1:40 p.m.: Matt Kawahara of the Houston Chronicle reports that, according to manager Joe Espada, Brown felt uncomfortable during his pitching session on Friday and posed for pictures before returning to Houston to be evaluated by team doctors. It’s likely the Astros will have a clearer picture of Brown’s return timeline once he’s been fully evaluated by the team’s medical staff.
12:44 p.m.: The Astros pitch right Hunter Brown in the injured list due to the difficulty of the right shoulder. The right hand Christian Roa he was returned to the frontcourt to replace Brown in the lineup.
Brown, 27, emerged last year as one of the best hitters in the entire game. In 31 starts last year, Brown pitched to a 2.43 ERA and struck out opponents at a 28.3% clip. He earned his first career All-Star nod and finished third behind Tarik Skubal again Garrett Crochet in the AL Cy Young Award race. In two starts this year, he was even better with a 0.84 ERA in 10 2/3 innings with a 39.5% strikeout rate. After the loss Framber Valdez in free agency during the offseason, the Astros entered the year relying on Brown to lead their rotation as they looked to get back into the postseason picture.
All of that is on hold for now. While it’s unclear how much time Brown should be expected to miss, even taking a little off the shelf hurts the Astros. Some can cause damage. Mike Burrows, Tatsuya Imai, Cristian Javieragain Lance McCullers Jr. make one of Houston’s Opening Day rotations. Burrows has excellent results but has struggled so far this year. McCullers looked good to start the year last week but pitched to a 6.15 ERA last season and last pitched even 60 innings at the big league level until 2021. Javier has given reason for optimism after returning from Tommy John surgery last year but has been tested for six earned runs in his first two starts this season. Losing Brown from the top of a rotation that already has a lot of question marks will be hard to stomach.
Long term, the Astros figure to turn to a depth option like Spencer Arrighetti, Colton Gordonor maybe hope Miguel Ullola to fill the void. The good news about Houston is that they’ve shown an amazing ability to weather the storm of injuries that have swirled in recent years, getting passable or better production from young unknowns and depth pieces. Arrighetti is getting more name recognition than that after a strong start to his career, and after two hits in Triple-A to open the season he appears to be the Astros’ first choice to replace Brown. MLB.com’s Brian McTaggart writes that the Astros were expected to switch to a six-man rotation this week before the Brown news because of the future in a schedule where they are going 13 games without a day off. If that’s still the plan, the Astros will need to turn to more Triple-A arms to fill out a rotation that already has just four active members.
For now, though, the team is turning to Roa to fill Brown’s roster spot. Brown’s place in the rotation won’t come until tomorrow, so the Astros can give their bullpen some extra depth in the meantime as they figure out what direction they want Brown to go in the sidelines. Roa gave up a run in 1 1/3 innings in his debut with the club earlier this year and has a career 2.08 ERA in four games after making his major league debut as a member of the Marlins last year. He sports a career-worthy 4.52 ERA in 171 2/3 innings of work as a swingman at the Triple-A level, and while he won’t have an impact for the Astros he should be able to eat innings in long or middle relief for the team over the next few days as they figure out their long-term pitching scheme.
