The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Brian McTaggart Talks About The Astros Struggling Offense

Episode Date: April 10, 2025

Brian McTaggart Talks About The Astros Struggling Offense 

All right, it is 1101 in H-Town. Welcome to hour number two of the Matt Thomas show at Ross. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Time for us to spend 12 quality minutes with our good friend, the one and only Brian McTaggart. Brian, the last time I saw you, we were on the Riverwalk and joined life, breaking bread, getting ready for the big event.

How has your life been in the last 36 hours? Yeah, probably a lot like yours. A bummer. just, you know, thinking back on the game and this could have happened and this could have happened. And, yeah, it stinks, doesn't it, just to get that close and not make it? And, yeah, just a bummer. So how did you handle the post when all the confetti? Do you leave the same as fast as humanly possible?

Are you stuck because of 30,000 people trying to leave it one time? Yeah, I got out there so quick when the confetti popped and I heard all we do is win-win, that song or whatever. I said, we out of here, and I walked out of there so fast, and I walked downtown. I wasn't even staying downtown, so I had to Uber back to my hotel. I had no idea where I was going, and luckily I found an Irish bar and comforted myself for a couple hours. All right. So at least you got to put... I went to a Denny's and had chicken fried steak lathered in cream gravy until like 1250 in the morning.

There you go. It is what it is. All right, let's get to some baseball. Obviously, you've been home and you will be rejoining the coverage Friday of the Angels in town. Five nothing, no matter what the scenario is, you got to hold that. That's a stinging loss. Tell me as you are now approached two weeks into the season, two plus weeks, kind of the state of things. First, is bullpen usage the concern for you right now?

Is it bullpen accuracy? It could be a little bit of both. where are you right now on where do you think Joe's trust factor is? Again, saying what you want to say here, they also won a game going 12 innings, and you have to have your bullpen net. So maybe we're just catching them on a bad day, obviously, when you lose a 5-0-0 lead.

Yeah, I mean, you're coming off, you know, the worst loss of the season out of only 12, but they did that, you know, if you're looking at it, glass full, they had a 3-3 road trip, so, you know, you take that. But, yeah, the chance to have a 4-2 road trip was right there. You know, I think coming into the season, And I think I told you that, you know, I thought the biggest issue was probably going to be the bullpen.

And the bullpen had been pretty good up until yesterday. And, yeah, I mean, Hater was down because with Erigetti being out and now you had a short start from Blanco, you're having to use guys more. You're already behind the eight balls a little bit in usage. So they really need the off day to reset things. It's kind of early for that to be happening, but that's the reality. And they're already doing some bullpen shuffling, but, you know, Contreras can. came in and loaded the bases right away. And then, you know, O'Kert, who's been really good, you know, you're asking him just to, you know, put out a four alarms fire at that point.

And, you know, that's really tough to do. And the Brayew ones, the head scratcher, because that's where you're going to need him sometimes to close games like that, but you're going to need him in the eighth inning. And, you know, he can't come out there and just not command his pitches and allow them to, you know, to win the game like that. So that's got to be, you know, troublesome. them still early. I mean, Braves pitched the six games. He's got, you know, what, a five plus ERA. Got to clean that up a little bit.

You know, still, the offense still looks like a big issue as well with, you know, several guys in the lineup just not hitting. But again, still really early. And they're, you know, they're five and seven. They're better off than they were at this point last year. But certainly there's some issues with this team.

Yeah, still. And the key is still early. And look, every team can turn it up, or it could be a season long problem. We don't have a crystal ball in front of us here on that. But was there any signs about a Brayu? Look, we spent a lot of the off season talking about. Got to make sure his appearance count is reduced from a year ago. Was there any signs in spring training that said, all right,

the great Brian of Brayu that was a part of last year maybe isn't on the plane just yet coming to Texas? Well, I mean, you know, it's really hard to tell in spring with, you know, especially veteran guys who are established like him. always working on things. They're not necessarily going out there and trying to blow guys away and get out. So, I mean, he looked pretty good in the spring, but, you know, they've played 12 games. He's pitched six. So, you know, you're right back at that, you know, 80-81 game pace that they wanted to try to avoid.

And they haven't been able to do that so far in the first couple of weeks of the season. But he's walked six guys in five in the third innings. I mean, that's just, that just can't continue. And so he's just whatever the control issues are, he's got to rein that in. of strikeout stuff, elite stuff, but the walks are just killing them right now. And so that's got to be corrected. But, you know, Lewis Contreras has watched five guys and six innings. And, you know, he's not a guy they're counting on as much as a brayu.

But I think we're just going to see a lot of shuffling in this bullpen. But they need the back-end guys, Hater, who's been really good, a brayu, and then, maybe Brian King's your seventh inning guy. They need those guys to step up and be consistent because I think we're going to see a lot of shuffling and inconsistency behind them. I imagine we agree, Brian, that at the end of the day, whoever's gone out there has to get the job done and that didn't happen yesterday.

But just in the moment of the decision making of Joe Espada, how have you been feeling about the way things have been handled? I can't take qualms with anything he's done. I mean, I think they knew coming in. The bullpen was probably not their strength. And you can only call on the guys you have down there to bring out there and go out there and pitch. I mean, losing Araggetti, you know, that was a big key piece of the rotation,

so they're going to have to, you know, fill that now. But I think as far as the bullpen decisions in his lineup, I mean, this is not a team that's five and seven because anything the manager has done. It's just because they haven't hit and some of their key relievers haven't gotten out at key times. I mean, that's it. The starting pitch has been pretty good for the most part. But, I mean, it's, you know, I'm not going to sit here and watching these games.

