April 16, 2025 • 34 mins
On this edition of the Crawford Boxcast presented by Karbach Brewing, Chris Gordy and Ross Villarreal discuss the Astros' lack of offense and two of their biggest hitters who have been slow to get going - Christian Walker and Yainer Diaz.
The guys also discuss the dominant Hunter Brown and some of the other pitchers who are still finding their way in the 2025 season. How long can we keep saying "it's early"?
The guys also discuss the dominant Hunter Brown and some of the other pitchers who are still finding their way in the 2025 season. How long can we keep saying "it's early"?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Astros fans, cheers, Wacky Lucky, Welcome to the Crawford Box
Cast Houston Astros crowd leapord for you by Crawford Bach
from Carbach Brewy you're.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Getting da bear.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Oh my goodness, the Crawford Box cast starts now here
we go.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Here's Chris Gordy and Ross Viial.
Speaker 4 (00:35):
And it is a Crawford Box cast. I don't wind them.
My music just completely dipped out there.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
All right.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
It is a Crawford Box cast here on UH Sports
Talk seven ninety Sports seven ninety dot com of course,
wherever you get your podcast. Chris Gordy here with you
along with Ross Veril. We got a lot to talk
about with your Houston Astros as we were talking to
you after the Wednesday day game against the Saint Louis
Cardinals where they fell four to one and they drop
(01:01):
two out of three to the Cardinals in Saint Louis.
And of course, make it all as possible, our friends
over at Carbock Brewing and the Crawford Bach make sure
you guys get loaded up on plenty of Crawford bok
for the start of this Astro season.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Ross, I've been all over town and it's like it,
like it creeps up on me.
Speaker 4 (01:18):
Like I was at a gas station the other day
they had Crawford back. I stopped at a CVS they
had Crawford Bach. I would go to the grocery store.
They have Crawford bike. Everywhere I'm going these days, I
see the Crawford Bach And that's a good sign because
you can get your hands on somewherever you are. But
welcome in.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
How are you Ross?
Speaker 3 (01:34):
I'm doing okay, feeling a little bit under the weather,
but I'm gonna make it. I'd be doing a lot
better if this team could string a two.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Wins in a row.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Is that too much to ask? It seems like I
guess it is.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
It is as this Astros team is seesaw, seesaw. They
took two out of three to open the season against
the Mets, then they were swept by the San Francisco Giants,
and ever since then it has been win loss, win loss,
win loss, win loss. And it's funny somebody tweet today,
I guess they're they're on pace to go eighty one
in eighty one, right, Well not exactly. They're eight and ten.
(02:06):
They're two below five hundred, but still in a good spot.
We talked about it the other day, like where they
were at this point the last five seasons. Basically last
year they had the dreadful start out of the gates,
but they're kind of where they've where they've been each
of the last five seasons. This is what the Astros
have done under Dusty Baker's what they're two and under
Jero Spot and they just kind of come a little
(02:27):
bit slow out of the gates.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
I don't know what it is or what you chalk
it up to, necessarily because we're talking about different eras,
different managers, different players. I mean, Alex Bregman was a
notorious slow starter, but he's gone. I mean, I guess
we have had it at times from jord On Alvarez
who got the day off the day so he gets
two days off. I don't know what exactly to chalk
it up to, but just slow bats, pretty good pitching.
(02:51):
That was the case today. Look was Renel Blanco spectacular
no five innings and three earned runs given up. But
that's enough for a guy at the end of her
rotation and to maybe get you a win as long
as you can score some runs. And we just have
not seen that consistently. We saw it a little bit
over the last weekend with the fourteen run game against
the Angels. But this offense has been anemic. It needs
(03:14):
to something needs to change. I don't know what it is,
but it's like everybody at the same time. Even Josel Tuvey,
who you've been counting on, was slumping a little bit,
although he had a couple of hits today to get
his average back over three hundred.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, it's it's been rough. They are.
Speaker 4 (03:28):
And you mentioned that game on Friday night when they
scored the fourteen runs against the Angels.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
That is kind of the outlier.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
I mean that that's the game that kind of skewed
all the numbers because they are even that that game included.
They are bottom third in baseball in just about every
statistical category batting average, home runs, on base percentage ops.
I mean it's bottom third. They're not dead last, but
they're near the bottom. I mean, as a team, they're
bat in two nineteen. Remember how bad the Atlanta Bres
(03:59):
were the first week and a half of the season.
They were the worst hitting team in baseball. They even
have a better batting average than your Astros. Now they're
hitting two twenty six as a team. They've woken up
the Astros. Bats still have not woken up the Pittsburgh Pirates,
by the way, dead last in baseball with a one
ninety five average. Saint Louis Cardinals, the team that just
took two out of three against you, still lead all
of baseball batting two eighty two. It's not the end all,
(04:21):
be all stat ross, but they just hit. And it
felt like the series against the Cardinals, outside of the
two to one game, you got the win. In Cardinals
bats came to play.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
And they at least came to play more than yours did.
I mean over the like today they scored four runs. Okay,
that's cool, that's good. You don't necessarily have to lose
a game when the other team scores four runs. And
we keep talking about this, Oh, they're running up with
some good pitching, and they did with Sonny Gray and
Steven Matts and Eric Fetti. But these guys are and
(04:55):
it's not like you're running into Smoltz Glavin in Maddox
like you can get hit. It's against good pictures. Steven
Mattz has a long track record kind of being a
mediocre type pitcher, so It has been some good pitching performances,
but it is just everybody from top to bottom, and
I think we can kind of go case by case
basis on this. There are some guys I feel confident
(05:16):
we'll shake out of this more than others. But I
would say of the guys I'm concerned about, Christian Walker
and the Interdiaz, who are you know, been fourth fifth
of the lineup in an ideal Joe A spot A lineup.
They're right in the center of that, driving in runs.
Both those guys needed to get it together.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
Yeah, the Christian Walker thing is where I want to
kind of start here, because it's it's getting it's getting ugly.
I mean, look, he we understand he had the oblique
issues in spring training. They you know, they basically had
to shut him down. And then it was like, well,
you know, he's not gonna miss any time. We think
he's gonna bounce right back. He's gonna be in the
opening day lineup. And so he didn't really get any
(05:54):
more spring action. And so when the bat was slow
the first week plus, I was like, well, he's still
kind of in spring training mode, right. He was having
all the strikeouts, So I was like maybe he'll come
out of this. Well, you know, he hits a home
run and it was like, okay, well this is it.
He's he's coming out of it. And then he regressed
right back into this hitless funk. And in eighteen games
(06:15):
played rass sixty five at bats he has ten hits
and that's a one sixty four batting average. And it's
just crazy because this is a guy who's hit throughout
his whole career. I mean, in Arizona, basically every year
he was there, he batted. You know, he had a
couple two forty seasons, a couple two fifty seasons. His
best season was two seventy one average wise. But look
(06:37):
at the home run totals. I mean a couple of
thirty six home runs, thirty three home runs, twenty nine,
twenty six. I mean, he's got the power. But as
he just turned thirty four last month, Ross, you know
what people are already jump into. But did we get a
JOSEA Bray you two point zero? Is this a guy
who has been a great slugger and great hitter his
whole career, but hits the mid thirties and so suddenly
(07:01):
that's it. The career is over, he's he forgot how
to hit. And you know it's joking obviously, but it's
it's a scary proposition that, like, you just got toasted
by this horrible A bray You deal and you're you know,
you're finally going to get out of it after this year.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
But now you give.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
Christian Walker this big fat contract that he comes here
and doesn't hit.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
Yeah, it brings us back to the point that we
kind of talk about and laugh. It's like, oh, I
don't want to pay Alex Bregman until his age thirty
five thirty six season. Well you're paying Christian Walker. You
did it with jose Ah bray You. But again, maybe
those deals point that maybe you shouldn't do that. But
it's interesting you brought up what I've been kind of
thinking about. Not the oblique injury where he'd missed a
little bit of time. He's had a history of oblique injuries.
(07:43):
Is he not one hundred percent? And so what I did.
I've been checking out his bat speeds, which have been
very good start of the season, but if you look,
there's been just a slight downtick. We're talking about very
very small sample sizes here to where His bat speed
was elite last year, eighty nine percentile average about seventy
five miles an hour. Stack cast. Anything over seventy five
(08:04):
miles an hour, they put like a little lightning bolt
against next to it. That's a really fast swing. So
that's his average. That's pretty good. He's slightly down to
seventy four point four percent, which doesn't sound like a lot,
but it's three percentile ticks. And if you just kind
of look at the graph of his average batswings, they
are a little bit slower. So is that an oblique issue?
Is that getting him a little bit? Is that because
(08:26):
he's a little bit older, or is that just because
you know, maybe he's still settling in in a new place.
