HOUSTON — Life without Kyle Tucker is getting arduous for a Houston Astros lineup that has somehow survived two months without him. The team managed to stay afloat across June and July with an admirable approach coupled with enough clutch hits to cover up a massive hole in the middle of its offense.
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Sunday started the third month of Tucker’s absence. Houston celebrated it with three singles against a Tampa Bay Rays team that just authored a sell-off at the trade deadline. The 1-0 loss finished a 4-5 homestand that offered an ominous outlook for what lies ahead.
Tucker isn’t anywhere close to a return. Manager Joe Espada suggested this weekend it may not even be within the month, and Tucker isn’t accompanying the club on the first leg of its upcoming nine-game road trip. Specifics of his shin contusion remain unclear, as does a satisfactory explanation for how it could cause him to miss so much time.
Without Tucker, pressure shifts to Jose Altuve, Alex Bregman and Yordan Alvarez to keep this lineup intact. Altuve and Bregman have combined for one extra-base hit across the club’s last six games. Just two of Alvarez’s eight hits in that span have fallen for extra bases. None were home runs.
Unsurprisingly, Houston has scored 16 runs in the last seven games. More production is mandatory, especially as a threadbare pitching staff braces for a stretch of 27 games in 29 days beginning Monday. Here are three takeaways from the Astros’ uninspiring homestand.
Youth movement could be coming to Houston
To hear general manager Dana Brown describe it, the Astros had enough prospect capital to make one meaningful deal before Tuesday’s trade deadline. The dire state of Houston’s starting rotation forced Brown and his baseball operations department to use it on an established pitcher.
The cost to acquire Yusei Kikuchi created a public outcry Brown has clearly heard and, perhaps, bothered him a bit. Prices were astronomical in a sellers’ market, a fact Brown has tried to underscore on multiple occasions.
“Everyone was upset with what we gave up to Toronto, imagine if we would’ve gotten a first baseman,” Brown told the team’s pregame radio show Sunday. “It (would have been) even more players we would have given up. Sometimes you have to fill that void from the minor leagues.”
Brown may be on the precipice of doing so. Both Shay Whitcomb and Zach Dezenzo drew lavish praise from the general manager before Sunday’s game against the Rays. The 1-0 shutout that followed felt like the sort of game that may inspire change.
Go off Shay!! 💣 pic.twitter.com/pVu6S9RJIP
See AlsoKikuchi has 11 Ks in Houston debut, Astros beat Rays 3-2Astros vs. Rangers ALCS Game 1 Starting Pitcher Matchup - October 15World Series Game 5 FAQ, lineups (LIVE on FOX)Astros earn crucial leg up on Rangers with Lone Star Series win— Sugar Land Space Cowboys (@SLSpaceCowboys) August 4, 2024
Promoting prospects at breakneck speed has been a hallmark of Brown’s brief tenure in Houston. He is also nothing if not candid, prompting wonder if both Dezenzo and Whitcomb could become factors across Houston’s final 51 games.
“Sometimes you have to go with the kids,” Brown said. “It’s just part of what we do in baseball. You see other organizations calling up young players that are playing well. Guess what? We have good young players, as well, and we’re going to have to call them up. If you’re not trading them, call them up.”
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Brown has few other options to upgrade a lineup searching for slug. The Astros have hit 47 home runs since Tucker sustained his shin contusion June 3. Only three lineups have hit fewer in that span, one in which the Astros have relied on passing the baton and piecing together innings with six or seven productive plate appearances.
Houston has the sort of lineup that can be conducive to such an approach, but sustaining it is another matter entirely. The last 17 games have demonstrated it. The Astros are scoring 3.05 runs per game across a stretch in which they’re 7-10.
Wrist issues plagued Dezenzo for the first half of this season, but he has slashed .310/.391/.528 in his first 161 plate appearances since they resolved. He’s played just 10 games at Triple-A Sugar Land and 159 as a professional, but promoting pitcher Jake Bloss after eight starts above A-ball represents how much Brown values high-level experience.
