Houston Astros: Francis Martes needs to pitch sometime today

The Houston Astros have finally made the inevitable a reality with the calling up of the franchise’s No. 1 prospect from Triple-A Fresno.

Who am I blabbing about today? I’m talking about Francis Martes, the Houston Astros right-armed hurler that is considered one of the best young pitching talents in today’s game.  Although I thought it’d be a lot later on in the season, things are so dire on the pitching rotation front, we need a steady, talented and fresh arm to get us through the bottom-end of the rotation until we get our main guys back.

As you probably know by now, Dallas Keuchel is going back to the DL with continued issues with his neck, Charlie Morton is still deciding when to throw once again and Joe Musgrove will hopefully be ready by Monday.  That’s a lot of uncertainty in a pitching rotation that is counted upon to help us get W’s left and right.

So what have the Houston Astros done since?  They’ve relied on their top-notch farm system to help them get through the tough times.  The Houston Astros have called up Ashur Tolliver, Reymin Guduan, David Paulino, Dayan Diaz and now finally Martes to help with the rotation.  As it stands, the rotation will feature Brad Peacock tonight, Mike Fiers tomorrow and Paulino this Sunday.  We all know that Peacock can’t go too long, especially when his pitch counts starts scraping the bottom of 70.

Here’s what I propose.  Get Martes in there as soon possible as if it were yesterday.  Although he did warm up last night to possibly finish the bottom the nine along with Chris Devenski, Devo ultimately chosen to the get final three outs to win the game.  It only took him eight pitches to do and with the uncertainty that Martes would’ve brought if he had been trotted out, wouldn’t have emanated the ultimate objective of winning the baseball game.

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We need to see what he has so we’ll know if he could be a valuable part of the rotation in the future or be packaged in a deal to go get a veteran arm later in the summer before the deadline.  Seriously, how bad could it be?  I think Martes has been waiting for this moment all his life and he won’t disappoint.

So when Peacock starts to melt possibly through five innings, A.J. Hinch should certainly consider calling Martes from the pen to go long for this team.  I honestly don’t think he’ll regret it.

His numbers haven’t been all that impressive this season — he has posted a 5.29 ERA with 38 strikeouts, 19 earned runs and a 2.10 WHIP through 32.1 innings pitched in eight starts for the Grizzlies.

But it’s time for a new chapter so who knows how he’ll perform now the page has been turned.

Go Astros.