And that's going to be okay. That's one of the
metrics that I'm really going to be keeping an eye
on with Christian Walker, is that bat speed.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
And the funny thing is we talk about father Time,
the one of the pieces that the Ascers were interested
in multiple times this offseason. Nolan Arnado of the Saint
Louis Cardinals, he is, he's bad and what a three
around three hundred right now on the season, Like he's
actually having a pretty nice to that guy. Yeah, he
had three hits and Monday's game he had a hit.
(08:59):
Yesterday hit it was a home run on Monday. So yeah,
it's just one of those funny things. And he's thirty
four as well, so it's like, you know, you never
know what these aging guys. You know, obviously their best
days are behind them, but what are you getting? And
the hope was you're getting at least a Christian walker
that slugs a bunch of home runs and all that,
and it's just we have not seen it yet.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I just I'm a.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
Little curious ross like how long do you keep batting
him in that four hoole? Because that he's constantly coming
up with men on base and not producing, not doing anything,
And so I just like I would hate to do
that to that guy.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
You know, does it?
Speaker 4 (09:37):
It's always that damned if you do, damned if you don't,
do you crush his confidence? You can move him down
in the lineup, And honestly, like, who do you move up?
Because how many other guys?
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Be my question, like, yeah I did it in theory,
but who do you put there?
Speaker 4 (09:50):
Yeah, it's just but it's just like I can't have
you keep coming up, and we keep leaving men on base,
the top, the top couple of guys, you know, And
I like what they did. They moved Painya up today
and it was L two A one, paying You two
Parades three and Christian Walker Ford and that was because
of yord On having the day off. But yeah, it
just felt like or it feels like Jordon. You know,
(10:11):
at least he's had a couple of games here as
of late that he's kind of starting to turn it on.
But it was like constantly those top guys getting on
base in al two ve and Parades and here comes
Walker and Jordon not doing you or not not being
able to.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Drive him in.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
Yeah, it's been certainly something, and you hinted on something
I wanted to address real quick because I'm seeing a
lot of this for whatever reason on Astros Twitter and stuff.
I know, Jordon Alvarez hit a home run yesterday. I
know he's had a couple of hard hit balls before that.
People are pissed that he got the day off. I mean,
is this our first rodeo? Yeah, We've been doing this
for years with the Astros. They have scheduled days off.
(10:44):
It's one hundred and sixty two game season. They like
to keep guys fresh for the end of the year.
They've had big time rallies as far as winning runs
at the end of seasons. It's not an accident. So
we don't have to sit here in the middle of
April and be all upset and want Joe a spot
a fired. I literally saw multiple tweets wanting Joe's bought
a fired for a scheduled off day that he didn't
have anything to do with.
Speaker 4 (11:05):
Yeah, I saw one guy say, you know they got
an off day tomorrow is the Scharmann soft It's like, guys,
this has been going on for ten plus years now
they give guys days off. That's this is the new age.
I was doing a radio hit the other day, Ross
and I don't know why they asked me this. The
guy asked me they were debating like sports records, and
they were like, what's one of the records you think
(11:26):
will never be broken? I said, it's Cal Ripkins, you know,
consecutive start streak.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
That just will never be broken.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
Because in this day and age, it's not just the astros,
it's everybody believes in the rest and recovery thing and
getting guys off their feet and keeping them fresh. And
you know, obviously the NBA has had it more than
anybody the last decade, but baseball has come around to it,
and so yes, deal with it.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Guys are gonna get days.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Off, Yeah, absolutely, But jord On, I think we're gonna
be okay. We're talking about people on like lease concerned.
A're gonna turn it around. We've already seen some signs
of life out of his bat. But I am worried
about Christian Walker. We had Brian Bogosvic as we do
Wednesdays at eleven o'clock on the Matt Thomas Show with
Ross talking about it, and you know, ask him what
he said he's seeing, and he says, it looks like
he's pressing. I mean, you look at his His whiff
(12:13):
rates are much higher than his career average. His walk
rates are much lower than career average. I think when
we did one of these last week or recently, he
was drawing some walks. He did for four straight games
two walks, but now he hasn't drawn any of the
last couple of days. So the on bas is going
back down, and it's just like at one point it's
gonna be up to Joe Spata, do you give him
that off day? I think, just from hearing Christian Walker
(12:36):
talk in the off season and all that stuff, he's
the guy who wants to be out there every day
no matter what. But we also heard that from Jose Bray.
You maybe give this guy a couple of days to
clear his head, maybe just the off day, and he'll
be okay. But does seem like he's pressing out there?
And Brian Bogozevic SAIDs much.
Speaker 4 (12:52):
Yeah, And so I mean, look, and I don't want
to put it all on him because there are some
other guys in this lineup, and the other one I
want to touch on is Yan Ds. I mean paging
Jan er Diez. This is the guy that you know
was outstanding the last two years. Twenty twenty three gets
his real huge chunk sample size bats to eighty two
with twenty three home runs, collects one hundred hits, drives
(13:14):
in sixty runs, and then last year takes another leap
forward with one hundred and forty eight games played. You know,
bat's just a hair under three hundred bats two ninety nine.
You know, crushes what was in sixteen home runs of
the home run total dipped a little bit, but drove
in a car high eighty four RBIs and like, you know,
the strikeout totals went over one hundred and all that.
(13:35):
But like, look, you just he was among the best
hitting catchers in baseball. I mean, at one point he
was outpacing Adlie Rushman, who was largely considered one of
the best, if not the best, hitting catchers. So, you know,
and then just to come into this year, I just
thought ross, like everything we heard from a spot and
dirt spring training. He talked about Victor Kartini and how
(13:57):
much Keratini you know, his bat means all this, and
I just thought they should maybe go fifty to fifty,
like get Yanair off his feet, because we saw last
year when they did give him a break a rest
of a handful of days, and he came back, he
started hitting again. But to me, I'm like, every night
I feel like I turned the astros and yan Ardea
is behind all plate. And I get with, you know,
(14:19):
Jordan being the full time DH. I kind of you
can't you have to, you know, you can't, dhian Ardeaz
like you did a bit a bunch last year. But
I don't know what the solution is I just know
yan ardaz betting one twenty is no bueno.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Yeah, it's it's definitely not where you want to be.
If you look at, you know, bringing up his percentages
again from this year to last year, it's like the
hard hit percentage was way better last year, the barrel
percentage and all that type of stuff. So he's still swinging
and everything, and if he's off it, then we kind
of talked about this as well. He's off just a tick,
then when he swings in everything and makes contact, which
(14:54):
he's good at because he doesn't walk, he's got to
do something to get on base, then then yeah, he's
spraying line dries everywhere. If he's off just a tick
and being pitched properly, then you are gonna hit a
lot of ground balls. You're gonna hit the you know,
I mean, this is this is the nature of baseball, right,
You're like a couple millimeters away from a line drive
in the gap and a pop out.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
Right.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
So he's one of those guys that he's gonna swing
at everything, and when he's hot, he's gonna be really
mega white hot, and when he's cold, he's gonna be
really really cold. Unfortunately that's how he started the season.
I think he's maybe I don't know if it's his
approach or his swing or what's off. It just seems
like it's just a tick off and a guy who
(15:34):
swings at everything like he does. When you are just
that tick off and you're not getting on base with walks,
then yeah, this is what we're gonna see.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
My buddy likes to remind me all the time. Remember
when y'all used to you know, bitch, you complain about
Dusty and not playing Yanar Diaz and it's like, okay,
well the ganna was incredible the last two years.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
This year not so much. But we hope he turns
it around.
Speaker 4 (15:56):
But yeah, those are those are to me, the two
biggest uh shoes right now. Like we said, we think
yourn is going to be just fine. Tove is going
to be just fine. I'd like Jeremy Payne you to
up the average a little bit. He's at two fifteen
right now, but he does have the three home runs
and you know occasionally he comes through. Uh east ak
paratus is actually I mean, the two thirty five batting
average is what is. But he's been one of your
(16:18):
best hitters so far. It's it's it's weird, you know,
I didn't think that that would be the thing. And then, really,
if you just want to talk averages ross Jake Meyer's
fan club, I know he went over let's go, he
went oh for three today, but two seventy one is
one of the best on the team.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, he's not getting a whole lot of extra base hits.
I don't think he's hit a home run and I
don't even know. I think he's hit maybe like one double.
But he's also the ninth place hitter normally if this
lineup is right. Unfortunately, he's been in the seventh place
a couple of games recently. But uh, do you like
what you're seeing from him? I don't expect it to
last that long, quite frankly, and honestly, if he can
just do what he's doing, get the occasional single. He's
(16:57):
stealing a lot of bases this season, so kind of
turning that line over line up over in the nine
spot or towards the back end of the lineup. He's
got six stolen bases, leading the team just one cot stealing.
