Astros Claim South Pod Dominance in Statis-Pro Texas Slugfest

 The Statis-Pro Astros sent 13 batters to the plate to kickoff the battle for Texas with a 10-run first innings. The batters were so dominant in this series that the ERA for starting pitchers in our league play rose from 4.00 to 4.32 in this tracker of all games, standing calculations and starting pitcher stats.

The combined box score is below of the Astros 11-6 and then 12-8 win in the pitching optional series. The Rangers needed to get within five runs by the end of the 8th inning to avoid the game counting as a 3-game sweep in our records, and they cut it to within 11-6 on Josh Jung's 3-run homer in the 7th inning.

At this point the Astros put Ryan Pressly in the game and, after an error, he retired five straight outs to finish the 7th and 8th inning to hold the lead at five runs. Our league rules are a 5-run lead is needed at the end of the 8th inning to get credit for a SWEEP, without using the closer. Pressly has been the closer of course, but the acquisition of Josh Hader meant he was the pitcher who could not be used. 

Hader was therefore also available for the 2nd game (we play only 2-game series and each reliever can be used in one of the two games). Hader overcame two fielding miscues by great batters who are poor fielders in the game. Jose Altuve made an error at 2nd base, then on a clutch defense to catcher Yainer Diaz could not get to the ball quickly to allow a 10-foot single. However, Hader got out of it.

The Astros win means the South Pod play wraps up with the Astros 10-02 in the pod and 17-8 overall. The other two pods also were won by a team with a 10-2 mark in the pod, with Seattle beating out Cleveland and Minnesota in the West and Baltimore going 10-2 against the Yankees and Red Sox.

If our Statis-Pro playoffs started today, the Mets and Yankees would play with the winner getting Houston, and the Mariners and Twins would face off with the winner getting the regular season champion Orioles.

Click here for links to all the current players as well as the 60 all-time great Statis-Pro baseball teams, and here are the instructions to play your own games.
 

East	Pod	L		w	l	perc	Playoff seed, 4th 2-game series still to play?
Baltimore	10	2		15	5	0.750	1 - Mets
Boston	3	9		6	12	0.333	CWS (relegated)
NY Yankees	5	7		14	13	0.519	6 - done 4th round
West	Pod			w	l	Per	Playoff
Cleveland	3	9		12	13	0.480	done 4th series
Minnesota	5	7		15	10	0.600	5 done 4th series
Seattle	10	2		15	8	0.652	4 done 4th series
South	Pod			w	l	Per	Playoff
Houston	10	2		17	8	0.680	2 - done 4th series
Tampa	5	7		8	10	0.444	StL
Texas	3	9		5	13	0.278	KC
Surprises	Pod			w	l	Perc	Playoff
Kansas City	2	4		3	9	0.250	StL (3rd), then Tex
NY Mets	8	4		11	5	0.688	3, Orioles
St. Louis	2	4		5	7	0.417	KC (3rd) then TB

Here is the combined box score for the two games. We deliberately skipped the 6th inning since neither team scored in the 6th inning of either of the 6th innings - the only inning that was true except in the 8th. We show the players projected OPS that led to the card, and then the home run range on the 11-88 random number. For pitchers, we show the projected ERA and then the key to Statis-Pro games, the PB range for the pitcher which shows which dice combos from 2-12 that keep the action on the pitcher's card vs. allowing the batter to have a swing with the chance for extra base hits.

 

