Astros Strong Read online

  Carlos Correa cemented himself as a true star in 2017, making his first All-Star team, and batting .315 with 24 homers and 84 RBIs in only 109 games. (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle)

  Correa and Altuve will become the first double-play partners to start for the AL since Robinson Cano and Derek Jeter in 2010, 2011 and 2012. It’s not difficult to envision the Astros’ up-the-middle duo repeating that feat for at least the next two seasons, the last two of Altuve’s current contract.

  “It’s really special to share the field again with Altuve, a guy I’ve learned so much from and a guy that makes me better every single day just by playing next to him and watching the way he works,” Correa said. “It’s going to be really special to share the field in the All-Star Game with him.”

  McCullers has been a teammate of Correa for all but a matter of days since the Astros made the two of them their top two picks in general manager Jeff Luhnow’s first draft rebuilding the team. They advanced through the minor leagues together and debuted in the majors within a month of one another in 2015.

  “Every year that I’ve played with Carlos, from 2012, I’ve been able to see him not only take steps (but) like leaps and bounds to become that player that everyone thinks he can become and will become,” McCullers said. “He is that player right now.”

  As a kid in Puerto Rico, Correa watched the All-Star Game every summer and dreamed of eventually playing in it. He said he also dreamed of attending a Home Run Derby, which he did Monday night. He watched alongside Lindor from the area in front of the first-base dugout with the rest of the AL All-Stars.

  “It’s surreal,” he had said earlier of his first All-Star experience. “It’s something that will be with me for the rest of my life, to be able to be here in my first All-Star Game, start at shortstop for the American League, and be able to share this special moment with my family.”

  Correa slides safely home off of a hit by Yuli Gurriel during Game 1 of the ALCS, a 2-1 Astros win. (Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle)

  Houston Strong

  Astros Put City, Victims Front and Center in Sweeping Mets

  By David Barron • September 3, 2017

  The 1969 Astros were jesting as they sang pitcher Larry Dierker’s ditty about their slapdash squad, “It Makes a Fellow Proud to Be an Astro.”

  Against the Mets at Minute Maid Park, the day’s emotions were expressed by a uniform patch with the team logo, an outline of Texas and the word “Strong.”

  It’s a public expression of the genuine pride the 2017 Astros have this season and beyond for their wounded city.

  In their post-Hurricane Harvey return to downtown Houston, Josh Reddick and Marwin Gonzalez had RBI singles and scored during a four-run sixth inning, lifting the Astros to a 4-1 win over the Mets in the nightcap of the first Houston doubleheader since 1999 at the Astrodome.

  In the opener, the Astros pounded out 17 hits in a 12-8 win before a crowd that included evacuees, volunteer relief workers and first responders.

  Reminders of Hurricane Harvey’s toll were everywhere to be seen. Players wore the new uniform patch, and pitcher Joe Musgrove threw 2 1/3 innings of two-hit relief work in the nightcap wearing shoes autographed by young evacuees he met at the George R. Brown Convention Center.

  The Astros wore their emotions on their sleeves, too. Manager A.J. Hinch told the crowd, “Stay strong, be strong, go ‘Stros,” and outfielder George Springer pointed to the “Strong” logo on his chest after hitting a two-run home run in the opener.

  “There are thousands of people who don’t have homes, don’t have belongings, and they are rallying around us,” Springer said. “And it’s our job as the sports team to do anything we can ... to provide anybody with some sense of relief, some sense of break.”

  It was an emotional weekend of baseball back at Minute Maid Park as the recovery from Hurricane Harvey was just beginning. (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle)

  The Astros chipped away in the nightcap, trailing 1-0 through five against Mets starter Seth Lugo (5-4) before tying it on base hits by Alex Bregman and Reddick, sandwiching a walk to Jose Altuve, and taking the lead when Altuve beat the throw home on Gonzalez’s single to right.

  Reddick scored on a groudout by Brian McCann, and Gonzalez went from first to third on the play and scored on J.D. Davis’ sacrifice fly.

  Musgrove and closer Ken Giles shut down the Mets the rest of the way, and Musgrove said he drew strength from footwear and fans.

  “We felt like we were carrying everybody in our hearts,” Musgrove said. “Having the shoes on my feet is a constant reminder of what some people are going through and how fortunate we are.

  “It was a special day for everybody, and we were glad to pull out both wins for the fans.”

  In the opener, the Astros exploded off Mets starter Matt Harvey for seven runs in two innings and got an effective starting job from Charlie Morton (11-6), who allowed six hits and struck out nine in five innings.

  “You want the game to lift people up. You want to do right for the city,” said Morton, one of 16 players who visited evacuees Friday.

  “I’m really proud to be an Astro. I’m really proud to be a small part of this city and this community.”

  Springer had two hits with a home run, two RBIs and two runs scored in the opener. Altuve had three hits with three runs scored and an RBI and Gonzalez and Reddick each drove in two runs.

  Harvey (4-4), just off the disabled list with a stress injury to his right shoulder, had the shortest start of his career, allowing seven earned runs on eight hits in two innings.

