1998 Houston Astros - Best Team to Never Make a World Series?

92' Pirates
98' Braves
98' Astros
01' Mariners
01' A's
04' Yanks

Past 20yrs its hard to pick

 

ugh.. hitchcock..

 

yes...unfortunately K. Brown did what Stockton had done to the Rockets a couple years back I can still remember G. Vaughn hitting that HR off R. Johnson in game 1 and our batters whiffing against Brown over, over, and yet over....The series was over before it began....

 

The 1998 Astros were clearly the best Astros team statistically. I have never felt more sick watching Game 3 & 4 of that series. My stomach hurts just thinking about it.

Personally, however, I was much more fond of the 2001 & 2004 Astros. I know the 1998 Astros hit and played defense better than the 2004 team, I just felt that the 2004 team was built for success in the playoffs. The 2004 team should have won the World Series. If Pettitte had not gone down, Munro does not make 2 NLCS starts. Oh what would have been.....

 

as much as Beltran pissed me off..

that is one of my greatest what-if's.. wish i could know what else Beltran had in store for us that postseason. he was just. insane.

 

Speaking of what would have been.

What if Qualls doesn't give up a grand slam in Game 2 of the WS? Or if Oswalt doesn't melt in Game 3? Or if we would of scored Willy T from third in Game 4 with one out late in the game?

 

Yeah, that and if Clemens could've gotten Albert Pujols and Scott Rolen out that one inning. That pitch that Pujols hit was a crazy golf shot at best and it tied up the game.... We had a chance at game 6 too if not for Dan Miceli.

The 1998 year.... I remember someone asking me to go watch Unit vs Brown, but I was in class. Yes, I remember who it was :grin: Having Brown come back and start game 3 vs Hampton was the dagger. Hampton threw 6 no-hit innings too!! Although he fell behind just about every hitter and you sort of knew that it was just a matter of time. Hoffman was also unbelievable that year. Watching Caminiti hit us hard, and then watching him struggle to swing the bat without pain was just plain awful. That was supposed to be our year. Randy Johnson was phenominal, and I just wish we had what it took to keep him. Billy Spiers and his game winning single in game 2 will also be etched in my mind for years to come. That was huge at the time, after Wagner gave up a game-tying 2-run homer to ... was it Jim Leyritz?

 

and and and... what if we could score in the 8th inning of game 1 when it was 1 out with men on 1st and third and ... Berkman was up, I believe?

We could've won EACH one of those games.

 

Man this thread makes me really sad. Went from 1998, to a sad reminder of many failures

While we're talking about sad Astros what ifs what about the 1986 team. What if we dont give up a homer to dykstra in the 9th of game 3, what if we were able to just grind out that epic game 6 and get to Scott in game 7. etc.. etc..

 

It seems like Brown pitched every game that series.

How come no one has mentioned that 94 team? MVP Bagwell, Cami, Biggio in the infield, Gonzo and Finley in the outfield, Shane, Harnisch, Hampton, Kile as starters, Hudek as closer...

You want to talk about "what if's".... I always thought we really could've made some noise that year if not for the damn strike.

If I remember right, we started getting red hot right before the season ended.

 

Our main roadblock wouldve been the (LOL) Expos. I think the Expos mightve been more stacked than us that year.

 

aside from the fact that Baggy broke his hand about a week before the strike or so?

the strike helped solidify Baggy's amazing season. His #'s would have needed the caveat of "missed ___ games and still did this" otherwise. As it stands, he can be compared to everyone else since the strike killed the season right there

But yeah, things would have been drastically different for the next 6-8 weeks while his hand healed. Would he have even been back for the playoffs? Maybe...even if so, if I remember right, he usually had an adjustment period coming off those broken hands (rightly so--not gripping a bat for a long period would probably be a huge issue)

 

As for the rest of that team.. they were really good. But this is CamiGonzoFinley pre "power surge" (or whatever you want to call it). Reynolds was still improving and Hampton was very young and in the pen. Their names are great, but they weren't there yet

 

Totally forgot about that!

Yeah, I imagine that may have had an effect on the next few months of the season, having your best player out.

The team sure was fun to watch though. It killed me watching Gonzo and Cami have MVP seasons after we traded them...

 

I'd take the 86 Astros over the 98.

 

I was going to throw this in, too. The strike is generally seen as the death of baseball in Montreal. The Expos had the best record in baseball and I believe they had a banner in Olympic Stadium commemorating the record.

 

Oops. Already covered.

Long live the Montreal Expos.

 

'94 was a wild short year in baseball. Bagwell had 116 RBI in 100 games. Matt Williams woulda been the first to get the home run record before McGwire and Sosa. Teams years in rebuilding surged to the top of the rankings. Tony Gwynn had a legitimate shot at hitting .400 (.394 in 110 games). Greg Maddux had 1.56 ERA.

Then other stuff like it being the first year with the wild card but they never got to debuting it. Astros new blue and grey uniforms (still my favorite for some reason).

 

From what I remember of that season, the Astros had a pretty tough time with the Reds as well.

 

Actually, we were only 0.5 games behind them when the season ended. A week before that, we had taken 2 out of 3 from them (on the road) to make us 6-4 against them for the year.

It would have been a fun finish either way, though. No doubt.