April 28: Off.
April 29: 3-4 loss vs. Washington
April 30: 0-7 loss vs. Washington
May 1: Off
May 2: 5-4 win vs. Seattle
May 3: 8-9 loss vs. Seattle
May 4: 7-8 loss vs. Seattle
You can chalk two more losses up to the bullpen. The Astros were up 3-2 in the 8th on April 29, and up 2-1 in the 7th on May 3 before Seattle piled on eight runs. With eight runs on Saturday and seven runs on Sunday, the Astros are now 9-3 when scoring 5+ runs, and this weekend marked the first instance of the Astros scoring 6+ runs and losing this season. Saturday's game was the most runs in a loss since losing 15-10 vs. Boston on August 6, 2013.
Anyhow, the Astros were outscored 23-32 this week. But yeah. Three of the four losses this week were one-run losses, and in one-run games the Astros are now 3-6. Interestingly enough, the Astros only played eight one-run games in all of 2013, so...progress?
We try to stay away from "would have beens" in this post, but winning either of the last two games would have set a season-high for largest comeback. As it is, the Astros have not yet been able to overcome a 3+ run deficit, and just for giggles, the Astros haven't overcome a deficit of 6+ runs in a game since 2008.
The eight runs allowed in the 7th inning on Saturday are a season-high for most runs allowed in an inning, breaking Oakland's record with their seven runs in the first inning of the First Battle of Jed Lowrie. The Astros had three such innings of allowing 8+ runs in 2013.
Now on to something depressing: Check out the following table. This shows the Astros' winning percentage when having the lead or a tie at the beginning of the following innings, compared to the rest of the AL (Astros' W-L has been removed) in that same situation.
| Inning | Astros% | AmLg% |
| 6th | .555 | .725 |
| 7th | .563 | .748 |
| 8th | .600 | .779 |
| 9th | .625 | .844 |
The Astros have lost six games when leading or tied to begin the 9th inning, the rest of the American League has combined to lose 33 games in the same situation.. We're still early enough in the season to where a few of those games go the Astros way, and things look differently. 14-17 looks a lot better than 10-21.
Hitting (min. 10 PAs)
| Villar | .353/.450/.824 | 6K:3BB |
| Dominguez | .294/.455/.471 | 0K:2BB |
| Presley | .250/.294/.500 | 1K:1BB |
| Guzman | .333/.333/.417 | 3K:0BB |
| Carter | .188/.188/.562 | 4K:0BB |
| Altuve | .273/.346/.364 | 2K:3BB |
| Krauss | .300/.417/.300 | 3K:2BB |
| Castro | .222/.364/.278 | 8K:3BB |
| Fowler | .227/.261/.227 | 6K:0BB |
| Springer | .222/.222/.222 | 9K:0BB |
Hitter of the Week: Jonathan Villar, who was 6x17 with a triple, two homers, three walks, and two stolen bases.
Notable:
*Jose Altuve, who still leads the AL with eleven stolen bases (in 12 attempts, when he led the AL in Been Caught Stealings), has drawn twelve walks this season in 142 plate appearances, or one per 11.83 PAs. This is pretty impressive, considering he drew 32 walks in 672 PAs in 2013 (1BB:21 PAs) and had a career 19.9 PA:BB ratio.
*It has been 24 Plate Appearances since George Springer's last extra-base hit.
*Twelve of Chris Carter's 16 hits this season (yeah, he has 16 hits all season) have been for extra-bases.
*Carter also did not strike out in Saturday or Sunday's game - a span of eight plate appearances. In his 28 games this season, this marks the 4th and 5th games of the season where he has not struck out, and it's the longest span without a strikeout since he went 10 PAs from June 21-23, 2013.
Starters
| Peacock | 6IP | 6H/2ER, 6K:3BB |
| Cosart | 6IP | 5H/2ER, 6K:2BB |
| Keuchel | 6IP | 4H/4ER, 3K:3BB |
| Oberholtzer | 4.2IP | 11H/6ER, 5K:2BB |
| McHugh | 4IP | 8H/5ER, 4K:1BB |
Bullpen
| Williams | 5IP | 3H/2ER, 3K:2BB |
| Clemens | 3.1IP | 2H/1ER, 1K:1BB |
| Bass | 3IP | 1H/1ER, 1K:0BB |
| Cisnero | 2.1IP | 4H/3ER, 3K:2BB |
| Fields | 2IP | 1H/1ER, 1K:3BB |
| Sipp | 1.2IP | 0H/0ER, 2K:0BB |
| Qualls | 1.2IP | 2H/0ER, 3K:1BB |
| Downs | 1IP | 1H/0ER, 1K:0BB |
| Valdes | 0.1IP | 3H/2ER, 0K:0BB |
Notable
*Since blowing open that April 19 game against Oakland, Chad Qualls has made five appearances without allowing a run.
*After allowing 21H/8ER in his first four starts (23.2IP), Brett Oberholtzer has allowed 19H/12ER in his last two starts (8.1IP).
*Since the Disaster Start on April 18 (3H/7ER, 0K:4BB in 0.1IP), Jarred Cosart has allowed 9H/4ER, 10K:5BB in 12.2IP.
*Dallas Keuchel extended a streak of getting 18+ outs to five games. The one time he didn't go at least 6IP was April 5 against the Angels. The Astros are 3-3 in Keuchel's starts.
Pitcher of the Week: Uh. Peacock, I guess.
