Here's why you can't worry about Astros' spring training failings - Chron

Perhaps you have looked at the Astros’ spring training record.

That is a perfectly acceptable thing to do. They put it right there, and it’s so easy to click. I mean, I don’t look at it, for I am an Intellectual, but by all means you go for it. Al Gore didn’t invent the internet for you to not be able to click on spring training standings.

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As a way of showing solidarity, I clicked on the standings and HOLY HANNAH WHAT HAPPENED? The Astros are 6-14? That’s a .300 winning percentage, the equivalent of winning 50-ish games over a full season. Ridiculous! I didn’t spend Jim Crane’s hard-earned cash last fall to see my beloved Astros lose 14 of 20 spring training games.

Award-winning journalist Jerry Izenberg once said, “Watching a spring training game is as exciting as watching a tree form its annual ring.”

But on the other hand, Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax said, “People who write about spring training not being necessary have never tried to throw a baseball.” So which one is correct? The award-winning journalist, or the Hall of Fame pitcher? The answer, dear reader, is both.

The point of spring training is not to get you – the fan – ready for Game 7 of the World Series. The point of spring training is to get the players ready for the season, to give the coaches a chance to see the minor-league players, to give minor-league players a chance to learn from the established players. This is a cycle. We watch spring training games because it’s been a long, horrible winter. The crack of the bat is but a distant memory by the time the truck leaves Minute Maid Park for West Palm Beach.

And spring training’s set-up, by nature, is bizarre. There are two leagues on opposite sides of the country – Florida and Arizona. Most likely, you only play teams within a reasonable bus ride from your spring training complex. The Astros and Nationals share a ballpark and the distance between the two teams' complexes is approximately as far as I can throw you. St. Louis’ Spring Training complex in Jupiter is about a 20-minute drive from West Palm Beach, which is why the Astros have played 25 of their 20 spring training games against the Cardinals and the Nationals (approximately).

You're certainly not flying cross-country to play the Cubs and rarely driving across the state to play the Yankees in Tampa. You’re trying to get your work in, and get out. If that offends your delicate sensibilities then please do keep in mind that these are players who are paid handsomely to entertain you six days out of the week from April until, ideally, the end of October. And if they don’t perform to the fans’ immense expectations, said fans get on that cursed website we call Twitter and let them, or their significant others know about it. Occasionally, fans from the other team bring trash cans, or so I hear.

Anyhow, spring training is about pitchers getting their arms ready. It’s about hitters getting their timing down. Heading into Monday's spring finale, Jose Altuve is hitting .204 in 49 at-bats, the equivalent of about two weeks worth of games. And the regular season is approximately 26 weeks long. The team leader in innings pitched – and opening day is just days away – is Brandon Bielak. Zack Greinke, the presumptive ace of the rotation, has thrown just 12 2/3 innings.

Perhaps this is too anecdotal for you. So I did the hard math on correlation between spring training winning percentage and regular season success. Let’s go back to 2012, as that is when MLB – in all its infinite wisdom – implemented a second Wild Card team to each league in the playoffs.

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We’re not counting last year's spring training in this exercise, because of the pandemic that cut it short. In eight spring training seasons from 2012-2019 there have been 80 teams make the playoffs. Twenty-eight of them (35%) finished spring training with an overall record below .500. Further: 20 of those 80 playoff teams (25%) owned one of the 10 worst winning percentages in both spring training leagues combined.

Let’s go a little further: There were 11 teams (13.8%) in the collective bottom-10 that went on to win their divisions. The 2015 Texas Rangers have the distinction of having the worst overall spring training win percentage, going 9-19 (.321), but still winning the division. But we don’t speak of the Rangers in non-mocking tones in these parts.

Sure, there is some correlation between spring training success and regular season success: 24 of the 80 teams with the best spring training winning percentage went on to win their division in the regular season. But it’s not as though it’s a guarantee: Only one team from the 2012-2019 spring training seasons with the best record went on to win the World Series: the 2018 Boston Red Sox.

Thirty-nine of those 80 teams (48.8%) didn’t make the playoffs at all. From 2012-2015 the team with the overall best record in spring didn’t even make the playoffs, including the 2013 Kansas City Royals who went 25-7 (.781, the equivalent of a 127-win season) and then missed the final wild card spot by six games.

Like the playoffs, spring training is a crapshoot. The real fun begins Thursday. Let’s not read too much into anything until then. Then we can live and die with every half-inning, like normal people.

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March 29, 2021 at 09:57PM
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Here's why you can't worry about Astros' spring training failings - Chron
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