That's one way to introduce yourself! 🚀
Zach Dezenzo (@astros) goes deep in his first AB for the @SLSpaceCowboys. pic.twitter.com/K5DCefro23
— Minor League Baseball (@MiLB) July 25, 2024
Adding Whitcomb would, at the very least, afford another power threat. His 58 home runs the past two seasons are the second most in the minors but must be assigned a proper perspective. Forty-six of them came in the Pacific Coast League, perhaps the most hitter-friendly league in all of affiliated baseball.
Whitcomb’s improvements in pitch selection and plate discipline are apparent — he trimmed his strikeout rate from 31.1 percent to 20.2 percent while increasing his walk rate to 11.6 percent — but whether it can translate to major-league pitching is a legitimate question. Answering it amid a pennant race is dicey, but Houston may have no choice.
First base remains an area of concern
Brown’s insistence that prices were too high for a first baseman does not diminish Houston’s need for one. The team entered Sunday extracting minus-0.1 wins above replacement from the position since releasing José Abreu on June 14.
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Starting Whitcomb at first base Saturday for Sugar Land was a “clip of coming attractions,” Brown said Sunday, but presuming he is the answer is short-sighted. Whitcomb has made one professional start at first base: Saturday at Triple-A Sugar Land. Dezenzo has 19 starts at first base.
It stands to reason the club will keep exposing Whitcomb and Dezenzo to first base during the ensuing days, but putting either prospect at a position he rarely plays during his major-league debut — and in the season’s biggest games — seems ill-advised.
Brown described both as options to “give (Jon) Singleton a breather,” but even that limited exposure carries risk — and doesn’t solve the underlying problem. Singleton, a left-handed hitter, will still draw most of the starts against right-handed pitching. He struck out three more times on Sunday, dropping his OPS to .667.
Putting an inexperienced player at first base would also run counter to the club’s constant claims that Joey Loperfido couldn’t handle the position upon his entrance to the big leagues. Loperfido had 59 minor-league starts at first base. Houston put him there once as a major-leaguer, as a last resort late in a game that went 11 innings.
Utilizing either Victor Caratini or Yainer Diaz at first base would make far more logical sense, especially Caratini, who has 63 major-league appearances and 25 starts at the position. Caratini took some early pregame work at first base during the Tampa series alongside infield coach Omar López.
In search of more offense, Espada has deployed both Caratini and Diaz in the same lineup during four of Houston’s past seven games, but doing so leaves the club vulnerable if either player is injured.
Calling up César Salazar would give Espada far more flexibility to play both of his primary catchers — perhaps at first base — and make Houston’s roster far more functional.
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Ryan Pressly’s back
One of the Astros’ elder statesmen will be back for another season.
Setup man Ryan Pressly vested his $14 million option for 2025 by appearing in Friday night’s 3-2 win against the Rays, securing his place in a bullpen where he’s become an unquestioned leader.
The $30 million extension Pressly signed before the 2023 season contained a team option that vested if he appeared in 50 games in both 2023 and 2024 or appeared in 110 games across both seasons.
Pressly made 65 appearances last season. His 45th of this season arrived Friday, vesting the option. Pressly still must pass a physical and can’t end the season on the injured list.
Presuming he is healthy — and presuming Bregman leaves in free agency after this season — Pressly will become the third-longest-tenured Astro behind Altuve and Lance McCullers Jr. in 2025. His transformation from forgotten Minnesota Twins middle reliever to one of the sport’s steadiest closers is one of this franchise’s biggest victories of its golden era.
Next year, Pressly should become the sixth reliever to accumulate 350 appearances as an Astro, joining Joe Sambito, Brad Lidge, Chad Qualls, Billy Wagner and Dave Smith. As an Astro, Pressly boasts a lower career WHIP and FIP than all of them.
Pressly hasn’t allowed an earned run in his past 22 2/3 postseason innings. His place as one of the franchise’s best playoff performers is secure if he never throws another pitch in October, but the 35-year-old right-hander will return intent on furthering that legacy.
(Photo of Shay Whitcomb in spring training: Jim Rassol / USA Today)
Chandler Rome is a Staff Writer for The Athletic covering the Houston Astros. Before joining The Athletic, he covered the Astros for five years at the Houston Chronicle. He is a graduate of Louisiana State University. Follow Chandler on Twitter @Chandler_Rome