Game 1	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	7th	8th	9th
Texas (6)	0	1	0	2	0	3	0	0
Houston (11 - SWEEP 3-0)	10	0	0	0	1	0	0	x
Game 2	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	7th	8th	9th
Houston (12 - WIN 2 games to 1)	1	5	1	1	0	0	0	4
Texas (8)	2	3	0	0	3	0	0	0
2024 Houston Astros	OPS	Pos	HR	AB	R	H	RBI	Other
Kyle Tucker	0.877	RF	28-35	10	2	2	0	sb
Jose Altuve	0.819	2b	28-34	9	1	5	1
Yordan Alvarez	0.988	DH	27-36	8	3	4	5	2-HR
Minute Maid Park (11-36 HR)	OPS	Pos	HR	0
Alex Bregman	0.823	3b	27-32	9	1	1	0
Pedro León	0.613	PR	26-25	0	1	0	0
Yainer Diaz	0.776	C	28-35	7	2	3	0
Mauricio Dubón	0.695	PH	33-34	0	1	0	0
Chas McCormick	0.76	CF	25-31	9	2	1	1	HR
Minute Maid Park (11-36 HR)	OPS	Pos	HR	0
Jeremy Peña	0.714	SS	28-33	10	3	3	5	2-2B
Jake Meyers	0.699	LF	26-31	8	4	3	6	2b,hr
Trey Cabbage	0.696	RF	18-25	8	3	3	2	hr
Astros batted 0.321				78	23	25	20
Houston Game 1 Pitchers	ERA	PB	IP	H	R	ER	W	K
Framber Valdez	3.36	2'-8	4	4	3	3	5	2
Cristian Javier	4.36	4'-7	2.3	2	1	1	3	0
José Urquidy	4.5	4'-7	0	2	2	2	0	0
Ryan Pressly	3.37	2'-8	1.7	0	0	0	0	2
Caleb Ferguson (fr NYY)	3.67	4'-7	1	0	0	0	1	0
Houston Game 2 Pitchers	ERA	PB
Yusei Kikuchi (fr Tor)	4.19	2'-7	4	5	5	4	2	4
J.P. France	4.39	4'-7	0	3	3	3	1	0
Lance McCullers Jr.	3.83	2'-7	2	1	0	0	1	5
Bryan King (Temp #D)	4.01	4'-7	1.7	0	0	0	1	1
Josh Hader	3.21	2'-9	1.3	1	0	0	0	0
Astros ERA 6.50				18	14	13	14	14
2024 Texas Rangers	OPS	Pos	HR	AB	R	H	RBI	Other
Wyatt Langford	0.813	DH	26-32	9	1	3	3	2-2b
Marcus Semien	0.796	2b	26-32	7	1	2	0	sb
Corey Seager	0.892	SS	28-36	10	2	3	2	2b,hr
TX (Globe Life Field 11-64 HR)	OPS	Pos	HR
Nathaniel Lowe	0.797	1b	28-33	8	1	1	0
Adolis García	0.775	RF	23-28	7	4	2	0	3-bb
Evan Carter	0.764	LF	26-28	8	0	3	2	2b,hr
TX (Globe Life Field 11-64 HR)	OPS	Pos	HR
Josh Jung	0.754	3b	26-32	9	3	2	3	hr
Jonah Heim	0.733	C	25-31	4	0	0	0
Sam Huff	0.729	C	21-26	4	1	2	2	hr
Leody Taveras	0.732	CF	28-32	6	1	1	0	sb
Rangers batted 0.264				72	14	19	12
Texas Game 1 Pitchers	ERA	PB	IP	H	R	ER	W	K
Max Scherzer	3.96	2'-8	0.7	6	10	6	3	1
Gerson Garabito (Temp #D)	4.17	4'-7	3.7	1	1	1	2	3
Andrew Heaney	4.5	4'-7	1.7	3	0	0	0	2
Kirby Yates	4.4	4'-7	1	1	0	0	1	1
David Robertson	4.31	2'-6	1	0	0	0	1	0
Texas Game 2 Pitchers	ERA	PB
Nathan Eovaldi	4.17	2'-7	2	5	6	6	2	0
Jon Gray	4.31	2'-7	2	3	2	2	0	3
José Leclerc	4.29	4'-7	1	0	0	0	1	2
Cody Bradford	4.49	4'-7	2.7	0	0	0	0	1
Josh Sborz	3.89	2'-7	0.7	3	4	3	0	1
Tyler Mahle	4.22	2'-7	0.7	0	0	0	0	1
Rangers ERA 7.36			17	22	23	18	10	15