CTH’s Houston Astros Players of the Week (April 13 – 19)

The Houston Astros are 6-6 after two weeks of Major League Baseball, and are atop the American League West! Are you excited about this team yet?

The pitching has carried this team through two weeks while the offense has batted a collective .202. If the pitching can continue to keep the team in games, and the offense gets rolling, this Astros team will be tough to play against.

With that, here are CTH’s weekly awards for your Houston Astros:

Pitcher of the Week: Collin McHugh

Collin McHugh put on a clinic in the final game of the A’s series to salvage a win and prevent an Oakland sweep. During Wednesday’s game, McHugh struck out 11 batters, just one shy of his career high, and held the Athletics to one run in 5 2/3 innings. The Astros beat the A’s 6-1 behind McHugh’s strong outing, giving him his second win of the season.

McHugh’s line: 1-0, 1.54 ERA, 6 hits, 11 Ks, 0 BB.

Position Player of the Week: Jose Altuve

Jose Altuve had a great week, both off and on the field. Off the field, a documentary titled “Big Dreams: The Jose Altuve Story,” debuted on Thursday evening about Gigante’s life. It was a pretty special event for the Venezuelan, who said, “It means a lot that the Astros are recognizing all the work I’ve done, and it means you’re doing pretty good.”

To say Altuve’s doing pretty good is an understatement. On the field over the past week, Altuve had two 3-hit games, one in a loss to Oakland on April 13, and the other in a win against the Angels on April 19. He also hit a homerun and picked up two stolen bases. Altuve’s strong play helped Houston go 3-3 this past week, and get the series win against the Angels.

Gigante’s line: .458/.500/.625, 11 hits, 1 HR, 3 RBI, 2 BB, and 2 SB.

Weekly Goat: Jonathan Villar

While Chris Carter had another dreadful week at the plate, Jonathan Villar gets the dubious honor of Weekly Goat for week two.

Villar was 1 for 8 this week with a walk, and his defense was lackluster. He committed consecutive errors while playing shortstop (his natural position) against the first two batters during Monday night’s game against the A’s. Those costly mistakes seemed to rattle Scott Feldman, who was unable to recover. Oakland won the game 8-1, getting three runs in the first inning, and tagging Feldman for seven earned runs in five innings.

Redemption Player: Scott Feldman

As mentioned above, Feldman got beat up pretty badly by Oakland in the second game of the series on Monday night. However, he was able to bounce back and redeem himself in yesterday’s win against the Angels.

Feldman pitched six solid innings, allowing two earned runs on six hits, with three strikeouts and zero walks. The only rough patch he went through was during the fourth inning when he gave up a home run to C.J. Cron with a man on and two outs. Other than that, he kept the game close and allowed the bullpen to come in and finish it out.

That’s a wrap for the week two awards. In case you missed it, here’s the week one write up.

Next: Week Two Power Rankings