Silent For Too Long said:

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What an absurdly pessimistic take. Our ceiling is 90 wins? No garauntees that our pitching will remain dominant but lets face it everyone outside of the big three suck at hitting?

Jesus. Some of you desperately need to learn how to withhold from hitting submit after losses.

We still have, by far, the best run differential in the majors. You don't amass that if you "only have 3 hitters." The bats will even out in the long run, it's a highly statistically likely, and this team will win 95-100 games. Once again, breathe.

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Outside of Gurriel who is hitting 270 nobody else has produced anything. That's a fact through the first quarter of the season. If I'm wrong please cite the other hitters and their batting averages that have contributed anything at all to run production. List them.

Now, maybe over the course of the season that will change with the rest of the order......however, through a quarter of the season we haven't seen it. That's not an opinion. It's statistics. Nothing subjective about it. A quarter of the season is a long haul. That's a statistically significant part of the season is it not? This isn't some ten game hitting slump.

So yeah, unfortunately, the rest of the order has "sucked" Not an opinion. It's a statistical fact so far. You can argue that you think it will turn around. Ok. What you can't argue is that through the first twenty five percent of the season the batting order has been anything other than completely unproductive. The fact that it's gone on for the first two months of the season is not encouraging.

That wasn't meant to be taken as an embarrassment. My point was that we had a historically good season last year that got us to 100 wins. It wasn't very easy getting there. To just assume this team can get to 100 wins like it's nothing is foolish. This team looks much more similar to 2015-2016 offensively than they do 2017

no one assumes they can just easily get to 100 wins. anyone that did think that would be as silly as those saying 90 wins is the ceiling.

that would mean this team can play no better than .541 the rest of the way. laughable to say that.

99 wins is the current projected win total fwiw.

as for "no one but Gurriel is producing," Springer is 13 in AL in RBI and 2nd in runs. Correa is 15th in RBI and 14th in runs.

Rangers have officially split the season series .... yikes. We should be at least 6-2 against these guys right now

you know it's funny in this era of super-advanced stats and metrics and such...

the Astros' offensive woes go back to two very important and basic stats:

1. batting average
2. slugging percentage

Houston is #7 in the American League in BA...and #11 in SLG %

agdaddy04 said:

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I think you've got some memory loss of last year. It wasn't all roses. Had plenty of people calling last year a failure during July and August. We had some rough patches last year.

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July and August were not good and at that point this team appeared to be going no where in the post season. They then went out and got Verlander and changed the season. Same thing similar needs to happen thus year too.

The good news is the starting pitching is the best in the league. THat will take you far on its own.

Surely the offense will come around.

Frok said:

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The good news is the starting pitching is the best in the league. THat will take you far on its own.

Surely the offense will come around.

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I also keep reminding myself how cheap rental bats are at the trade deadline. Plus, this year should be more of a buyer's market with all the tanking going on.

I'm hoping the early season "struggles" are just the baseball gods playing with us and the 'Stros for these comments concerning a post-World Series hangover.

I believe the team will be fine in the long run. Certainly have reasons to still be optimistic going forward.

No George tonight.

Gramercy Riffs said:

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No George tonight.

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Cole hit him on purpose!!

Haha, kidding.

We are gonna see some pretty telling things in the next 20 or so games:

1) Was Altuves power a fluke? (Does he look smaller to anyone else?
2) How good exactly is Fisher?
3) was marwin a 1 season wonder
4) is Evan Gattis alive?
5) is our SP as good as we think it is?

Nuke LaLoosh said:

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We are gonna see some pretty telling things in the next 20 or so games:

1) Was Altuves power a fluke? (Does he look smaller to anyone else?
2) How good exactly is Fisher?
3) was marwin a 1 season wonder
4) is Evan Gattis alive?
5) is our SP as good as we think it is?

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Why is number 5 a question? SP is the only reason we even have a winning record

Nuke LaLoosh said:

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We are gonna see some pretty telling things in the next 20 or so games:

1) Was Altuves power a fluke? (Does he look smaller to anyone else?He started abysmally last year and got it turned around. I don't think there was much fluke about it. I think an argument could be made he's at least in the discussion about best player.
2) How good exactly is Fisher?Thunk it's too soon to tell on him.
3) was marwin a 1 season wonder I think he'll always be streaky
4) is Evan Gattis alive? No idea.
5) is our SP as good as we think it is? Definitely the top 2 or 3. Back half is pretty damned solid though.

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Outside perspective.

Agnzona said:

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agdaddy04 said:

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I think you've got some memory loss of last year. It wasn't all roses. Had plenty of people calling last year a failure during July and August. We had some rough patches last year.

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July and August were not good and at that point this team appeared to be going no where in the post season. They then went out and got Verlander and changed the season. Same thing similar needs to happen thus year too.

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Why would you need to do that though? Who are you gonna ditch? Even your bench players last year were money. I think the Astros are in a unique position, barring injury, to not have to trade away prospects at the deadline. Certainly anybody can get better, but it doesn't seem like a real need for you guys this year.

The only question is whether they can continue their badassery. They have been incredible as a unit.

Surprised any pitcher ever comes middle or inside would Altuve. He struggles so much with pitches on the outer half

That curve ball.

CFM is dealing tonight!

Foul
Doesn't matter I guess now

Our staff should be telling every player in the lineup to try to go the other way every AB until we start to square some balls up at home.

Our swings have almost been as bad as our approaches

Man Guzman demolished that

A RUN!!!

That had to be a hit and run

Astros are 8th in wRC+ with Jose and Carlos waiting to bust out. They are going to be fine.

irish pete ag06 said:

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Astros are 8th in wRC+ with Jose and Carlos waiting to bust out. They are going to be fine.

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And Bregman. Not saying he's on their level but I fully expect more from him in the coming months.

Bad break for Bregs.

2 horrible ABs from Fisher and Altuve kept that from being an RBI groundout. Little things

That ball broke 2 feet

McCannnnonnnnballllll

Boom!