Astros are dealing with bullpen trust issues and putting Joe Espada in impossible spot

The Houston Astros fell to the Cleveland Guardians on Tuesday night despite carrying a 4-2 lead into the eighth inning. Enyel De Los Santos was only able to record one out before being lifted in favor of Bryan King. The Astros left-hander — who'd thrown 40 pitches two days prior — then suffered a catastrophic meltdown. The Astros lost by the final score of 8-5.

There's plenty of blame to go around, but most rational Astros fans won't throw it at the feet of King. He's been one of Houston's best relievers all season, and was put in a bad spot. He left with a blown save after allowing three earned runs on two hits with a pair of walks and no strikeouts.

Manager Joe Espada is sure to shoulder some of the blame for the loss, but it's not as if he had much of a choice in that situation. Sure, he could've stuck with De Los Santos to see if the right-hander could have wriggled out of a jam, but there's no guarantee the results would've been any different.

Bryan Abreu's lack of reliability is to blame for the Astros loss

Though this may aggravate several Astros fans, if you're looking for someone to blame (or scapegoat), you should cast your frustrations upon Bryan Abreu. That may seem like a bold statement considering he didn't enter Tuesday's game at all, but the entire reason he wasn't summoned was due to a lack of trust in his ability.

Espada had hoped to rely upon Abreu to fill in as the team's closer in the ninth inning with Josh Hader on the IL to begin the season. Instead, he's seen his most reliable reliever turn into a shadow of his former self.

In nine appearances out of the Houston bullpen, Abreu has more walks than strikeouts and an unsightly 14.73 ERA. Even the advanced metrics aren't going to save him. He has am 8.22 xERA, 12.28 FIP, and both his fastball (-4.0 wFA) and slider (-3.3 wSL) are getting absolutely hammered.

Kai-Wei Teng has been Houston's most dependable reliever this season, and it's not even close. The former San Francisco Giants hurler has a 1.65 across 16⅓ innings of work this season. But he can't cover every inning, and with so many starters on the IL, Houston's relief corps has been grossly overworked.

There's no easy fix to this situation, and that's what's so troubling for the Houston faithful. Getting Hader back — whenever that is — should help, but until then, Espada and the Astros coaching staff have to figure out a better way to close out games.

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