The Houston Astros had won three out of their last four games heading into Thursday, but is this surge already too late to save their season?
ESPN's Jeff Passan seems to think so as one of his biggest takeaways from the first part of this year has been that the Astros might be the most doomed out of baseball's biggest disappointments.
Despite their recent success, they still sit with the fourth-worst record in the league thanks to their abysmal start to the season.
A large part of that can, and should, be attributed to their pitching staff being littered with injuries. The good news on that front is that they are slowly getting their strongest arms back.
Justin Verlander and Framber Valdez have looked strong ever since coming back from injury. Cristian Javier and Jose Urquidy are making important steps to returning.
The offense has been ok so far, fairly average at worst. They rank 16th in runs scored, but are top five in OPS.
Jose Altuve has been one of the best hitters in baseball so far, but not everyone on the team has had the same luck. Yordan Alvarez and Alex Bregman are slumping, though they have high hopes of turning that around.
If they can get some pitching help, Houston should be able to get back to being at least an average team.
But is that enough to still have some hope for the season?
The Astros currently sit 6.5 games back from the Seattle Mariners in the race for the AL West, and 7.5 games back from a Wild Card bid. They will obviously need some help from the teams ahead of them, but it might not be over.
Passan did hint that it wasn't just the immediate future that he was talking about, though, as this roster is only getting older.
They currently rank 19th in the MLB with an average age of 28.9. That fact is made worse when considering the organization has one of the weakest farm systems in the league as well.
If Houston can't right the ship the season, Passan might be right in being pessimistic about the future of the two-time World Series champions.
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