I would love to tell you that there were signs of encouragement in this game for Astros fans, but I fell asleep watching the thing after the Astros let Kyle McClellan start off with three perfect innings. Yes, that’s right, another day, another terrible offensive output. The Astros scored two runs, one on a sac fly, and one on a wild pitch. Telling yourself at this point that the Astros are running into a stretch of “good pitching” is delusional: this is just a bad offensive team. They had some hot BABIP to start the year and have been treading water ever since.
J.A. Happ pitched admirably in defeat on the surface, allowing four hits and three walks in six innings and striking out eight. Against a Cardinals lineup that started just two of their top four hitters though? That wasn’t exactly a sterling outing. Albert Pujols went hitless, but Allen Craig’s three hits and Gerald Laird’s 2 RBI double was all the scoring St. Louis would need against Houston today.
They’ll turn their sights to Toronto, where exhibition baseball will begin again. Jo Jo Reyes hasn’t won a game since 2008, but he’ll have his best chance in awhile as the Blue Jays draw Aneury Rodriguez in game one of the series. Fans in the left field bleachers may want to wear hardhats as HR champion Jose Bautista gets to face the Astros pitching staff.