Alternate title: “The Cave-In”

SERIES PREVIEW

Team from a Rainy City @ Team from a Rainy City

April 25-27, 2016

Once upon a cloudy morn I awoke, awash with scorn
At the extra-inning game my team had lost the night before.
Colby tied the game post-haste, only to watch it go to waste
When Billy Wagner 2.0 could not even prevent a score.
After five hours and twelve frames the Red Sox made the winning score.
The Astros scored nevermore.

I rose from bed, feeling foolish that this baseball team so ghoulish
Could see a reversal in its fortunes and not be a bore.
I checked the schedule.  Up next: Sea Hags.  Could this bunch of scalawags
Be just what the Astros need to boost them to their play of yore?
And another thing that just might get them back to times of yore:
No King Felix to account for.

But then I saw: they’re on the road!  A new burden on me bestowed.
I banged my keyboard on my desk and cried to Orbit as I swore:
“In twenty-fifteen they were shitty away from the Bayou City!
“West coast road trips cannot help.  They’ll just keep being an eyesore!”
Orbit shrugged at me and said, “Away or home, they’re an eyesore.”
This team’s problems could grow more.

“It’s not fair to make them travel just to watch them more unravel!
“Has MLB not seen the massive flooding that’s been such a chore?
“The team will need a boat and paddle to get them up to Seattle!”
But my complaints could do no good; Orbit had heard this all before.
“Don’t be so negative,” he said.  “You’ve seen them turn around before.”
Perhaps he’s right.  Good days in store?

Then I realized: west coast games mean late start times.  My ears shot flames!
These contests just might be played while I’m in bed catching a snore.
I cried again, “My will is pure!  How many more must I endure?
“Staying up ‘til twelve or one makes me the coming day abhor.”
There was nothing to these games that I did not fully abhor.
Lamented Orbit, “Fifteen more.”

Monday, April 25 – 9:10pm CDT
Doug Fister (1-2, 5.94) vs. Taijuan Walker (1-0, 1.50)

Following two outings that were firmly mediocre at best, Fister turned in a solid effort against the Rangers last Wednesday, only allowing two runs on a home run through six innings.  Fister also deserved better than to be matched up with Cole Hamels, against whom the Astro bats could do almost nothing.  Fister has at least had good success against the Mariners during his career, going 2-0 with a 2.49 ERA in three career starts, and none of their hitters can claim gaudy stats against him.

Walker comes into the series with some early success in his second full big league season.  He’s thrown three straight quality starts, picking up no-decisions in a loss to the A’s and a win against the Rangers and, most recently, getting the W against Cleveland.  He’s also being stingy with allowing baserunners, currently owning a sub-1 WHIP.  The silver lining is that the Astros had good success against him last year; he faced them four times in 2015, going 1-1 with a 5.91 ERA against the good guys and getting lit up for 7 ER in three innings in Houston in April.  The Houston lineup also has seven homers off this guy, and Rasmus is 5×10 with a crank off him.

Tuesday, April 26 – 9:10pm CDT
Dallas Keuchel (2-2, 3.71) vs. Nathan Karns (1-1, 5.28)

I’m not sure what it is about the Rangers that gives them the ability to bring out the worst in Keuchel.  They blew him up for nine runs in 4+ innings last September (by far his worst outing of the year), and got to him again for six runs and 13 hits in his last outing.  That he lasted six innings is something of a minor miracle.  I’m personally looking for him to get his groove back on Tuesday since he’s had good historical success against the M’s and at Safeco.

Karns, like Walker, is also in his second full season in the bigs, but he off to a bit of a rockier start.  In three starts he has yet to finish a 6th inning and has already allowed nine walks, so if the Astros can stay at least a little patient at the plate they can find themselves some scoring opportunities.  Karns did not have the same struggles with walks in 2015 so Houston needs to get while the gettin’ is good.  He did face the Astros once in 2015, allowing just 1 ER over six innings while striking out eight.

Wednesday, April 27 – 9:10pm CDT
Collin McHugh (1-3, 7.56) vs. Hisashi Iwakuma (0-2, 3.81)

Man, I just don’t know.  It’s tiring to watch the hit parade that always seems to ensue when McHugh is on the mound (he’s sporting a smooth 2.10 WHIP right now), and his start in the home opener against KC remains the lone bright spot in what has been a crappy season so far.  The Mariners also went monster mash on him last year, tagging him for six home runs in three games and being responsible for McHugh’s worst outing of the year (3 IP, 8 ER) in June.  Forgive me if I’m not brimming with confidence on this one, and I’m just hoping Fister and Keuchel can eat some innings ahead of this game.

Iwakuma has been a steady arm for the M’s for several years, and his record belies his performance so far.  His losses against the Rangers and at the Yankees came with little run support behind him, and he did not get a decision in his best two starts in Arlington and Anaheim.  He has also progressively worked deeper into games, turning in eight innings in his most recent start against the Angels.  On the plus side, non-100-loss Astros teams have hit him pretty well: in six starts against Houston since 2014, he is 2-3 with a 5.61 ERA.

SERIES PREVIEW

Grossly Overweight Third Baseman @ Grossly Overweight Loss Column

April 22-24, 2016

Overall I would say that I have adapted to the American League pretty well.  The DH really doesn’t bother me anymore and I have actually come to prefer it, sacrilegious that may be.  Not having the old NL rivalries sucks but it is what it is.  I’ve even gotten over the habit of looking for the Astros in the NL Central standings.

Days like today really make me miss the National League.  Not because of the DH, not because of rivalries of yore, not because of history.

I miss the NL because of the Texas Fucking Rangers.  Not because they keep whipping dat ass (although that sucks too) but because of how they have necessarily changed my mindset as an Astros fan.

In the Astros’ NL days I could be blissfully indifferent toward the Rangers.  They played in one sandbox, the Astros played in another.  Until just a few years ago, except for 1996 they were never a playoff team when the Astros weren’t.  The few occasions that they played each other were completely drummed up by marketing as if to force me to be more than indifferent, and whatever successes or failures came out of those were “ho-hum, just another game” in the grand scheme of things.  And when the Rangers did become World Series contenders, I could engage in a bit of schadenfreude when they pissed away postseason games in ways that are, tragically, very familiar to Astros fans.  Misery loves company, right?

I can’t be indifferent toward the Rangers anymore; I am required to hate them, and that bothers me.  It doesn’t help that the Rangers started becoming really good when the Astros started becoming really awful, causing the media and baseball fandom to ignore 45 years of history and declare the Rangers God’s gift to baseball in Texas.  So, coming into 2013, the Rangers were one year removed from back-to-back AL pennants and the Astros had had back-to-back 100-loss seasons.  They were officially rivals.  I had to hate them.  And what did that automatically make me and just about any other Astros fan that cares?  The little fucking brother.  Fuck.  That.

That’s to say nothing of the stRanger fans I know who had all but one fingernail off the bandwagon last year before clambering back on during their resurgence to the AL West title.  “Why can’t you just be happy that a Texas team will win the division?”  “You mean you didn’t root for the Rangers in the World Series a few years ago?”  THAT’S NOT HOW THIS WORKS.  I suppose I could have done that before 2013 if I had wanted to, but now Ranger success is directly detrimental to MY team.  If you want me to be happy about that then you can wrap your ass cheeks around an electric fence.

These things can never be said enough: Fuck Bud Selig in his goat ass sloth rectum goblin sphincter.  Fuck Drayton McLane for ever letting the team get so irrelevant that they could be used as a bargaining chip.  Fuck Nolan Ryan (Reid, you’re cool) for being the main cheerleader of the Astros’ move to the AL, and for switching allegiances between Houston and Arlington whenever it personally benefits him most.

And double-fuck the Rangers.

[This was supposed to be a series preview. – Ed.]

Right.  Sorry.

The 5-11 Astros are a mess.  The pitching in particular is hard to watch since none of the starters – including Keuchel – seem to be able to string together any consistent outings in the early going.  It’s getting hard to know what to expect from any guy on any given day.  Fields inspires very little confidence when he toes the rubber; I almost turned off Wednesday’s game when he came in, and actually did so after he predictably dug a deeper hole .  Ken Giles has been worrisome; I know, In Luhnow We Trust, but if you like not feeding the ulcer you may already have, do yourself a favor and don’t go look up Vince Velasquez’s stats for the Phillies.

It should be noted that none of the above applies to Gregerson, Devenski, Harris, and Neshek.  All of them, and especially the first three, have been pitching their asses off with a regularity that would make Von Miller’s bowels happy.  Sipp has also been improving with four straight scoreless outings after some early struggles.  

The hitting is less than the sum of its parts.  Three guys (Rasmus, Altuve, White) have a four-digit OPS, and three other guys (Springer, Tucker, Correa) are over .800.  They lead MLB in stolen bases.  They’re going yard in bunches, currently ranking third in MLB in HRs and fourth in slugging.  However, their closest peers in HR and SLG – namely the Turds, Rockies, and Orioles – are scoring anywhere between 9-21 more runs.  Think that would be worth a few more wins?  The Astros’ problems lie in running themselves out of scoring opportunities on the basepaths, a just-barely-not-bottom-tier OBP, extremely poor situational hitting (29th in hitting with RISP, dead last with RISP and two outs).  It’s tough to be optimistic about the last two stats since the same lineup had big problems with those same things in 2015.

Equally as frustrating is that all of the good performances – pitching or hitting – seem to be happening on islands: it’s been almost impossible to get great individual performances to coincide with other great individual performances, the team as a whole can’t score when they can pitch, and they can’t pitch when they can score.  In that light, it feels like the standout performances by all the guys I mentioned have been wasted.  Sucks.

The Red Sox pitching staff is coming into the series with four would-be contributors on the DL, including Joe Kelly who was originally slated to start Sunday’s game.  Pablo Sandoval is on the DL for some combination of a shoulder injury, being fat, and/or having a bad attitude.  The team as a whole is coming off of a 3-4 stretch against their middling AL East competition.  Offensively the Sawks are pretty competent, near the top of the league in most major categories except home runs.  The pitching overall has been pretty comparable to Houston’s: similar ERAs, Astros giving up more hits, Boston allowing more walks.  One big cause for concern: the Red Sox are 2nd in MLB in strikeouts.  Harris County may be under a wind advisory this weekend.

Friday, April 22 – 7:10pm CDT
Steven Wright (0-2, 2.13) vs. Collin McHugh (1-2, 6.39)

There’s not much that I like about this matchup right now, mostly because we have no idea which Collin McHugh is going to show up.  Will it be the McHugh that blanked a pissant Royals lineup for seven innings in the home opener, or will it be the McHugh that bookended that excellent outing with nine earned runs in his other five-plus innings?  The good news is that McHugh has had good success against the Red Sox as a whole (2-1, 2.86) and decent success against their hitters individually.  Keep the Tums within arm’s reach just in case.

Wright has thrown quality starts in both of his starts this year but has suffered from a lack of run support.  All of his runs have been allowed in the first inning, so hopefully Altuve can start the game hacking.  Remarkably, most of the Astros lineup has never faced him, and in his only career start against Houston he gave up three runs in only one inning against the craptastic 2013 Astros.  Maybe there’s hope?

Saturday, April 23 – 3:05pm CDT
Clay Buchholz (0-1, 5.74) vs. Mike Fiers (1-1, 6.48)

There’s little doubt that Fiers is off to an ugly start, tied for an MLB-worst six home runs allowed already.  He threw a quality start against the Royals but took the loss anyway, then allowed four runs in 5.2 innings against the Tigers and picked up the win.  All part of the team’s Jekyll/Hyde routine.  Since Fiers has spent most of his career in the NL he has never faced the Red Sox, but has held three of their hitters to a combined .091 average.  Take that for what it’s worth.

Buchholz’s season hasn’t been great thus far either: it says a lot when you allow five earned runs in your second start and your ERA goes down.  His most recent game against the Blue Jays was much better, throwing 6.2 innings of shutout ball only to watch the bullpen blow the game.  In fact, the Sox have lost all of his starts.  However, Buchholz has been devastating against the Astros, going 3-0 with a 1.38 ERA against them for his career and going the distance while allowing just one run when they met in 2015.

Sunday, April 24 – 7:05pm CDT
TBA/Henry Owens (2015: 4-4, 4.57) vs. Scott Feldman (0-2, 4.11)

I’ll say it: Feldman has deserved better.  Sure, he sucked in Milwaukee and his start in Arlington could have been better, but he could easily be 2-1 with a little better run support against KC and fewer bullpen meltdowns after he leaves a game.  Turning our attention to this weekend, it doesn’t help that Feldman is 1-4 with a 7.24 ERA against the Sox for his career.  He did not face them last year but got lit up for 14 earned runs in 10+ innings against them in 2014.

