August 8, 2024 • 20 mins
On this episode of the Crawford Boxcast, Gordy and Ross talk about the Astros taking the final series vs the Rangers to win the Silver Boot Series for the eighth year in a row. They also touch on Yusei Kikuchi impressing so far through two starts. And what is going on with the lack of timely hitting with this offense?
In addition, could Zach Dezenzo help provide a spark to the bats? What's the latest with Justin Verlander returning? We hit on all of that & more on the Crawford Boxcast presented by Karbach Brewing and the Crawford Bock.
In addition, could Zach Dezenzo help provide a spark to the bats? What's the latest with Justin Verlander returning? We hit on all of that & more on the Crawford Boxcast presented by Karbach Brewing and the Crawford Bock.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Astros fans cheers, Rocky Lucky.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome to the Crawford Bucks Cast, as.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Proudly porn for you by Crawford Bach from Carbach Brewing.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
You're getting dap bear.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Oh my godness, the Crawford Box Cast starts now here
we go.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Here's Chris Gordy and Ross Viail.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
And it is an all new edition of the Crawford
Box Cast, presented by the Crawford Bach and Carbach Brewing.
As we get into it, as this roller coaster of
a season for your Houston Astros continues. As as we speak,
the Astros have just won the Golden Boot or the
Silver Boot rather series and they are back in the
first place in the American League West. And man, it's
(00:57):
you feel much better from where you are. Just a
week we could go. We see, we've seen you say,
Kakuchi make two starts now for the Astros, both very strong.
We've got Justin Verlander knocking on the doorf coming back.
Still no real update on Kyle Tucker. But here we
are as the Astro sit at fifty nine and fifty
five overall and back in the first place in Aos
(01:18):
with the Seattle Mariners having lost three in a Row.
I'm Chris Gordy. He is Ross, Virial and Ross. As
we talked about our friends over at Carboch Brewing. You
were over there on Monday as they did their watch
party for the Rangers game.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
How was that?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Yeah, that was pretty good. We had a lot of
people come out. We were broadcasting from the Pizza and Pints,
which has been open after we've been talking about it for.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
A long time. Had a slice of pizza. Dan Matthews
came by.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
He had a pizza ad to slices brisket pizza that
was quite delicious. I also like, my favorite thing is
the board of Bruds that they're kind of working on
in tinkering on. They call it the Fun Series. I
like the West Coast ipa there. But of course, as
you said, Crawford Boch is always a standby. Orbit came
out shooting stars is going to shock you. They were
looking pretty good. They had raffles giveaways. It was a
(02:05):
fun time and there was actually a little bit of
a breeze once the sun went down. It was quite
pleasant out there at the beer garden. It over at
car Back brought.
Speaker 4 (02:12):
Yeah, and they've got cool stuff going on all the
time over there at car back and appreciate them for
doing that and talk to a bunch of people who
were out there, and the Crawford Bock was flowing, just
as it will be when the Astros get back home.
And by the way, Astros about to go into a
stretch of very difficult games. We'll get into that as
we roll along, but we start here ross as the
(02:34):
Astros go into Arlington and have a heartbreaker loss on Monday,
blowing that game before they come back and win Game
two in Game three of this series, and thus they're
done with the Texas Rangers for the regular season. They
win the Silver Boot Series for the eighth season in
a row, and it wasn't easy. Obviously, the tiebreaker came
into play last year decided who won the American League West.
(02:57):
We'll see what happens as the Rangers sit five and
a half behind me Astros now if that will come
to play again. But nonetheless, it was looking bleak there
for a little bit, as they had lost three in
a row, they had lost six of eight, and now
here they are they've won two in a row and
feel a little bit better about themselves.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Yeah, it's funny because it's just really been the Astros
experience this year.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
I mean, they started off horribly, but since.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
They've been winning, even the games that they win, they
just don't blow out folks a whole lot, and even
it feels like the games that they lose, like you
mentioned the heartbreaker on Monday, losing an extra innings, They've
lost a lot of extra inning games.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
It's kind of the.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Nature of the team right now, where the state of
the pitching, which has been pretty good so far this
season and bullpen has been good for the majority of
the season, but having Kakuchi back there now in the rotation,
hopefully getting Verlander back as well. But the offense has
been an offense that isn't going out there and giving
you seven, eight, nine runs, So you're in these nip
(03:56):
and tuck battles. You lose an extra innings on Monday,
they were close games on Tuesday, and Wednesday you had
to use Josh Hater three games in a row for
the first time all season. So it's kind of been
It's just it's been a white knuckle ride, it feels like,
especially after the really horrible start to where every night
it almost feels like we're in these stressful games because
(04:19):
of how solid the pitching has been and how lacking
the offensive has been. Exploding for six runs in the
last game, we'll call that an explosion for this offense
and what we've seen from them lately.