So if he can just keep doing what he's doing,
he's out there making five star catches. He's one of
the league leaders in center field, which I predicted before
the season because he's gonna catch everything because Cam Smith
(17:17):
and jose L Tube are out there and he's calling
them off for everything. So he's making a defensive impact
and then anything you get at the bat from him
is gravy. So to have that three hit night the
other night, was it yesterday? I guess with by the
way three batted balls over one hundred miles per hour,
that was encouraging to see. I'm going to keep my
expectations low, but seeing him produce at the level that
(17:38):
he has been, I am not mad at it.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
I like when you start talking fast you get on it.
You almost sound like melkkiper Jr. When you talk about
Jeby Payina. You know, it's like that Frank Calliando impression
of melk kiper Jr. Let's switch gears for us to
talk pitching, because the Houston Astros have an ace. We
knew it was We knew it was going to be
a trend position there eventually. I just thought it would
(18:02):
happen this offseason after from Barvaldez leaves some free agency,
but Hunter Brown has been the stud of this pitching staff.
He is your ace of the future, and he may
be your ace as of this moment because Hunter Brown,
through four starts so far, has any array of one
point fifty. He's given up two runs or less, a
(18:23):
couple of shutout outings. But man, Hunter Brown has been awesome.
Twenty four inchs pitch, twenty two strikeouts, only five walks.
That is a stuff so far from Hunter Brown.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Yeah, absolutely, And you know he's one of those guys.
And I do like analytics and talking about them, but
analytics don't tell you what is in somebody's mind. And
if you look at him and his demeanor and his
body language language and the way he carries himself on
the mound, it is absolutely night and day from when
he was struggling early in the season last year to
(18:55):
where he's looking like all right, he's looking meek and like, oh,
like I let a guy on. Oh no, what's gonna
happen next?
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (19:02):
I don't want to get pulled from this game or
do now. He's like he gives up a hit or
a walk or whatever, he looks pissed off. He's like,
give me the ball. Joe Spotta was talking about this
last night. We talked about it with Brian Bogosvic earlier
today as well, Like he looks like he's just give
me the damn ball and I'm gonna get these guys out.
Like he is just got that edge, He's got that meanness.
(19:22):
And you know, we can go through the list of
the guys that have had that back in the day,
the Randy Johnson's, the Paedro Martinez. Of course he's not
in that upper echelon of all time greats or anything
like that, but having that sort of edge and attitude
and bleep you I'm gonna throw this, you come hit it.
That's what we're seeing out there from Hunter Brown, and
it is awesome to watch him flourish the way that
(19:44):
he has to blossom into an ace. He was using
a sinker a lot towards left handed batters, which he
hasn't done a whole lot, so I mean, that's just
another tool that he can use to even get lefties out.
He's constantly improving, constantly getting better. His velo ticked up
this year that's so far has had staying power. It
is just kind of one of those things, Gordy, I
think we get maybe more in baseball than maybe we
(20:06):
don't get in other sports. I mean maybe to basketball
and football to some extent, but I feel like, especially
in baseball, you can just really see somebody grow and
get better and get more comfortable and kind of just
sharpen their skills to where they go from this guy
that was just kind of a prospect. He was having
some blowouts, blow ups last year. To now he is
just literally I want to say, there was a date
(20:27):
I saw a tweet yesterday, since some certain date of
last year, he's like number one in the American League
at ERA with starting pitchers.
Speaker 2 (20:33):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Yeah, well, we know he turned to you know, he
had that turnaround and was one of the most consistent
pitchers down the stretch of last year.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
He and Spencer Raghtti became so good for you, I think.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
We have I found a real quick Hunter Brown leading
starting pitchers in an American league at ERA dating back
to May first of last year.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
Wow, that's pretty that's pretty outstanding. The rest of the crew,
Hayden was Nesky has been I think pretty good. You know,
he's been just fine for what you ask out of
your you know, what do you supposed to be your
number five guy. I think he's been really good. You know,
I think we haven't even touched on the Spencer Arraghetty
Fluke injury on this podcast since it happened. But you know,
(21:11):
shag and fly balls out in Seattle. He sees the
ball coming, he puts his hands over his head and
just happens to the thumb right at the base and
cracks the bone and breaks his thumb on his throwing hand.
No less, the baseball gods were not looking out for
Spencer Raghetty. I saw him in the clubhouse the other day.
He said, if somebody asked him how you're doing, He's like,
(21:31):
as good as I can. I mean, he's like, nothing
I can really do other than time. Let time heal
this bone. But you know, at least what we heard was,
you know, they're gonna give us a couple of weeks
to heal. They'll take him out of the cast. If
he looks good from there, he'll be able to start
gripping the ball. Then maybe you know, some soft toss
after that, and then he'll have a build back up
(21:53):
process to get back. They you know, originally you were thinking, oh,
he's done for the season. They did come back and say,
you know, maybe not for the season, but it's going
to be a while for Spencer arrogaty to earn his
way back or to heal up and get back in there.
So the other part of this ross from ber Valdez
and Renald Blanco, Blanco not terrible. He had one bad
(22:17):
pitch on Wednesday that that really it cost him the game.
I mean, he had a one nothing lead and you know,
gives up a three run bomb in the in the
fifth and that ends up being the difference maker. But
I thought it was a more encouraging outing from Blanco
from some of his other ones this year. But as
we sit right now, ren Old Blanco and e area
of six forty eight and from ber Valdez an area
(22:38):
of four to ninety one.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Which doesn't look terrible.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
But if you watched fromber the last outing against Saint Louis,
where you give him seven earned off ten hits, not good.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
Yeah, especially quick note by the way, on an Arragedty thing,
We had a Hayden Wesneski on this week and he
said that that Spencer Ragedty was holding a baseball in
his hand, so if he wasn't, and so it got
basically the base all hit his thumb and hit against
the baseball. If his hand was empty, he might have
gotten out there with just a bruise. Damn, I even
hit the hard ball, hit the hard ball. He got
(23:09):
it fractured.
Speaker 4 (23:10):
That that sucks because and I was joking about with
Brian McTaggart the other day and Channel Rom in the clubhouse.
I was like, even if he doesn't put his hands
on his head, he gets hitting the noggin and yeah,
it's probably got a pretty big bump. But you know what,
he maybe misses a few days with a concussion or
something and then he's back out there throwing.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
It's just like it hit right in the spot that just,
you know, cause.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Damage with the ball in your hand.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Crazy, That's that's awful.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
But go ahead, all right, Yeah, but yeah, onto renew Blanco.
I feel like it's been it's been the big inning
that has gotten away from him. You mentioned it was
just one swing off of Lar's new bars. I mean
it was after it was a bunt single. Then quite frankly,
by the way it rolled out, it rolled foul and
the umpires just waved it fair like exi paratis waited
(23:57):
it for it to roll foul, picks it up and
it gets cold fair ball and that's not reviewable. Insane,
So it's a bunt single, then literally a bloop to
right field, and then and then the blast. Unfortunate, so
Renel Blanco has had the big inning kind of crop
up on him. I'm a little I'm not gonna say
I'm less worried, because I'm not super worried about Fromber either,
(24:18):
but Fromber's last start was concerning because it wasn't just
one big inning. It was it was all the extra
base hits that he was given up. He was given
up runs in multiple innings and it was I think
I want to say it was six or seven extra
base hits, the most he'd ever given up in his
career in a start. So he was off to a
real hot start of the season. Curve ball had been
(24:40):
covering up with how nasty and dominated is a lot
of his issues, especially with the sinker, and unfortunately those
came into play on what was it Monday at this point,
where yeah, he gave up two three run innings and
a one running of the three. Like he just started
to blow up there consistently at the end. So hopefully
he can get back to the drawing board and get
things fixed because the Astros, obviously the way these bats
(25:02):
are going, he can ill afford Farmer Valdez to go
out there in the hill and you take L's Well.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
The other guy who has slid into that five mans
or the fifth man spot is Ryan Gusto, who man
through four relief appearances.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
You know out of the bullpen was outstanding. You had
New York Ray have I want to say one.
Speaker 4 (25:21):
Thirteen after four appearances in the pen, and then on
Saturday he got his first career start against the Angels,
went four innings but gave up three runs off four hits.
I think it was a little bit of early jitters
because he did settle down with six strikeouts the rest
of the way. So I was encouraged. I know the
Astros lost that game four to one. Well, they lost
the game four to one because offense didn't show up.
(25:42):
If the bats showed up, they went that game seven
to four.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (25:46):
And we're not we're talking about Hey, that was a
good outing from Gusto. So I'm excited to see him
next to you know, he's gonna make the start when
they play on Friday or Ross. We talked about the
the Cardinals being the best hitting team in baseball in
terms of batting average of two eighty two. Number two
behind them are the Padres at two seventy seven.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
This is all great.