At the time of this writing MLB still officially lists Boston’s Sunday starter as TBA, but the scuttlebutt is that soft-tossing lefty Henry Owens will be getting a callup from AAA to fill Kelly’s slot.  Owens broke into the league last August and started 11 games for the Red Sox with generally decent results, although he was prone to a bad outing here and there (three games where allowed seven earned runs).  Since not making the Opening Day roster he’s been lighting it up in AAA, going 1-1 in three starts with a 1.00 ERA and 23 K’s in 18 innings.  However, he has also walked 10 batters.  Based on scouting reports his fastball flirts with 90mph, backed by a low-80s slider, mid-70s change, and high-60s/low-70s curve.  Not really sure what to think of this one – I could see the Astros teeing off on this guy just as much as I could see them getting blanked.

HOME OPENER

Kansas City Royals (4-1) @ Houston Astros (2-4)

These fuckers again.

The defending World Series Champions return to Houston for the first time since dropping a seven-spot in the last two innings of Game 4.

The Royals continue to win; the Astros look to find a groove at home.

Monday, April 11, 2016

Chris Young (0-1, 3.60) v Collin McHugh (0-1, 135.00)

The last time Young faced the Astros was October 8 – Game 1 of the Division Series in Kansas City.  He came in relief of Yordano Ventura, throwing seven strikeouts in four innings while giving up a solo shot to Springer.  He pitched well throughout the playoffs, appearing in four games (2 starts) with one win and five earnies.  The gigantic Princeton grad threw five innings (2 runs) vs the steM last Tuesday and took the loss as Noah Synderrgaaaaaard blanked the Royals at home.

Collin McHugh looks to fill the hole in the ground he created in the Bronx last week (I assume Michael Feliz gave McHugh the World’s Biggest Swirly on his way to his new assignment).  Fortunately with just two outs he’ll surpass last week’s output and divide his gargantuan era by a number that’s less catastrophic.

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

Kris Medlen (0-0, n/a) v Mike Fiers (0-0, 9.00)

Medlen makes his first appearance of 2016 and first against the Astros since 2013, when, in what must be the most bizarre/sad outings ever, Rick Ankiel went 0-3, Ronny Cedeno went 1-2 and Wade LeBlanc went 0-2.  That’s it.  According to MLB.com those are the only players he faced, and he faced them multiple times.

Fiers looks to bounce back from his 5 IP/5 ER/2 HR/0 BB outing vs the Yanks last week.

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Yordano Ventura (0-0, 3.60) v Scott Feldman (0-1)

Another helpful feature of MLB.com – I can now tell you that Yordano Ventura averages a spin rate of 2374 rpm, and his average extension is 5.49 feet.  I’m not sure how that helps this scouting report (damn stat geeks), but he walked six batters last week vs the Twins so I think he needs to extend his extension or something.

Feldman looks to bounce back from his 4 IP/4 ER/2 HR/3 BB outing vs the Brewers last week.

Thursday, April 14, 2016

Ian Kennedy (1-0, 0.00) v Doug Fister

Kennedy adjusted well to playing for a team that actually expects to win games, pitching 6.2 shutout innings vs the Twins Saturday with 0 BBs and 7 Ks.  It must be that impressive 6.37’ extension.

Fister fisted well enough Saturday vs the Brewers, fisting 5 innings while fisting 3 ER and 6 fistouts.  He fisted the Royals once last year, when Jonny “No H or Z” Gomes somehow walked and struckout in the same at bat.

PROMOTIONS

 Monday –

2016 Schedule Magnet, presented by United Airlines – all games scheduled to begin one hour before they actually start.

Tuesday –

You’ll get nothing and you’ll like it.

Wednesday –

$1 hot dogs presented by Nolan Ryan’s beef.  Phrasing!

Thursday –

You’ll get nothing and you’ll like it.

INJURIES

Royals

Tim Collins – pica (out all year)

Jarrod Dyson –  micropisa (mid-April)

Mike Minor – Lesch-Nyhan Syndrome (June)

Jason Vargas – Aboulomania (late 2016)

Astros

El Oso Blanco Afeitada – Might be back tomorrow

McCullers – Expected to begin AA rehab assignment today

Stassi – wrist (6 weeks)

Follow the action in the GameZone!

SERIES PREVIEW

Carlos Gomez’s Sloppy Seconds @ Chris Carter’s Sloppy Seconds
April 8-10, 2016

It’s early.

