3 Things to Watch for Against the Astros

Written by Matt Gwin, Elie Waitzer, and Richard Lee-Sam

Big Power from Unlikely Places

You’d be forgiven if you’d confused Houston with Australia. They’re both have dry, barren areas that surround them with a millions animals that could conceivably kill you. As well, what’s up is down and what’s down is up…at least in baseball terms. By tAV, the Astros four best hitters this year are Marwin Gonzalez, Carlos Correa, Jose Altuve, and George Springer. The latter three are all up the middle players, fielding at shortstop, second base, and centre field respectively. Meanwhile, Marwin would’ve been an up the middle player, had he not been blocked at shortstop and second base by two perennial MVP vote getters. Instead, he’s out in left field.

That’s weird…right? Four up the middle-ish players who are also the four best hitters on their team. Meanwhile, the Astros’ every day designated hitter, third baseman, and first baseman are in the latter half of the team’s tAV standings, with Alex Bregman (3B) and Carlos Beltran (DH) being the team’s two worst regular hitters. In recent years, we’ve seen a number of top hitters pop up at positions outside of 1B, but the Astros are an extreme example.

On average this is how a team ranks by tAV by position:

You’ll note that 1B is expectedly at the top, followed expectedly by RF and 3B.

This is how the Astros regulars rank:

It’s not a perfect mirror of the MLB average, but it’s pretty darn close.

This is how the Blue Jays regulars rank:

The Blue Jays ranking follows substantially more in line with the MLB average. Justin Smoak and Josh Donaldson are at the top, while the trio of Kevin Pillar, Devon Travis, and Troy Tulowitzki round out the bottom third of the leaderboard. In other words, while we’ll watch Pillar, Tulowitzki, and the Goins/Barney platoon struggle to generate any power this weekend, their Astros counterparts will likely be driving Houston to victory. Bo Bichette Jr. can’t come soon enough.

George Springer Leads Off With a Boom

George Springer already has 25 homers batting leadoff for the Astros. If he keeps up that pace he will break Alfonso Soriano’s record of 39 leadoff homers in a single season. Slugging leadoff hitters are nothing new at this point. From Kyle Schwarber to Jose Bautista, you don’t need to be quick to bat first these days.

Thing is, though, Springer is quick. He hasn’t stolen a base yet this season, but he racked up 16 in a short 2015 season. Altuve and Correa get most of the attention, but at just 27 years old Springer is the key to the Astros’ deadly offence – and he’s doing things out of the leadoff spot that we’ve never seen before.

Things like: nine of those 25 leadoff homers have come in the first at-bat of the game. That’s tied for fourth-most all-time. Already. His .485 ISO as the first batter of the game is second all-time to Brady Anderson. If you thought Mookie Betts was trouble, you won’t have to wait long to find out what George Springer can do.

Something’s Heating Up in Texas

Think back to five seasons ago. Do you remember anything about the Astros? Of course not. They were awful. Playing their final year in the National League, they were in the midst of their second of three straight 100-loss seasons. Their intentional tanking to produce high draft picks and quality talent left them an average 42.3 games back over the course of those three seasons.

In 2017, it’s an entire different ballgame in Texas. Houston is 16 games up on the second place Los Angeles Angels in the AL West. Barring a miracle, the Astros should coast to the division title this fall. Assuming their lead holds, they will be going into the All-Star break with one of the largest division leads in history.  It looks like the state of Texas finally has a legitimate shot of bringing a championship home.

Going into yesterday’s game, the Astros as a team have slashed a ridiculous .281/.351/.492 on the season, and their .843 OPS is actually better than the second half OPS of the baseball-mashing 2015 Blue Jays, who only posted a mark of .829. The Astros are so frightening right now that they even forgot how to strike out. In 2015, when they made the ALDS, the Astros saw success despite striking out 22.9% of the time, good enough for the second highest mark in the league. In 2016, that number creeped up to 23.4%. Where do they rank this season? The Astros are striking out in only 17.3% of their plate appearances at a time when strikeouts are up throughout baseball. That’s how you have success. 

What does that mean for the Blue Jays? Well, their pitchers will have their hands full this weekend with an Astros lineup ready to hammer any mistake they make.

Lead Photo: Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports