6 MLB teams on the brink of collapse in the 2020 season
By Bill Felber
6 MLB teams on the brink of collapse
Houston Astros
The first and most obvious concern is the loss of ace pitcher Gerrit Cole to free agency. Cole went 20-5 with a 2.50 ERA across 33 starts in 2019, so his departure for the Bronx creates an obvious gaping problem.
The Astros’ present plan, obviously subject to change on short notice, is to replace Cole’s performance with some combination of Lance McCullers, Brad Peacock, Jose Urquidi, and Framber Valdez. Beyond that, by the way, they hope the quartet will also fill the team’s No. 4 and 5 starting roles behind Justin Verlander and Zack Greinke.
McCullers is coming back from elbow surgery that cost him all of 2019. The collective 2019 performance of the other three amounted to a 13-14 record and 4.68 ERA in 30 starts. The odds of finding three starters for a pennant winner from among those four? Hey, it’s January, so there’s still hope.
The Astros plan assumes another big season from Verlander. That’s a reasonable presumption, but it glosses over the fact that he will be 37 in 2020, an age at which few pitchers continue to be overpowering.
There are few recent parallels for the expected performance of age 37 pitchers. To the extent you place any faith in projections, Baseball-Reference projects him at 15-7 with a 3.12 ERA in 193 innings. That would be good, but it would still represent six fewer wins, 30 fewer innings and a 20 percent increase in his ERA.
There’s also the matter of the sign-stealing turmoil that has overshadowed the Astros’ off-season. It is a totally fair question of what penalties MLB imposes, and what impact that has on the team’s leadership structure.
Finally, history is against Houston. The Astros are coming off their third consecutive divisional championship. That matches the longest such string in the franchise’s history. The last time Houston won three straight, from 1997 through 1999, they sank to fourth with a 72-90 record the following season. This team has too much talent to fall that hard, but given the numerous uncertainties entering 2020, it would be silly to take a fourth straight division title as a foregone conclusion.