Speaker 4 (26:04):
It's a lineup that hits, and they're they're you know,
an unfortunate spot for Ryan Gusto to be kind of
thrown into it.
Speaker 3 (26:11):
Yeah, that's the thing is, you've been kind of middling,
You've been scuffling. You've been having this crazy streak of
thirteen straight games where you're going win loss, win loss, win, loss,
win loss, and then I mean, luckily you've been getting
some wins against some teams that are somewhat lesser competition
now at least I think even though the Angels are
have got off to a good start and stuff like that.
But you've got the Padres coming in right now. They
are fourteen and four. They're one of the best teams
(26:34):
in baseball. They are gonna it's gonna be really tough
having them come in, and yeah, you're gonna need good
starts out of Gusto. And at some point Police, I mean,
as you mentioned, you give up three four runs that
should be Okay, you should still be able to win games.
You shouldn't be getting no crooked innings. I'd be curious
to look up even how many crooked number innings the
(26:57):
Astros even had all year, because even on Sunday, when
you scored seven against the Angels, it was a three
run swing from from Esok Paratus and then were six singles,
so fourteen. Of course, when they scored the fourteen on Friday,
it was a Grand Slam. There's other stuff where they
were scoring and eating extra bases, but it has just
been too far in between. You're gonna be needing to
(27:17):
put some crooked numbers up this weekend, if you're gonna
come out with some victories.
Speaker 4 (27:21):
How about this ross eight guys in their lineup that
two seventy five are better this year. They have Jesus,
They have several three hundred hitters in Jackson Merrill, Fernando Tatis,
Many Machado and Gavin Sheets, all batting three to eleven
or better. You have Oscar Gonzalez batting two eighty six.
(27:41):
You have Jose Glicias batting two seventy eight. Luisa Riez
is one of their worst hitters at two seventy five.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
I mean, yeah, the guy that's like a batting titleist
that could wake up at any moment.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
Oh yeah, Xander Bogarts, he's a he's a paltry two
fifty eight. If he were on the Astros, he'd be
one of their best hitters at two fifty eight this year.
So that's just give you an idea of what your facing.
Oh and by the way, they don't lose many games.
The Padres have one of the best records in baseball
at fifteen and four. They've lost four games all year,
(28:11):
eight and two in their last ten. So yeah, man,
look if we want to try to like be Sunshine
and Rosie and feel like, look on the bright side,
like this isn't the team you want coming in. And
then behind them it's the Toronto Blue Jays, who've been
kind of the surprise of the American League East so
far at eleven and eight. They've kind of been sitting
up there with the Yankees the top that division so far.
(28:33):
So it's just I get it. We can keep saying
it's early. You know, we're not even through April yet.
I know, but man, you just got to have a
good mix of good with the bad. You're getting here.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
Yeah, and at least if we want to try to
look for a silver lining or a reason to be optimistic.
If you remember like last year where the Astros are
scuffling and then when they kind of started playing some
better teams, they sat up in their chair as it were, like,
all right, some good teams coming in here, let's go,
let's lock in. How Tuve and the boys, we've seen
them do that. It is it is at home this weekend,
(29:07):
So maybe we can see them finally lock in and
start to flourish once one of the best teams in
baseball comes into town, because we have seen that from
them before.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Yeah, I want to say, was it that? So it was?
Speaker 4 (29:17):
The Braves came in mid April like literally this this
week a year ago and swept the Astros and you
were like, oh god. And then they go and loose
two out of three in Washington, and then they get
swept at Chicago against the Cubs where aj you know,
JP France gets rocked. And then suddenly it was like
something started to click. After that Detroit series, they started.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
Winning, and was it was it?
Speaker 4 (29:39):
Baltimore came in here in June and they swept Baltimore
and that was like, that was the series where we
were on, holy crap, all right, this team is really
like they're playing good baseball. That was a you know,
World Series contending team in the Orioles and they and
they took care of business against them.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
I just worery though Ross.
Speaker 4 (29:57):
There's no Alex Bregman, there's no Kyle Tucker on this
so you know, those guys were the big boppers that
could help pick you up and turn things around. I
just I look at this lineup and go, Who's who's
gonna be those guys that are gonna help lift them.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Yeah, it's gotta be your Don it's gotta be Al two,
it's gotta be Christian Walker. And to a lesser extent,
Janar Diez has to figure out whatever's got him off
just a tick. He's got to figure that out because
he is I mean, he just doesn't. He's actually drawing
walks better this year than he has ever in his career.
It's almost like, hey, stop trying to draw a walk.
Just swing and everything like you've always done. Minually you'll
(30:32):
get hot and things will be all right.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 4 (30:34):
Well that's what we got going ross the Astros. They
will be off day Thursday, so you guys can all
listen to this Crawford Box cast and get caught up
on everything. And then on Friday it will be the
Padres coming in. But one of remind listeners about our
friends at Cardback Brewing of course, the Crawford Bach. They
are gonna be doing an official watch party with the
(30:57):
Astros a week from Friday. This is gonna bed April
twenty fifth, out at the beer Garden at Carboch. It's
a little bit earlier. It's the Astros are going to
be Kansas City taking on the Royals. First pitch is
six forty. I don't know who set these pitches, Ross,
but like, why are we playing all these six forty
first pitches? Like it's seven o'clock, it's seven oh five.
At seven to ten, that's when you pick. That's when
(31:18):
you start a game. Six forty. I don't know it
is what it is. But anyway, the Astros versus the
Royals next Friday, and here's what they got lined up
Ross five dollars Crawford Box, five dollars Crawford pale Ale specials.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
You'll have go.
Speaker 4 (31:32):
They'll have a visit from Orbit, so bring the kids out.
The Astro shooting stars will be out there. The championship
trophies will be on display, so I imagine photo opportunities with them.
There are tons of Astros vendors and giveaways, so anything
Astros you want to purchase, they'll have that out there.
Like I said, giveaways and all the game day energy
(31:53):
without the stadium lines, free to ten, family friendly, full
of good vibes. Let's all rally together. It'll be Astra
Royals a week from Friday at Carbak Brewing watch party.
And I'm just look, Lance mccullors may pitch that series.
He could pitch that night. We'll see where his timetable
is by next Friday, but that will be all right.
(32:14):
Who Yeah, Lance mccullor's.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Junior who is still on the team.
Speaker 4 (32:19):
Yeah, we didn't even really touch on him, but he
has been pitching well in his minor minor league rehab
starts and he is on track to rejoin the team
here within the next two weeks. It's it's crazy we
have not seen him ross. It is April sixteenth, twenty
twenty five. We have not seen Lance mccullor's pitch a
real game for the Astros. Since was that November of
(32:40):
twenty twenty two in Philadelphia.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
Yeah, so it's been a while. It's been a long
time coming. We've seen a lot of setbacks so far,
keeps checking boxes, knocking things off his list. Haven't seen
a set back yet, and I know because sometimes with
him we kind of feel like, when is the other
shoe gonna drop it? So far, so good, and I'm optimistic.
Speaker 4 (33:00):
I'm optimistic as well. And it seems like he's in
a good space mentally as well. All of the interviews
you know that where he talked to us in spring
training and then all the interviews he's been doing after
these rehabs starts, he seems to be in a good
mind space. And that's big too, because that's gonna be
a big part of him getting up here and doing
what he needs to do. But anyway, whatever you're doing,
(33:21):
whether you're watching the Astros or listening to him on
Sports Talk seven ninety, make sure you guys are doing it.
With the Crawford box from Carbox Brewing Tequila, Sundride's stripes
on the can you know it. You love it when
you see it goes perfect with whatever you have to
be eating. I like it with the ballpark food, whether
it's Nacho's hot dogs, the Pluckers wings, whatever you're having
at the ballpark, get yourself a Crawford bog and I
(33:41):
think Ross and I were even talking about this. You
can go to the vendor and get him in the can,
in the big tall can. Or you can go to
the boots where they have the draft and they put
him in the collectors kind of like plastic mugs, and
then you can take that home and you can be
like Ross and I and have your entire pantry stocked
with uh Minute made part or dik in Park plastic
(34:04):
cups that we drank Crawford bock out of. But whatever
you're doing, wherever you're drinking, and enjoy the Crawford back
from our friends at Carbok Brewing. Any of the final thoughts, Ross.
Speaker 3 (34:13):
Nope, just need the bats to hit. I think we've
kind of been talking about this all season long, and
we keep saying, Gordy, it's early, they're gonna turn, it's early,
they're gonna turn. Well, we need something to happen here.
Hopefully it happens this weekend against the San Diego Padres.
Speaker 4 (34:26):
Yeah, I'll go on a limb and say an Astros
picture throws a no hitter, So that's all right?
