Today the Houston Astros, with their trusted closer gone for a while and their setup man Bryan Abreu not a proven 9th inning man, signed Craig Kimbrel to a deal. Kimbrel has been...shaky in recent years. Last year for Baltimore he struggled mightily filling in for Felix Bautista. Earlier this year he was very good in two appearances for Atlanta but was cut rather than optioned due to his contract. It does generally look like Kimbrel looks better than he has, and could help the Astros. But Kimbrel also might be a small bandaid on a gaping wound.
The Astros have lost 6 of their last 8. Four of those losses were shutouts, including a game that was nearly perfect. Three of those losses had deficits of 10 runs or more. As I'm writing this they're winning against the Orioles, but that's because of their ingenious strategy of making the Orioles leave Brandon Young in til the ninth and tire him out so that the next time they have to face him, a week later, he'll be manageable. But the rest of the O's series relies on starts from Cristian Javier, Lance McCullers and Spencer Arrighetti, all of whom have missed time this year due to injuries, and all of whom have seen their quality go down as a result. Hunter Brown and Framber Valdez have been great, but they've been lucky.
Bryan Abreu, with a 2.8 WAR, has the fourth-highest WAR on the team. Higher than every hitter except for Jeremy Pena. Which means that only one hitter has a better WAR than 2.8. On the Astros, the team that normally outhits everyone. Could it be that letting Alex Bregman, George Springer and Kyle Tucker go results in a spottier overall lineup performance? Or maybe getting mixed signals on Yordan Alvarez's status a year after going through the same ordeal with Kyle Tucker points to bargaining with the inevitable? Look, the way this team used to be run, an injury to Taylor Trammell didn't used to be the sort of thing that hampered momentum. Or a missed month from Jake Meyers.
It's down to the Bryan Abreus and Mauricio Dubons and Victor Caratinis of this team, and that's why there's been such a drop-off. Even plugging Carlos Correa back into things can only do so much. He's hitting .333 with 2 homers and 8 RBIs, but he's running into the same problems he did in Minnesota, where the exclamation point he used to carry is basically gone and now he's just a halfway decent infield bat. Meanwhile, Abreu has a 1.58 ERA and 84 Ks in 56 innings. He's one of the best relief pieces in baseball. And he's arguably succeeding because there's no pressure on him. There's been pressure on Meyers and Trammell and Christian Walker to fill these roles and bring the team back and it's just not happening because the Astros are trying to pretend that nothing's different. The last couple years this has worked because the core has still been volatile. Here it's not fooling anyone.
The one thing the Astros have to be grateful for is that the Mariners are falling at a similar rate. But next the Astros have to play the Rockies and Angels, two teams who've played the spoiler for similar competitors, while the Mariners have to play the A's, Guardians and Rays. You never know when the momentum will finally swing someone else's way.
Coming Tomorrow- One of the most powerful hitters of his generation by far.
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