2021 Spring Training

Most of the industry might not have noticed Altuve’s gaffe. But officials in Houston did. And many of them were not surprised.

Even as Altuve was winning the AL MVP award at second base in 2017, the Astros were thinking of moving him off the position, according to three people familiar with the discussions. Altuve had won a Gold Glove there two years earlier, but newly available Statcast data now indicated that he struggled moving laterally—that he was, in fact, the worst second baseman in the game at going to his left. But he excelled at coming in on balls and he had good speed. Then GM Jeff Luhnow’s front office discussed moving him to centerfield. Utilityman Marwin González would handle second, centerfielder George Springer would shift to right and rightfielder Josh Reddick would lose playing time. They came close enough that Reddick showed up to the following spring training with a first baseman’s glove. Eventually the coaching staff convinced Luhnow that demoting the unofficial team captain would upset the rest of the players, and Luhnow shelved the plan. (Luhnow did not respond to a request for comment.)

Those conversations continued on and off for the next two years, in part because of the way Houston deployed its personnel. Since 2016, when Statcast began tracking such things, no other team has employed a defensive shift as often as the Astros, who used one in nearly half of plate appearances in ’19 and ’20. The reshuffling asks a great deal of all infielders, but perhaps no one is more affected than the second baseman. Altuve plays second because he lacks the arm strength to play shortstop. Yet when the team shifts against righties, there is Altuve, trotting over to the third base side of second base; when it shifts against lefties, he is stationed in medium-depth rightfield.

He never felt entirely comfortable making throws from a shifted position, according to two people who know him well. But the Astros saw his anxiety as unfounded and believed it could be overcome. The best way to conquer a fear of flying is to keep boarding planes. They wanted their second baseman playing at shortstop against righties and in short right against lefties. So they framed the request as, We need you to do this for the team, and Altuve complied. Still, opposing scouts included the weakness in their reports: In a big spot, they told their hitters, challenge his arm.

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The team's office space looks out onto Minute Maid Field, so officials monitored Altuve's work. What they saw quieted any conversation of moving him. The Astros checked in on free-agent second baseman DJ LeMahieu, according to three people familiar with the talks, but a person with knowledge of those talks says they were more about LeMahieu than about Altuve: If you have a chance to nab a perennial MVP candidate, you take it, and figure the rest out later.

Baker insists they never seriously considered moving Altuve this offseason. “I didn’t even go down the road,” Baker says. “That road never even opened up. There was no gate to the road.”

Altuve says he never worried that the team would relocate him. He always believed he would be able to heal what ailed him. He looks back on those emotions from October as if they belonged to someone else. “It’s hard to remember,” he says, then explains: “Everybody that wants to do their job, they want to do it right. So when something goes wrong, it doesn't feel really good, but I think the key for me is to move on. Every year, it doesn't matter if I play really good or really bad; I try to get to spring training with my mind clear, and I think that's what has been working for me. So that's why it's kind of hard to remember exactly how I felt and what was going on in the moment.”

He does not call what happened to him the yips. He also does not attribute it solely to his body. “I don't know,” he says. “That's a good question. Probably a little bit of both. I mean, I felt good physically and mentally. But, you know, sometimes things happen.”

That particular thing is over, he says. He feels good. He believes the game will be fun again. He knows opposing fans, allowed back into ballparks, will jeer him, but he says he will feed off that energy. He is ready to play with intensity and bring a championship back to Houston.

Scouts agree: He has looked good this spring. He may indeed be fixed. But we won’t know for sure until the games count. Many sufferers of the yips feel fine on back fields or during exhibitions. On Opening Day or shortly thereafter, a groundball will head toward his glove. He will point his front shoulder at his target. He will find his four-seam grip. He will open his hips. And he will release the ball.