Speaker 2 (34:31):
That would that would make a fuffer box if you
had not enough need to go have some. You guys
have a great day.
Speaker 4 (34:38):
We'll talk to you guys again soon right here on
the Crawford Box Cast, presented by the Crawford, Bach and
Carbock Brewing
Astros fans, cheers, Wacky Lucky, Welcome to the Crawford Box
Cast Houston Astros crowd leapord for you by Crawford Bach
from Carbach Brewy you're.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Getting da bear.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Oh my goodness, the Crawford Box cast starts now here
we go.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Here's Chris Gordy and Ross Viial.
Speaker 4 (00:35):
And it is a Crawford Box cast. I don't wind them.
My music just completely dipped out there.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
All right.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
It is a Crawford Box cast here on UH Sports
Talk seven ninety Sports seven ninety dot com of course,
wherever you get your podcast. Chris Gordy here with you
along with Ross Veril. We got a lot to talk
about with your Houston Astros as we were talking to
you after the Wednesday day game against the Saint Louis
Cardinals where they fell four to one and they drop
(01:01):
two out of three to the Cardinals in Saint Louis.
And of course, make it all as possible, our friends
over at Carbock Brewing and the Crawford Bach make sure
you guys get loaded up on plenty of Crawford bok
for the start of this Astro season.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Ross, I've been all over town and it's like it,
like it creeps up on me.
Speaker 4 (01:18):
Like I was at a gas station the other day
they had Crawford back. I stopped at a CVS they
had Crawford Bach. I would go to the grocery store.
They have Crawford bike. Everywhere I'm going these days, I
see the Crawford Bach And that's a good sign because
you can get your hands on somewherever you are. But
welcome in.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
How are you Ross?
Speaker 3 (01:34):
I'm doing okay, feeling a little bit under the weather,
but I'm gonna make it. I'd be doing a lot
better if this team could string a two.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Wins in a row.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Is that too much to ask? It seems like I
guess it is.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
It is as this Astros team is seesaw, seesaw. They
took two out of three to open the season against
the Mets, then they were swept by the San Francisco Giants,
and ever since then it has been win loss, win loss,
win loss, win loss. And it's funny somebody tweet today,
I guess they're they're on pace to go eighty one
in eighty one, right, Well not exactly. They're eight and ten.
(02:06):
They're two below five hundred, but still in a good spot.
We talked about it the other day, like where they
were at this point the last five seasons. Basically last
year they had the dreadful start out of the gates,
but they're kind of where they've where they've been each
of the last five seasons. This is what the Astros
have done under Dusty Baker's what they're two and under
Jero Spot and they just kind of come a little
(02:27):
bit slow out of the gates.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
I don't know what it is or what you chalk
it up to, necessarily because we're talking about different eras,
different managers, different players. I mean, Alex Bregman was a
notorious slow starter, but he's gone. I mean, I guess
we have had it at times from jord On Alvarez
who got the day off the day so he gets
two days off. I don't know what exactly to chalk
it up to, but just slow bats, pretty good pitching.
(02:51):
That was the case today. Look was Renel Blanco spectacular
no five innings and three earned runs given up. But
that's enough for a guy at the end of her
rotation and to maybe get you a win as long
as you can score some runs. And we just have
not seen that consistently. We saw it a little bit
over the last weekend with the fourteen run game against
the Angels. But this offense has been anemic. It needs
(03:14):
to something needs to change. I don't know what it is,
but it's like everybody at the same time. Even Josel Tuvey,
who you've been counting on, was slumping a little bit,
although he had a couple of hits today to get
his average back over three hundred.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, it's it's been rough. They are.
Speaker 4 (03:28):
And you mentioned that game on Friday night when they
scored the fourteen runs against the Angels.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
That is kind of the outlier.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
I mean that that's the game that kind of skewed
all the numbers because they are even that that game included.
They are bottom third in baseball in just about every
statistical category batting average, home runs, on base percentage ops.
I mean it's bottom third. They're not dead last, but
they're near the bottom. I mean, as a team, they're
bat in two nineteen. Remember how bad the Atlanta Bres
(03:59):
were the first week and a half of the season.
They were the worst hitting team in baseball. They even
have a better batting average than your Astros. Now they're
hitting two twenty six as a team. They've woken up
the Astros. Bats still have not woken up the Pittsburgh Pirates,
by the way, dead last in baseball with a one
ninety five average. Saint Louis Cardinals, the team that just
took two out of three against you, still lead all
of baseball batting two eighty two. It's not the end all,
(04:21):
be all stat ross, but they just hit. And it
felt like the series against the Cardinals, outside of the
two to one game, you got the win. In Cardinals
bats came to play.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
And they at least came to play more than yours did.
I mean over the like today they scored four runs. Okay,
that's cool, that's good. You don't necessarily have to lose
a game when the other team scores four runs. And
we keep talking about this, Oh, they're running up with
some good pitching, and they did with Sonny Gray and
Steven Matts and Eric Fetti. But these guys are and
(04:55):
it's not like you're running into Smoltz Glavin in Maddox
like you can get hit. It's against good pictures. Steven
Mattz has a long track record kind of being a
mediocre type pitcher, so It has been some good pitching performances,
but it is just everybody from top to bottom, and
I think we can kind of go case by case
basis on this. There are some guys I feel confident
(05:16):
we'll shake out of this more than others. But I
would say of the guys I'm concerned about, Christian Walker
and the Interdiaz, who are you know, been fourth fifth
of the lineup in an ideal Joe A spot A lineup.
They're right in the center of that, driving in runs.
Both those guys needed to get it together.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
Yeah, the Christian Walker thing is where I want to
kind of start here, because it's it's getting it's getting ugly.
I mean, look, he we understand he had the oblique
issues in spring training. They you know, they basically had
to shut him down. And then it was like, well,
you know, he's not gonna miss any time. We think
he's gonna bounce right back. He's gonna be in the
opening day lineup. And so he didn't really get any
(05:54):
more spring action. And so when the bat was slow
the first week plus, I was like, well, he's still
kind of in spring training mode, right. He was having
all the strikeouts, So I was like maybe he'll come
out of this. Well, you know, he hits a home
run and it was like, okay, well this is it.
He's he's coming out of it. And then he regressed
right back into this hitless funk. And in eighteen games
(06:15):
played rass sixty five at bats he has ten hits
and that's a one sixty four batting average. And it's
just crazy because this is a guy who's hit throughout
his whole career. I mean, in Arizona, basically every year
he was there, he batted. You know, he had a
couple two forty seasons, a couple two fifty seasons. His
best season was two seventy one average wise. But look
(06:37):
at the home run totals. I mean a couple of
thirty six home runs, thirty three home runs, twenty nine,
twenty six. I mean, he's got the power. But as
he just turned thirty four last month, Ross, you know
what people are already jump into. But did we get a
JOSEA Bray you two point zero? Is this a guy
who has been a great slugger and great hitter his
whole career, but hits the mid thirties and so suddenly
(07:01):
that's it. The career is over, he's he forgot how
to hit. And you know it's joking obviously, but it's
it's a scary proposition that, like, you just got toasted
by this horrible A bray You deal and you're you know,
you're finally going to get out of it after this year.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
But now you give.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
Christian Walker this big fat contract that he comes here
and doesn't hit.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
Yeah, it brings us back to the point that we
kind of talk about and laugh. It's like, oh, I
don't want to pay Alex Bregman until his age thirty
five thirty six season. Well you're paying Christian Walker. You
did it with jose Ah bray You. But again, maybe
those deals point that maybe you shouldn't do that. But
it's interesting you brought up what I've been kind of
thinking about. Not the oblique injury where he'd missed a
little bit of time. He's had a history of oblique injuries.
(07:43):
Is he not one hundred percent? And so what I did.
I've been checking out his bat speeds, which have been
very good start of the season, but if you look,
there's been just a slight downtick. We're talking about very
very small sample sizes here to where His bat speed
was elite last year, eighty nine percentile average about seventy
five miles an hour. Stack cast. Anything over seventy five
(08:04):
miles an hour, they put like a little lightning bolt
against next to it. That's a really fast swing. So
that's his average. That's pretty good. He's slightly down to
seventy four point four percent, which doesn't sound like a lot,
but it's three percentile ticks. And if you just kind
of look at the graph of his average batswings, they
are a little bit slower. So is that an oblique issue?
Is that getting him a little bit? Is that because
(08:26):
he's a little bit older, or is that just because
you know, maybe he's still settling in in a new place.
And that's going to be okay. That's one of the
metrics that I'm really going to be keeping an eye
on with Christian Walker, is that bat speed.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
And the funny thing is we talk about father Time,
the one of the pieces that the Ascers were interested
in multiple times this offseason. Nolan Arnado of the Saint
Louis Cardinals, he is, he's bad and what a three
around three hundred right now on the season, Like he's
actually having a pretty nice to that guy. Yeah, he
had three hits and Monday's game he had a hit.