Speaker 4 (04:31):
Yeah, what's lost in all this is how good the
Astros pitching has been. I mean, we talk about Spencer
Urghetti goes six innings of one run ball against the Rays,
takes a loss because they can't get him in he
run support. They lose one to nothing. Hunter Brown goes
out there and pitches six innings of one run ball.
It's a game that they end up blowing. But frob
(04:53):
Ert Valdez has a near no hitter. I mean, he
was one out away from a new hitter the other night.
He was fantastic, And you say Kakucci yesterday. You know,
maybe not dazzling is a word used, but five and
the third eight strikeouts, you know, gives up a home
run and then puts a man on and then they
pull him, and then that run scores.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
You always hate that because it's not it gets attributed
to him.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
But you know, if he just could have gotten a
couple more outs there, it would have been six innings
of one run but regardless, through the first two, in
first two outings of Cacucci, you would say so far
and time will tell, But so far this trade has
been a win for the Astros.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Yeah, of course, so far. It's early. It's been two starts.
It's not like I mean, you put it perfectly, not
like he dazzled out there.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
But he's been effective.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
And what you need to ask yourself is how much
better were those last two starts than what Jake Bloss
would have provided you? And Jake Bloss right now is
in triple A for Toronto. And oh, by the way,
Joey lo Berfido in twenty three played appearances has struck
out eleven times. He's got one extra base hit. He's
hitting like one eighty something. So it's yeah, again again,
(06:00):
it's early, it's early, it's early. But Yusakakuchi is helping
this team. He started two games, you've won both of them.
You need every game. You're gonna have to scratch and
claw in the American League West because this Astros team
is just not been perfect all year long.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
When they hit, they can't pitch. When they pitch, they
can't hit.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Bullpen has blown a game here and there, but for
the most part has been good. But it has to
start with the offense in the back end of that offense.
But absolutely right now, you for for twenty twenty four,
which is what this deal was made for, and Dana
Brown knowing that that you might have to take it
on the chin in twenty five or twenty six or whatever.
But the Astros need to get in the playoffs that is,
that is and win the American League West, because they
(06:40):
ain't gonna doesn't look like they're gonna win a wild
card the way that they're like five back or whatever
it is in those standings. So you need to get
into the playoffs. You need to do that via the
winning the American League West. Every game matters. You're knotted
up at this point virtually with or a head by
a half game. Excuse me of the Seattle Mariners down
(07:00):
the stretch. You need you Sekakuchi more than you need
Jake Bloss, Joey Lo Brafdo and Will Wegg.
Speaker 4 (07:07):
Yeah, I want to touch a little bit on the
offense here. As you know, they still have one of
the best batting averages in all of baseball. I think
they're third. They've been number one for much of this season.
But what's crazy Ross is they are thirteenth in run scored.
I mean, I don't think I've ever seen a discrepancy
that big where it's you have the third best batting
average in all baseball, ye, you're thirteenth in run scored.
(07:29):
They have no problem getting hits, they have no problem
getting men on base, they cannot get the men around
to score. And it just feels like every night they're
three for ten or you know, one for nine with
runners in scoring position. It just feels like they are
not clutch when it comes to that. How do they
fix that or is this just who they are this season?
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Yeah, it'll be interesting and it's something we've talked about
on this podcast a lot. How they started out the
season like twenty sixth in teams with team risk right
now fifteenth seven to fifty three ops with runners in
scoring position. First in baseball is the Kansas City Royals.
Last year, they were second behind the Orioles. The year
before that, I can't remember exactly off the top of
(08:12):
my head, they were like top five. So they've been
top five the last couple of years. They just haven't
been there this year. I think some of that is
not coming up in clutch situations and some bad luck
that will you know, has turned somewhat and hopefully can
turn to more of a degree. But I think also
you're just having guys kind of physically it's the dog days,
it's August. They haven't been able to score runs. You
(08:34):
had Channel of Rome put out the stat I can't
remember the exact numbers, but basically, like infield innings played, Altuve,
Pena and Bregman are all amongst the leaders in baseball.
Like those three guys, they've not been getting spelled. Jeremy
Pania looks like he's going through it.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
At the plate.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
You're seeing some signs of life again from Bregmant and
hopefully that can happen. And Altuve has been getting hits,
but it's just been a ton of singles lately.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
It hasn't been the extra base hits.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
So you need all three of those guys to be
performing down the stretch and then into the playoffs if
you're going to compete. And you know, brings to mind,
and something I thought about today really is remember how
last year you would get the l two va Well,
Brigman only think got one day off, but the occasional
Jeremy Paine a day off and be like and people
(09:24):
be like, Oh, what's going on, what's Dusty Baker doing?
He needs to win these games right now, and you've
kind of had to go all in because of how
far back you've been. But how much is that going
to cost you on the back end of playing these
guys so much that you could possibly see some fading
down the stretch. It is certainly something that I think
is in play.
Speaker 4 (09:43):
One element that is very interesting is they bring up
Zach Dezenzo, who we know is one of their top
rated prospects in their system.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
I believe he's was top five.
Speaker 4 (09:53):
You know, a lot of people believe can be the
future at third base if Alex Bradman leaves this coming
off season, which a lot of people think is it
is going to happen. But Dezenzo gets an opportunity d
HS the other night, then play some first base yesterday
and actually played pretty decently, made a nice defensive play there.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
But he goes over in his debut.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
But then two for three yesterday, you know, showing some
signs of life with the bat, and I thought it
was very interesting. I think it was Brian McTaggart was
on with you and Matt Thomas, who made a parallel
to Evan Carter who got called up with the Rangers
last year mid season, was one of their higher ranked
prospects and he started raking and was a big part
(10:32):
of what they did and route to winning a World Series.
And I'm not saying Zach Dezenzo was going to be that,
but it was kind of interesting because I just looked
at it as they're just bringing this kid up because
they don't really have any other options, and they're just
gonna give him a chance. But what if they do
catch lightning in a bottle with the Zenzo. What if
this guy does start to hit for them and could
be a very good, you know, mid season edition with
(10:54):
all the rest of this veteran lineup.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Yeah, I mean that would be great. That would cure
exactly what has been a the Houston Astros. And I
think they did call him up, maybe perhaps a little prematurely,
out of necessity. It's not like his numbers at Double
A were great. They were good in Triple A, but
in an extremely small sample size. But you needed something,
you have to spark this team. You're trying to figure
it out and Joe Spot and Dana Brown have a
tough task because you're trying to see, like, Okay, Jake
(11:19):
Myers gives us a great May, but since May he
hasn't been good. Chas McCormick was great last year, but
this year he's been an absolute disaster. You want pedro
Leone to work out, but he's a twenty six year
old guy you called up from Triple A. Zach Dezenzo
doesn't have a whole lot of seasoning, but you call
him up.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
You got to do something. You got to figure it out.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
That lightning in a bottle that you're talking about, they
need to try to grab a hold of that and
have it happen. If they're gonna win this world series,
they're gonna need something like that. Because if you're going
to day one of a playoff series and you're Joe
Espoto writing out or typing out your lineup card and
you're putting three John Singleton, that's not super exciting. It's
(11:58):
just not so if it is a young kid who
can perform and maybe get his head on straight and
get those nerves out, which it looks like he did
last night with those couple of hits. Hard hit contact
by the way on three of his at bets, and
then the other one he drew a walk. Okay, we're
not putting him in the Hall of Fame, but it's
at least encouraging.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
He's six foot five, he's a big.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Target at first base, and if he can just comport
himself well over there, he doesn't have to, you know,
flash gold glove type leather because that's not what John
Singleton does.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
He can make some.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
Plays, but at least don't embarrass yourself at first base.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Get some hits.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
That's gonna be an improvement of what you've had all season,
which is a mismash of guys, starting with jose A
Brew of course, who was a disaster.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Yeah, and we're starting to see, you know, they've parted ways, right,
I mean, they moved on from Josea Brew, they moved
on from Montero, and you know they're just they're making
moves where they're saying, look, we got to go with guys,
so we're gonna help this team down the stretch. Trey
Cabbage get sent back down to Triple A. So you
know they're trying everything they can, and you know the
(13:03):
reality is they need Kyle Tucker back. Chandler Rome did
write a piece in The Athletic this week about the
bone bruise, which is, you know, in our estimation, one
of the worst bone bruises in the history of bone bruises.
But Chandler spoke with some doctors who said this is
not out of the realm of abnormality. That some bone
(13:23):
bruises are you know, deep and take a long time
to heal.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Man, So yeah, if you read The Athletic, Chandler room
doing a great job with the Athletic.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I'm a subscriber. I love it.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
But anyways, that's enough of the free plugs. But yeah,
it's a good article from Chandler. But it's just funny
to me that it has even come to this where
a beat reporter for the team is reaching out to
Orthopedis to cross the city in nation or whatever because
the Astros trainer doesn't talk. Kyle Tucker hasn't talked. You've
(13:57):
kind of just getting that not the run around, but
I mean conflicting reports. Joe spot over the weekend saying
it would be aggressive to say Kyle Tucker is back
of the end of August. Then Dana Brown this week saying, yeah,
we expect him by the end of August, and nobody
knows anything. And apparently, according to the article from Chandler Rome,
it's one of those things where you can wake up
one day and all of a sudden, the soreness is gone.
(14:19):
It can take a couple of days, or it can
take a couple of months. Unfortunately for Kyle Tucker, it's
toward the ladder of that. But the saga hopefully, like
we can all laugh about this in a couple of
years and the Astros go on and win the World Series.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
But the saga of the.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Shin Brus of twenty twenty three has somehow just become
this huge.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Storyline for the Astros this year. It's incredible.
Speaker 4 (14:41):
Well, as I know from my bone bruis that I
suffered in the Astros Media softball game where I was
rounding second running to third and fell down and hurt
my arm and thought it was broken. It was not
a break. It was just a very deep bone bruise
and it took many weeks to heal. So, Kyle Tucker,
I sympathize with you. We are brothers and bone bruds together,
and uh, let's hope that this.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
Thing heals up quickly.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
But the good news Ross is we are uh, we
are on a track with mister Verlander. Justin Verlander has
been he's been clear, he's got his uh, his bull
his last bullpen thrown, and he's going to start for
sugar Land either Friday or Saturday this weekend. If all
goes well there, he'll make at least one more minor
league rehab start, and if all goes well there, we're
(15:25):
looking at Justin Verlander rejoining the big league club very soon.
So that's some good news for a neck injury. A
couple weeks ago, we just had no idea or no
timeline on when he would be back.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Yeah, I'm kind of interested to see number one of course,
when he's going to get back and what Justin Verlander
we get because this year, I mean you just look
at his numbers, even from a raw ERA standpoint, which
Yusai Kakuchi is teaching everyone that ERA is not everything,
but he's outperformed is era his field in a pinch,
(16:00):
it was like a four ninety nine, not like I
pulled it up three ninety five ERA, And so he's
due for a little bit of bad luck from those metrics.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
But if he's refreshed, he's.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Had this time off and he's ready to go down
the stretch, he can let loose a little bit more
because we're getting close to August September than we are
earlier in the season, and.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
He can round into form.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
You're not asking the guy to go out and be
who he was in twenty twenty two when the dude
is winning a cy young but you're just asking him
to be good, solid part of this rotation, not give
up a ton of runs. You're gonna have five other guys,
and this pitching has really been rounding in a form.
I'm curious after two il stints, forty one years old,
how he can bounce back. If there's one guy, I'm
(16:44):
not doubting it's justin Verlander. I do think he will
be effective, but certainly something we're going to be keeping
an eye on down the stretch.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
We did get some not so great news.
Speaker 4 (16:52):
Luis Garcia still has yet to throw, and now we're
a battle against the clock here. If it's you know,
if we go another week where he is to get
to throw, I mean, the odds of him getting back
before the season ends just looks more and more slim,
and then of course last Sunday we got confirmation. I
think I was one of the first people to put
it out there when Joe A spot A said it.
But Lance mccullor is safe to say he will not
(17:15):
pitch at all this the rest of this year. So
I say, Lance, get healthy, get ready for the start
of next spring training, because the reality is you're not
gonna have hove Er, You're not gonna have hi.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
Erkeati to start next season, so you're gonna need be gone.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Yeah she's probably gone.
Speaker 4 (17:34):
Yeah, I mean you're gonna need Lance McCullers to be
ready to go for spring training next year. And you know,
I think Luis Garcia is getting close to entering that
category as well.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, that's good and bad news unfortunately, but also underscoring
the fact that you needed to make a deal with
the deadline and everybody getting all up in arms about
these prospects got traded away. I understand, but something had
to be done, and you you just couldn't keep throwing
Jake Bloss out there and then hoping that a forty
one year old with two il stintz was coming back,
hoping that a guy that you're rushing or I keep
(18:06):
trying to say ahead of schedule rather than rushing. You're
ahead of schedule on Tommy john surgery. Returning from that,
you can't pray on that, and you certainly can't pray
on on Lansow Colors Junior now that he's basically out
for the year. So it sucks having those two guys
shut down. I mean mc callor's gone for good. Luis
Garcia were running out of time and you can't necessarily
(18:27):
factor him in the plans. But hopefully Verlander comes back,
Hopefully everybody stays healthy and you can go to that
six man down the stretch because the Astros definitely need it.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
And I pulled it up.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
I mentioned earlier Gordy that the pitching really has turned
it around since that bad first month. So since May first,
Astros in eer Braves number one in baseball three point
five seven, Astros number two three point six to one.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
This is starters and relievers.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
So as far as the pitching has gone since May first,
they've had the second in baseball.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Hitting's got to do their job.
Speaker 4 (19:02):
Well, that is pretty crazy. Well, hopefully you do your
job and you enjoy plenty of Crawford Bach from Carbock
Brewing as you watch the Astros or listening to them
on seven ninety and Ross and Clothes in closing a
tough stretch you had for the Astros. They gotta go
play three up in Boston against the mighty Red Sox,
who have turned into a pretty hot contender that really
(19:24):
good pitching this year, pretty good offense. And then you
gotta go play Tampa, who's not great, but the same
Tampa team that just came and took two out of
three against you a minute made. You got to go
play them in their house. And then you get a
little bit of a breather with the awful Chicago White
Sox coming to town next Friday.
Speaker 3 (19:40):
But still a tough week of games for the Astros ahead.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, that's baseball.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
You want to win some ball games, you gotta you
want to win the American League West. It's not gonna
all be Slappy's. Nobody's gonna hand it to you. Go
out there, take care of the business and win these games.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
He is Ross Viial. I'm Chris Gordy.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
This has been an all new edition of the Crawford
Box Cast, presented by a Carbox bring in the Crawford
Box and make sure you get your hands. I'll plenty
of Crawford bock. It is a home run every time.
We'll talk to you guys next week, right here on
the Crawford Box Cast
Astros fans cheers, Rocky Lucky.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome to the Crawford Bucks Cast, as.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Proudly porn for you by Crawford Bach from Carbach Brewing.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
You're getting dap bear.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Oh my godness, the Crawford Box Cast starts now here
we go.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Here's Chris Gordy and Ross Viail.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
And it is an all new edition of the Crawford
Box Cast, presented by the Crawford Bach and Carbach Brewing.
As we get into it, as this roller coaster of
a season for your Houston Astros continues. As as we speak,
the Astros have just won the Golden Boot or the
Silver Boot rather series and they are back in the
first place in the American League West. And man, it's
(00:57):
you feel much better from where you are. Just a
week we could go. We see, we've seen you say,
Kakuchi make two starts now for the Astros, both very strong.
We've got Justin Verlander knocking on the doorf coming back.
Still no real update on Kyle Tucker. But here we
are as the Astro sit at fifty nine and fifty
five overall and back in the first place in Aos
(01:18):
with the Seattle Mariners having lost three in a Row.
I'm Chris Gordy. He is Ross, Virial and Ross. As
we talked about our friends over at Carboch Brewing. You
were over there on Monday as they did their watch
party for the Rangers game.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
How was that?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Yeah, that was pretty good. We had a lot of
people come out. We were broadcasting from the Pizza and Pints,
which has been open after we've been talking about it for.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
A long time. Had a slice of pizza. Dan Matthews
came by.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
He had a pizza ad to slices brisket pizza that
was quite delicious. I also like, my favorite thing is
the board of Bruds that they're kind of working on
in tinkering on. They call it the Fun Series. I
like the West Coast ipa there. But of course, as
you said, Crawford Boch is always a standby. Orbit came
out shooting stars is going to shock you. They were
looking pretty good. They had raffles giveaways. It was a
(02:05):
fun time and there was actually a little bit of
a breeze once the sun went down. It was quite
pleasant out there at the beer garden. It over at
car Back brought.
Speaker 4 (02:12):
Yeah, and they've got cool stuff going on all the
time over there at car back and appreciate them for
doing that and talk to a bunch of people who
were out there, and the Crawford Bock was flowing, just
as it will be when the Astros get back home.
And by the way, Astros about to go into a
stretch of very difficult games. We'll get into that as
we roll along, but we start here ross as the
(02:34):
Astros go into Arlington and have a heartbreaker loss on Monday,
blowing that game before they come back and win Game
two in Game three of this series, and thus they're
done with the Texas Rangers for the regular season. They
win the Silver Boot Series for the eighth season in
a row, and it wasn't easy. Obviously, the tiebreaker came
into play last year decided who won the American League West.
(02:57):
We'll see what happens as the Rangers sit five and
a half behind me Astros now if that will come
to play again. But nonetheless, it was looking bleak there
for a little bit, as they had lost three in
a row, they had lost six of eight, and now
here they are they've won two in a row and
feel a little bit better about themselves.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Yeah, it's funny because it's just really been the Astros
experience this year.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
I mean, they started off horribly, but since.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
They've been winning, even the games that they win, they
just don't blow out folks a whole lot, and even
it feels like the games that they lose, like you
mentioned the heartbreaker on Monday, losing an extra innings, They've
lost a lot of extra inning games.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
It's kind of the.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Nature of the team right now, where the state of
the pitching, which has been pretty good so far this
season and bullpen has been good for the majority of
the season, but having Kakuchi back there now in the rotation,
hopefully getting Verlander back as well. But the offense has
been an offense that isn't going out there and giving
you seven, eight, nine runs, So you're in these nip
(03:56):
and tuck battles. You lose an extra innings on Monday,
they were close games on Tuesday, and Wednesday you had
to use Josh Hater three games in a row for
the first time all season. So it's kind of been
It's just it's been a white knuckle ride, it feels like,
especially after the really horrible start to where every night
it almost feels like we're in these stressful games because
(04:19):
of how solid the pitching has been and how lacking
the offensive has been. Exploding for six runs in the
last game, we'll call that an explosion for this offense
and what we've seen from them lately.
Speaker 4 (04:31):
Yeah, what's lost in all this is how good the
Astros pitching has been. I mean, we talk about Spencer
Urghetti goes six innings of one run ball against the Rays,
takes a loss because they can't get him in he
run support. They lose one to nothing. Hunter Brown goes
out there and pitches six innings of one run ball.
It's a game that they end up blowing. But frob
(04:53):
Ert Valdez has a near no hitter. I mean, he
was one out away from a new hitter the other night.
