Houston Astros: Team made riskiest move of all by not making big move

The Houston Astros were in talks to make many trades for a variety of pitchers. But as the trade deadline came and went, the front office decided their team overall is good enough to win the World Series and only needed a small improvement adding a left handed arm to the bullpen in the form of Francisco Liriano.

The Houston Astros decision to pretty much stand pat at the trade deadline comes with an increased risk of not winning a World Series championship. Especially considering the second place team in the American League (The New York Yankees at the time of this writing) made plenty of bold moves to bolster their current roster.

Should the New York Yankees and Houston Astros meet in the American League Championship series, it will be interesting to look back on this trade deadline and see if it made a difference in determining the American League pennant winner.

The Astros made a small improvement, adding Francisco Liriano to be a second left hander out of the bullpen. He also adds to the plethora of long relievers the Astros have stock-piled as they seem to be changing the current bullpen norm of one inning relievers and going with guys who can throw for two or more innings on any given night.

The New York Yankees made a bevy of moves, including upgrading a bullpen that already has Aroldis Chapman (though he has struggled a bit this year) and Dellin Betances by adding another closer (David Robertson) to pitch the seventh inning and the Chicago White Sox set up man (Tommy Kahnle) to pitch the sixth.

As if their super bullpen that can end a game if the Yankees have a lead by the sixth inning isn’t enough, the addition of Sonny Gray improves their powerfull offense’s chances of getting that lead come the sixth inning.

Recent history has rewarded those that made big deadline moves in spite of being the first place team in their respective league.

The Astros do have plenty of talent obviously, otherwise they wouldn’t be standing atop the American League with a double digit game lead over their nearest competitor. But the baseball post season shows time and time again that your regular season accomplishments pretty much mean jack once the post season starts.

Since the implementation of the Wild Card in 1995, out of 42 World Series participants from either league, 12 have been wild card teams. That’s a 29 percent chance for the team with the worst seeding going into the playoffs getting to the championship round.

And to the Astros situation, let’s look at how being a dominant team lines up with winning the World Series. Since the beginning of the Wild Card era, out of 178 playoff teams there have been only 19 teams that have won 100 or more games going into the postseason. The amount of championships won between those 19 teams? Three.

So if the Astros go into the post season having reached the extremely difficult benchmark of a 100 win season, history tells us they stand a 16 percent chance of winning a World Series despite all that effort to be the most dominant team in the regular season.

This is all to say that while being the best team in the regular season is nice, it’s not nearly as important a factor in the post season as it is in football or basketball. In football if you’re the number one seed, you get home field advantage throughout the playoffs for the one game you get against each opponent and you get an extra week of rest on top of that.

In basketball it’s a hard road for anyone who’s not a one through three seed to even get past the second round. But in baseball, all you have to do is get there and you have as much of a chance as anyone.

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And that is why these lack of moves at the deadline has left this amazing season in peril of ending with disappointment once again for us Astros fans who are starving for a championship. While other American League competitors made small moves as well, with the Cleveland Indians just adding reliever Joe Smith and the Boston Red Sox adding reliever Addison Reed, the New York Yankees took a big leap forward with their additions.

Recent history has rewarded those that made big deadline moves in spite of being the first place team in their respective league. Last year the Chicago Cubs traded for Aroldis Chapman despite their first place standing in the National League. In 2015, the Kansas City Royals added Johnny Cueto and Ben Zobrist at the deadline despite their 4.5 game lead over the next American League team in the standings.

I wrote more about it quite a bit ago here, but suffice to say, you make these moves not for the regular season, but with the opponents you’ll face come October in mind. The Astros seem comfortable with their World Series chances despite injury concerns surrounding their rotation and the inconsistency of their bullpen.

A fully healthy Astros team I have no doubt could win the World Series as constructed. But another starting pitcher would have been a nice insurance policy if Lance McCullers Jr. or Dallas Keuchel become immobilized again and can’t pitch in the post season. And moving Mike Fiers to the bullpen could have helped with the inconsistency there (though he would not have helped with the need for another lefty in the bullpen).

Next: Five Most Devastating Series in Astros History

Our farm system could have taken a hit. Whether it was Derek Fisher or Kyle Tucker, Francis Martes or Franklin Perez. We were stocked. Other than left field, the team offensively is set through 2020. At some point, the future has to be now. We’ll see if the Astros choosing to not take the plunge at the trade deadline was the right move. At the moment, it was just the riskiest one.

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