(08:59):
Yesterday hit it was a home run on Monday. So yeah,
it's just one of those funny things. And he's thirty
four as well, so it's like, you know, you never
know what these aging guys. You know, obviously their best
days are behind them, but what are you getting? And
the hope was you're getting at least a Christian walker
that slugs a bunch of home runs and all that,
and it's just we have not seen it yet.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I just I'm a.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
Little curious ross like how long do you keep batting
him in that four hoole? Because that he's constantly coming
up with men on base and not producing, not doing anything,
And so I just like I would hate to do
that to that guy.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
You know, does it?
Speaker 4 (09:37):
It's always that damned if you do, damned if you don't,
do you crush his confidence? You can move him down
in the lineup, And honestly, like, who do you move up?
Because how many other guys?
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Be my question, like, yeah I did it in theory,
but who do you put there?
Speaker 4 (09:50):
Yeah, it's just but it's just like I can't have
you keep coming up, and we keep leaving men on base,
the top, the top couple of guys, you know, And
I like what they did. They moved Painya up today
and it was L two A one, paying You two
Parades three and Christian Walker Ford and that was because
of yord On having the day off. But yeah, it
just felt like or it feels like Jordon. You know,
(10:11):
at least he's had a couple of games here as
of late that he's kind of starting to turn it on.
But it was like constantly those top guys getting on
base in al two ve and Parades and here comes
Walker and Jordon not doing you or not not being
able to.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Drive him in.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
Yeah, it's been certainly something, and you hinted on something
I wanted to address real quick because I'm seeing a
lot of this for whatever reason on Astros Twitter and stuff.
I know, Jordon Alvarez hit a home run yesterday. I
know he's had a couple of hard hit balls before that.
People are pissed that he got the day off. I mean,
is this our first rodeo? Yeah, We've been doing this
for years with the Astros. They have scheduled days off.
(10:44):
It's one hundred and sixty two game season. They like
to keep guys fresh for the end of the year.
They've had big time rallies as far as winning runs
at the end of seasons. It's not an accident. So
we don't have to sit here in the middle of
April and be all upset and want Joe a spot
a fired. I literally saw multiple tweets wanting Joe's bought
a fired for a scheduled off day that he didn't
have anything to do with.
Speaker 4 (11:05):
Yeah, I saw one guy say, you know they got
an off day tomorrow is the Scharmann soft It's like, guys,
this has been going on for ten plus years now
they give guys days off. That's this is the new age.
I was doing a radio hit the other day, Ross
and I don't know why they asked me this. The
guy asked me they were debating like sports records, and
they were like, what's one of the records you think
(11:26):
will never be broken? I said, it's Cal Ripkins, you know,
consecutive start streak.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
That just will never be broken.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
Because in this day and age, it's not just the astros,
it's everybody believes in the rest and recovery thing and
getting guys off their feet and keeping them fresh. And
you know, obviously the NBA has had it more than
anybody the last decade, but baseball has come around to it,
and so yes, deal with it.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Guys are gonna get days.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Off, Yeah, absolutely, But jord On, I think we're gonna
be okay. We're talking about people on like lease concerned.
A're gonna turn it around. We've already seen some signs
of life out of his bat. But I am worried
about Christian Walker. We had Brian Bogosvic as we do
Wednesdays at eleven o'clock on the Matt Thomas Show with
Ross talking about it, and you know, ask him what
he said he's seeing, and he says, it looks like
he's pressing. I mean, you look at his His whiff
(12:13):
rates are much higher than his career average. His walk
rates are much lower than career average. I think when
we did one of these last week or recently, he
was drawing some walks. He did for four straight games
two walks, but now he hasn't drawn any of the
last couple of days. So the on bas is going
back down, and it's just like at one point it's
gonna be up to Joe Spata, do you give him
that off day? I think, just from hearing Christian Walker
(12:36):
talk in the off season and all that stuff, he's
the guy who wants to be out there every day
no matter what. But we also heard that from Jose Bray.
You maybe give this guy a couple of days to
clear his head, maybe just the off day, and he'll
be okay. But does seem like he's pressing out there?
And Brian Bogozevic SAIDs much.
Speaker 4 (12:52):
Yeah, And so I mean, look, and I don't want
to put it all on him because there are some
other guys in this lineup, and the other one I
want to touch on is Yan Ds. I mean paging
Jan er Diez. This is the guy that you know
was outstanding the last two years. Twenty twenty three gets
his real huge chunk sample size bats to eighty two
with twenty three home runs, collects one hundred hits, drives
(13:14):
in sixty runs, and then last year takes another leap
forward with one hundred and forty eight games played. You know,
bat's just a hair under three hundred bats two ninety nine.
You know, crushes what was in sixteen home runs of
the home run total dipped a little bit, but drove
in a car high eighty four RBIs and like, you know,
the strikeout totals went over one hundred and all that.
(13:35):
But like, look, you just he was among the best
hitting catchers in baseball. I mean, at one point he
was outpacing Adlie Rushman, who was largely considered one of
the best, if not the best, hitting catchers. So, you know,
and then just to come into this year, I just
thought ross, like everything we heard from a spot and
dirt spring training. He talked about Victor Kartini and how
(13:57):
much Keratini you know, his bat means all this, and
I just thought they should maybe go fifty to fifty,
like get Yanair off his feet, because we saw last
year when they did give him a break a rest
of a handful of days, and he came back, he
started hitting again. But to me, I'm like, every night
I feel like I turned the astros and yan Ardea
is behind all plate. And I get with, you know,
(14:19):
Jordan being the full time DH. I kind of you
can't you have to, you know, you can't, dhian Ardeaz
like you did a bit a bunch last year. But
I don't know what the solution is I just know
yan ardaz betting one twenty is no bueno.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Yeah, it's it's definitely not where you want to be.
If you look at, you know, bringing up his percentages
again from this year to last year, it's like the
hard hit percentage was way better last year, the barrel
percentage and all that type of stuff. So he's still swinging
and everything, and if he's off it, then we kind
of talked about this as well. He's off just a tick,
then when he swings in everything and makes contact, which
(14:54):
he's good at because he doesn't walk, he's got to
do something to get on base, then then yeah, he's
spraying line dries everywhere. If he's off just a tick
and being pitched properly, then you are gonna hit a
lot of ground balls. You're gonna hit the you know,
I mean, this is this is the nature of baseball, right,
You're like a couple millimeters away from a line drive
in the gap and a pop out.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
Right.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
So he's one of those guys that he's gonna swing
at everything, and when he's hot, he's gonna be really
mega white hot, and when he's cold, he's gonna be
really really cold. Unfortunately that's how he started the season.
I think he's maybe I don't know if it's his
approach or his swing or what's off. It just seems
like it's just a tick off and a guy who
(15:34):
swings at everything like he does. When you are just
that tick off and you're not getting on base with walks,
then yeah, this is what we're gonna see.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
My buddy likes to remind me all the time. Remember
when y'all used to you know, bitch, you complain about
Dusty and not playing Yanar Diaz and it's like, okay,
well the ganna was incredible the last two years.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
This year not so much. But we hope he turns
it around.
Speaker 4 (15:56):
But yeah, those are those are to me, the two
biggest uh shoes right now. Like we said, we think
yourn is going to be just fine. Tove is going
to be just fine. I'd like Jeremy Payne you to
up the average a little bit. He's at two fifteen
right now, but he does have the three home runs
and you know occasionally he comes through. Uh east ak
paratus is actually I mean, the two thirty five batting
average is what is. But he's been one of your
(16:18):
best hitters so far. It's it's it's weird, you know,
I didn't think that that would be the thing. And then, really,
if you just want to talk averages ross Jake Meyer's
fan club, I know he went over let's go, he
went oh for three today, but two seventy one is
one of the best on the team.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
Yeah, he's not getting a whole lot of extra base hits.
I don't think he's hit a home run and I
don't even know. I think he's hit maybe like one double.
But he's also the ninth place hitter normally if this
lineup is right. Unfortunately, he's been in the seventh place
a couple of games recently. But uh, do you like
what you're seeing from him? I don't expect it to
last that long, quite frankly, and honestly, if he can
just do what he's doing, get the occasional single. He's
(16:57):
stealing a lot of bases this season, so kind of
turning that line over line up over in the nine
spot or towards the back end of the lineup. He's
got six stolen bases, leading the team just one cot stealing.