Must not panic.

Mustnotpanicmustnotpanicmustnotpanic.

What’s up with the pitching staff?  Through three games the Astros have a MLB-worst 9.36 ERA and have a couple of guys that could deservedly be referred to as Refined Petroleum Product Storage Apparatuses.  Sure didn’t see that coming.  Since it’s still way too early to hit the panic button, I choose to delude myself and blame the staff’s rocky start on the following factors, in no particular order:

• Early season jitters
• Weather delays, postponements, and generally unfavorable conditions
• Players still getting tuned up
• Bud Selig (on principle)
• Angel Hernandez (on principle)
• That abominable Austin Automotive Specialists radio commercial

Don’t judge me.

The offense, on the other hand, is off to a strong start.  Despite finally looking human at the plate on Thursday, Carlos Correa is in early beast mode form.  Tyler White has a hitting streak for his career.  Preston Tucker is more than adequately holding down the DH slot in Evan Gattis’s absence.  Carlos Gomez finally showed signs of life Thursday after some shameful ABs earlier in the series.  Springer (salami notwithstanding) and a kinder, gentler, more patient Altuve are having their fits and starts, but… it’s early.

With any luck, a middling Brewers team and the guarantee of (at worst) climate-controlled games could be a good opportunity to shake off the rust in the Rust Belt.  The Brewers got shelled 12-3 on Opening Day, dropped a 2-1 decision on Tuesday, and eked out a 4-3 win on Wednesday.  Despite being bottom-third in runs scored their overall offensive production is firmly middle of the pack and is actually quite comparable to the Astros’.  Aside from the Opening Day shenanigans the Brewers pitching hasn’t been bad.

Friday, April 8 – 7:10pm CDT
Scott Feldman (2015: 5-5, 3.90) vs. Chase Anderson (2015: 6-6, 4.30)

I said as much in my last series preview, but I was a big fan of Feldman’s work in 2015.  Keuchel, McCullers, and McHugh stole the spotlight from him and deservedly so, but he turned in a lot of solid yet understated pitching performances, gobbling innings (completed the 6th inning in all but five games) and dropping his ERA by a full run over the summer before his shoulder gave out.  He’s in the walk year of a front-loaded contract so he could be a huge value to the Astros this year (either on the field or as trade bait) if he can put up similar numbers.  He turned in a decent spring training performance so we’ll have to see how the shoulder is holding up.

Anderson, a newcomer to the Brewers, battled injuries in the second half of 2015 for Arizona and struggled with consistency, watching his sub-3 June ERA rise to 4.52 in early September.  He was slated to be the Brewers’ #5 but got moved up in the rotation since Matt Garza was placed on the DL. Since this is only Anderson’s third season in the bigs he has never faced the Astros, and he had a horrific spring (16 ER in 14+ innings and a .409 opponents’ batting average).

Saturday, April 9 – 6:10pm CDT
Doug Fister (2015: 5-7, 4.19) vs. Willy Peralta (0-1, 9.00)

The Astros’ newest acquisition in the rotation gets his first start of the season after a very unimpressive spring.  Fister was hardly terrible (or even bad) in 2015, and the Astros are hoping that he’ll return to the 3.50-ish ERA guy he has been in the past.  He did face the Brew Crew once last year and it did not go well, surrendering four runs (three earned) in just over an inning in relief.

Peralta was the main perpetrator of the Brewers’ opening loss, giving up 4 ER in as many innings before getting chased.  He had a rough spring (6+ ERA), missed a huge chunk of time in 2015, and was consistently inconsistent before and after his injury.  That he was the Brewers’ Opening Day starter says a lot about the state of the Brewers’ pitching staff coming into the season.

Sunday, April 10 – 1:10pm CDT
Dallas Keuchel (1-0, 2.57) vs. Jimmy Nelson (0-1, 2.45)

I can give Dallas a pass for his early trouble in New York on Tuesday.  Hell, I wouldn’t want to be out there throwing an ice-cold ball of leather in 20mph winds.  (Then again, I am grossly nonathletic.)  It didn’t take him too long to settle in once the damage was done, and he ended up lasting seven innings when such a thing looked extremely unlikely after the first three.  With a start under his belt and much more agreeable conditions, I expect him to be closer to his true form.  He has never pitched against the Brewers, but rumor has it that Chris Carter is 7×9 against him in intrasquad slow-pitch softball from Carter’s time on the Astros.

