With new skipper, Astros eye same winning ways

This story was excerpted from Brian McTaggart’s Astros Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

HOUSTON -- A new era in Astros baseball will begin Thursday when first-year manager Joe Espada leads his team into the 2024 season against Juan Soto, Aaron Judge and the Yankees at Minute Maid Park.

Espada, who spent the previous six seasons as the bench coach in Houston under a pair of World Series-winning managers in A.J. Hinch and Dusty Baker, inherits a loaded and motivated Astros team that last year fell one home win shy of reaching their fifth World Series in seven seasons. Houston has won the last six full-season American League West titles and is seeking its eighth consecutive trip to the ALCS.

Will it get there? That will be decided over the next six months, but all the Astros do these days is win. They’ve played in more playoff games than any other team since 2017 and have won the second-most games, including the postseason, of any MLB team in that span.

“We have winners in the building,” third baseman Alex Bregman said. “Winning is contagious. Guys here know how to win and what it takes to win. You can’t teach that.”

What needs to go right? Starting pitching holds it together

That starts with getting healthy. Justin Verlander and José Urquidy are starting the season on the injured list but could be back early in the season. The Astros also hope to get Lance McCullers Jr. and Luis Garcia back midseason. Until then, Framber Valdez and Cristian Javier will be looking for bounce-back seasons after struggling for long stretches last year, and the Astros need 2023 rookies J.P. France and Hunter Brown to take a step forward.

Great unknown: Middle relief pitching depth

The Astros have starting pitching depth when healthy and boast one of baseball’s premier back-end bullpen trios in setup men Bryan Abreu and Ryan Pressly and closer Josh Hader, who signed a five-year deal to join Houston in January. Getting the ball from the starters to the back end of the bullpen could be a little bit challenging considering the amount of innings Houston lost from last year’s bullpen.

The club is counting on Rafael Montero to bounce back and is hoping to get contributions from Brandon Bielak, Seth Martinez, lefty Bennett Sousa and other arms who aren’t as proven as some of the pitchers the Astros lost in free agency.

Team MVP will be: Yordan Alvarez

There are probably four solid choices you could pick here, and they hit at the top of the order: Jose Altuve, Bregman, Kyle Tucker and Alvarez. Alvarez finished third in AL MVP voting in 2022 -- behind Shohei Ohtani, who’s now in the National League, and Judge -- and last year would have posted bigger numbers if he had not missed six weeks with a right oblique injury. A healthy Alvarez should be the leader of the Astros’ lineup, and he’s likely going to hit second this year, giving him more at-bats. Don’t be surprised, though, if any of the other star players at the top of the lineup make a run at team MVP.

Team Cy Young will be: Cristian Javier

Javier looked very good this spring after reporting to camp 15 pounds lighter, which helps him be more fluid on the mound. He focused on sprint workouts during the winter in the Dominican Republic and is back at the weight he pitched at in 2022 -- his breakout season. Javier’s rising fastball had the kind of late rise that he didn’t always have last year, and he’s added a changeup to go along with his sweeping slider. Valdez and Hader may have something to say about this honor, though.

Bold prediction: Astros will return to the World Series

OK, is it really that bold when they’ve played in four World Series in the past seven years? Maybe not, but some are ready to declare the Astros’ run of success over. Not so fast. Houston could be better than it was a year ago, when it was one home win away from winning another pennant.

The lineup should be their deepest since 2019 with Yainer Diaz taking over full-time at catcher, especially if Altuve and Alvarez don’t miss huge chunks of time with injuries like they did in ‘23. They have a lockdown back end of the bullpen and the rotation is deep when it’s healthy. The Astros have a better pitching staff than the Rangers, who will be one of their biggest challengers in the AL. Don’t sleep on the Yankees, who added Soto and Alex Verdugo but are already dealing with an injury to ace Gerrit Cole.