If Houston Astros are to win AL West, it will start with Jeremy Peña. Here's why

Jeremy Peña was mired in a weekslong slump. Then, abruptly, he authored a monster series. Harnessing the latter version of their shortstop may be critical to the Houston Astros‘ final push for a playoff berth.

Friday’s offensive lull in a 6-2 loss to Atlanta, in which Peña went hitless, reinforced the idea in the wake of his three-game flurry against the Royals. Peña is the Astros’ offensive sparkplug. A mechanical tweak made with the help of their hitting coaches may have helped pull him back toward that crucial form.

Peña hit .322 with a .904 OPS through Aug. 2. Over his next 35 games, he batted .170 with a .518 OPS. Houston’s offense slowed with him, scoring the third-fewest runs in the majors in that stretch. He had seven hits in his first 12 games in September; the Astros scored three or fewer runs in eight of them.

Tuesday, before the opener of their series against the Royals, Peña and Yordan Alvarez did early on-field hitting at Daikin Park. The session is where Peña worked to correct an issue that the Astros observed as having crept into his usual swing mechanics, according to the hitting coaches.

“When he starts his move, he usually sinks down into his legs a little bit, and that allows him to keep his hands and his lead arm down close to his body – as opposed to staying up tall and coming up,” assistant hitting coach Anthony Iapoce said. “It keeps him more compact on his way to the ball, which allows him to make decisions a little later.”

Iapoce said the Astros saw Peña “pushing up” at the start of his move, then sinking into the legs. Lead hitting coach Victor Rodriguez worded it slightly differently, saying Peña had “too much movement” in his load that led to his “wrapping the bat” behind his head prior to starting his swing.

“So he was creating a long movement, a longer route to the ball,” Rodriguez said, “instead of that short movement that he always does.”

Peña, on Tuesday night, did not offer specifics about what he’d worked on but said it involved finding a consistent position from which to deliver his swing. Rodriguez, who observed Tuesday’s hitting session, and Iapoce said they showed Peña some visuals of the potential issue before that session.

“I think he found himself late (on pitches) because of the extra movement,” Rodriguez said. “They did some early work, he felt it and took it into the game.”

In his first at-bat Tuesday, Peña hit the first pitch, a Michael Wacha cutter in the middle of the zone, an estimated 440 feet onto the train tracks in left field. It began a furious series for the leadoff hitter, who entered it 7-for-47 in his previous 12 games.

Peña went 8-for-13 with three home runs in three games against Kansas City. He opened two games by hitting the first pitch a Royals starter threw for a home run, giving the Astros a sorely needed spark.

“Those pitches that he drove, they were all kind of in the heart of the plate, and he was really in a good posture to hit those pitches,” manager Joe Espada said. “It was not jumpy, it was just really selective.”

ASTROS STATS

BATTERSAVGOBAABRH2B3BHRRBIBBSOSBCSETeam Totals.239.31351666831237227182066524991264462069Alvarez.312.431535981673214099105115102Allen.279.3271362438503141030205Correa.279.3691222234803161826101Peña.276.327413741141912051241059212Diaz.276.308308348513012381252023Paredes.259.3565336213826121886585007Shewmake.256.2727810204039213002Altuve.243.30249066119242154440106535Delgado.243.3003749101437002Harris.226.2863147010426200Walker.220.29354166119251258047140003Wade.215.3171211726604191834000Loperfido.214.3111031322711121432111Meyers.213.2681411530703111031120Dezenzo.213.2807511164013731101Smith.212.278481621021662054391351126Vázquez.206.2612382249707251852102Trammell.202.29024229491028222685432Matthews.197.2502082341517221571441Varsho.176.2281481226415141035300Price.167.2311212100016001Spence.162.24437461003315011Cole.157.18951481038121001Johnson.143.2941412000023000Barrosa.143.333711100023001Velázquez.130.16023230026111001Whitcomb.130.16723230025111000Salazar.056.2271801000133000

