Astros wRC+ rank by position: C 25th 1B 14th 2B 26th SS 9th 3B 7th RF 16th CF 22nd LF 24th DH 1st Yainer and Altuve getting back on track would go a long way to fixing the offense. Cobbling together a platoon in CF and LF would be the next priority. As bad as the injuries have been at SP, losing Loperfido early on then immediately losing Wade was a meaningful setback to the offense. Dezenzo didn't meet the moment; he's gotten the most pa in LF and posted a paltry 70 wRC+. Outside of Wade, the smattering of LF has been bloody awful, with all of Loperfido, Matthews, Harris, Cole, and Trammell posting wRC+ below 65 as LF. I'm a little surprised Trammell/Meyers haven't been able to produce more given they should be complimentary offensively; I think this is mostly because Matthews has taken a lot of the pa in CF that might've otherwise gone to Trammell. Meyers has a 12 wRC+ against LHP this season against his career mark of 102 (he's actually hitting quite well against RHP by his standard with a 91 wRC+). Trammell has hit pretty well against RHP (wRC+ 104 against a career mark of 95). Trammell has a wRC+ of 135 as a CF so maybe there's something to that. I'd like to see him get a stretch as the CF against RHP for awhile. Matthews is 170 pa into the season with pretty regular playing time and it isn't working; I would send him down.
The biggest issue I have with the lineup (and there are a few) is that Joe Espada manages the lineup like he has 9 Yordan Alvarez's Despite having as much team speed (Cam, Pena, Loperfido, Matthews, Meyers, Dezenzo, Altuve, Shewmake, and Cole all 60th percentile or better) than it has had in years only the SF Giants have stolen fewer bases. Outside of forces the Astros have only been thrown out at 3B three times and home five times all season. Obviously I don't want anyone getting out, but at some point if it doesn't happen its because you are taking too few risks. Do you know why? Because they are a station to station team that takes very very few chances on the bases. For the 2026 Astros, the bottom half of the lineup is usually the OF and C. Astros C .607 OPS ( .676 league average) Astros LF ..619 ( .731 league average) Astros CF .597 ( .685 league average) Astros RF .675 ( .729 league average) Thats too many lineup positions, especially consecutive ones, to consistently score runs. There is a huge difference between the "haves" and "have nots" on this team. I think using the speed from guys like Cam, Loperfido, Meyers, Matthews, Dezenzo, Shewmake, and Cole is the only way they will get enough production from the bottom half of this lineup. Until there are some upgrades at those positions this needs to happen.
i had such a nice break from astros terrorist baseball yesterday with the world cup. i guess back to astros terrorist baseball today
You're right that they need the fast guys to run more. But honestly they have few opportunities with how rarely they get on base. Matthews has a .254 OBP. Cam is at .309. Meyers .275. The rest of those guys have fewer than 100 ABs and also generally suck at reaching 1st base, which is a prerequisite to stealing 2nd. Joey's the only one who appears to be both fast and able to get on base at a decent rate, and he seems to have stopped running back in 2023.