Nelson made some strides in his first full big league season for the Brewers in 2015 and tossed a pretty good game against the Giants earlier this week.  He pitched into the 8th and the only real trouble he got into was a solo homer in the 3rd and allowing just one run in a 4th inning, bases loaded, no-out jam.  He also threw a pretty impressive 1.17 ERA in four spring starts.  This could be a pretty good pitching showdown.

SERIES PREVIEW

2015 Wild Card Champions @ 2015 Wild Card Not-Champions
April 5-7, 2016

In the time leading up to both of my kids being born, I remember a combination of excitement and anxiety.  When they finally arrived the excitement and anxiety remained, but there was also a slight sense of dread that there was no turning back from a huge investment of time, money, and emotion.  It was definitely going to be worth it, but it wasn’t going to be easy.

Opening Day always feels the same way to me.  Watching 162 games in six months is hardly a small investment of time, especially with the west coast games that are scientifically proven to be 1-1.5 hours longer.  The long season also contains plenty of ups and downs, and it can take an emotional toll on you even when you try not to let it get to you (see also: the month of September 2015).  

Of course the analogy is a little more appropriate this year: both of my kids had to be forcibly ejected from my wife after their due date, and the Astros and Yankees get a late start to the season after Opening Day 1.0 got The-Northeast-in-April’ed out.  Even Michael Bloomberg’s Big Gulp thinks playing baseball in New York in still-slightly-winter is a bad idea.

On paper this season looks pretty promising, since this Opening Day roster is ostensibly much better than last year’s.  The starting rotation, a sure weakness to start 2015, now figures to be one of baseball’s best, and I don’t envy the personnel decision Hinch/Luhnow have to make when Lance McCullers comes off the DL.  Aside from the obvious top-of-the-rotation guys like Keuchel and McHugh, I think Scott Feldman is one of the team’s more underrated arms.  Injuries aside, he was a pretty effective innings-eater in 2015 and pitched his ass off between DL stints.  That he was a #2/#3 last year and is now a #5/#6 on this year’s staff – and that they’re not trotting out Straily, Oberholtzer, and Fausto Carmona every few days – shows that the water level has risen significantly.

The bullpen’s boat stands to rise with the tide, which will hopefully prevent them from wearing down late in the season like last year.  Last year’s unexpectedly excellent pen is largely intact except for essentially swapping Ken Giles in for Chad Qualls.  I’m not all that concerned about who closes as long as they do it well.  Gregerson, currently slated to be the closer, did a pretty admirable job last year despite his propensity for the meatball early in the season.  If this unit is anywhere near as solid as they were last year, we may see a lot of games that are basically over by the 6th-7th innings.

Offensively, with much of the lineup intact there are a lot of known quantities, but hopefully guys like Springer, Tucker, and Marisnick can develop even more with another year under their belts.  Having a full season of Correa can, and probably will, make a huge difference and he is already getting some preseason run for AL MVP.  Perhaps the only real unknown is Tyler White, who will be taking his first MLB at-bats this afternoon.  Things may get interesting if he stumbles while AJ Reed tears up the PCL.

Many pundits I’ve seen have pegged the Astros at the mid/high 80s in wins.  I’m a little more bullish; 92-93 wins feels about right to me.

Tuesday, April 5 – 12:05pm CDT
Dallas Keuchel (2015: 20-8, 2.48) vs. Masahiro Tanaka (2015: 12-7, 3.51)

It’s hard not to like any matchup that includes Keuchel, especially when he’s pitching against the pinstripes.  Dude absolutely wrecked the Yankees in 2015: three games (two in the Bronx), 22 innings, zero runs allowed.  He also had an outstanding spring with a .123 opposing average and 16 K’s in 17 scoreless innings.  Here’s hoping 2016 is just a continuation of 2015.

The Astros didn’t have too much trouble in two outings against Tanaka last year, touching him up for six runs in five innings in June and then handing him the loss in the Wild Card Game.  He also got hit hard this spring, for whatever that’s worth.

One equalizing factor in this game could be the weather: das, OWA’s resident meteorologist, is calling for cold temps, stiff winds, and an even more pronounced ill temper among New Yorkers.