___

PITCHERSWLERAGGSSVIPHRERHRBBSOTeam Totals77774.52154154481365.212167376861986181341Meyers000.001001000000Hader410.834402643.1174411155Santa011.17100015.1862169VanWey101.505006521005Okert622.13681067.245171671468Blubaugh523.42600192733735133992Brown633.4318180977640371149110Pearson103.601601201610811216Lambert8103.702727015112864621557147Wesneski523.7099048.239242041638Pecko103.7764028.220131251219Abreu643.77630859.240272584078Ullola004.157208.25442310Arrighetti754.601717088684745125087Teng574.763010073.2694339103373King354.78571658.163353182146De Los Santos334.79660571.1694338112067Imai645.132115073.258424295192Roa015.197008.21055176Javier265.311611061633636102657Sousa135.40311026.230181641627Bolton015.408312021121231422Burrows495.991817094.21126963213575McCullers236.8688039.138323072243Blanco017.1175031.230252591526Murray007.4380013.1191111178Weiss037.629202635242282030France008.103006.2666154Salazar009.001001111100Alexander119.3342018.12119194814Gordon0011.574109.12112126311Muñoz0015.753004777366Wade0018.001001322100

Pitch selection has contributed to Peña’s struggles. He chased out of the zone at a 45.4% clip in August, when his 38.6% whiff rate was his highest for a month this season by more than 6 percent, according to Baseball Savant. His 69.5% swing rate on in-zone pitches was his lowest.

An overall lack of results, though, can contribute to expanding in search of hits, Iapoce noted. And Peña said Thursday night that a factor in his recent funk was not capitalizing on pitches he normally hits well – something he linked to the starting position of his swing.

“I need to get to a position where I feel like I can do damage on my pitches,” Peña said. “I feel like before, I was getting my pitches and I would hit them foul or I would just miss them or hit them straight back. So there had to be a little change somewhere. When I get my pitch and I can put the barrel on it, I know I’m in a good position.”

He did that multiple times against the Royals, with five of his 11 batted balls in the series carrying an exit velocity above 102 mph. Friday’s series opener against Atlanta proved arduous again.

Peña struck out in two of his first three at-bats against Atlanta starter Tyler Mahle, who allowed one hit in six innings, and went hitless in four at-bats. Houston’s lineup totaled five hits in the loss. Alvarez and Isaac Paredes combined for three from the spots behind Peña. Paredes drove in both of the club’s runs.

It underscored an ongoing problem for the Astros. Their lineup is ultra-reliant on those top three hitters, placing an undue burden on them to produce. Peña and Alvarez combined to record all four of their hits and drive in all four of their runs in Tuesday’s opener against the Royals, for example.

In a 6-2 win Thursday against Kansas City, Houston received five solo home runs, including three from the 5-through-9 lineup spots. On Friday, those spots combined to go 1-for-18. For the 23rd time in 41 games since the trade deadline, the Astros scored three or fewer runs. They are 19-22 in that stretch.

“These guys are working their tails off to really try to put some good at-bats together,” Espada said of the lower half of the lineup, “and today wasn’t the case.”

In the fourth inning, Alvarez, Paredes and Jose Altuve struck consecutive hits. It pared their deficit to 2-1 and put the potential tying run on second base. Daulton Varsho hit a fielder’s choice grounder. Christian Walker flied out, too shallow for Paredes to tag up from third. Taylor Trammell grounded out.

LaMonte Wade Jr.’s eighth-inning single – the one hit from the 5-through-9 spots – set up a run. But the Astros trailed 4-1 by that point, en route to a loss that left them tied atop the AL West again with Texas.

Eight games remain in a division race. Extracting what offense they can from the lower half of the order feels imperative for the Astros, yet little suggests they can expect a consistent impact. No lineup should hinge on a few hitters, but Peña carrying a strong last series forward may be paramount.

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This article originally published at If Houston Astros are to win AL West, it will start with Jeremy Peña. Here’s why.