So if he can just keep doing what he's doing,
he's out there making five star catches. He's one of
the league leaders in center field, which I predicted before
the season because he's gonna catch everything because Cam Smith
(17:17):
and jose L Tube are out there and he's calling
them off for everything. So he's making a defensive impact
and then anything you get at the bat from him
is gravy. So to have that three hit night the
other night, was it yesterday? I guess with by the
way three batted balls over one hundred miles per hour,
that was encouraging to see. I'm going to keep my
expectations low, but seeing him produce at the level that
(17:38):
he has been, I am not mad at it.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
I like when you start talking fast you get on it.
You almost sound like melkkiper Jr. When you talk about
Jeby Payina. You know, it's like that Frank Calliando impression
of melk kiper Jr. Let's switch gears for us to
talk pitching, because the Houston Astros have an ace. We
knew it was We knew it was going to be
a trend position there eventually. I just thought it would
(18:02):
happen this offseason after from Barvaldez leaves some free agency,
but Hunter Brown has been the stud of this pitching staff.
He is your ace of the future, and he may
be your ace as of this moment because Hunter Brown,
through four starts so far, has any array of one
point fifty. He's given up two runs or less, a
(18:23):
couple of shutout outings. But man, Hunter Brown has been awesome.
Twenty four inchs pitch, twenty two strikeouts, only five walks.
That is a stuff so far from Hunter Brown.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Yeah, absolutely, And you know he's one of those guys.
And I do like analytics and talking about them, but
analytics don't tell you what is in somebody's mind. And
if you look at him and his demeanor and his
body language language and the way he carries himself on
the mound, it is absolutely night and day from when
he was struggling early in the season last year to
(18:55):
where he's looking like all right, he's looking meek and like, oh,
like I let a guy on. Oh no, what's gonna
happen next?
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (19:02):
I don't want to get pulled from this game or
do now. He's like he gives up a hit or
a walk or whatever, he looks pissed off. He's like,
give me the ball. Joe Spotta was talking about this
last night. We talked about it with Brian Bogosvic earlier
today as well, Like he looks like he's just give
me the damn ball and I'm gonna get these guys out.
Like he is just got that edge, He's got that meanness.
(19:22):
And you know, we can go through the list of
the guys that have had that back in the day,
the Randy Johnson's, the Paedro Martinez. Of course he's not
in that upper echelon of all time greats or anything
like that, but having that sort of edge and attitude
and bleep you I'm gonna throw this, you come hit it.
That's what we're seeing out there from Hunter Brown, and
it is awesome to watch him flourish the way that
(19:44):
he has to blossom into an ace. He was using
a sinker a lot towards left handed batters, which he
hasn't done a whole lot, so I mean, that's just
another tool that he can use to even get lefties out.
He's constantly improving, constantly getting better. His velo ticked up
this year that's so far has had staying power. It
is just kind of one of those things, Gordy, I
think we get maybe more in baseball than maybe we
(20:06):
don't get in other sports. I mean maybe to basketball
and football to some extent, but I feel like, especially
in baseball, you can just really see somebody grow and
get better and get more comfortable and kind of just
sharpen their skills to where they go from this guy
that was just kind of a prospect. He was having
some blowouts, blow ups last year. To now he is
just literally I want to say, there was a date
(20:27):
I saw a tweet yesterday, since some certain date of
last year, he's like number one in the American League
at ERA with starting pitchers.
Speaker 2 (20:33):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Yeah, well, we know he turned to you know, he
had that turnaround and was one of the most consistent
pitchers down the stretch of last year.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
He and Spencer Raghtti became so good for you, I think.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
We have I found a real quick Hunter Brown leading
starting pitchers in an American league at ERA dating back
to May first of last year.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
Wow, that's pretty that's pretty outstanding. The rest of the crew,
Hayden was Nesky has been I think pretty good. You know,
he's been just fine for what you ask out of
your you know, what do you supposed to be your
number five guy. I think he's been really good. You know,
I think we haven't even touched on the Spencer Arraghetty
Fluke injury on this podcast since it happened. But you know,
(21:11):
shag and fly balls out in Seattle. He sees the
ball coming, he puts his hands over his head and
just happens to the thumb right at the base and
cracks the bone and breaks his thumb on his throwing hand.
No less, the baseball gods were not looking out for
Spencer Raghetty. I saw him in the clubhouse the other day.
He said, if somebody asked him how you're doing, He's like,
(21:31):
as good as I can. I mean, he's like, nothing
I can really do other than time. Let time heal
this bone. But you know, at least what we heard was,
you know, they're gonna give us a couple of weeks
to heal. They'll take him out of the cast. If
he looks good from there, he'll be able to start
gripping the ball. Then maybe you know, some soft toss
after that, and then he'll have a build back up
(21:53):
process to get back. They you know, originally you were thinking, oh,
he's done for the season. They did come back and say,
you know, maybe not for the season, but it's going
to be a while for Spencer arrogaty to earn his
way back or to heal up and get back in there.
So the other part of this ross from ber Valdez
and Renald Blanco, Blanco not terrible. He had one bad
(22:17):
pitch on Wednesday that that really it cost him the game.
I mean, he had a one nothing lead and you know,
gives up a three run bomb in the in the
fifth and that ends up being the difference maker. But
I thought it was a more encouraging outing from Blanco
from some of his other ones this year. But as
we sit right now, ren Old Blanco and e area
of six forty eight and from ber Valdez an area
(22:38):
of four to ninety one.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Which doesn't look terrible.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
But if you watched fromber the last outing against Saint Louis,
where you give him seven earned off ten hits, not good.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
Yeah, especially quick note by the way, on an Arragedty thing,
We had a Hayden Wesneski on this week and he
said that that Spencer Ragedty was holding a baseball in
his hand, so if he wasn't, and so it got
basically the base all hit his thumb and hit against
the baseball. If his hand was empty, he might have
gotten out there with just a bruise. Damn, I even
hit the hard ball, hit the hard ball. He got
(23:09):
it fractured.
Speaker 4 (23:10):
That that sucks because and I was joking about with
Brian McTaggart the other day and Channel Rom in the clubhouse.
I was like, even if he doesn't put his hands
on his head, he gets hitting the noggin and yeah,
it's probably got a pretty big bump. But you know what,
he maybe misses a few days with a concussion or
something and then he's back out there throwing.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
It's just like it hit right in the spot that just,
you know, cause.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Damage with the ball in your hand.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Crazy, That's that's awful.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
But go ahead, all right, Yeah, but yeah, onto renew Blanco.
I feel like it's been it's been the big inning
that has gotten away from him. You mentioned it was
just one swing off of Lar's new bars. I mean
it was after it was a bunt single. Then quite frankly,
by the way it rolled out, it rolled foul and
the umpires just waved it fair like exi paratis waited
(23:57):
it for it to roll foul, picks it up and
it gets cold fair ball and that's not reviewable. Insane,
So it's a bunt single, then literally a bloop to
right field, and then and then the blast. Unfortunate, so
Renel Blanco has had the big inning kind of crop
up on him. I'm a little I'm not gonna say
I'm less worried, because I'm not super worried about Fromber either,
(24:18):
but Fromber's last start was concerning because it wasn't just
one big inning. It was it was all the extra
base hits that he was given up. He was given
up runs in multiple innings and it was I think
I want to say it was six or seven extra
base hits, the most he'd ever given up in his
career in a start. So he was off to a
real hot start of the season. Curve ball had been
(24:40):
covering up with how nasty and dominated is a lot
of his issues, especially with the sinker, and unfortunately those
came into play on what was it Monday at this point,
where yeah, he gave up two three run innings and
a one running of the three. Like he just started
to blow up there consistently at the end. So hopefully
he can get back to the drawing board and get
things fixed because the Astros, obviously the way these bats
(25:02):
are going, he can ill afford Farmer Valdez to go
out there in the hill and you take L's Well.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
The other guy who has slid into that five mans
or the fifth man spot is Ryan Gusto, who man
through four relief appearances.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
You know out of the bullpen was outstanding. You had
New York Ray have I want to say one.
Speaker 4 (25:21):
Thirteen after four appearances in the pen, and then on
Saturday he got his first career start against the Angels,
went four innings but gave up three runs off four hits.
I think it was a little bit of early jitters
because he did settle down with six strikeouts the rest
of the way. So I was encouraged. I know the
Astros lost that game four to one. Well, they lost
the game four to one because offense didn't show up.
(25:42):
If the bats showed up, they went that game seven
to four.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (25:46):
And we're not we're talking about Hey, that was a
good outing from Gusto. So I'm excited to see him
next to you know, he's gonna make the start when
they play on Friday or Ross. We talked about the
the Cardinals being the best hitting team in baseball in
terms of batting average of two eighty two. Number two
behind them are the Padres at two seventy seven.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
This is all great.
Speaker 4 (26:04):
It's a lineup that hits, and they're they're you know,
an unfortunate spot for Ryan Gusto to be kind of
thrown into it.