He was fantastic, And you say Kakucci yesterday. You know,
maybe not dazzling is a word used, but five and
the third eight strikeouts, you know, gives up a home
run and then puts a man on and then they
pull him, and then that run scores.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
You always hate that because it's not it gets attributed
to him.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
But you know, if he just could have gotten a
couple more outs there, it would have been six innings
of one run but regardless, through the first two, in
first two outings of Cacucci, you would say so far
and time will tell, But so far this trade has
been a win for the Astros.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Yeah, of course, so far. It's early. It's been two starts.
It's not like I mean, you put it perfectly, not
like he dazzled out there.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
But he's been effective.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
And what you need to ask yourself is how much
better were those last two starts than what Jake Bloss
would have provided you? And Jake Bloss right now is
in triple A for Toronto. And oh, by the way,
Joey lo Berfido in twenty three played appearances has struck
out eleven times. He's got one extra base hit. He's
hitting like one eighty something. So it's yeah, again again,
(06:00):
it's early, it's early, it's early. But Yusakakuchi is helping
this team. He started two games, you've won both of them.
You need every game. You're gonna have to scratch and
claw in the American League West because this Astros team
is just not been perfect all year long.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
When they hit, they can't pitch. When they pitch, they
can't hit.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Bullpen has blown a game here and there, but for
the most part has been good. But it has to
start with the offense in the back end of that offense.
But absolutely right now, you for for twenty twenty four,
which is what this deal was made for, and Dana
Brown knowing that that you might have to take it
on the chin in twenty five or twenty six or whatever.
But the Astros need to get in the playoffs that is,
that is and win the American League West, because they
(06:40):
ain't gonna doesn't look like they're gonna win a wild
card the way that they're like five back or whatever
it is in those standings. So you need to get
into the playoffs. You need to do that via the
winning the American League West. Every game matters. You're knotted
up at this point virtually with or a head by
a half game. Excuse me of the Seattle Mariners down
(07:00):
the stretch. You need you Sekakuchi more than you need
Jake Bloss, Joey Lo Brafdo and Will Wegg.
Speaker 4 (07:07):
Yeah, I want to touch a little bit on the
offense here. As you know, they still have one of
the best batting averages in all of baseball. I think
they're third. They've been number one for much of this season.
But what's crazy Ross is they are thirteenth in run scored.
I mean, I don't think I've ever seen a discrepancy
that big where it's you have the third best batting
average in all baseball, ye, you're thirteenth in run scored.
(07:29):
They have no problem getting hits, they have no problem
getting men on base, they cannot get the men around
to score. And it just feels like every night they're
three for ten or you know, one for nine with
runners in scoring position. It just feels like they are
not clutch when it comes to that. How do they
fix that or is this just who they are this season?
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Yeah, it'll be interesting and it's something we've talked about
on this podcast a lot. How they started out the
season like twenty sixth in teams with team risk right
now fifteenth seven to fifty three ops with runners in
scoring position. First in baseball is the Kansas City Royals.
Last year, they were second behind the Orioles. The year
before that, I can't remember exactly off the top of
(08:12):
my head, they were like top five. So they've been
top five the last couple of years. They just haven't
been there this year. I think some of that is
not coming up in clutch situations and some bad luck
that will you know, has turned somewhat and hopefully can
turn to more of a degree. But I think also
you're just having guys kind of physically it's the dog days,
it's August. They haven't been able to score runs. You
(08:34):
had Channel of Rome put out the stat I can't
remember the exact numbers, but basically, like infield innings played, Altuve,
Pena and Bregman are all amongst the leaders in baseball.
Like those three guys, they've not been getting spelled. Jeremy
Pania looks like he's going through it.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
At the plate.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
You're seeing some signs of life again from Bregmant and
hopefully that can happen. And Altuve has been getting hits,
but it's just been a ton of singles lately.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
It hasn't been the extra base hits.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
So you need all three of those guys to be
performing down the stretch and then into the playoffs if
you're going to compete. And you know, brings to mind,
and something I thought about today really is remember how
last year you would get the l two va Well,
Brigman only think got one day off, but the occasional
Jeremy Paine a day off and be like and people
(09:24):
be like, Oh, what's going on, what's Dusty Baker doing?
He needs to win these games right now, and you've
kind of had to go all in because of how
far back you've been. But how much is that going
to cost you on the back end of playing these
guys so much that you could possibly see some fading
down the stretch. It is certainly something that I think
is in play.
Speaker 4 (09:43):
One element that is very interesting is they bring up
Zach Dezenzo, who we know is one of their top
rated prospects in their system.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
I believe he's was top five.