Wednesday, April 6 – 6:05pm CDT
Collin McHugh (2015: 19-7, 3.89) vs. Michael Pineda (2015: 12-10, 4.37)

McHugh took a bit of a step back in 2015, particularly in that he gave up a lot more hits and got into trouble more often early in games before settling down.  This still didn’t prevent him from having a very good year, and he also owned a sub-2 ERA against the Yankees last season.  His spring stats have never been all that flashy and this year was no exception.

Pineda took two losses at the hands of the Astros last year, going eight pretty good innings in June and then getting chased in the 5th inning in August.  His spring training yada yada yada.

Thursday, April 7 – 3:05pm CDT
Mike Fiers (2015: 7-10, 3.69) vs. Nathan Eovaldi (2015: 14-3, 4.20)

The No-No Guy finds himself in the #3 slot and, if things pan out, this could be the first season that he can stay locked in in the rotation.  Despite a string of no-decisions to end 2015 there’s hardly anything to complain about regarding his tenure in Houston.  Here’s hoping that spending a full season on a better team will allow him to shine.  Fiers has never faced the Yankees.

Eovaldi led the Yanks in wins in 2015, including a streak of nine straight wins that lasted much of the season.  He did not face the Astros in 2015, although historically he has whipped up on a bunch of scrubs that had the misfortune of wearing Astros jerseys.

It’s hard to complain about splitting a four-game series with Detroit.  The Tigers were one of the first winning teams the Astros have played and have a strong lineup.  That said, it’s hard to shake the feeling that they should have won the series 3-1.  The late comeback on Thursday was really fun to watch, and I guess Tony Sipp was just due for a long ball.  Too bad.

If nothing else, though, the Detroit series should send a clear message to everyone that these Astros do not lay down and give up.  Even in games where they have been trailing late (5-0 in the 7th on Thursday, 2-1 in the 6th on Saturday, 7-3 in the 6th on Sunday) they’ve found a way to close the gap.  Evan Gattis and George Springer are starting to heat up and Preston Tucker has been nails, especially off the bench.  Lance McCullers has turned in two solid starts.  There’s a lot to like about how things are going right now.

The reigning AL East champions are currently sitting at 4th place and three games under .500.  The Orioles just dropped two out of three to the last-place Marlins, including a game in which the O’s scored no runs on nine hits.  I swore for a minute that I was looking at a box score from certain past Astros teams.  Nonetheless, Baltimore will be sending some decent pitching to the mound in this series, so the Astros still have their work cut out for them.

Monday, May 25, 12:35pm CDT
Dallas Keuchel (6-0, 1.67) vs. Wei-Yin Chen (1-3, 2.90)

Chen has an impressive string of outings, with five straight appearances of at least six innings.  His biggest problem has been run support; he is 1-2 during those five appearances, although the team as a whole was 3-2.  He has not lost to the Astros and has otherwise good numbers – notably, 17 K’s in about as many innings – but previous years’ comparisons hardly seem valid this year.

Keuchel pitched a gem his last time out, recovering nicely from his last two shaky outings that still resulted in wins.  This will be an interesting lefty-lefty matchup to watch.

Tuesday, May 26, 6:05pm CDT
Scott Feldman (3-4, 5.17) vs. Chris Tillman (2-5, 6.10)

This game could have some fireworks.  Tillman has been beaten up a lot this year, with three games of at least five earned runs, and has lost four straight decisions over five games.  He has also not had great run support, even in the games in which he has pitched well.  He only got three innings of work in his last game against Seattle due to a rain delay.

Feldman has continued his Jekyll and Hyde routine of combining big innings with otherwise lockdown pitching.  He played a big part in the Astros falling behind 5-0 to Detroit last Thursday, but ended up with a no-decision.

Wednesday, May 27, 6:05pm CDT
Collin McHugh (5-2, 4.06) vs. Ubaldo Jimenez (3-3, 2.82)

Jimenez is coming off of an outing in which he gave up seven hits and three runs in only four innings.  He had a similar appearance earlier this month.  That said, he’s thrown seven innings and two runs or less four times, so he’s certainly capable of putting together a good game.  Depends on what kind of mood the bats are in on Wednesday.

McHugh has been hittable lately, but didn’t get much help from the offense against the Tigers on Friday.  He pitched well against the O’s last year in his only appearance against Baltimore to date, so there’s not a lot of history to go off of.

Prediction

Astros take the series 2-1.