Postseason Push Check-In: Seattle Mariners & Houston Astros | The Bandwagon
Yahoo Sports MLB writers Hannah Keyser and Zach Crizer hop on The Bandwagon to discuss whether the Seattle Mariners and the Houston Astros have lived up to their preseason expectations, and debate what their prospects are for the last month of the season.
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Video Transcript
[MUSIC PLAYING]
HANNAH KEYSER: Mariners, you put them at expectations. Not surprising in either direction, as expected, the Seattle Mariners.
ZACH CRIZER: Yes.
HANNAH KEYSER: I kind of am surprised. They're really good. I was worried.
ZACH CRIZER: They've been really good recently. They were not good at all for like the first three months.
HANNAH KEYSER: They have generally not been doing it with hitting. But lately, they've been doing it with hitting. And even yesterday, when Julio Rodríguez didn't play, they won 14 to 2. And Zach, tell the people what Julio has been doing.
ZACH CRIZER: Everything. He's been doing everything. He rates as one of the top defensive outfielders in baseball. He's stealing. He already has 33 stolen bases. And for the last week, he's been getting a hit every time he goes to the plate. He had 21 hits in a week, which is a lot. He had four games in a row with 4-plus hits, which was the first time anyone had done that since 1925.
And if he continues to just play like that-- not 21 hits a week, but at the general level he played last year. JP Crawford is playing well. And if they can just get something from the rest of the lineup-- Cal Raleigh and Eugenio Suárez have been homering recently-- that should be enough. They have so many good pitchers. They should be a terror.
HANNAH KEYSER: Now we have the Astros, who you wanted to say were at expectations. And I think--
ZACH CRIZER: No.
HANNAH KEYSER: No, wait.
ZACH CRIZER: I wanted to say below.
HANNAH KEYSER: Oh, and I wanted to say they were at expectations? I should know that's what I wanted to say.
ZACH CRIZER: You did earlier.
HANNAH KEYSER: All right. What did I say? Do you remember? Was it smart?
[LAUGHTER]
ZACH CRIZER: You said that they were in the playoffs and that they have been really good since they got healthy, which is true.
HANNAH KEYSER: Oh, that is true. They're only a game and a half back. I guess it's that do you-- well, all right, so we're going to lump these two together. The Rangers are definitely--
ZACH CRIZER: They're super way ahead.
HANNAH KEYSER: They're super way above.
ZACH CRIZER: Way better than expectations.
HANNAH KEYSER: Yes. So the question is, the logic question is, if the Rangers are way overperforming and are only 1 and 1/2 games above the Astros, does that mean, by definition that the Astros are disappointing because we expected them to be better than the Rangers? Or that they're probably just at expectations, and the other team is the one that is doing the extreme thing? I think that was my argument was that like--
ZACH CRIZER: The Astros are the final boss of baseball. They do not get to be at expectations unless they are winning the division by a mile, clear World Series favorites. Anything less than that is disappointing for the Astros. That's it, to me.
HANNAH KEYSER: They did really win the division by a mile last year, didn't they?
ZACH CRIZER: Yes.
HANNAH KEYSER: AL West standings, it was like they were-- oh, my gosh, yes. They won the division last year by 16 games. That is-- this division is so different than it was last year. All right, fine, the Astros are a little bit of a disappointment. That was a huge-- wow, all right. That was a big difference.