Astros' list of injured pitchers continues to grow

The Astros have placed right-hander Lance McCullers Jr. on the 15-day injured list due to a right foot sprain, retroactive to June 13. Fellow righty Jason Alexander has been recalled to take his place on the active roster. McCullers was scheduled to start today’s game but Ryan Gusto will get the ball instead. Chandler Rome of The Athletic was among those to relay the info.

To this point, the Astros haven’t provided any information about how the injury occurred or how long they expect McCullers to be out of action. In his most recent start, he tossed 96 pitches over five innings. Up until this announcement of his IL placement, he was listed as the starter for Monday's game in West Sacramento.

More information will presumably be forthcoming, but it’s a notable development regardless. For McCullers personally, he’s looking to get back on track after a lengthy absence. He missed all of 2023 and 2024, and most of 2022, due to elbow issues. He was reinstated from the IL about six weeks ago for his first major league action in over two years. He has since made seven starts with a 4.91 earned run average, though most of the damage came in his second start when he allowed seven earned runs to the Reds while only recording one out.

Now, he’s set for another injury absence. On the bright side, it has nothing to do with his elbow, though it’s a setback nonetheless. Perhaps it will turn out to be a fine reset. Since he has thrown so little over the past few years, he wasn’t going to suddenly throw 200 innings in 2025. Ideally, this will be just a minor issue that will let him catch his breath before he picks things back up.

But it will be a situation to monitor given his history and the club’s larger pitching situation. McCullers is now the seventh starter on Houston’s injured list, with the others mostly facing lengthy absences. Both Ronel Blanco and Hayden Wesneski required Tommy John surgery in the past month. Luis Garcia has been struggling to get healthy since his own Tommy John surgery in 2023. Cristian Javier had his TJS in June of last year and could perhaps be an option later in the year. J.P. France is recovering from last year’s shoulder surgery with an uncertain timeline. Spencer Arrighetti has a fractured thumb and also has a murky path forward.

Despite all of those injuries, the Astros have been performing well, with a 41-30 record that puts them 4.5 games up in the American League West. Without McCullers, the challenge of keeping the rotation in viable shape will grow.

The Astros have Framber Valdez and Hunter Brown as two strong performers at the front of the rotation, though it now appears that three very inexperienced arms will be backing up that duo. Colton Gordon, Brandon Walter and Gusto have thrown a combined 120 2/3 innings in the majors between the three of them.

Gusto was originally planned to start Tuesday's game but will now bump up to Monday. The Astros have TBA listed as Tuesday's starter, with Valdez still listed for Wednesday. Perhaps that means there will be some kind of bullpen game Tuesday with Alexander factoring in heavily. He has been starting at the Triple-A level and could cover multiple innings.

It’s already been reported that the Astros will be looking for starting pitching help prior to next month’s trade deadline. The McCullers injury, whether it proves to be serious or not, should only add to that desire.