Speaker 4 (09:53):
You know, a lot of people believe can be the
future at third base if Alex Bradman leaves this coming
off season, which a lot of people think is it
is going to happen. But Dezenzo gets an opportunity d
HS the other night, then play some first base yesterday
and actually played pretty decently, made a nice defensive play there.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
But he goes over in his debut.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
But then two for three yesterday, you know, showing some
signs of life with the bat, and I thought it
was very interesting. I think it was Brian McTaggart was
on with you and Matt Thomas, who made a parallel
to Evan Carter who got called up with the Rangers
last year mid season, was one of their higher ranked
prospects and he started raking and was a big part
(10:32):
of what they did and route to winning a World Series.
And I'm not saying Zach Dezenzo was going to be that,
but it was kind of interesting because I just looked
at it as they're just bringing this kid up because
they don't really have any other options, and they're just
gonna give him a chance. But what if they do
catch lightning in a bottle with the Zenzo. What if
this guy does start to hit for them and could
be a very good, you know, mid season edition with
(10:54):
all the rest of this veteran lineup.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Yeah, I mean that would be great. That would cure
exactly what has been a the Houston Astros. And I
think they did call him up, maybe perhaps a little prematurely,
out of necessity. It's not like his numbers at Double
A were great. They were good in Triple A, but
in an extremely small sample size. But you needed something,
you have to spark this team. You're trying to figure
it out and Joe Spot and Dana Brown have a
tough task because you're trying to see, like, Okay, Jake
(11:19):
Myers gives us a great May, but since May he
hasn't been good. Chas McCormick was great last year, but
this year he's been an absolute disaster. You want pedro
Leone to work out, but he's a twenty six year
old guy you called up from Triple A. Zach Dezenzo
doesn't have a whole lot of seasoning, but you call
him up.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
You got to do something. You got to figure it out.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
That lightning in a bottle that you're talking about, they
need to try to grab a hold of that and
have it happen. If they're gonna win this world series,
they're gonna need something like that. Because if you're going
to day one of a playoff series and you're Joe
Espoto writing out or typing out your lineup card and
you're putting three John Singleton, that's not super exciting. It's
(11:58):
just not so if it is a young kid who
can perform and maybe get his head on straight and
get those nerves out, which it looks like he did
last night with those couple of hits. Hard hit contact
by the way on three of his at bets, and
then the other one he drew a walk. Okay, we're
not putting him in the Hall of Fame, but it's
at least encouraging.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
He's six foot five, he's a big.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Target at first base, and if he can just comport
himself well over there, he doesn't have to, you know,
flash gold glove type leather because that's not what John
Singleton does.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
He can make some.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
Plays, but at least don't embarrass yourself at first base.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Get some hits.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
That's gonna be an improvement of what you've had all season,
which is a mismash of guys, starting with jose A
Brew of course, who was a disaster.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Yeah, and we're starting to see, you know, they've parted ways, right,
I mean, they moved on from Josea Brew, they moved
on from Montero, and you know they're just they're making
moves where they're saying, look, we got to go with guys,
so we're gonna help this team down the stretch. Trey
Cabbage get sent back down to Triple A. So you
know they're trying everything they can, and you know the
(13:03):
reality is they need Kyle Tucker back. Chandler Rome did
write a piece in The Athletic this week about the
bone bruise, which is, you know, in our estimation, one
of the worst bone bruises in the history of bone bruises.
But Chandler spoke with some doctors who said this is
not out of the realm of abnormality. That some bone
(13:23):
bruises are you know, deep and take a long time
to heal.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Man, So yeah, if you read The Athletic, Chandler room
doing a great job with the Athletic.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I'm a subscriber. I love it.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
But anyways, that's enough of the free plugs. But yeah,
it's a good article from Chandler. But it's just funny
to me that it has even come to this where
a beat reporter for the team is reaching out to
Orthopedis to cross the city in nation or whatever because
the Astros trainer doesn't talk. Kyle Tucker hasn't talked. You've
(13:57):
kind of just getting that not the run around, but
I mean conflicting reports. Joe spot over the weekend saying
it would be aggressive to say Kyle Tucker is back
of the end of August. Then Dana Brown this week saying, yeah,
we expect him by the end of August, and nobody
knows anything. And apparently, according to the article from Chandler Rome,
it's one of those things where you can wake up
one day and all of a sudden, the soreness is gone.
(14:19):
It can take a couple of days, or it can
take a couple of months. Unfortunately for Kyle Tucker, it's
toward the ladder of that. But the saga hopefully, like
we can all laugh about this in a couple of
years and the Astros go on and win the World Series.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
But the saga of the.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Shin Brus of twenty twenty three has somehow just become
this huge.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Storyline for the Astros this year. It's incredible.
Speaker 4 (14:41):
Well, as I know from my bone bruis that I
suffered in the Astros Media softball game where I was
rounding second running to third and fell down and hurt
my arm and thought it was broken. It was not
a break. It was just a very deep bone bruise
and it took many weeks to heal. So, Kyle Tucker,
I sympathize with you. We are brothers and bone bruds together,
and uh, let's hope that this.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
Thing heals up quickly.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
But the good news Ross is we are uh, we
are on a track with mister Verlander. Justin Verlander has
been he's been clear, he's got his uh, his bull
his last bullpen thrown, and he's going to start for
sugar Land either Friday or Saturday this weekend. If all
goes well there, he'll make at least one more minor
league rehab start, and if all goes well there, we're
(15:25):
looking at Justin Verlander rejoining the big league club very soon.