Speaker 3 (26:11):
Yeah, that's the thing is, you've been kind of middling,
You've been scuffling. You've been having this crazy streak of
thirteen straight games where you're going win loss, win loss, win, loss,
win loss, and then I mean, luckily you've been getting
some wins against some teams that are somewhat lesser competition
now at least I think even though the Angels are
have got off to a good start and stuff like that.
But you've got the Padres coming in right now. They
are fourteen and four. They're one of the best teams
(26:34):
in baseball. They are gonna it's gonna be really tough
having them come in, and yeah, you're gonna need good
starts out of Gusto. And at some point Police, I mean,
as you mentioned, you give up three four runs that
should be Okay, you should still be able to win games.
You shouldn't be getting no crooked innings. I'd be curious
to look up even how many crooked number innings the
(26:57):
Astros even had all year, because even on Sunday, when
you scored seven against the Angels, it was a three
run swing from from Esok Paratus and then were six singles,
so fourteen. Of course, when they scored the fourteen on Friday,
it was a Grand Slam. There's other stuff where they
were scoring and eating extra bases, but it has just
been too far in between. You're gonna be needing to
(27:17):
put some crooked numbers up this weekend, if you're gonna
come out with some victories.
Speaker 4 (27:21):
How about this ross eight guys in their lineup that
two seventy five are better this year. They have Jesus,
They have several three hundred hitters in Jackson Merrill, Fernando Tatis,
Many Machado and Gavin Sheets, all batting three to eleven
or better. You have Oscar Gonzalez batting two eighty six.
(27:41):
You have Jose Glicias batting two seventy eight. Luisa Riez
is one of their worst hitters at two seventy five.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
I mean, yeah, the guy that's like a batting titleist
that could wake up at any moment.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
Oh yeah, Xander Bogarts, he's a he's a paltry two
fifty eight. If he were on the Astros, he'd be
one of their best hitters at two fifty eight this year.
So that's just give you an idea of what your facing.
Oh and by the way, they don't lose many games.
The Padres have one of the best records in baseball
at fifteen and four. They've lost four games all year,
(28:11):
eight and two in their last ten. So yeah, man,
look if we want to try to like be Sunshine
and Rosie and feel like, look on the bright side,
like this isn't the team you want coming in. And
then behind them it's the Toronto Blue Jays, who've been
kind of the surprise of the American League East so
far at eleven and eight. They've kind of been sitting
up there with the Yankees the top that division so far.
(28:33):
So it's just I get it. We can keep saying
it's early. You know, we're not even through April yet.
I know, but man, you just got to have a
good mix of good with the bad. You're getting here.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
Yeah, and at least if we want to try to
look for a silver lining or a reason to be optimistic.
If you remember like last year where the Astros are
scuffling and then when they kind of started playing some
better teams, they sat up in their chair as it were, like,
all right, some good teams coming in here, let's go,
let's lock in. How Tuve and the boys, we've seen
them do that. It is it is at home this weekend,
(29:07):
So maybe we can see them finally lock in and
start to flourish once one of the best teams in
baseball comes into town, because we have seen that from
them before.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Yeah, I want to say, was it that? So it was?
Speaker 4 (29:17):
The Braves came in mid April like literally this this
week a year ago and swept the Astros and you
were like, oh god. And then they go and loose
two out of three in Washington, and then they get
swept at Chicago against the Cubs where aj you know,
JP France gets rocked. And then suddenly it was like
something started to click. After that Detroit series, they started.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
Winning, and was it was it?
Speaker 4 (29:39):
Baltimore came in here in June and they swept Baltimore
and that was like, that was the series where we
were on, holy crap, all right, this team is really
like they're playing good baseball. That was a you know,
World Series contending team in the Orioles and they and
they took care of business against them.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
I just worery though Ross.
Speaker 4 (29:57):
There's no Alex Bregman, there's no Kyle Tucker on this
so you know, those guys were the big boppers that
could help pick you up and turn things around. I
just I look at this lineup and go, Who's who's
gonna be those guys that are gonna help lift them.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Yeah, it's gotta be your Don it's gotta be Al two,
it's gotta be Christian Walker. And to a lesser extent,
Janar Diez has to figure out whatever's got him off
just a tick. He's got to figure that out because
he is I mean, he just doesn't. He's actually drawing
walks better this year than he has ever in his career.
It's almost like, hey, stop trying to draw a walk.
Just swing and everything like you've always done. Minually you'll
(30:32):
get hot and things will be all right.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 4 (30:34):
Well that's what we got going ross the Astros. They
will be off day Thursday, so you guys can all
listen to this Crawford Box cast and get caught up
on everything. And then on Friday it will be the
Padres coming in. But one of remind listeners about our
friends at Cardback Brewing of course, the Crawford Bach. They
are gonna be doing an official watch party with the
(30:57):
Astros a week from Friday. This is gonna bed April
twenty fifth, out at the beer Garden at Carboch. It's
a little bit earlier. It's the Astros are going to
be Kansas City taking on the Royals. First pitch is
six forty. I don't know who set these pitches, Ross,
but like, why are we playing all these six forty
first pitches? Like it's seven o'clock, it's seven oh five.
At seven to ten, that's when you pick. That's when
(31:18):
you start a game. Six forty. I don't know it
is what it is. But anyway, the Astros versus the
Royals next Friday, and here's what they got lined up
Ross five dollars Crawford Box, five dollars Crawford pale Ale specials.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
You'll have go.
Speaker 4 (31:32):
They'll have a visit from Orbit, so bring the kids out.
The Astro shooting stars will be out there. The championship
trophies will be on display, so I imagine photo opportunities with them.
There are tons of Astros vendors and giveaways, so anything
Astros you want to purchase, they'll have that out there.
Like I said, giveaways and all the game day energy
(31:53):
without the stadium lines, free to ten, family friendly, full
of good vibes. Let's all rally together. It'll be Astra
Royals a week from Friday at Carbak Brewing watch party.
And I'm just look, Lance mccullors may pitch that series.
He could pitch that night. We'll see where his timetable
is by next Friday, but that will be all right.
(32:14):
Who Yeah, Lance mccullor's.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Junior who is still on the team.
Speaker 4 (32:19):
Yeah, we didn't even really touch on him, but he
has been pitching well in his minor minor league rehab
starts and he is on track to rejoin the team
here within the next two weeks. It's it's crazy we
have not seen him ross. It is April sixteenth, twenty
twenty five. We have not seen Lance mccullor's pitch a
real game for the Astros. Since was that November of
(32:40):
twenty twenty two in Philadelphia.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
Yeah, so it's been a while. It's been a long
time coming. We've seen a lot of setbacks so far,
keeps checking boxes, knocking things off his list. Haven't seen
a set back yet, and I know because sometimes with
him we kind of feel like, when is the other
shoe gonna drop it? So far, so good, and I'm optimistic.
Speaker 4 (33:00):
I'm optimistic as well. And it seems like he's in
a good space mentally as well. All of the interviews
you know that where he talked to us in spring
training and then all the interviews he's been doing after
these rehabs starts, he seems to be in a good
mind space. And that's big too, because that's gonna be
a big part of him getting up here and doing
what he needs to do. But anyway, whatever you're doing,
(33:21):
whether you're watching the Astros or listening to him on
Sports Talk seven ninety, make sure you guys are doing it.
With the Crawford box from Carbox Brewing Tequila, Sundride's stripes
on the can you know it. You love it when
you see it goes perfect with whatever you have to
be eating. I like it with the ballpark food, whether
it's Nacho's hot dogs, the Pluckers wings, whatever you're having
at the ballpark, get yourself a Crawford bog and I
(33:41):
think Ross and I were even talking about this. You
can go to the vendor and get him in the can,
in the big tall can. Or you can go to
the boots where they have the draft and they put
him in the collectors kind of like plastic mugs, and
then you can take that home and you can be
like Ross and I and have your entire pantry stocked
with uh Minute made part or dik in Park plastic
(34:04):
cups that we drank Crawford bock out of. But whatever
you're doing, wherever you're drinking, and enjoy the Crawford back
from our friends at Carbok Brewing. Any of the final thoughts, Ross.
Speaker 3 (34:13):
Nope, just need the bats to hit. I think we've
kind of been talking about this all season long, and
we keep saying, Gordy, it's early, they're gonna turn, it's early,
they're gonna turn. Well, we need something to happen here.
Hopefully it happens this weekend against the San Diego Padres.
Speaker 4 (34:26):
Yeah, I'll go on a limb and say an Astros
picture throws a no hitter, So that's all right?
Speaker 2 (34:31):
That would that would make a fuffer box if you
had not enough need to go have some. You guys
have a great day.
Speaker 4 (34:38):
We'll talk to you guys again soon right here on
the Crawford Box Cast, presented by the Crawford, Bach and
Carbock Brewing
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