Ohtani is 0-2 with a 6.86 era vs Stros

Ragnar Danneskjoldd said:

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Ohtani is 0-2 with a 6.86 era vs Stros

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Deluxe said:

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I'm looking forward to seeing this:



Become this:

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Which one are you condemning to an early death?

This is part 5 of my 6-part countdown to Opening Day 2022, featuring a brief look at all previous 59 opening day games in franchise history.

April 2, 2002: Brewers 9, Astros 3: Larry Dierker stepped aside and the Astros hired Mr. Personality himself, Jimy Williams, to guide them out of the playoffs. Starter Wade Miller got lit up for 7 earned runs in 4 innings, including hoe runs by Richie Sexson, Geoff Jenkins, and Alex Ochoa. Ben Sheets whipped the Astro hitters, allowing 2 runs and striking out eight in six innings. Lance Berkman homered and was 3-for-5, starting an incredible year where he hit 42 HR, led the lead with 128 RBI, slugged .578 and finished third in the MVP voting.

April 1, 2003: Astros 10, Rockies 4: The good guys erupted for six runs in the bottom of the third to start the blowout and make a winner out of Roy Oswalt. Down 2-1, the Astros eight straight batters reach base against Jason Jennings, starting with an Oswalt single and capped by a two-run Jeff Bagwell home run. The Rockies started future Astro legend Jason Jennings, who was a masterful 2-9 with a 6.45 ERA for us in 2007. Geoff Blum and Bagwell each had three RBI, and Jeff Kent went 3 for 5.

April 5, 2004: Giants 5, Astros 4: Jimy Williams' last opening day as manager he was fired after 88 games (44-44) and replaced by Phil Garner, who went 48-26 and got us our first-ever playoff series win after just seven tries. The Astros pitching fell apart late, blowing a 4-1 lead through seven innings thanks to a three-run homer by Captain Steroids himself and a sac fly by J.T. Snow. Richard Hidalgo was 3-for-4 with 2 RBI and a home run.

April 5, 2005: Cardinals 7, Astros 3: The year that started so bad and ended so good team went from 8-7 to 15-30 (and the Chronicle tombstone spread) in a month's tine, then went 74-43 the rest of the way en route to our first-ever league championship and World Series appearance. After losing to St. Louis in the NLCS the year before, the Cards did it again thanks to a trio of homers from Jim Edmonds, Reggie Sanders, and Larry Walker, a three-run shot by Edmonds in the first inning off Roy O. The Astros were so confused on offense that they had Adam Everett leading off. Chris Carpenter continued his trend of owning the Astros like Sigfried owns Roy with 7 innings, 4 hits, 1 earned run allowed.

April 3, 2006: Astros 1, Marlins 0: A serious regression from NL champs to 82-80 and out of the playoffs. But on Opening Day, Roy O and Brad Lidge combined on a complete-game, 5-hit shutout with 9 strikeouts and only 2 walks. Oswalt went 8 innings and threw just 91 pitches. The game's only run came when Biggio scored on a wild pitch by Joe Borowski with 2 out in the bottom of the seventh.

April 2, 2007: Pirates 4, Astros 2: Here's where we were, just two years removed from one World Series appearance, and a full decade from the 2017 team. Brad Ausmus was 38, Biggio was 41, we were still trying to squeeze something out of Luke Scott, Chris Burke, Jason Lane, and Eric Bruntlett. Hunter Pence was finally called up and was as good as advertised, and Carlos Lee's biggest contribution to the season was breaking Adam Everett's leg with his massive body. A sign of things to come, the Astros blew a 2-0 lead, allowing 1 in the 8th, 1 in the 9th, and 2 in the 10th to lose to a Pirate team full of household names like Chris Duffy and Ronny Paulino. Lidge gave up a game-tying home run with 2 outs in the ninth. Luke Scott drove in both Astro runs with a two-run homer.

March 31, 2008: Padres 4, Astros 0: A last gasp of contention from the old guard, which finished 86-75 before being systematically dismantled. Biggio didn't start on Opening Day for the first time since 1989, a staggering thing to think about. Cecil Cooper saw his first Opening Day as manager. The team managed just 4 hits against Jake Peavy and two relievers, while Roy Oswalt gave up 11 hits in 5.1 innings.

April 6, 2009: Cubs 4, Astros 2: Well guess who destroyed the Astros? Why yes, it was Carlos Zambrano! 6 innings, 5 hits, 1 run, 6 strikeouts. I hate that guy. Roy O was the hard-luck loser giving up 3 runs in 7 innings. New Astros Miguel Tejada was 3 for 4 with 2 runs scored, and Michael Bourn was 2 for 4 with an RBI.

April 5, 2010: Giants 5, Astros 2: That's 4 straight Opening Day losses, and 6 out of 7. Until I opened this page on Baseball Reference, I forgot that Brad Mills was the Astros' manager in 2010. Oswalt made his last opening-day start before being traded. Tim Lincecum pitched 7 innings of shutout ball with 0 walks and 7 strikeouts. The Astros started the Pedro Feliz experiment at 3B, and also started Tommy Manzella at shortstop and JR Towles at catcher, and I kind of want to throw up now. Feliz balled out to the tune of a .221 average at age 35 and lost his job to Chris Johnson. Manzella ripped it up hitting .225. And Towles hit .191 before being replaced by prequel-era Martin Maldonado, Humberto Quintero.

April 1, 2011: Phillies 5, Astros 4: Hello, Loserville population, you. The start of the Astros' dark times and a 56-106 season began with a fifth straight opening day loss. The pitching matchup seemed fair. We started Brett Myers, the Phillies started Roy Halladay. Their big sticks were Jimmy Rollins and Ryan Howard; we had Angel Sanchez and Brett Wallace. Ugh, hope the next decade is better!

i had an irrational love for jason lane. And Zambrano just absolutely owned the astros, holy crap what a memory lane you just took me down.

FINALLY!!! Going to Saturday's game and cannot wait! LFG!!!

Freaking Zambrano.

In… and I want more cocky Bregman dugout celebrations

jkag89 said:

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In!

So what caused the demise of the first thread? Was the TOFA & AOFA on it even less TexAgs friendly?

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I copied last year's season thread which only had the schedule image in it, when the proper way to start a season thread is with gifs, AOFA, TOFA, and Rally Kate.

Lesson learned, and I am better for it

Tony Eusebio in rumored to be hired in the next few weeks as a hitting consultant FYI

Max Stassi and Myles Straw

Ahead of Yuli who is not on the list at all

astros4545 said:

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Introducing The Athletic’s MLB Hitter Tiers: the top 125 position players for 2022, from Acuña to Yastrzemski.

A project with @enosarris and @Britt_Ghiroli, with input from the 20+ people in baseball who checked our work: https://t.co/cEb5v6PKqU pic.twitter.com/1IFIMOoCTC

— Stephen J. Nesbitt (@stephenjnesbitt) April 5, 2022

Unsubscribe from The Athletic if you do

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Did that when they broke the scandal. Haven't missed it at all.