Astros Tanking It? Relax.

There has been much discussion lately of the Astros pitching staff, specifically the absence of some regular starters. No Oswalt, no Woody Williams, just some scrub rookies. As a Cub fan, it was a tough pill to swallow. Why now? Why does it have to happen right as we're the middle of a pennant race? What in the heck did we ever do to the Astros to make them lay down for Milwaukee? I wanted answers and I wanted to drink the blood of Larry Dierker, er, Phil Garner, um, you know, whoever their manager is. Jimy Williams??

Then I started to look at things rationally. Can you really blame Oswalt for wanting to be with his labor-induced wife? And are people actually getting stirred up over Woody F-ing Williams voluntarily going to the bullpen? Christ, we should be so lucky. There's probably not too many opposing hitters who are fearing an 8-15 pitcher with an ERA over 5.00. I must have missed the memo that said he was on par with Johan Santana. (The one I got said Ruben Quevedo) Let's face it, we've been pretty damn lucky down the stretch in a lot of ways. We never had to face Oswalt in the last two series we played against them, we only had to face Aaron Harang for one inning in the series before last against the Reds, no Webb against the Diamondbacks, etc.

Okay, just a little bit more. Anyone care to remember how many times we've been in the Astros position at this point in the season? No hope of playoffs, morale is down, the Pirates are jockeying with you for last place, the fans are frustrated, yet we still turn on the TV to see a Jason Bere or Ismael Valdez toeing the rubber? I can remember thinking to myself, "If we're gonna get the snot kicked out of us, let's at least see what we have in the Farm System!" That's what MLB teams do when they're terrible. It's why they have expanded rosters at the end of the year.

The point is, we should only be worrying about ourselves at this point. It's not gonna do any good to be wasting time worrying about stuff like this. Heck, even the Astros President called Hendry to explain their actions. I'm not quite sure why that was necessary, but I suppose that would qualify as being "classy". Let's hope for the best, and when it happens, we can know that we earned it. And even if you say that the Brewers are getting off easy, they still have to face Smoltz, Hudson, and probably Peavy and Maddux.