So that's some good news for a neck injury. A
couple weeks ago, we just had no idea or no
timeline on when he would be back.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Yeah, I'm kind of interested to see number one of course,
when he's going to get back and what Justin Verlander
we get because this year, I mean you just look
at his numbers, even from a raw ERA standpoint, which
Yusai Kakuchi is teaching everyone that ERA is not everything,
but he's outperformed is era his field in a pinch,
(16:00):
it was like a four ninety nine, not like I
pulled it up three ninety five ERA, And so he's
due for a little bit of bad luck from those metrics.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
But if he's refreshed, he's.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Had this time off and he's ready to go down
the stretch, he can let loose a little bit more
because we're getting close to August September than we are
earlier in the season, and.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
He can round into form.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
You're not asking the guy to go out and be
who he was in twenty twenty two when the dude
is winning a cy young but you're just asking him
to be good, solid part of this rotation, not give
up a ton of runs. You're gonna have five other guys,
and this pitching has really been rounding in a form.
I'm curious after two il stints, forty one years old,
how he can bounce back. If there's one guy, I'm
(16:44):
not doubting it's justin Verlander. I do think he will
be effective, but certainly something we're going to be keeping
an eye on down the stretch.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
We did get some not so great news.
Speaker 4 (16:52):
Luis Garcia still has yet to throw, and now we're
a battle against the clock here. If it's you know,
if we go another week where he is to get
to throw, I mean, the odds of him getting back
before the season ends just looks more and more slim,
and then of course last Sunday we got confirmation. I
think I was one of the first people to put
it out there when Joe A spot A said it.
But Lance mccullor is safe to say he will not
(17:15):
pitch at all this the rest of this year. So
I say, Lance, get healthy, get ready for the start
of next spring training, because the reality is you're not
gonna have hove Er, You're not gonna have hi.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
Erkeati to start next season, so you're gonna need be gone.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Yeah she's probably gone.
Speaker 4 (17:34):
Yeah, I mean you're gonna need Lance McCullers to be
ready to go for spring training next year. And you know,
I think Luis Garcia is getting close to entering that
category as well.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, that's good and bad news unfortunately, but also underscoring
the fact that you needed to make a deal with
the deadline and everybody getting all up in arms about
these prospects got traded away. I understand, but something had
to be done, and you you just couldn't keep throwing
Jake Bloss out there and then hoping that a forty
one year old with two il stintz was coming back,
hoping that a guy that you're rushing or I keep
(18:06):
trying to say ahead of schedule rather than rushing. You're
ahead of schedule on Tommy john surgery. Returning from that,
you can't pray on that, and you certainly can't pray
on on Lansow Colors Junior now that he's basically out
for the year. So it sucks having those two guys
shut down. I mean mc callor's gone for good. Luis
Garcia were running out of time and you can't necessarily
(18:27):
factor him in the plans. But hopefully Verlander comes back,
Hopefully everybody stays healthy and you can go to that
six man down the stretch because the Astros definitely need it.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
And I pulled it up.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
I mentioned earlier Gordy that the pitching really has turned
it around since that bad first month. So since May first,
Astros in eer Braves number one in baseball three point
five seven, Astros number two three point six to one.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
This is starters and relievers.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
So as far as the pitching has gone since May first,
they've had the second in baseball.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Hitting's got to do their job.
Speaker 4 (19:02):
Well, that is pretty crazy. Well, hopefully you do your
job and you enjoy plenty of Crawford Bach from Carbock
Brewing as you watch the Astros or listening to them
on seven ninety and Ross and Clothes in closing a
tough stretch you had for the Astros. They gotta go
play three up in Boston against the mighty Red Sox,
who have turned into a pretty hot contender that really
(19:24):
good pitching this year, pretty good offense. And then you
gotta go play Tampa, who's not great, but the same
Tampa team that just came and took two out of
three against you a minute made. You got to go
play them in their house. And then you get a
little bit of a breather with the awful Chicago White
Sox coming to town next Friday.
Speaker 3 (19:40):
But still a tough week of games for the Astros ahead.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, that's baseball.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
You want to win some ball games, you gotta you
want to win the American League West. It's not gonna
all be Slappy's. Nobody's gonna hand it to you. Go
out there, take care of the business and win these games.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
He is Ross Viial. I'm Chris Gordy.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
This has been an all new edition of the Crawford
Box Cast, presented by a Carbox bring in the Crawford
Box and make sure you get your hands. I'll plenty
of Crawford bock. It is a home run every time.
We'll talk to you guys next week, right here on
the Crawford Box Cast
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