Dana Brown's anger boiled over vs. Pirates, but Astros' beef should be elsewhere

Unfortunately for the Houston Astros, their victory over the hapless Pittsburgh Pirates on Thursday came at a significant cost. The game was under rain delay for over three hours which meant the Astros, who had to fly to Cleveland immediately after the game, didn't get much sleep last night. It's fair to say that Astros General Manager Dana Brown was not a fan of the decision.

Before the rain delay was over, managers Joe Espada and Don Kelly came out to chat in the rain and talked about how they wanted to proceed after such a long rain delay. However, that conversation went sideways, especially after Brown came down to the field to argue his case and tensions rose.

What in hell's bathroom was going on here?! After the game, Brown was asked about the confrontation. While he made a point to say that he had no beef with Kelly, who seemed to get the brunt of Brown's ire on the field, the Astros front office exec said that he took issue with not banging the game and instead reschedule it for a different date. He was also clear that he didn't regret getting heated about it.

Brown's frustrations with the situation were understandable. However, not only was his anger directed at the wrong people, but it may have been misguided altogether.

Astros GM Dana Brown may have wanted to postpone Thursday's game, but that seems like it would have been strictly worse

First and foremost, the Pirates weren't making the decision. That decision lies with MLB who has to take a lot of things into account when making the decision, including whether or not to rob teams of an off day during the stretch run. If Brown wants to be mad, he should be mad with the league office.

More than that, it doesn't even seem as if Brown was right to want to postpone the game. Sure, flying into a road environment in the wee-hours of the morning sucks — that's not debatable. However, the only mutual off days for these two teams the rest of the season were in September and they don't play each other again.

Would the Astros really prefer to forfeit a late season off day in order to fly to Pittsburgh for a single game instead of just lallygagging and waiting for the rain to stop?

Brown felt like he had to advocate for his players in that situation, and maybe he felt like not playing would have helped the club in other, less obvious ways. If there are some players who are banged up or needed a free rest-day for Lance McCullers Jr., perhaps that was on his mind. Unfortunately, in this instance, it feels like Brown got fired up at the wrong people.

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