  Houston mayor Sylvester Turner shakes hands with first responders before throwing out the first pitch prior to the start of the Astros’ game against the Mets. It was the first professional sporting event in the city since Hurricane Harvey. (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle)

  “Playing the game, that is what we do,” Hinch said. “We were ready to play. We can separate everything leading up to today after the first pitch. Seven runs in the first two innings, a manager will never complain about that.”

  Houston sent eight to the plate in the first inning, highlighted by Gonzalez’s two run double. Springer’s two-run homer came in the second, and Reddick had a two-run base hit in the fourth, followed by Davis’ solo home run.

  Morton was touched up only for a two-run homer by the Mets’ Dominic Smith in the fourth. The bullpen struggled once more, capped by a five-run seventh inning that included a grand slam by Wilmer Flores, but the Astros added two in the seventh, including a RBI single by Tony Kemp.

  The Astros will depart after the series finale for a road trip that will include the debut of Justin Verlander, who arrived in Houston during the first game, threw a bullpen session between games and received one of the day’s biggest ovations when the El Grande video screen briefly showed him in the Astros dugout.

  Verlander joins a team that has struggled of late but still has the best record in the American League, clinched their third consecutive winning season with the sweep of the Mets and now has a new source of inspiration.

  “I want so badly to do well for these people, and I want our team to do well for our people,” Springer said.

  Springer was asked at what point when he was rounding the bases after his homer he started thinking about Hurricane Harvey’s flood victims.

  “I haven’t stopped,” he replied.

  Justin Verlander

  35 | Starting Pitcher

  Trade Secrets

  Inside the Final Hours that Brought Justin Verlander to the Astros

  By Jake Kaplan • September 17, 2017

  On the morning of Aug. 31, the day he would make the hardest decision of his baseball life, Justin Verlander woke up not expecting anything to happen.

  The face of the Detroit Tigers for more than a decade, Verlander figured he would finish his 13th major league season with the only
team for which he’d ever pitched. Before the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline, the Tigers had dealt outfielder J.D. Martinez, catcher Alex Avila and relief pitcher Justin Wilson. It seemed like any other significant moves would wait until winter.

  Aug. 31 represented the final day teams could acquire players and have them eligible for inclusion on their postseason rosters. If Verlander wasn’t traded before 11 p.m. Central, he would simply finish out his season with Detroit. The rumor mill would calm until November.

  Little did Verlander know that he would be pacing around his living room with less than 45 minutes to decide where he would pitch the remainder of this season and the next two. The 34-year-old righthander says he doesn’t like to make any decision rashly. This situation would render it nearly impossible not to.

  “(Tigers general manager Al Avila) had talked to me a lot throughout the process, and I knew that the Astros had contacted and were probably the most serious threat,” Verlander would say a week later when recounting the frenzy of that night. “But still, it was never presented to me in a way that made me think that something was actually going to happen.

  “So I just never really thought about it. That was my only way to continue to go about my job in Detroit. If I’m going to heavily think about (trade possibilities), then I’m not going to be doing my job on the mound. It was just kind of background noise until all of a sudden.”

  All of a sudden, a potential Hall of Fame pitcher was tasked with a career-altering decision, one that signaled the official end of an era for the team with which he will always be synonymous and injected him into a pennant race for another, one that had the former MVP and Cy Young Award winner donning a new uniform just two days later.

  Seventeen days later, Verlander will make his first home start for the Astros. Sunday afternoon’s series finale against the Seattle Mariners will be the Minute Maid Park faithful’s first opportunity to watch the man whose addition not only improved the Astros’ odds to win in the postseason but helped lift a city recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Harvey.

  Justin Verlander was one of the best pitchers in baseball during his tenure with the Tigers, earning a Cy Young Award, MVP, Rookie of the Year Award and six All-Star selections. (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle)

  All because of a late-night Aug. 31 blockbuster that came down to the final seconds.

  Verlander was home that day at his apartment in the Detroit suburb of Birmingham. It was a Thursday, and the Tigers were off. He had pitched the day before, throwing six innings of one-run ball at Colorado’s Coors Field, the latest outing in a resurgent second half. It would come to signify the last of his 380 regular-season starts sporting the old English D.

  In the afternoon, word of a move that would set in motion the events of the evening popped on Verlander’s radar via social media. Seemingly out of nowhere, the Tigers had traded All-Star outfielder Justin Upton to the Los Angeles Angels. Verlander sent a text message to Avila, the Tigers’ GM, to gauge where things stood for him.

  Talks were ongoing, he was told, but no deal was probable. So Verlander continued to go about his off day.

  On the other side of the country, Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow went through countless waves of increasing optimism and growing pessimism.

  By Aug. 31, he had been in the Los Angeles area for a week, unable to fly back to Houston after a series the Astros played in Anaheim the same weekend Harvey made landfall. Luhnow’s wife’s parents live in L.A., so on that Thursday morning he set up shop at the dining room table of his in-laws’ Brentwood home.

  Luhnow and Avila had ongoing negotiations preceding the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline, a day after which Luhnow was widely criticized for his failure to execute a significant deal. At one point on Aug. 30, Luhnow felt pretty confident a deal for Verlander would get done. By day’s end, he considered the probability pretty low.

