Reeling Astros' August swoon continues in walk-off loss to Rangers

ARLINGTON, Texas — They are searching for a spark, something to spur this depth-deficient roster during baseball’s dreaded dog days. Slug is absent, strikeouts are ample, signs of competence are fleeting and the only solace is their spot in baseball’s most dreadful division.

Anywhere else and the Houston Astros may already be buried. They have spent seven seasons making this sport seem easy, but this iteration isn’t making anything simple. Steps forward are being stymied by steps back, be it by their Rolodex of rehabbing pitchers or a lineup that has never looked more limited.

“We need energy,” first-year manager Joe Espada said before Monday’s game against the Texas Rangers. “We need determination. We need to push ourselves because we still have 50-something games to go and every game matters. I expect our guys to dig deep and fight all the way to the end.”

What followed felt like anything but. A season that substandard baseball has threatened to derail reached its nadir in an arena the Astros claim to own.

They scored 96 runs, struck 62 extra-base hits and slugged .549 across their previous 12 games at Globe Life Field. During the 13th, Houston played a borderline unwatchable brand of baseball, a strikeout-plagued case study in squandering scoring chances and supplying pitchers a minuscule margin for error.

Relievers Ryan Pressly and Caleb Ferguson allowed home runs that exceeded it, but focusing on their follies obscures a more overarching problem: Fatigue from Houston’s furious first-half turnaround is apparent, and few solutions exist to fix it.

The last chance to find them faded at 5 p.m. last Tuesday when second-year general manager Dana Brown bemoaned that “nothing materialized” in his pursuit of acquiring a position player. An infertile farm system did not help. Nor did $93 million in dead money from two dreadful contracts consummated before Brown’s arrival.

Monday’s 4-3, walk-off loss highlighted Brown’s inaction, but this is the same club that compiled a 119 wRC+ in June and scored 4.6 runs per game in July. Sustaining it felt questionable, especially as Kyle Tucker’s absence extended longer than anyone could have foreseen and contributions came from players without much of an established major-league track record.

August is beginning to offer a brutal answer. The Astros have scored six runs in the month’s first 36 innings and are averaging 3.25 runs per game since the All-Star break, a stretch in which they’ve gone 7-9. Somehow, they remain just 1 1/2 games out of first place, an indictment on the American League West more than a celebration of anything Houston has accomplished.

On Monday, the lineup loaded the bases thrice in the final four innings, each time with fewer than two outs. The Astros mustered one hit — a four-foot infield single from Jeremy Peña — and did not hit a ball to the outfield. Of the seven at-bats they took, five ended in strikeouts. Houston has now struck out 24 times in its past 18 innings.

“It’s not easy,” Espada said. “We’re going through that stretch where we all have to stay together, grind through this as a team. We’ll get out of this. We’ll get out of this little funk.”

Expecting Espada to say anything else is silly, even if empty promises won’t satisfy a steaming fan base. These are the same players who arrived at Globe Life Field on Monday with baseball’s best record since April 27. Efforts like this minimize that fact, inviting wonder whether enough energy exists to sustain it.

“It’s August. Everyone is tired. You have to really dig deep and fight through it,” Espada said. “Have we spent a lot of energy to get where we’re at? Of course. But that should not be the reason why we’re not doing something right.”

Twenty-three players awoke on Monday with at least 915 defensive innings played this season. The Astros employ three of them: Peña, Alex Bregman and Jose Altuve. No other team has more than two.

Spelling any of them is impossible given the stakes these games carry, but none of the options available inspire much confidence. Mauricio Dubón struck out two more times on Monday, falling further into a 4-for-45 funk. Aledmys Díaz has taken four major-league plate appearances since June 30.

Brown mentioned promoting infield prospects Shay Whitcomb and Zach Dezenzo during an interview on the team’s pregame radio show on Sunday. Houston exposed Whitcomb to the Rule 5 Draft last season. No team selected him. Dezenzo has played 11 games above Double A.

Expecting either man to morph into a savior is shortsighted, but Monday must prompt wonder what the harm could be. Espada already acknowledged on Monday he is playing outfield prospect Pedro León in search of something to invigorate an insipid offense.

“I think we need that little spark and he can provide that,” Espada said. “We need our entire offense just for a spark and play hard the next couple weeks. That’s where we are right now.”

León struck out thrice on Monday, including stranding the bases loaded in the seventh inning of a tied game. That Espada even put him in that position at all prompts wonder what Díaz’s purpose is on this depth-starved roster.

Díaz hasn’t played in the past 13 days. When Houston signed him to a minor-league deal on July 13, Díaz hadn’t taken a major-league at-bat since June 30. The Astros didn’t even send him to a minor-league affiliate before bringing him back to the big-league team late last month.

Jettisoning Díaz isn’t an elixir. Jake Meyers and Chas McCormick are 17 for their past 93.  Fourteen of Jon Singleton’s last 21 hits are singles. This is an all-encompassing anemia, not something that the sport’s worst farm system can salvage with players streaking in one of baseball’s most hitter-friendly minor-league environments.

The path out involves premier players acting like it. Altuve hasn’t homered since July 12. Bregman’s solo shot on Monday was his fifth extra-base hit in 18 games. Texas intentionally walked Alvarez twice on Monday, cognizant that few players behind him are capable of inflicting any damage.

Until they do, days like Monday may become more common. Texas’ win took them to five games below .500, a sobering thought for a Houston club that just dropped consecutive series to the Pittsburgh Pirates and Tampa Bay Rays.

Seventeen of the Astros’ next 25 games are against clubs that entered Monday at least eight games above .500. Fourteen arrive from Aug. 19 through Sept. 1, a grueling stretch with no off days and when just a spark may not be enough.

(Top photo of Jose Altuve missing the ball in the sixth inning: Jerome Miron / USA Today)