwin Encarnacion – DH 3 Jose Altuve – 2B
4 Michael Saunders – LF 4 Carlos Correa – SS
5 Troy Tulowitzki – SS 5 Colby Rasmus – LF
6 Russell Martin – C 6 Alex Bregmann – 3B
7 Justin Smoak – 1B 7 Preston Tucker – DH
8 Kevin Pillar – CF 8 Carlos Gomez – CF
9 Devon Travis – 2B 9 Jason Castro – C

via Roster Resource

Final Thoughts

The Blue Jays are within a half game of first place in the division and have already authored a wonderful month. They’ve historically had trouble in Houston but might be making the trip at the right time. The struggling Astros will need to get back on track lest they fall further behind in the playoff hunt. All things considered, the team would have to be happy with splitting the four games at Minute Maid but could certainly take at least three games from Houston if they jump on Astro starters early.

Lead Photo: Butch Dill-USA TODAY Sports

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