I haven't seen anything where I'm like, oh, you know, what is Joe doing? I mean, he's doing everything he can at this point to try to put them in position to win. And look, yesterday they were four outs away from a four-and-two road trip and the bullpen imploded. So, I mean, that's certainly not on him. Brian McTaggart with us here on Sports Talk 790. Let's go to the offense side. We know that it will turn at some point. They are last in the majors in Team OPS.

but I guess the question remains, how much will it turn to where we were hoping for, you know, 40 plus bombs from Yoron? We're hoping for Jeremy Payne and have the best offensive year of his career. And I just, it's kind of in the balance of how close to those types of aspirations we had will get. Yeah, I mean, I think they're last in slugging. I think they're 26 and runs, last in doubles. It's just across the board. I mean, Payne had a really, really good spring. just from start to finish.

I mean, he looked like a guy who was just ready to come out and have his best season. Still could, but, you know, 12 games in, he's got a 635 OPS. You know, Alvarez is the one they've got to get going. I mean, they cannot win if Alvarez is hitting 195 with a 600 OPS with one homer every two weeks. It's just, they cannot get it done. Yoner Diaz is another one. He has two hits and 33 bats. I mean, just he's a guy that hits in the middle of the lineup.

and it's just just killing them right now. So Paredes has been okay, you know, not bad. Brendan Rogers has been, you know, okay. Altuvae's been Altuvei, of course. I think Christian Walker, another guy who has to get it turned around a little bit. I mean, there's three key bats, Diaz, Walker, and Alvarez that are just not getting it done right now. That is the reason they're at where they're at, yes, and they can turn this around with one big weekend and everyone's back on track. Cam Smith, book out on him a little bit.

You know, he's coming around a little bit. the bats look a little bit better, but you really weren't, you know, you didn't know really what you're going to get from him, but those key big three bats in the middle have to get going. Brian McTaggart, MLB.com with us here on Sports Talk 790. I want to go back to

the bullpen for a second, not necessarily the group, but the Montero trade to Atlanta. Do you think in your mind this has been in works for a while that maybe a change of scenery would be better to get something back in return, get a little bit of financial savings on that? Where do you

you think that Dana said, you know what, it'd be best served if we moved him somewhere else? My guess is they've been trying to do it for a while. I mean, if you look at the moves they've made over the last few months, I mean, this team's in a little bit of a penny-pinching mode. I mean, they traded it, you know, Presley for, you know, financial reasons and Tucker because they knew they wouldn't resign him. So it only makes sense that Montero, a guy making the money he's making, 11 plus million would be on the market as well.

Maybe, you know, some teams wanted to wait to see how he did to start the year. But certainly this was, you know, made to, you know, a reliever I think they can do without who is expendable. The Braves can pay some money and they, you know, they can call up somebody else like Benet-Souza who might be able to do, you know, a better job than the Montero. So I think it was all, you know, financially driven. They're just trying to save as much as they can. I mean, I think they'll have a lot more payroll flexibility of this year, but they're just

in penny pension mode right now. And I say that, they still have. they still have a top five payroll penny pinching modes relative here for what the Astros do. It's not like they have a small payroll, but they're trying to avoid going over the luxury tax. And next year they'll have a lot more money to do some things. But that's just kind of the reality they're in right now. Any surprise about the amount of second base that Jose Al-Tuvae has played? That he hasn't played?

No, because Joe's never really said he's going to play this much or this much. I thought he might play once a week. I don't know how many as he started out there. Two or three maybe. So, you know, Brandon Rogers is doing a pretty nice job out there. Not only defensively, but with the bat, but Joe's been hesitant to say

exactly how he's going to split that playing time between left field and second. And maybe he really doesn't know. It's just going to have to be on matchups and parks are playing in and everything. And maybe there is something to, you know, maybe we should play him a little bit more at second base, but they seem still committed to him being the

every day left fielder out there. And then, you know, as long as he's hitting, you know, you get him in the bat in there somewhere because he's the one bright spot in this lineup. And that, you know, he's Jose Al-too, but he shouldn't be surprised. Yeah. All right. And look, let's go glass-half to wrap this up. As many things as there have been with bullpen issues and lineup being, you know, bottom

in OPS, it's five and seven. I mean, if you were not a consumer of Astros baseball and you listen to a conversation, among fans, and maybe to a certain extent this visit, you'd think this team was two and ten so far, and that's not the case. They, you know, it could be a lot worse. It really could be. And starting pitching for the most part, it's been pretty good. The bullpen did do its job in that 12th inning game.

And you know what, Jose Al-Tubei, even though the left field experiment has been a little bit of a mixed back so far, and it's probably always going to be that way, is tearing the cover off the ball right now. Yeah, you're right. It's five and seven. I mean, you look back at Astro starts the last 10 years. I mean, you know, it's not uncommon for them to be, you know, floundering around 500 after two weeks still trying to fill things out. I guess, you know, going back to the three main guys, I was talking about Walker Diaz and Albert.

I mean, those guys are going to come around. I mean, they're not going to put up these numbers forever. They are going to play better at some point. So you're right. It does feel like they're two in ten and doom and gloom. But they're five and seven with, you know, 140 plus games to go and a chance for, you know, still to do plenty of damage. are in a way worse situation than they were last year. But I know it's frustrating for Astros fans who all they hear all spring training are positive things.

And we're going to do this and that. And, you know, they come out and get off a little bit of a slow start. Look around the league. I mean, there's a lot of teams right around where they're at. And this thing will sort of itself out here in the next few weeks. We'll get a better idea where they're out. Good stuff. It's always, Tag.

Talk to you next week. Thank you for the visit, as always. All right, guys. See you. Yes, Brian McTaggart, MLB.com. 14 here on the Matt Thomas show at Ross coming up at the bottom of the hour.