  On the morning of the 31st, Luhnow had another deadline to tend to first. The claim the Astros had won two days earlier on Los Angeles Angels outfielder Cameron Maybin was set to expire late in the morning Pacific time, and the teams had yet to work out a deal.

  With minutes remaining before the claim expired, the Angels agreed to send Maybin to the Astros as long as they took on the roughly $1.5 million left on his $9 million salary for this year.

  Having spent his entire career with the Tigers, Verlander was reluctant to leave Detroit, but it turned out to be a championship-caliber decision for him and the Astros. (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle)

  Luhnow didn’t know at the time the Angels agreed to part with Maybin because they had acquired Upton from the Tigers, a deal that would in turn help facilitate the Verlander trade. At the time of the Astros’ Maybin acquisition, Luhnow said, he didn’t think they would land Verlander.

  Luhnow’s wife, Gina, had made a dinner reservation for that evening at 8:15. With 45 minutes until the deadline, Luhnow figured, the Astros would have either made a trade or know negotiations were dead.

  “I woke up probably pretty pessimistic that anything would happen,” Luhnow said. “At one point early in the morning California time, I became much more optimistic. Then it waned again, and I became pessimistic. That cycle continued about every couple of hours, and sometimes there were just minutes between cycles. It was pretty intense.

  “Knowing that the clock was ticking all along and recognizing that we had a lot of pieces to put in place even if there was agreement, it started to get pretty stressful I’d say around 6 p.m. Pacific time.”

  At 6 p.m. Pacific, Luhnow oddly enough found himself at the “Bad News Bears Field” in West L.A., where he had promised his 11-year-old nephew he would watch his Little League practice. His nephew’s coach asked Luhnow to speak to the team. All the while, the GM was in the middle of negotiations for one of the biggest trades in Astros history.

  “The whole thing was a little surreal,” Luhnow said. “I’m at a Little League practice with 11-year-olds, giving them a talk about how to practice. Meanwhile, this deal’s going on in the background.”

  Negotiations between the Astros and Tigers had intensified in August, a month in which Verlander reeled off strong start after strong start and the first-place Astros struggled. The Detroit ace cleared trade waivers early in the month, an expected formality given the $56 million in guaranteed money he’s owed over the 2018 and 2019 seasons.

  Through July, Verlander had a 4.29 ERA in 22 starts. By August’s end, he had improved it to 3.82. He had also dominated the major league-leading Los Angeles Dodgers for eight innings of one-run, two-hit ball on Aug. 20. The Astros, meanwhile, played their worst in August, an 11-17 slog on the heels of their relative inactivity – they did acquire lefthander Francisco Liriano from the Toronto Blue Jays – at the July 31 trade deadline.

  In addition to the Astros and Tigers needing to find common ground on a prospect package, they had to agree on how to divvy the rest of Verlander’s contract. According to people familiar with the negotiations but not authorized to speak publicly, the Astros earlier in August offered to pay $18 million annually of the $28 million Verlander will make in 2018 and 2019. That was $2 million below Detroit’s asking price.

  Verlander was spectacular in his five regular-season starts with the Astros, winning all five games and striking out 43 in 34 innings, with a 1.06 ERA. (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle)

  The Astros later conceded to paying $19 million per year. When on Aug. 31 Luhnow and Avila agreed to the prospect package the Astros would send the Tigers – highly touted 19-year-old righthander Franklin Perez, outfielder Daz Cameron and catcher Jake Rogers – Astros owner Jim Crane gave the go-ahead for the final $1 million needed to meet the Tigers’ ask.

  Luhnow was back at his in-laws’ house getting ready for dinner when he and Avila agreed the deal was done. But then came the uncertainty over whether Verlander, who has full no-trade rights, would say yes. Luhnow asked his wife to push t
heir dinner reservation to 9:00 or 9:15 p.m. Pacific.

  Back in Michigan, Verlander and fiancée Kate Upton had gone for a late dinner at about 9:30 p.m. Eastern, still not expecting a trade. But as they made the roughly five-minute walk home from The Bird & The Bread restaurant at about 11:20, Verlander’s phone rang. It was Avila.

  “And then I had to make the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make in baseball,” Verlander said.

  Verlander’s conversation with Avila was brief. The gist: There was a deal in place, and the pitcher had to decide if he would accept. Once back at his apartment, Verlander began making calls, many of them back and forth with his agent, Mark Pieper.

  “Given that period of time, I just wanted to get as much information as I could, whatever it was,” Verlander recounted in an interview with the Houston Chronicle. “‘What are we talking about in two years? What are we talking about right now? What’s the locker room like? What are these guys like? What’s the town like? … There was just a hurricane there. Obviously, they’re in bad shape as a city. What’s that like? Can I live somewhere?’ Stuff I hadn’t even thought of. I was just trying to weigh all of that.”

  Within this short window of time, Verlander received a call from Astros ace Dallas Keuchel, who had heard the trade rumblings while back at his apartment in Houston. The Astros had landed in Houston earlier that evening after playing the last of their three “home” games against the Texas Rangers in St. Petersburg, Fla. It was their first night home since Harvey hit.